Spain. Soiled beach and sea

The different locations chosen by Emmanuel Ortiz for his shots underline the extent to which environmental disasters, and the disasters that ensue, are problems that transcend national borders. Here and there, the photographer captures the portraits of men and women working to clean up coastal pollution. Most of them are volunteers, supervised by the army or the emergency services. They remove fuel oil washed up on beaches or floating at sea, often using rudimentary tools - the imbalance between the resources available and the immensity of the task is sometimes obvious. Emmanuel Ortiz also highlights, as in this photograph, the damage caused by this pollution to ecosystems, contributing to a series of images that have been sadly familiar since the 1970s, that of oil spills.

A freelance photojournalist since the 1980s, Emmanuel Ortiz is interested in environmental issues, particularly through the prism of climatic accidents and ecological disasters. He works mainly in black and white. In the selection of photographs chosen by the museum, this choice of colour palette accentuates the contrast between the pollution caused by the oil slick and the environment it affects. In this photograph, for example, the surface of which is largely covered by shiny fuel oil, the difference between the deep black rocks and the white, airy ocean foam that forms against them is striking.