burn magazine

Yael Martinez – La casa que sangra

Yael Martinez

La casa que sangra (The house that bleeds)

It was getting dark when I got the call. Luz, my wife, was telling me that they had killed her brother Beto. She was uncontrollable — I had never heard her speak like that. Her voice was shaking, breaking. I could not sleep all night. “Beto was killed, hanged,” resonated in my head, “he was beaten, burned, but they told us that he committed suicide.” Her other brothers, David and Nacho, had been missing for over 3 months.

My wife Lucero Granda taking a shower at home. The trauma of Mexico’s missing is an open wound in the nation’s psyche. Families who can’t grieve for their loved ones spend the day alternating between doubt and despair, praying for, and dreading, the blessing of certainty.Taxco Guerrero Mexico on November 23,2014.

The trompi working at the slaughter House. Acapulco Guerrero. He has one missing brother. But his family decided not to filed their case with the PGR (Attorney General’s Office). Acapulco Guerrero. On Saturday April 15, 2016.

Bedroom of the Cruz’s family in the community of Santiago Temixco, Guerrero Mexico On december 14,2014.

A person burning grass near his house in the community of Chilapa in the mountain region. This region has declared itself in crisis due to violence, disappearances and forced displacement due to organized crime and lack of rule of law. Guerrero, Mexico 2018.

Tania Fernandez at her boyfriend house. She has one missing family member. Guerrero Mexico on March 14, 2019.

A man burns a torito (fireworks) to celebrate a birthday . Guerrero Mexico. December 29,2018

(my wife) & Me at home after the lose of her Brother Beto. Taxco Guerrero México. Guerrero is one of the Mexican States that have been most affected by organized crime; It is the second poorest and most violent state in the country. The condition of social and economic marginalization of Guerrero is becoming more evident. The crisis of the rule of law is increasingly alarming and forced disappearances are only one of the symptoms that prove it. In 2013, three of my brothers-in-law died. (They used to live in Iguala, the place from where the Ayotzinapa students disappeared). One of them was killed; the other two disappeared.) After these events I began documenting my family, and the families of other missing people, in order to capture in photographs the psychological and emotional breakdown caused by the loss of family members, especially for parents, children, and siblings. I am working with the concepts of pain, emptiness, absence, and forgetting.

After these events in 2013, I began to document my family and the families of other missing people as well as fractured communities that are immerse in violence in Mexico; I am trying to create work that represents the connection between absence and presence, and this state of invisibility in a symbolic manner, working with the concepts of pain, emptiness, absence, and forgetting. The symbolic construction of the territory where violence penetrate all and this violence crosses the physical and spiritual space of those who inhabit it. The territory as an analogy to a body / space that can be a house, a person, a family, a community or a country.

Ruined house in the comunity of Santiago Temixco, Guerrero Mexico.In 2013 we lose 3 brothers-in laws. One of them was found killed at jail. Two of them still disappear. They used to live at Iguala Guerrero, the same place where the Ayotzinapa students disappeared. After that event happened we went to some places where some traces were found. We did not found anything. Guerrero Mexico on December 14,2014

Blanca Gonzalez watching t.v. after a labor day. she works on the cocine of a school in the comunity of. She is the wife of Jose Angel campos one of the 43 missing students of Ayotzinapa. Tixtla Guerrero.

Digno Cruz (My grand-father-in-law) was crying at home while he was talking about his missing grandsons. Guerrero Mexico. The discovery of several mass graves during the search of the 43 normalistas Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, shows the magnitude of the crisis of enforced disappearances in the country. The goverment have found 60 clandestine graves in the cities of Iguala-Taxco with at least 129 bodies (20 women and 109 men). None of them belonged to the 43 normalistas missing in Iguala during the month of September 2014. Official figures show that in recent years there have been 30 000 disappearances and Guerrero is one of the Mexican States that have been most affected. Guerrero Mexico on November 3, 2014.

Adriana Garcia poses for a portrait in her home in Cuajinicuilapa Guerrero Mexico on May 25th 2019.

Dried roots of Cactus on a wall in the comunity of Tixtla Guerrero Mexico.Tixtla is where the normal Isidro Burgos of Ayotzinapa is settled. Its been more than a year and still no results of the 43 missing students. Guerrero Mexico On november 7th 2015.

Itzel Martinez playing at grandparents house in the community of Santiago Temixco. In 2013 3 of her uncles disappeared, the most affected were the children. Guerrero Mexico on November 15 2014.

A crime scene. (self-portrait) Zautla Mexico. After the loss of my brother-in-law. I Try to represent symbolically his death and the death of thousands people in Mexico because of organized crime. Zautla Mexico on September 20, 2013./Escena del crimen (autorretrato) Después de la pérdida de mi cuñado. Intento representar simbólicamente su muerte y la de muchas personas en Guerrero a causa del crimen organizado. Zautla México el 20 de septiembre de 2013.

Landscape at dawn Oaxaca Mexico. on March 9, 2019.

My daugther Itzel Martínez at home in Taxco Guerrero.She is 9 years old. In 2013 three of my brothers in-laws died. After these events I began documenting my family and tried to capture the psychological and emotional breakdown caused by the loss of a family member.Guerrero Mexico on February 18, 2019

Bio

Martínez is based in Guerrero, Mexico. His work has explored the connections between, poverty, narcotraffic, organized crime, and how this affects the communities in his native Guerrero in southern Mexico. He is trying to represent the relationship of absence and presence and this state of invisibility in a symbolic manner working with the concepts of pain, emptiness, absence, and forgetting.

He received the Magnum Emergency Fund, Magnum On religión, and was named one of the PDN’s 30 new and emerging photographers to watch 2017. In 2015 he was selected in the Joop Joop Swart Master Class Latinoamerica. He was a finalist in the Eugene Smith grant in 2015 and 2016. He was nominated to the Foam Paul Huf Award, the Prix Pictet and the Infinity award of the ICP.

Giorgio Bianchi – Donbass Stories

Giorgio Bianchi

Donbass Stories

Several tens of thousands of dead and wounded, over a million refugees. The civil war in Donbass has literally erased entire cities and villages from the map, staining with blood the soil of the European continent for the first time in the twenty-first century.

These are two chapters – Alina and Blind Pit – of my Donbass Stories, which came to life with the idea to portray as main characters those invisible actors affected by the civil war in that region.

Alina

Despite power cuts, a shutdown of all businesses, curfews, and nearly daily shelling, residents of the rebel-held city of Donetsk flock to the Opera and Ballet Theater on weekends in search of respite from the reality of life within a battle zone. When war broke out around a third of the theater’s performers fled, including key singers and all four of its conductors. A further setback occurred when a wayward missile destroyed the warehouse where most of the stage sets were stored.

The opera house was forced to close in July 2015 because of heavy clashes, then it recruited new staff and was again operative the following September. Despite the ongoing hostilities and challenging circumstances, audience figures at the 960-seat theater have been impressive since its reopening. In the ground floor cloakroom, camouflage military jackets hang among civilian furs and overcoats.

Alina is a professional dancer from Donetsk and a member of the Donbass Opera and Ballet Theatre chorus. She has been studying at the theatre academy since she was a girl and throughout the entire war period she has continued to dance, convinced that keeping performances alive was one of the few ways to make sure the inhabitants of her city would not think about the horrors of war, if only for a few hours.

The rhythm of Alina’s life follows the timings of the theater: from Tuesday to Friday she has ballet lessons and rehearsals, on Saturday and Sunday the performances; Monday is the only day off the performers have and she goes to visit her maternal grandparents with whom she is very close, or she meets up with her ballet girlfriends to take a walk around town or go to the disco. Even if she doesn’t intend to leave her hometown at the moment, she doesn’t rule out the possibility of moving to Russia in case of an escalation of the war.

Blind Pit: The Story of Sasha

Sasha is a sightless 31-year-old miner. He works in one of the many independent (kopanki) mines located around the small town of Torez. Raised with three brothers in a dysfunctional family, Sasha lost his sight when he was 11, because of a very bad accident.

After a long cohabitation, he married Evgenija (Genia), who had two children – Valerija (15) and Alexander (11) – from a previous marriage. One year ago their third child, Anja, was born. Due to the conflict, the zootechnical farm where they both worked closed down, leaving all the workers without jobs. Because of the economic crisis resulting from the war, many people from the area were forced to choose between joining the separatist militias and trying to get hired at one of the dozens independent coal mines surrounding the city of Torez.

Nonetheless, Sasha remained unemployed for a long time, because nobody would trust hiring a blind man – least of all mine managers – even if his determination and high productivity were widely known. Then, one day he met a Tartar called Ildar, owner of a kopanko, who offered him a job. Since then, Sasha has gone to the mine every day, at 6:30 a.m., led by his father, a miner as well, and goes back home eight hours later with his wife, or one of his elder children. From his house to the mine it’s a 30-minute walk, through fields and woods.

The mine where Sasha works is a thick net of underground tunnels that are never higher than 4 feet and in some places are less than 1.6 feet. These tunnels run under a small natural pond and go as deep as 300 yards. This means that in many places the mine is flooded, which makes it even harder for Sasha and his colleagues to reach the mineral vein. Sasha can go down the mineshaft as quickly and as nimbly as his colleagues. Despite his disability, he has learned to navigate confidently the underground maze, to avoid obstacles and to dodge dangers posed by the uneven beams of the roof, the puddles of water, the slippery clay and the extraction devices placed along the path. His mental map of the mine is made of a continuous flow of sensations that take him, one orderly step after another, to the mine’s core. Sasha’s task is to pour with a shovel the coal, that’s been broken to pieces with a jackhammer, into steel tanks that will bring it to the surface. Sqeezed in a cavity less than 15 feet high, surrounded by the deafening noise of pneumatic drills, covered with coal powder, and immersed in total darkness, made even deeper by his blindness. Accidents are extremely frequent, as it’s well known despite the fact that there are no available official statistics; in the same fashion, there is no available documentation regarding the disease and mortality incidence – well above national average – among miners due to poor working conditions. Nonetheless, kopankas remain the only source of income for thousands of families.

According to specialists who have visited him through the years, Sasha’s blindness is reversible and could be cured with a corneal transplant. Recently, Sasha has decided to go for the surgery that could help him regain his sight. He and his wife went to the Fyodorov clinics, in Krasnodar and then in Moscow, to undergo preoperative testing. Unfortunately, his healing process is slow and full of uncertainties because of the high cost of the treatment. Maybe one day, upon exiting the mine, Sasha will be able to smile along with his collegues, on seeing the sunlight again, after eight hours spent in darkness.

With director Federico Schiavi, Bianchi is working to create a documentary from Sasha’s story. In order to maintain maximum independence and freedom of movement, they are running a crowdfunding campaign to raise the necessary funds to develop this work.

Bio

Giorgio Bianchi is an Italian photojournalist, documentarist, writer and filmmaker (Rome in 1973). In his work Giorgio has always paid particular attention to political and anthropological issues, and has undertaken a freelance career to focus on a combination of long-term personal projects and client assignments. He has covered stories in Syria, Ukraine, Burkina Faso, Vietnam, Myanmar, Nepal, India, and throughout all of Europe.

Since 2013, he has made several trips to Ukraine, where he followed closely the Ukrainian crisis from the Euromaidan protests until the outbreak of war between the government army and the pro-Russian separatists. Thanks to his robust archive of footage and pictures about the Donbass conflict he is making a documentary film entitled “Apocalypse Donbass”. In 2016 he started covering the Syrian conflict.

Giorgio has won several international prizes and has received many public recognitions, and his pictures are regularly published in newspapers and magazines, both paper and online. His work has been exhibited in many international and national festivals.

Joel Pulliam – Springtime Nightmare

Joel Pulliam

Springtime Nightmare

I moved to Tokyo with my family in 2018. For nearly two years, life was happy. Then, without warning, my young daughter died.

Can art begin to convey a father’s grief? Over three hundred years ago, the haiku poet Raizan Konishi wrote after the loss of his own child:

I must be crazy

to not be crazy in this

crazy springtime nightmare

Springtime nightmare, indeed. Outside, the pandemic widens, and emergency orders quiet the city. Snow falls out of season, blanketing the cherry blossoms. Human contact fades. The streets near my home, once so familiar, appear alien. I wander them, point my camera, and press the shutter. The only images I seem able to capture are those that reflect my own inner state.

Bio

Joel Pulliam was born in the United States in 1974. He studied history and literature at Harvard College, then law at Harvard Law School. Until 2018, he worked at the United States Department of the Treasury. Currently, he lives in Tokyo, where his black-and-white photography of the city has been recognized by publications such as the Asahi Shimbun newspaper and Asahi Camera magazine. His long-term projects center on various areas of Tokyo that have been neglected by other photographers.

Daniel Hinks – In Sickness and in Health

Daniel Hinks

In Sickness and in Health

2020 this foul year of our lord. Disease, death and decay now plague the world. Rising nationalism, right-wing popularism, global economic fallout and political dogma are not the only virus to scourge this earth. The pandemic has spread globally, causing mass hysteria between the World Health Organization (WHO) and nations, causing mistrust and resentment. World leaders point fingers throw accusations playing the blame game like giddy little school children, seeming to forget that there is more at stake than a false ego and the pride of a nation.

Lest we forget it is human lives that are being played with, we are living in desperate times. Have we lost our humanity, our compassion, our humility for our fellow beings? After all, it was Confucius that said: “Under the sky’s and heavens we are all but one family”.

China had put a blanket ban on gathering and large ceremonies such as weddings and funerals, during the first months of the pandemic to prevent further spread of the disease. As of March 25th, parts of China eased up on these restrictions. Each province and city govern themselves under a local municipal government, which is tightly monitored and complies with the laws and regulations of the central government. This makes things more manageable for smaller provinces and cities to resume business as usual under the proper measures in comparison to its counterparts across the country like Beijing, Shanghai, Guandong and Sichuan.

Shandong was one of these provinces that eased up on its restrictions rather quickly, due to its low level of recorded cases of Covid-19. Shandong is 746km away from the outbreak with a documented 788 confirmed cases and only 7 deaths.

Luckily enough for two traffic officers from ZaoZhuang in Shandong province, a population of 4.18Million people and only 24 reported cases and no deaths. Sun Meng, 27, and his bride to be Xu FeiFei, 31, were worried that their big day might not go ahead as planned. However, as luck has it, the ceremony was able to take place.

There is an ancient Chinese tradition of selecting a date for the wedding. The use of both persons birth year that corresponds with the animal of that year is used. Along with the time of birth as they align with aspects of Wu Xing the five elements, this brings luck, prosperity and happiness to life and in marriage. It is believed that if you alter the date, it will bring challenges to your life along with pain, sorrow and anguish.

Sun Meng and Xu Fei Fei, despite their apprehensions, were over the moon to be able to spend their magic moment with their honored guests.

Putting politics and this cold-blooded bummer, which we find ourselves aside and taking a moment to appreciate this beautiful moment between two human beings, for what is a marriage. Love, compassion, tolerance and unity. Everything that makes us human. This wedding serves as a beacon of hope of the future. Shining its light through the darkness at the end of the tunnel.

Bio

I am a documentary photographer, visual artist and trouble maker; I am constantly fascinated by the human condition. I take on stories that I truly believe in something that can peak my interest and curiosity, turning that energy outwards into creating work. Looking at the state of the human existence but concentrating on the resilience of the human spirit.

I have a profound belief that the still image has the ability to change people’s minds. Even in today’s modern forever changing fast paced world of now! now! now! and limited concentration spans. The access that your subjects allow me when working is imperative to the work that I create. I treat my subjects with complete respect and photograph them with dignity and complete diligence in order to help tell the truth and bring their stories to life.

My work is intended to bring about understanding of different cultures, races, religions and bridge the gap between humans rather than extending it. Bringing people closer to create a more thoughtfully educated world.

Irina Werning – La Cuarentena

At first, we bought some food, I’m a stocker by nature so I already had most of the food in that picture.

Irina Werning

La Cuarentena

It’s the new normal ! Lockdowns are being championed as a solution to the spread of the number one enemy: the coronavirus. In developing countries like Argentina, where 40% of the population lives in poverty, it’s difficult to just stay fixated on the fear of infection when one realizes how daunting the economic setback of these strict lockdown policies are for most of the population. In these economies so many more workers carry out hands-on work which is incompatible with the new moral high ground of social distancing. So many more are also likely to be employed informally and thus are clinging to cash payments in exchange for the type of daily work which the government has black-listed and penalized. It’s hard to buy much time with lower income and lower saving or to wait for hand-outs from bankrupt governments. In addition, experts advise that the peak of the virus spread should fall in June, precisely as winter hits South America. When you add to this the fact that developing countries have less old population and less “diseases of civilization” like diabetes or heart problems, this makes you wonder if the solution is worse than the disease.

Behold! My family in full lockdown in Buenos Aires (41 days and counting…)

I wish I could say I’m one of those great moms who creates an activity for their kids to play and heal in such difficult time, but I’m not. I just can’t survive without a project.

As we all know, we are caged.

I must confess I love trashing my kid’s art work when they are asleep but these days I treasure it. On Day 20 we did a little exhibition on our front door – for no one actually.

Hurray! We celebrated my 44th birthday.

On the 7th day…it was still boiling hot down in south America, so we had to get away somehow and the beach seemed like such a splendid idea. Fun’s over, now we’re into autumn

The kids, of course, know everything about the coronavirus, news, fakenews, science, pseudoscience, and conclusions from all that big data…

Sometimes I give them undivided attention for hours, sometimes I hide in the bathroom, but I have to say…the kids are all right.

Day 26 : Lars (my son) woke up with a swollen eye. We consulted the Eye doctor via text message.

Bio

Irina grew up in Buenos Aires. She studied a BA in Economics and an MA in History. She began to travel in Asia and Middle East and ended up in London where she studied an MA in Photojournalism and lived for 7 years. She’s now back in Buenos Aires and focuses on personal long term projects. She loves to build sets and invent stages for her subjects. She can spend hours in a tool shop.

Gianmarco Maraviglia – Winter Came in Spring

Gianmarco Maraviglia

Winter Came in Spring

We’ve seen the masks. We’ve seen hospitals and cemeteries. As always happens as reaction to a dramatic event there are different stages, different approaches. Then there is the everyday life. The search for a new normal, new rhythms, something to hold on to pretend that everything is fine.

Most of our life certainty is nothing more than repetitions. The alarm clock that rings at the same time, children go to school, cooking in the evening, going to bed knowing what is going to happen the next day. A kind of rhythm of existence. But when rhythm breaks down, it turns out how fragile is the balance we base our lives on. On the other side, leaving this safety zone forces you to find new dynamics, to search for new geometries from chaos.

As in an unexpected chemical reaction, the elements seek a new stability, a new order. Covid has already brought about enormous changes in our society, and the humans appear again capable of adapting with extreme speed, in search of a new balance. The same dynamics are found in a family, closed at home for two months, looking for a new form of everyday life.

Here in Milano, Lombardia, Italy – perhaps the most affected area in the world by the new coronavirus – this year here winter came in spring. Italy has been in a lock down situation for two months now. The emergency laws enacted by the government are among the most restrictive in the world. You cannot leave the house without a self-certification, and only for urgent reasons. As a photojournalist I worked on the news, on the empty streets, on the masks … But as a narrator I could do nothing but visually tell the changes that were happening quickly around me.

Bio

A humanistic background allows me to get closer to the stories I tell with the respect that every person deserves, respect for being told for what they really are, avoiding the path of visual spectacle of pain or poverty. I believe in the value of information as the first thing, for this reason my research does not stop only to the dramatic stories, because our world is fortunately still able to offer stories of great redemption, of rebirths, stories not yet told but that give hope for the future. I have the pleasure of working with magazines like Der Spiegel, Washington Post, CNN, Corriere Della Sera, Io Donna, Mare, Cicero and many others. I’m the proud founder of the non-fiction communication and brand journalism collective Jolly Jolly Grog. I’m also a teacher of photojournalism at IED Milano and Officine Fotografiche. I hope to leave a better world to my two kids, Olivia and Yago.

Sissie Chang – Don’t Throw Away Your Daughters

Sissie Chang

Don’t Throw Away Your Daughters

My grandmother just celebrated her 98th birthday. She’s lived with my two aunts for as long as I can remember. Growing up, I don’t recall having any long, meaningful talks with my grandfather. One of the few things I do remember is a statement I overheard him telling my mother when I was a little girl: “Why are you spending so much money on her education? She’s only going to run off to get married when she turns eighteen.” I was told that sons were prized because they carry on the family name. Daughters… Well, they’re just “guests.” It’s how traditions are, and I understood not to ask certain questions.

My grandparents had three daughters, and like the most traditional Chinese families, they continued having children until sons were born. As my grandfather’s health declined, his second and third daughters—both retired, unwed, and living under the same roof—were his primary caregivers. These same two daughters continue to take care of my grandmother today.

Meanwhile, a few time zones away, I’m suddenly living back at home, taking care of my own mother as she undergoes cancer treatment. It’s funny, none of us have run off yet. We’re still here.

As the years passed, I watched the prized sons of the family become more and more distant, and I couldn’t help but start to question that notion about daughters being unimportant.

I guess my grandfather was wrong. Don’t throw away your daughters.

Short Bio

Sissie Chang is a documentary photographer based out of Orange County, California. At one time, she was a firm believer that the most intriguing stories, and those with the best backdrops, required a passport. She eventually discovered that the most engaging human stories are actually the ones you see on a daily basis.

Her first self-published book, Don’t throw away your daughters, is slated for release Spring 2020.

Mafalda Rakoš – A Story to Tell

Mafalda Rakoš

A Story to Tell

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

“You don’t really fit in… You don’t fit into the group of normal people, because you’re anorexic. And you don’t fit with those affected by anorexia, because you’re a man.“ – Thomas, 21. Our process always starts with a conversation. What does it look like, your mental cage? What do you feel, see, think, hear, taste and smell? And where shall we go to take that picture of it? A Story to Tell resulted from many encounters with ten men affected by anorexia, bulimia and binge eating. Being well-aqcuainted with the topic myself, I was wondering: how is it to be affected as a male? The protagonists of this project, many of them trans*, gay, bisexual or otherwise associated with a genderdiverse community want to show: everyone can be affected.

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Very often, it was shocking to listen. They told us about the shame, invisibility and unrecognition that they experience, not rarely resulting in serious self–harm and even suicide attempts. Their stories were more extreme, more violent and more painful than I would normally hear it from women. Yet, together with journalist Ruben de Theije, we kept drilling towards the true conflicts in the intersection of social expectations and big emotions; conflicts that lie at the heart of the stories they wanted to tell.

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Short Bio

Mafalda Rakoš (*1994, AT) is a visual artist based between Austria and the Netherlands. Educated at the Royal Academy of Art (KABK) in The Hague and Academy of Fina Arts in Vienna, she also holds a BA in Anthropology from Vienna University. Her projects often move along the intersection of art, documentary and journalism and attempt to dive deep into protagonist’s stories around safety, pain and trauma. Since 2013, she has been researching eating disorders through a collaborative and research-based practise rooted in documentary photography and cultural anthropology. The main platform of her work are books which gained attention in contests such as Kassel Dummy Award and the European Publishers Award for Photography; furthermore, it is regularly shown in international exhibitions and other contexts such as congresses for eating disorders (2016), or a hospital (2017). It was recognized by Awards such as c/o Berlin New Documentary Talent, the Steenbergen Stipendium and the Documentary Project Fund Emerging Vision Award.

Chris Donovan – The Cloud Factory

Chris Donovan

The Cloud Factory

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

As a child, I looked up at the billowing smoke stacks of the refinery and asked my father if they made all of the world’s clouds. “No,” he replied. “They make money.” I grew up in Saint John, New Brunswick – an industrial city on the east coast of Canada – bookended by Canada’s largest oil refinery and a pulp mill owned by the same billionaire family. Despite the enormous wealth controlled by the Irving family, we also have the highest rate of child poverty in Canada, at around 50%. This billionaire family also owns every newspaper in the province. The Cloud Factory project is my way of fighting against censorship and addressing the environmental and social implications of industrial classism on my community.

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Jacques Poitras, author of Irving vs Irving, says of the Irving control of the media: “Newspapers are a historical record of our time. The concern with the Irving papers is not what is being written about, but what is being left out.” The goal of project is to fill in some of these blanks. For residents of the Bayside neighborhood, adjacent to the refinery, it feels like a lot is being left out. Resident Lisa Jacquart says her non-smoking neighbors are “dropping like flies” of lung cancer. With no studies on the air quality in this specific neighborhood, it’s impossible to hold the company accountable for these issues. Canada is now at a crossroads. A proposal to create the country’s longest-ever pipeline, which would transport oil to the refinery in Saint John, is currently on hold. As we get closer to electing a conservative Prime Minister in the Fall, that is expected to change. This is a complicated story of a town that relies on a damaging industry for survival. It must be approached with nuance and collaboration. As a Saint Johner, this is my story, and I hope you can help me tell it. Thank you for your consideration.

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Short Bio

Chris Donovan (b. 1995) is a visual storyteller based in Toronto, Canada. Hailing from a small industrial city on Canada’s east coast, most of his work focuses on the interplay between industry and community. Chris’ work has been recognized by POYi, the Sony World Photo Awards, and the Canadian Pictures of the Year – including being named Photojournalist of the Year in 2017 and 2018. Hi clients include The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Globe and Mail, Maclean’s Magazine, Reuters and others.

Ute Behrend – Bear Girls

Ute Behrend

Bear Girls

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

How do young girls become strong women? Adolescence is the theme of my new book. At the beginning I tell a story about a fictional “Indian tribe” that separates its pubescent girls and dresses them in bearskins. In this way they are protected from premature sexualisation. The result is a shelter that gives the girls the opportunity to develop freely and self-determinedly in this important phase of their lives. I call these girls “bear girls” and draw parallels in our society, where free spaces for adolescent girls become less and less. Many young women try to evade the stereotypes of sexualised identification that are shaped by society and the media. This is often evident in similar behaviour patterns, e.g. wearing very large sweaters that girls like to “borrow” from their father’s wardrobe.

3 - „Bear Girl in forest & Bear Girl in bedroom“ - a5960149-b6ce-4774-bcf8-5fb5081c74a7

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6 - “Girl with fur in woods & Sleeping bear” - c08be5f2-9d19-4ea7-b8a9-904b34015611

7 - „Homage to Meret Oppenheim & poisonous mushrooms“ - a0790c26-9d97-482b-a0d5-53e499a89491

8 - “Sleeping girl & Feather on red earth” - 56559e7e-35bd-4578-b6ad-47411aa24b8a

9 - „Seawater & Amalia” - 2e2d03a5-0986-416a-b93f-3aab1fdfaacc

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In “Smart Girls, Gifted Women”, Barbara Kerr examined the similarities that later became strong women. She found that all girls had time for themselves, the ability to fall in love with an idea, and a “protective cover”. None was particularly popular and most remained relatively isolated in their age group. Interestingly, this rejection gave them a free space in which they could develop their uniqueness. Parallel to the portraits of the girls I take photographs with a focus on nature, wild animals and the concept of distance and closeness. I then work on combining these single images to final pairs. The references between the pictures are intended to stimulate the viewer to link the content of what he has seen. Out of one’s own memory and also out of cultural memory.

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16 - “Fire & Hunters vest” - 6a1980c5-de61-4664-831d-d217b456b68b

17 - “Daya and Mila & Scull” - 40f8f458-4fa5-4d14-a4a3-181dcb980175

18 - “Footprints and Paw prints & Little plastic hand” - ff6f348d-4a98-45c7-a29d-525c6eca3592

19 - “Girl with beard & Girl with pink wig” - e1846aa2-e4d8-41b0-a97a-03c9b0ad21ee

20 - “Indian shadow & Hair on red carpet“ - 726be193-ac47-4678-ae81-4e301a3e6607

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23 - “Recumbent eight & Bear´s Portrait” - b727f114-c3e4-43bb-be83-28ed93686515

Short Bio

Biografie 2019 Artist Book, Bear Girls, (artists‘ book) Publisher: BummBumm Books, Cologne, Germany 2015 Teaching assignment, Academy for Communication Design, Cologne, Germany 2011 The Last Year of Childhood (artists‘ book) Publisher: POWERSHOVEL.BOOKS, Tokio/New York 2009 The Door Behind the Wall | Project with handicapped and non-handicapped inhabitants of the Dr. Dormagen-Guffanti foundation, Cologne, Germany 2008 – 09 Teaching assignment, College of Higher Education Bielefeld, Germany 2008 Zimmerpflanzen (artists‘ book), publisher: Snoeck Verlag, Cologne, Germany 2007 Teaching assignment for Visual Communications Merz Akademie,Germany 2006 Mermaids, video Galerie 11, in the Gruner + Jahr publishing house, Hamburg, Germany 2005 Teaching assigment, College of Higher education Voralberg, Austria Märchen, Fairy Tales (artists‘ book) Publisher: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walter König, Cologne, Germany 2004 Observer and Indoor Plants (booklet) latent, aristotelean mimesis within the thriller genre | label: www.bold-dvd.de 2002 Art goes School | State Chancellery, Saarland, Germany 2001 kunstKöln special edition 1996 Girls, Some Boys and Other Cookies (artists‘ book) Publisher: Scalo Verlag, Zürich, Switzerland 1987-93 Academic studies: Photographic Design University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Dortmund, Germany 1985-87 Academic studies: Communication Design 1979-82 Apprenticeship as a carpenter

Alexander Bronfer – Floating

Alexander Bronfer

Floating

This project is about the tight bonds connecting us to The Dead Sea, in the face of ecological catastrophe threatening the future of this unique natural treasure.

People are always fascinated by the Dead Sea. This place was always a refuge for messiahs, zealots, martyrs, kings, and ascetics. People prayed, sinned, healed and kill each other on these yellowish shores. They built dams and plants, drilled wells, cut the sea from any source of freshwater and left it to die. And meanwhile, we continue praying, sinningand killing each other, moving our beach chairs and sunshades deeper and deeper, silently following the disappearing sea

Short Bio

Alexander Bronfer is an Israeli photographer. Born in Ukraine and studied in Saint Petersburg (Russia). His main interest is the connection between street and fine art photography. After arriving to Israel, Alexander lived in Kibutz in South Israel where he fell in love with the Dead Sea region. He is a finalist of multiple international and Israeli photography festivals. Recently he spends a good amount of time on personal projects mainly in Israel and Eastern Europe.

Anniina Joensalo – Tender

Anniina Joensalo

Tender

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

“Tender” is an exploration into the contradictions inherent in queer lives and loves. I want to explore all aspects of intimacy in a non-normative way and in non-normative settings. In this series I’ve captured the people around me, my friends, partners and lovers. I’m inspired by the space queer people take up everyday, and the work they undertake in love and friendship. I am compelled to get as close to people as possible. My objective was to portray power balances between subject and photographer, to show the juxtaposition of tenderness and violence. “Tender” aims to bring up questions of intimacy and consent within these queer relationships where individuals are often pushing the boundaries of love and sex in anarchic ways.

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Queer people are often subject to violences in their early lives, forced to fight for an identity and to push against binaries. Often through these hardships they become more in touch with their narratives and their needs. Their paths are sometimes beautiful, sometimes sad. Usually consisting of polarizing extremities, from anxiety to pure bliss. What lies between these tensions is calmness; a moment of reaching peaceful intimacy with another after a long wait of uncertainty. These moments of tenderness are full of power, where queer expression is encouraged and accepted. These are portraits of queerness I want to showcase.

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Short Bio

Careers like a photographer didn’t exist where I grew up. The world around me and the people in it were executing a perfect working class life of teachers, nurses, and factory workers. I was watching them in awe: they were on autopilot; blissfully unaware. Go to school, find a boy, get married, have a nice house and kids. This was the narrative I was given and it was supported by all the stories I was exposed to. In the abundance of visual storytelling my responsibility as an artist is to give emphasis to the meaningful ones. I should find and bring out the stories that wouldn’t be heard otherwise, to this audience that wouldn’t be exposed to them. My mission as a photographer is exploring stories in which the identities of different kinds of people are represented. My objective is to explore and portray a lifestyle outside of the patriarchal, capitalist and heteronormative structures of couples, romance and religious norms. I want our identity to be represented to the future queer generation growing up. I want our love stories. This “Queer Way of Living” is my own personal utopia that I chose to believe in.

Jaakko Kahilaniemi – 100 Hectares of Understanding

Jaakko Kahilaniemi

100 Hectares of Understanding

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

It’s impossible to overstate the significance of forests for Finland, both historically and economically. 71,6 % of the total area of the country is covered by forests – that’s over 26 million hectares. I own 100 hectares. 100 Hectares of Understanding is my attempt to understand the forest area I inherited 1997. Throughout adulthood my relationship with the forest has been somewhat discordant and attitude towards my inheritance has been indifferent. Recent explorations in the forest, and in the world of forestry have managed to provoke my interest towards unfamiliar inherited property of mine. I study what nature has to offer to urbanized people and I will try to create new ways of thinking and ways to experience and feel the forest. I capture nature through my lens before applying the alchemical process that makes art out of the familiar. I arbitrarily mix various types of pictures with each other, and define them as part of a larger visual entity. I am working with the method of deconstruction, but rather than creating physical work out of the results of my private rituals in the forest, I unveil the result through the medium of photography. For the unknown to become familiar requires both physical and delicate acts: to nurture and to tame, to master and to yield. My photographs are testimonial, traces of my aspirations towards understanding and awareness. Photography, for me, is a gateway to the very core of my thoughts and imagination. II see similarities between my acts in the forest and walking artist Hamish Fultons walks, which he records with photographs and poems. Taking inspiration from Fluxus and the traditions of Arte Povera, I seek to encounter the forest with a playful and open approach. 100 Hectares of Understanding consists of the objects that I’ve found, the acts that I’ve photographed, the sculptures I’ve made and visual secrets that I have created.

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Short Bio

Kahilaniemi was born in 1989 in Finland. He earned his BA in Photography from Turku Arts Academy (FI) in 2014 and his MA also in photography from Aalto University, the School of Arts, Design and Architecture (FI) in 2018. Kahilaniemi is a recipient of the ING Unseen Talent Award (NL, 2018) and the Backlight Price (FI, 2017). He got chosen as one of the eight finalists for the Tokyo International Photo Contest in 2019. Kahilaniemi was one of the selected Lens Culture Emerging Talents in 2017, and he also was one of the ten finalists in Hyéres Photo Festival and in Fotofestiwal Łódź in 2018. Kahilaniemi has exhibited at Denver Art Museum the US, Voies Off Arles, Benaki Museum Athens, Klompching Gallery NYC, Robert Capa Center in Hungary, FOTOFLUSS Wolkersdorf, Fotografisk Center Copenhagen, Tampere Art Museum, Organ Vida Festival Zagreb, , Unseen Amsterdam, Noorderlicht Photofestival, Northern Photography Center Oulu 33rd Festival de Photographie Hyères, Fotofestiwal Łódź, Kunsthalle Memmingen, Kunstverein Ludwigshafen, Potentiale Festival Austria, OFF_Festival, Photo Is:rael, the Latvian Museum of Photography, the Finnish Museum of Photography, Kunst Haus Wien and others. Kahilaniemi’s work has been featured in many publications, including Fisheye Magazine, Das Magazin, Eikon Magazine, Europe Now Journal, Fotografi Norway, GUP magazine, Greenpeace Magazine, Der Greif and HANT Magazine.

Luis Cobelo – Chas Chas

Luis Cobelo

Chas Chas

30 years ago, I came across a story in a comic book called “Parque Chas”, about a mysterious neighborhood in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The comic reveals the adventures of a writer who was told that fantastic and extraordinary things happen there. A place where wonderful mystical people live.

The reason such unusual things can take place there is because the center of the neighborhood was architecturally constructed similar to a spiderweb or a labyrinth. That’s why they say (the ‘chas chasians’) that if you enter into that concentric form, you may never leave, and magical things can happen to you. Many say that this is the true reality. Essentially, in Parque Chas everything is possible.

All these years later, I decided to travel thousands of kilometers to see for myself. But what really led me there was to discover if there was truth in their claim: “Everything you ever lost in your life, exists in Parque Chas”. And yes, I found it.

The project “Chas Chas” is an intangible exploration of the intricate myths and amazing lives of this neighborhood.

Short Bio

Born in Venezuela, Luis Cobelo took his philosophical studies as a warm coat to Galicia, Spain, where his family’s roots grew. Working independently across borders, Luis develops documentary projects in America, Asia and Europe, and has been published in many magazines and newspapers. His Latino soul brings him back to South America very often, where he created his first book “Zurumbático” and “Chas Chas”, (both self-published) to reveal the magical spirit of this part of the world. “Zurumbático” book has fascinated people all over the world and the exhibition of this work has traveled across oceans: Italy, México, Miami, Madrid, Costa Rica, Portugal and Venezuela. Now, he’s presenting “Chas Chas” the second second part of a collection of fantasies, mysteries and magical stories of the Latin American continent.

Ana Zibelnik – We are the ones turning

Ana Zibelnik

We are the ones turning

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

The series is a reflection on something we all grapple with: dying. To make sense of what is constantly there – somewhere, sometimes latent, sometimes not so much – to better understand and bear the “possibility of impossibility” we tend to listen to those more experienced, similarly or more troubled than us. We read books and watch films and lend an ear to the occasional wise man speaking. My own idea of how we encounter the constant presence of death is greatly indebted to some of those who examined the infinitely compelling and defining nature of mortality in detail and put it down in ink. One of those who mark the conceptual backbone of my series is Martin Heidegger, who accurately noted that the paramount difference between man and everything else that lives, lies not in the ratio, but in mortality: “mortals are those who experience death as death”. In this sense, human beings are identified by the great absence. Not necessarily by fear of it or permanent anticipation, but by mere awareness of the fact – an awareness we are born with and is reinforced and revisited simply by living. My series is an exploration into the subtle encounters with death during lifetime. I wish to construe a vast and and intense fictional narrative that zooms in on what it means to be running out of time.

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19 - A map does not know where you stand - 590d348f-93aa-4ec6-9e3b-d983affed388

Short Bio

Ana Zibelnik (b. 1995) is a photographer currently living and working in Leiden, Netherlands. After graduating summa cum laude from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana with the thesis “Moment and Duration,” she decided to further pursue her studies in film and photographic theory at Leiden University. During the period between 2015 and 2018 she was part of the If Slovenia Were project, an intense mentorship programme led by a renowned French-Slovenian photographer Klavdij Sluban. In May 2018, she was selected as an emerging artist to participate in the second cycle of PARALLEL – European Photo Based Platform (founded by Procur.arte). The project she created in the scope of the programme (We are the ones turning, 2019) won the Verzasca Nera award. She has been dealing extensively with the topic of death and time consciousness in photography, often incorporating literary works into her practice. Following her thesis project, she self-published a book “As if you could kill time without injuring eternity…” where her photographs are presented in dialogue with the lines of Vladimir Nabokov. Aside from the artistic work, she has been exploring and documenting Blue zones (longevity hotspots) in a long-term collaboration with the writer and philosopher Jaka Gerčar.

Mariia Ermolenko- Flow

Mariia Ermolenko

Flow

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

In my project I research time. Man is in perpetual search. In Japanese philosophy, there is the concept of “Fueki Riuko”. This is about form of the eternal and continuous, which are associated with the current and instant. These pictures were taken in different places that I visited. During travels, I take a very clear view of what is happening. And I do not want this to end. Life is fragile, and our stay in it is fleeting as a journey. My series is about the impression, about the moment, about life and death. Often, when my eyes are closed, memories pop up in my head. A person becomes a memoryless person. Memories are like a mosaic that constitutes man. As long as I remember, I am who I am. I’m afraid of losing memories. To forget is to die.

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Short Bio

Mariia was born in St. Petersburg (Russia) in 1995. She studied at the restoration of painting. She studied painting with masters from the Academy of Arts. Now studying at the Academy of Documentary Photography. Mariia is interested in exploring the themes of memory, time, the boundaries between sleep and reality, the themes of myths, as well as themes of ecology and the state of the environment. Lives and works in St. Petersburg.

Sathish Kumar – Town Boy

Sathish Kumar

Town Boy

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

These are images from as early as my teens to this day. The essence of every new experience as I was growing up was recorded with my camera – roaming around the neighborhood, meeting old friends, most times making new ones. At some point, I had to move to a large city for work. As the life in a large city got suffocating, I began to seek relief by going back to my town or by going on treks, to take a deep breath, to be back to the demands of the city. Town Boy is an observation of this gradual transformation into who I am today. These string of images are about my coming of age, my movement from a small town to a cosmopolitan city, to somehow fit into this contemporary world. (ongoing work)

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Short Bio

Sathish Kumar, born in 1986 in Kanchipuram, India. A large part of my school vacations was spent at my uncle’s photo studio which became an inspiration for me to pursue photography. I got a point and shoot film camera from my uncle as a gift which I always carried around to school picnics, cricket grounds shooting my friends and everything around. With photography, I want to record my everyday existence, of all encounters and journeys to create an expression of myself, of my life, of the world around. Currently, I am working as a freelance photographer and as an artist pursuing personal works from Chennai, India.

Lavinia Parlamenti & Manfredi Pantanella – An Atlas of Countries that Don’t Exist

Lavinia Parlamenti & Manfredi Pantanella

An Atlas of Countries that Don’t Exist

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

Political charts of the world are very fluid realities. Countries are created and countries die. In today’s world, globalization hasn’t killed the concept of Nation-State, but has certainly tore down its importance. A world once defined by borders and supervised by the static power of national governments, has been replaced by a more dynamic kind of transnational reality, in which the power is no longer connected to a single State, but takes the form of NGOs, banks and societies who rule by collecting global data. In this ever-changing scenario, little attention is paid to the fact that the map of the world is still hiding today a huge number of unrecognized States.

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Our “Atlas of Countries that Don’t Exist” is an imaginary journey in real territories that uses documentary photography to show the paradox of those portions of the world that self-declared their independence but – for different reasons – haven’t been recognized by the UN. By documenting and conceptualizing some aspects of the reality of these places,our work in progress aims at stimulating a reflection on the subject of personal and national identity, at a time in which this seems to us more than necessary. The physical place where one is born, where one is guarded after death, the family; these are elements defining our personal identity. On the other hand, the culture of a place (arts, monuments, traditions, food), its history and politics, the fauna and the flora, make up the identity of a “Nation”. That’s why we are dealing with tracing these elements in the 12 territories we have chosen to portray: Transnistria, North Cyprus, Catalunya, Republic of Artsakh, Isle of Man, Iraqi Kurdistan, Greenland, Somaliland, Sahrawi, Lakota, Taiwan and Ryukyu. Having already visited the first 3 territories, the Burn Emerging Fund would allow to carry on our research including the maximum variety of global situations into the Atlas, which we hope will take the form of a book and an interactive exhibition.

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Short Bio

Lavinia Parlamenti and Manfredi Pantanella met each other in Tahrir Square at the end of 2011, during the second wave of the so called Egyptian Revolution. Their collective research mainly focuses on geopolitical paradoxes and aims to combine documentary photography with the dimension of surreal and fantastic. Meeting point of their different personalities is, with no doubts, a common ironical approach to life (therefore to photography) and the great value that they give to imagination inside reality. Their first collective project, “Roundabout#Cyprus” (2012), has been transformed into a book and self-published in 2013. In the last years, Lavinia and Manfredi also realized several editorial works in Italy, Europe and the Middle East, collaborating with newspapers and magazines as LaRepubblica, Le Monde, The New York Times, Time, Internazionale, IoDonna, Vanity Fair, Panenka football magazine.

Daniel Kovalovszky – An Infernal Play

Daniel Kovalovszky

An Infernal Play

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

In 1945 Mátyás Rákosi, the leader of the Hungarian Communist Party, following the Soviet example, introduced a new Stalinist dictatorship in which human rights were severely violated. As a result of show trials, several hundred thousands of political convicts were sent to forced labor camps, were imprisoned and hundreds were executed based on fictional charges. In most cases the charges consisted in supplying data to western powers and secretly organizing a revolt against the people’s power. Having found the memoirs of the political prisoner a very dreadful and unknown world opened up for me. I decided to start a visual collection to shed light on a segment of what was happening during these obscure years that is unknown to many but still significant: the world of prisons in Hungary between 1945 and 1963.

1 - Forced labor camp in Recsk, Hungary. „Nothing else remains for you who enter, only hope!” - f4082675-1161-4874-8653-bae6174ba0fc_1

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4 - Böhring drill. - 93fa61f8-3108-44fc-af69-b3ca7a99f256_2

7 - Forced labor camp in Recsk, Hungary. - 1406998d-9332-4417-a158-409336fe72d6_1

8 - Portrait of Lajos Kovács. - c66ebdb3-d48a-4659-bcd4-02a35727a658_2

This world is disappearing unnoticed, and with the last old surviving witnesses and scenes. There is a time pressure for my work as there are fewer and fewer former prisoners who are still alive, and the places themselves also continuously disappear or change their function. The scenes will be holding the remembrance of the physical and mental suffering of thousands for a long time. This is the time to record what happened in the past for the next generations, because it will not be possible to do this in 3-4 years.

9 - Internment camp in Kistarcsa. - e7de50fb-04ac-4f42-91d3-e0364c578861_2

10 - Portrait of Árpád Halász. - 3d9cecf5-288f-4ddf-bf57-97741dc6a559_2

11 - Shower room in the Small Prison, Hungary. - 9db9ee3e-1c14-4857-8399-0c297e9c81d5_2

12 - Portrait of István Válóczy. - f42e2201-6b2f-4aab-aa15-7f26ffcbbb5c_2

13 - The inner facade of the Budapest Metropolitan Prison Service in Markó Street. - 64244bf7-2321-4359-8609-5ac4438afe55_2

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15 - The interior of a cell from the penalty unit ( Doberdo ) of the Prison in Vác, Hungary. - 8a54e017-6267-4e0e-aa86-b82d1ca474f1_1

16 - Portrait of János Straub. - 40cf54ef-3187-408c-8498-eb9fa53dea29_2

My work (2016-2019) is about the old survivors who spent long years in the ‘darkest’ prisons and labor camps of the dictatorship I documented. They live privately, hidden from publicity, carrying this heavy historical burden for which they no time left in their lives to process and they still haven’t received proper moral or financial compensation for their sufferings. I made long interviews with the old political prisoners which have significantly changed my personal approach to the 20th century history of Hungary. I hope my work will also become historically meaningful at one point and can show something to the future generations.

17 - Gallows in the Small Prison. - eefd774b-7816-48e8-8d03-2c64f079e4ab_2

18 - Pieces of the fence of the prisoners’ camp in Csolnok. - 86f712cf-1afa-4847-b0a1-83db2368b878_2

19 - Portrait of Ottó Koós Békei. - 5e88c373-061a-411f-93b8-440fe4ba7314_2

20 - Prison door of the time from Csillag Prison, Szeged - b132489e-7b4b-46a3-a257-fd48a576f6b6_1

21 - Toilet bowl in one of the cells of Small Prison. - 6a91c250-8322-46e9-86fb-1c9f5b7ccae9_2

22 - Portrait of József Vidi. - 53ae3bab-c370-473a-af66-90a8f5de3967_2

24 - Portrait of Ferenc Balogh. - 40f14c3d-269f-45ad-bb4d-549f8886791e_2

25 - Lower camp in Recsk, Hungary. - ef688194-8fb3-46a0-bc31-cb22a6fdcbc9_1

Short Bio

Daniel lives and works in Hungary. After graduating from high school, he studied portrait photography and photojournalism in Budapest and has been working as a photographer since 2001. Between 2001 and 2010, he made several documentary photography essays, mostly about aging in Hungary. Over the last few years, he has become deeply interested in landscape and portrait photography, working on long-term and conceptual projects. His works have been exhibited in several galleries and museums in Eastern Europe and the United Kingdom.

Ingmar Björn Nolting – Somaliland

Ingmar Björn Nolting

Somaliland

[ FUJIFILM/YOUNG TALENT AWARD 2019 FINALIST ]

The Horn of Africa is regarded as one of the continent’s most war-torn regions. Somalia in particular crashed into an ever deeper chaos of civil war and terror after the disempowerment of the Somali dictator Siad Barre in 1991. There is still no end in sight. Despite all resistance, however, an island of peaceful coexistence emerged in the north of the country. Somaliland. The borders of Somaliland go back to the area of the former British protectorate, which united with Italian-Somaliland to Somalia in 1960. Under the dictatorship of Barre, who seized power through a putsch in 1969, the inhabitants of the north felt increasingly deprived. The resulting fights of the guerilla group “Somaliland National Movement” against the Barre regime culminated in the overthrow of the Barre regime, the adoption of a declaration of independence and the founding of the Republic of Somaliland on 18 May 1991.

Zuhaib (16) and Zakiriye (16) pose on the training grounds of the New Somaliland Circus in Hargeisa, Somaliland. Since there is no circus culture in Somaliland, the shows of the young artists attract a lot of attention, especially in rural areas. The circus group performs in all regions of the country and uses the audience’s attention to educate about HIV, malaria, female genital mutilation and the risks of migration to Europe. Every year, young men die on the way, in the Mediterranean or are kidnapped in Libya. The circus thus becomes a tool of education and gives the young artists self-esteem and a mission.

A street scene in Boorama, Somaliland.

Ahmed (29) poses in the living room of his house in Hargeisa, Somaliland. He grew up in America and decided to return to the country of his parents two years ago in order to learn Somali and contribute to the development of the country. He met his wife in Hargeisa, married her and they had a child. Today he can no longer imagine moving back to America. Ahmed volunteers as a teacher in the “Family, career and community leaders of Somaliland” (FCCLS) project. FCCLS has made it its mission to educate young men and women beyond regular, often inadequate schooling to become responsible leaders who will later change and develop the country.

Nomads at an oasis near Biyo-Guure southeast of the port city of Berbera. Muna (11) and Mohamed (12), left in the picture, lead the 50 goats of their family every day to this small creed. In the aridity of the last years the creek dried up, 50 of their goats died. Approximately half of the inhabitants of Somaliland live as nomads outside the towns and villages, the livestock is their most important living basis. The continuing droughts of recent years have killed about 70 percent of Somaliland’s livestock and forced tens of thousands of families to flee to the cities’ IDP camps. Climate change has led to temperature changes in the Indian Ocean, pushing the wind and humid air that usually brings rain away from the mainland. The effects of climate change are increasingly affecting the entire Horn of Africa, leading to water scarcity, starvation and flight.

Moneychangers are preparing their stand in downtown Hargeisa, Somaliland for the day. The currency of Somaliland, the Somaliland Shilling, is not internationally recognized and cannot be changed or traded outside the country. During the noon prayer the moneychangers leave their stand to pray in a nearby mosque, leaving the money unattended. Due to the social control by the clan system, the country is largely safe. Thieves are usually quickly identified and arrested by the police, who have a strong presence in the city.

A street scene in “Istanbul” IDP camp on the outskirts of Hargeisa, Somaliland. More than 560 families live here, more than 200 of them used to live as nomads in the rural areas until the droughts of recent years destroyed their livelihoods. The IDP camps around Hargeisa are mainly supplied by international NGOs, but there are often shortages, too little access to water and food.

Ahmed (29) prays at the Dahabshiil Mosque in Hargeisa, Somaliland. Islam is the main religion of the country and determines the daily life of the population. After the end of the guerrilla war against the troops of the Somali dictator Siad Barre and the subsequent declaration of independence of Somaliland, large parts of the population filled the accrued political and social vacuum with religion and found hope in Islam.

Mohamed Arab Geele (52) posing for a portrait in the Veteran Association in Hargeisa, Somaliland. At the age of 18 he joined the guerilla group “Somaliland National Movement” (SNM) and fought against the troops of Siad Barre. The inhabitants of the north felt strongly disadvantaged under his dictatorship, in the north there was too little water, little food and no university. More and more inhabitants of the villages occupied by the SNM joined the SNM. In 1988, after a three-month fight for Hargeisa, Mohamed was injured by a bomb splinter in his knee. Barre’s troops bombed Hargeisa with fighter jets starting from the airport on the outskirts of Hargeisa. Since the clan elders proclaimed Somaliland’s independence in 1991, Mohamed has been hoping for international recognition.

A landscape near Laaleys, Somaliland. Due to the droughts, the soil hardens and the water can not be absorb by the soil when it rains. The water masses flow through the city and block roads.

Abdizamad (19) poses together with his mother Qali Rooble (50) in their room in Hargeisa, Somaliland. Abdizamad began his journey to Europe in July 2017 without telling his mother. He paid smugglers who gave him instructions by telephone, guided him through Ethiopia to Sudan and from there to Libya. In Libya, he was kidnapped, beaten and held in a house with other refugees. The traffickers demanded a ransom of 5500 dollars from his family. 15 of his family members joined forces and bought him free after five months. Abdizamad got on a boat that was supposed to take him across the Mediterranean to Europe after all. After two days at sea, the refugees were taken on board of an NGO ship and brought back to Libya. There he was detained for three months and then returned to Hargeisa. His family raised 2,000 dollars and he opened a small shop. Many of the young people in Somaliland do not see any perspective in their homeland. Unemployment, poverty and the hope for a better life drive them into the arms of the traffickers on their way to Europe.

During Ramadan, young men sit on the banks of the Gulf of Aden in Berbera, Somaliland, waiting for breaking the fast at sunset. Somaliland’s largest source of income comes from the port of Berbera. Somaliland mainly exports livestock to the Arab Gulf states.

During my work in Somaliland, I have focused on issues of migration, climate change and aspects of democracy and state-building to create a portrait of the often overlooked region, which has been seeking international recognition for 28 years and where nothing seems more important than the young peace. The project is ongoing.

Asiya kayd Zandan (56) poses on the grounds of the IDP camp of “Norwegian Refugee Council” in Burao, Somaliland. Asiya belongs to the minority group “Gabooye”, which is a kind of work caste. People who are attributed to the minority often work in manual, lower professions and are affected by discrimination. Asiya is divorced from her husband, who now lives in Mogadishu and does not support her.

Hassan (23), Abdiadiqadir (20) and Mohamed (19) pose on the campus of the Faculty of Agriculture and Environment of Amoud University in Boorama, Somaliland. The university was the first in the country and opened in 1998. Before independence, there was no university in northern Somalia. The university writes about its faculty in brochures: „At the moment, Agriculture in our country is subsistence agriculture (the production of enough food to meet just the needs of the farmer/agriculturalist and his/her family). Amoud university with the establishment of the faculty of agriculture wants to transform the current agricultural system into that of industrial agriculture, (often referred to as factory farming) long prevalent in “developed” nations and increasingly so elsewhere, which consists of obtaining financial income from the cultivation of land to yield produce, the commercial raising of animals (animal husbandry), or both.“

The military parade to celebrate the 28th year of Independence on 18 May 2019 in Hargeisa, Somaliland. On 18 May the city is in a state of emergency. All shops are closed and the people meet to celebrate together. Although the independence is not internationally recognized, the majority of the inhabitants support the separation from Somalia and are proud of their still young nation.

In this building in Burao, Somaliland, the clan elders met on 18 May 1991 to declare Somalilands independence from Somalia. Today this historic place is lying in ruins.

Viewers at a football match at the Djigdjiga Yar Stadium in Hargeisa, Somaliland.

Hinda Abdi Moamoud (23) poses on the site of the “Family, Career and Community leaders of Somaliland” (FCCLS) project. FFCCLS has made it its mission to educate young men and women beyond regular, often inadequate schooling to become responsible leaders who will later change and develop the country. Hindi wants to become a journalist and help improve the role of women in Somaliland.

A young man crosses the dried-up riverbed that divides the Somali capital Hargeisa into North and South.

Short Bio

Ingmar Björn Nolting (1995) lives and works as a freelance documentary photographer in Leipzig, Germany. After finishing his A-levels, he volunteered to help the homeless and blind. Since then, Ingmar’s photographic work has focused on social documentary issues, in which he sets his sights on people and their habitats, which have disappeared from the public eye. With a slower approach to his work process, he tries to understand how his protagonists think, feel and interact with each other, to absorb and understand what makes their lives. Ingmar is a founding member of „DOCKS Collective“ for humanistic photography. – Shortlist, Athens Photo Festival 2019 – Honorable Mention, New Generation Priza at Phmuseum Grant 2019 – Honorable Mention, PDNedu 2019, Portraiture – Winner, Emerge Visual Journalism Grant 2018 – Finalist, Vonovia Award of Photography 2018, Newcomer Award – Finalist of the LuganoPhotoDays Emerging Award, 2018 – Selected for Canon Masterclass, Visa pour l’image, Perpignan 2018 – Winner of Vonovia Award of Photography 2017, Newcomer Award – Shortlisted for Felix Schoeller Photo Award 2017, Best Emerging Photographer – Finalist for Kolga Award 2017, Newcomer Award – Nominated for Kolga Award 2017, Best Documentary – Awardee, German Youth Photography Award 2016 – Scholarship, granted by the German Ministry for Education and Research – Participant NikonNOOR Workshop, C/O Berlin

Turjoy Chowdhury – Genocide ’71- A Memory Map

Turjoy Chowdhury

Genocide ’71- A Memory Map

[ EPF 2019 FINALIST ]

Though still unrecognised internationally as genocide, many researchers have studied and different studies have mentioned different numbers of people killed in 1971 by the Pakistani Military with their collaborators. The government of Bangladesh puts the number at 3 million. 200,000 to 400,000 women were raped. It’s the price Bangladesh had to pay for its independence. The massacre and the subsequent war that ended with the birth of an independent Bangladesh, started with ‘Operation Search Light’ on 25th March, continued for 9 months. An estimated 7000 people died only on the first night. 10 million people fled and took refuge in India. Hindus, students, Awami League sympathisers, intellectuals and influential leaders were targeted and killed. Countless people were inhumanly tortured to extract information about freedom fighters. Hindu settlements were destroyed. The Pakistani Army and their supporters systematically abducted, killed and dumped bodies in different killing sites.

Bengali victims were hog-tied and thrown into the Rupsha river from the Custom Ghat jetty by Pakistani soldiers and Bihari collaborators stationed at the nearby Khulna Circuit House, as reported by survivor and eyewitness Shakti Pada Sen.

The Khulna Railway Station was the only way to go to North Bengal for thousands of people from Khulna, Faridpur and Barisal. Pakistani soldiers lay waiting for passengers, robbed them of valuables, cut their stomachs open and dumped them into the river from the attached steamer jetty. On 5th April 1971, Bihari collaborators killed railway station guard Bari and 5 others. Workers of the railway station and the steamer jetty were killed as well and skeletons were later found at an abandoned storage behind the railway station. Women were raped at the storage house, which was used as a torture cell as well.

Resident Bengalis of Khulna Rail Colony were killed by Pakistani soldiers and non-Bengali collaborators and their bodies buried here and there. The Railway Colony served as a killing field and mass grave. Khulna Station Road was a popular place for people to buy kerosene from – during an air-raid in December, passerby and kerosene buyers took shelter in the railway colony. Soon after, Pakistanis captured and killed them, dumping their bodies. One melted body was later identified to be that of detective Abul Kashem of Khulna Police Station.

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The Hayne Railway School, adjacent to the Khulna Railway Station, was used as a torture cell and a killing field, with classrooms in the old building used in the torturing and killing of Bengali victims passing through the railway station. The pond inside the school premises were used to dispose of the bodies.

Charer Haat has a jetty on the Bhairab river that was an important part of commerce and transport for the area. After 26th March, there was a drastic drop in the number of people traversing the waters around Charer Haat – till 8th May, when a launch carrying hundreds of passengers set off for Khulna from Narail. On board was Muslim League General Secretary Advocate Md Ayub Hossa and his family. When the launch neared the Charer Haat jetty, two gunboats took up position under Pakistani naval commander Gulzar’s command, and forced the passengers to disembark and line up. Under the pretense of checking for arms, the people on the jetty were robbed of their valuables – Ayub Hossain tried to convince the soldiers to not fire on innocent civilians, but the Pakistani soldiers shot and killed every single person. A further five launches were stopped in a similar fashion, and nearly 600 people were killed. Eyewitness Masud somehow managed to escape and inform his relative Jalal Akbar, who was in the Navy at the time – Jalal took locals and dug a mass grave for the people killed at the Charer Haat jetty. The Charer Haat story was published on The Daily Bangla on 17th February 1972.

Forest Ghat was a jetty next to Rupsha river. People usually never moved around the area at night, only a few people used it during the day – during the liberation war use of this jetty was stopped out of fear of the Pakistanis and their local collaborators. As a result this jetty was always under control of the Pakistanis. Everyday, around 20 people were beheaded, gutted and thrown into the river. Near the jetty was a ration store maintained by the local police – around 30 policemen and their office help were stationed here. Kamrul Haque Chowdhury, then an employee of the office, said that the Pakistanis would frequently force the people stationed there to collaborate in killing their victims – they would grasp the arms of the victims tightly while the Pakistani soldiers bayonetted them, kicking them into the river after they were done. Abdur Rob and Shahadat, employees of the police ration store, recounted details of the killings when they returned to office – during the day, at least 6-7 people were killed, the numbers going up many-fold during the night. The horrific killings rendered the wooden jetty slick and slippery because of the blood of victims – eyewitnesses report countless sandals and shoes scattered about the jetty, with countless bodies floating in the river like weeds. The blood-curdling sound of the people being killed and the dying screams of the Pakistanis’ victims were heard by Judge Khondoker Nessarul Haque, resident of a nearby bungalow. Upon requesting the commanding officer to not kill people near the courthouse, Judge Nessarul Haqye was threatened and his request denied – he fell seriously sick and died of a heart attack on 30th May. The next day, his employee Syed Kaiser Ali died in a similar fashion – peon Abdur Rouf died of a heart attack as well a few days after that.

Maqsudur Rahman is an eyewitness and a survivor of Forest Ghat mass killing.

Adjacent to the courthouse near Forrest Ghat was Khulna Circuit House, commonly referred to as “Helipad”. In 1971, this served as an interrogation cell for the Pakistani military – people were brought from all over the place and held at Khulna Circuit House to be tortured, raped and killed. In the name of interrogation, the Pakistanis dealt out inhumane torture, with a pre-determined verdict as justice – death. Victims sentenced to death would be carried out to Forrest Ghat, where they would be killed. The Pakistani soldiers used to tie up and hang people from the helipad as well. Abdus Salam Sardar, then employee of Rupali Bank, had this to say – “You just needed to look towards the helipad to see the signs of torture. One day I saw a child of no more than 12 or 13, hung upside-down from the helipad, being beaten. His body was covered with blood and he was either dead or unconscious. Countless people were tortured in similar fashion, with new torture techniques implemented frequently.”

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These killing sites, mass graves and torture cells are scattered all over the country. Unfortunately, very few obvious visual evidence of this horrors have been documented, as foreign journalists were forced to leave the country and most of the prominent local journalists were killed or were forced to go in hiding. After independence, only some of the major mass graves were protected and declared as part of national heritage and other places have changed drastically. This project reveals those horrific stories by exploring these mass graves, killing fields and torture cells through visuals, captured of their present condition with the goal of finding traces of the past in a conceptual manner and mapping the genocide. Portraits and testimonies of eyewitness and survivors, archival letters, documents, articles, family and other artefacts or objects connected directly or indirectly to the genocide is also included as authentic evidence.

Munshi Siddiqur Rahman was an influential person with political affiliations with the Awami League party, and as such, his family home – widely known to locals as “Munshibari” – was a place of interest in the Goalkhali region. Located east of the Jessore-Khulna highway and next to the railway, Munshibari was one of the most important incidents of mass killings in Khulna. Munshi Siddiqur led the Bengalis in the region through the communal violence that broke out during March 27 – the Biharis in the region, led by Motiullah, wanted to punish Siddiqur for his role in organising the Bengalis in the region. Motiullah thus devised a plan – since Siddiqur was the only politically involved Bengali who did not flee after Khulna fell in the hands of the Pakistanis, Motiullah approached him on the morning of 6th April with a proposal of keeping the peace in the locality. Accompanying Motiullah was Mohammad Ali, Farid Miah, Musgunni Ghulam. In the meeting, both parties agreed to keep the peace and Siddiqur was put in charge of distributing and storing wheat as relief for the affected people of the area. Siddiqur then met with locals loyal to him on the 7th of April in order to devise a distribution plan. Around 3 PM, alerted by the sound of approaching soldiers, Siddiqur took some people and escaped out of the back of the house. Under command of Major Babar, the Pakistani soldiers surrounded the house with their vehicles – sitting in those vehicles were Motiullah, Ezaz, Tofayel and Harun. Upon entering the house and being unable to find Siddiqur, the Pakistanis started killing the people they found inside – they bayonetted Christian caretaker Shontu in a balcony and bound everyone else. The 12 people who were found inside were marched to the pond beside the house and killed by firing. The Munshibari family graveyard lists all the casualties of 7th April.

Letter signed by Sheikh Mujib sent to Ataur Rahman, father of Munshibari victim Habibur Rahman, acknowledging the contributions of the victim towards the liberation of Bangladesh and his loss of life. The only document acknowledging the Munshibari killing, the letter, issued on 6th April 1972, also contains proof of financial compensation provided to the victim’s family, amounting to 2000 Taka.

14 - Genocide '71-14 - 8286c649-5d06-4614-945b-53054d9e4373

The Khulna Newsprint Mill was established by the Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation in 1959 on 53 acres of land in Khalishpur and was the first newsprint mill in what is now Bangladesh. The mill served as a killing field for the Pakistani military junta. 28th March onwards, most of the workers and their families living in the mill colony left the area, but were urged to come back and continue working through radio broadcasts that assured workers that the mill was safe and secure. The radio broadcasts were part of a trap set by the Pakistanis to try to lure as many people to the mill as possible – soldiers lying in wait picked off the returning workers one by one and killed them, some of the bodies were dumped in an identified mass grave at the mill colony and in the nearby Bhairab river. Soldiers from the adjacent Titumir Naval Base were involved in the killing – the isolated mill later served as an extended base of operations for the Pakistanis. Eyewitness account by Abdul Malek Sardar.

Established on 55 acres of land in Khalishpur, Khulna, in 1954, the Platinum Jubilee Jute Mill was the scene of a horrific ritual perpetrated by the Pakistani military and their local collaborators in 1971. Similar to the trap set by the Pakistanis at Khulna Newsprint Mill, workers were lured back to the area by radio broadcasts asking people to return to their posts – once caught, the Bengali workers were forced to sit in front of the boiler as they were tied and bagged by their captors. With the fire of the boiler burning in front of their eyes their last sight, the workers were shoved into the same pit they themselves had once fed with coal – feet first, with the rest of their bodies following suit. The Pakistani soldiers made sure the deaths of those 56 workers, some named Harun, Hemayet and Aziz among others, were slow and painful – their screams reverberating around the factory. The gruesome story of what happened at the Platinum Jubilee mill was published in The Daily Bangla newspaper on 17th February, 1972.

The Pakistani military turned the Crescent Jute Mills into a killing field like they did with other factories in Khulna. People brought in trucks to the jute storage facility in trucks were led, blindfolded and hands tied, to the jute cutting machines inside. They were beheaded at these machines, some impaled on spikes used to tear jute apart. The body of the Central Excise Inspector was cut into pieces and hung visibly. The Customs Officers Quarters were turned into torture cells, the drains beside the building used to take the blood away to the Bhairab river, in which most of the bodies were dumped. Later on, after the war, skeletons were discovered in the mill area. Ferdousi Priyobashini witnessed the massacre of Bengalis at the hands of the Pakistanis and their collaborators, and compared the beheading of workers with the jute cutting machines to death by guillotine.

The Peoples Jute Mill was a killing field operated by the Pakistani military where factory workers were lured back in a similar fashion to other instances. They were tied, bagged in jute, and tortured to death. Abdul Khalek Hawlader bore witness to the atrocities at the Peoples Jute Mill.

19 - Genocide '71-18 - cfa3a107-5652-44ec-b44c-69dd6c9c5324_1

The photograph is of a recent grave in the local graveyard, in a place that is suspected to be the old mass grave. 300 Biharis lived in Deara village and was a prominent spot for anti-Bengali collaborators. A Rajakar camp was established here in August 1971 with Shawkat as the commander. Around the end of August, the Rajakars and the Biharis, commanded by Shawkat, perpetrated vicious attacks against the people of the village. Houses were looted, people killed and the village was set on fire. After the killings, the surviving locals buried the bodies scattered around the place in a mass grave.

Chuknagar is located west of Dumuria upazila – adjacent to Khulna, Shatkhira and Jessore, with highways from all three regions meeting at Chuknagar. Chuknagar bazaar was a common transit point for people going to India – the adjacent Bhadra and Ghangrail rivers, now dried up, were commonly used waterways as well. Between 19th May night and 20th May morning, around a hundred thousand religious minorities gathered at Chuknagar as a result of vicious attacks by the Pakistanis on 19th May at the nearby Botiyaghata locale. On 20th May two trucks arrived down the highway from Shatkhira and the mass killings at Chuknagar started around 10-11 AM.

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