Sinead Kennedy

This project is a response to the strange, contradictory space and existence occupied by those seeking asylum in Australia. They occupy this in-between: between the declaration of politicians that they will ‘never be settled in Australia’, and the international obligation of non-refoulement (forced return). Others are still waiting for the result of their application for asylum, years after their arrival.

This liminal zone that these individuals are forced to live through is one hidden from the public’s sight and consciousness. It is carefully designed to erase, to suspend these individuals in a different temporality, one with no possibility of moving backward to their home country or forward to create their future.

To the current government the simple fact of their bodies in space is deemed a threat to the nationhood of Australia. There is an absurdity here that is hidden under the guise of bureaucracy. Attempting to speak to the arbitrary nature of mandatory and indefinite detention for people seeking asylum, this work addresses the fact that the forced existence inside this space has deep psychological consequences. The selective restrictions and allowances of freedom fracture thinking and an individual’s sense of belonging and agency.

This work attempts to make visible this out of sight, almost negative space. A space that is actually filled with the activity and creativity of these individuals despite the limbo they currently exist in.

Sinead Kennedy (1993) is an artist based in Melbourne, Australia. Her practice is guided by an interest in photography and social issues, recently focusing on the politics of migration and asylum in an Australian context. She explores expanded documentary as a mode of visual storytelling. Sinead studied a Bachelor of Photography at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. She was awarded the Pool Grant 2017, won second prize in PHmuseum’s Women Photographers Grant 2018 and is one of World Press Photo’s 6×6 Global Talents for Southeast Asia and Oceania 2019.