Photographing in Calais over a period of two years, from November 2014 through December 2016, Melissa Arras documented refugees and migrants arriving there with the ultimate aim of reaching the UK. Several different camps in the area have served as temporary homes for countless people escaping war, torture and persecution in their home countries. The crisis is ongoing, and at this location near the narrowest part of the English Channel (separating mainland Europe from Great Britain), around 300 to 600 migrants at a time are now present in makeshift encampments.
The camps are places of in-between, where lives are suspended and disrupted while people seek protections and await bureaucratic validation in order to continue, in a legal sense. Settlements are under constant threat of being destroyed by French authorities, and violent interactions with police have created an ongoing struggle in Calais.
In her work, Melissa challenges the perception of refugees and migrants with a view of intimate moments created after building trusting relationships – a response to a lack of awareness and intimacy that has fuelled negative stereotypes and racism.