In Beltràn’s photos of migrants we do not see helpless, but self-confident, full of life young men

When Colombian Felipe Romero Beltrán (Bogata, 1992) arrived in Spain in 2016, he had great difficulty arranging his papers for a stay in the country. He had to wade through a morass of bureaucracy, filling out documents whose language – his native language, Spanish – he barely understood. He felt lost in a country where he would stay for a number of years as a desired foreigner – Beltrán followed a PhD program in photography at the Complutense University of Madrid.

Beltrán: “These migration procedures are very complicated, even if you have a good command of the language. What must it be like for refugees who do not speak the language, who feel unwanted? Who can they turn to for help?”

Beltrán has just returned to his apartment in Paris, where he recently lived, after being in Amsterdam for the opening of his exhibition Dialect in the Foam photo museum. We speak to him via a video call, shortly before he boards the plane again to Mexico, where he has been working on since 2021 Bravoa photo series about migration from South America to the United States.

His series Dialect was awarded the Paul Huf Award in 2023 (the exhibition in Foam is part of the prize) and the Spanish Kbr Mapfre Award. In 2022 he won the Aperture Portfolio Prize with the series.

Cutting each other’s hair

For Dialect For three years, he followed nine young men who illegally crossed the maritime border between Morocco and Spain and who waited in Seville for a decision on their asylum application. Beltrán: “I met them during a theater workshop, where I was invited to talk about my own experiences as a migrant in Spain. When they found out I was a photographer, they asked me to take some photos that they could use on social media and send to their families. There was no idea behind it for a project or a series. It was very playful, organic. They didn’t speak Spanish, I didn’t speak Arabic. We found a way to communicate with each other through the camera.”

As the boys – who reached adulthood while in Spain – mastered the language, they told Beltrán about their experiences as migrants and their collaboration intensified. Beltrán photographed hanging out, lazing around, cutting each other’s hair, sharing bread at the kitchen table. He made still lifes; of rotten tomatoes, dried herbs, a bag of potatoes, an unmade bed – witnesses of time that creeps by terribly slowly when you can and are not allowed to do anything other than wait.

“They told about the journey across the Mediterranean and the arrival in Spain. What that had been like for them. That was so compelling. How should I incorporate that into my project? I’ve tried different things; interviews, seeing if I could use photos from their smartphones. Finally we decided that they would act out the scenes. ‘Look, that’s how I lay when the boat washed up on the Spanish coast. “I was completely exhausted,” one said. ‘Behold, this is how we took our friend on our shoulders as we walked from the coast to Seville in the heat. He was passed out, overtired, dehydrated,” said another.”

Professional dancers

All men now have a residence permit, most of them still live in Seville. Beltràn is still in regular contact, he helps them with videos for the music they are now making and works with one of them, Bilal Siasse, on the dance video, Instruction. A preview can already be seen at Foam. In the video, Bilal performs a choreography together with professional dancers in which they express the physical process of immigration – literally a body crossing a border. We see jerking, searching movements, they look uncomfortable.

While images of immigrants often emphasize their helplessness, suffering, and despair, in Beltràn’s images we see self-confident, muscular young men who interact with each other in a caring manner. “Thanks to our intensive collaboration, they became part of the production process. Of course, their immigration process is a difficult one, long, grueling, uncertain, lonely too – despite their close bond. But that’s not how they wanted to see themselves presented. They are also strong, cheerful young men – full of life. I took that into account in my final selection of the images for Dialect. They decided how they wanted to pose. How they wanted to be seen.”

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