March 1st 2010
"Ma quali criminali, quali clandestini, ecco i nuovi cittadini!"* This is the recurrent slogan in the demonstrations that took place on March 1st 2010 in Milan, linked to the "Yellow strike - a day without us". An initiative born in France thanks to Nadia Lamarkbi, a journalist of moroccan origins, who landed in Italy thanks to the "Primo marzo 2010" commitee (www.primomarzo2010.it), still active on themes related to immigration. The morning garrison in piazza della Scala, the afternoon gathering in piazza del Duomo and the following parades were an example of pacific civil demonstrations, that the Italian "piazze" (public squares) had long since forgotten. April 25th, December 12th** and student demonstrations are often full of whistles, wall writings, smoke bombs and clashes with police forces. On the contrary, the streets peacefully filled with foreign people of different ethnic groups, Italians, workers, people looking for jobs, many young people and families with children. The media got us used to seeing immigrants (or "non-EU" as they're often defined) moving together in riots, compelled by exasperation to take streets, squares, orange groves when it's the last straw. Then they forget about them whenever they peacefully try to get to know people and thus to be known, when they look for a job or they break their backs doing underpaid jobs which no Italian wants to do anymore. The processions, instead, took place in a euphoric and hopeful atmosphere and the immigrants that participated beside the Italians seemed almost incredulous that Milan could be also like this. Many of them wanted to speak, to witness, to show their permit of stay, their "postal receipts", pieces of paper that avoid expulsion in hold that the administration - calmly - grants them some rights. Many stories, many voices, many languages, many images that, despite their numerous colours, I wanted to note in black and white, maybe to remember that the one can't exist without the other. At the end of the day, the sensation was not to have finished something, but to have begun it.
*"what kind of criminals, what kind of clandestines, here are our new citizens!"
**April 25th is the anniversary of the liberation from nazi-fascism and December 12th is the anniversary of the slaughter of Piazza Fontana, where 17 innocent people died in a terrorist attack.
