Return, Aghanistan

• Photographer
  Zalmai, United States
• Website
  http://www.aperture.org

Following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 two young brothers set out on a grueling trek from their home in Kabul, fleeing the invaders and crossing the border, exhausted and now homeless, into neighboring Pakistan. Fifteen-year old Zalma? would go on to become a Swiss citizen and a photographer working for such prestigious publications as The New York Times Magazine, Time, and Newsweek. In 1996, sixteen years after leaving his homeland, Zalma? returned to war-torn Afghanistan under the auspices of a Swiss newspaper and the International Committee of the Red Cross to photograph victims of landmines. He went back a second time a few years later to document refugee camps.

In 2001, after the fall of the Taliban and at the start of a precarious peace, Zalma? returned once again with the support of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The result is Return, Afghanistan (Aperture, September 2004), a dramatic and personal account of the beginnings of reconstruction in a country still threatened by factional violence, poverty, and the resurgence of the Taliban. In the essay that accompanies the photographs, Zalma? remarks on his switch to using color film for the first time in his personal work. It was as if, he says, ?colors were returning and ? they would be those of a peaceful Afghanistan.?
In this powerful body of work, Zalma? documents the relationship between the march of international politics and the daily struggles of life in Afghanistan. He captures breathtaking landscapes of plains and mountains but juxtaposes such grand panoramas with scenes in markets, schools, and tents where people are caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday living. He also photographs gatherings of local councils and meetings with Hamid Karzai, leader of the transitional government. Zalma? writes, ?my project tries to capture the resilience of a people who have rarely known peace, their optimism in the face of overwhelming odds and the very real worry that the country remains on the knife-edge and could easily slip back into a nightmare from which it is still trying to escape.? Return, Afghanistan reflects a long-awaited homecoming and hope for the future.

Zalma? fled Afghanistan with the first wave of 600,000 people displaced by war in 1980. That number swelled to over six million in 1990 and, despite three million returns, remains one of the highest in the world. His work thus addresses one of the most pressing problems of our century. Its power, however, lies not in grand statements but in images of the particularity of destruction, of its effect on ordinary people who, in picture after picture, acknowledge in gestures and glances the man behind the camera.
Zalma? was born in Kabul in 1964. He studied photography at the School of Creative Photography in Lausanne, and at the Center for Professional Education in Photography, Yverdon. He has worked as a freelance photographer for various publications and organizations including The New York Times Magazine, D-Repubblica, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Le Temps. He has traveled widely, covering stories on topics such as Tibetan and Sudanese refugees, the 40th anniversary of the Cuban revolution, and the plight of Central Africa?s Pygmees whose land is being destroyed through deforestation. His work has appeared in numerous group and solo shows, including an exhibition on victims of anti-personnel mines produced by the ICRC in twelve European cities. He has won several awards, among them the prestigious World Press Joop Swoop Master Class award (1997). He divides his time between Geneva and New York and returns to Afghanistan as often as possible to continue his work of documenting a society undergoing reconstruction.

Aperture?a not-for-profit foundation dedicated to advancing photography in all its forms?was founded in 1952 by six gifted individuals: photographers Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, Barbara Morgan, and Minor White; historian Beaumont Newhall; and writer/curator Nancy Newhall. With scant resources, these visionary artists created a new periodical, Aperture magazine, to serve photographers and photography enthusiasts worldwide. As the medium flourished, so too did Aperture Foundation, expanding to include the subsequent publication of books (over four hundred to date); limited-edition photographs and portfolios; artist lectures and symposia; and a traveling exhibitions program that since its inception has presented over one hundred exhibitions at major museums and cultural institutions throughout the United States and abroad.