The Coming Community

Ilan Spira 

Ilan Spira is concerned with documenting the life and culture of the foreign workers' community in the south of Tel Aviv - a heterogeneous community whose members live on the margins of Israeli society. Spira is a photojournalist for the Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot, as well as an independent photographer who is intimately familiar with this community, and who takes an active part in the struggle for its members' rights. Over the years, Spira has forged personal connections with community members, has participated in community activities, and has documented them with his camera. His works present this group of people from a dual point of view: at times his photographs bespeak a sense of identification and an emphasis on the human dimension of his subject matter, while in other instances his gaze seems detached and estranged from his subjects, resulting in works imbued with an ethnographic and documentary quality. On a social level, the importance of Spira's work and activism has been underscored by the government's decision, this past summer, to deport many of the foreign workers' children. Spira continues to document the remaining vestiges of this community, which is disintegrating as many of its members return to their countries of origin.

Born in Israel, 1975; lives and works in Giv'atayim