BADLANDS (Spain, 2009)

For centuries after the departure of the Moors, the Spanish province of Almería was a backward area. During recent decades however the development of Almería has rapidly picked up speed. Glistening seas of plastic betray the presence of market gardening, expensive hotel complexes are rising, and in the rough, desert-like landscape you find the smoothly trimmed green of the golf course. But there is not just progress. Hidden in the wilderness, migrant labourers live in primitive shelters made of plastic and tied together with bits of string. Corinne Silva sees Almería as a micro-cosm – the globalising world economy in miniature. This microcosm lies on what is called the ‘po-litical equator’, where the economic might and political indifference of the North meets the poverty and exploitation of the South. The actors in this post-industrial world – North African migrants, golf tourists, pensionados – live strictly segregated lives, but Silva mercilessly exposes the friction be-tween the flamboyant artificiality and the hidden underlying economic reality.