Fragments of Existence
Testimonies of life with no recourse to public funds
This exhibition explores what it means to be subjected to the ‘No Recourse to Public Funds’ (NRPF) immigration restriction in the words of people living its effects. NRPF prevents people from accessing most welfare benefits, social housing and other support. Those affected include migrants with time-limited visas, asylum seekers, undocumented migrants, care leavers, and British citizens with migrant parents. Having NRPF means that individuals cannot access the “safety net” of public welfare support, trapping them in debt, poverty and homelessness simply because of where they or their parents were born.
Fragments of Existence presents testimonies from people in England who have experienced NRPF. Their stories were prepared as part of our research project Shadows: Making Lives with NRPF which explores how parents, children and young people with NRPF live and how this form of everyday state violence impacts their existence. A version of this exhibition, curated by Alice Millar in collaboration with the Shadows project team, was presented at Rich Mix in London, UK, from 17-26 May 2006.
This exhibition draws on the themes described by people: feeling fragmented and trapped by everyday restrictions and borders; being under constant scrutiny and surveillance yet being unseen and unheard; living in unsafe accommodation or being unhoused; exhausted and overwhelmed by the labour of everyday life when the state has abandoned them; and childhoods spent feeling left out, lonely and hungry. These stories are rarely heard, yet more than 2 million people in the UK are subject to the NRPF condition today and the policy continues to be rapidly expanded.
The charcoal images included here were produced in response to testimonies by London-based artist Meera Shakti Osborne.
D.O., Spider, 2025
We moved around a lot. The black lines represent that, like spiders and they are cool (when they are tiny). It just makes all the moving look fun and special because in their own way they were.
Without a Name, Untitled series, 2025
A series of photographs contrasts touristic stereotypes with the reality of a ‘broken existence’ and feeling trapped. Life with NRPF is splintered and precarious, without continuity.
I force myself to get through the day, pretending everything is fine, but inside I’m breaking.
No Name, Untitled 1 & 2, 2026
Many of the artworks and objects in this exhibition speak to the emotional toll of life with NRPF.
Icho, Icho and the Backpack, 2025
It’s been two years now, and this backpack is always with me. If this backpack could talk, it would tell you so many stories.
Icho’s contribution centres around his backpack. NRPF pushes people into prolonged situations of housing precarity. Unable to rent and without access to support, it is difficult to remain in one place permanently. The backpack became an important part of Icho’s life to stay mobile and flexible. In his backpack he carries everything he needs, always ready to move on to the next place or the next city.
Many children and young people affected by NRPF find themselves homeless and without the safety net of social housing. As Nameless writes, ‘I was asking my mum “Mum, what are we doing here? Mum, are we going to sleep on the bench?” and then she was like … “Yeah, we’re going to have to sleep on a bench.”
Joel J (frame by Alice Miller), Handwritten note on food insecurity, 2026
Many people with NRPF experience food insecurity, meaning they do not have access to sufficient food. Growing up in a family with NRPF, Joel reflects on his mother going without food to make sure he had enough to eat.
At that time, children of families with NRPF could not qualify for free school meals, leading Joel to feel guilty when the school charged his mum for his meals.
I felt bad for being hungry. I felt bad for wanting to eat.
Before 2020, children from migrant families were often unable to access free school mealsdue to the ‘no recourse to public funds’ immigration restriction. North East London Migrant Action (NELMA) campaigned for free school meals for all children who needed them, regardless of immigration status. These postcards were produced as part of their campaign.
Toyin Akeju, Uncommon Voices, 2025
O.O., Wave, 2026
This piece of music was composed and performed by a young person with NRPF for the exhibition.
Find out more:
Fragments of Existence exhibition at Rich Mix, May 2026
Fragments of Existence: Testimonies of life with NRPF – See the full spoken, written, and artistic testimonies made by people whose lives have been curtailed, erased, and splintered by the borders of and within nation states. Each in their own way tells us something of the brutalities of the United Kingdom’s ‘no recourse to public funds’ immigration policy, which prohibits many migrants from accessing the vital support and services needed to live.