Jharkhand is the heart of the indian industry. Most of the raw material of the Indian subcontinent is pull out this land. Coal business is the major source of income of hundred of thousand families. Working condition are terrible but nobody will complain. At least they have a job. During heat season, the coal region of Dhanbad seems to be the hell on earth. Underground fire as a consequence of bad mining habit emerge at the surface. The rainy seasons put and end for a few months to this flames coming out of the ground. Quickly the precipitations transform the land that turn in sticking black mud. The danger rise for the workers as the water infiltrates quickly the underground galleries of the coalmines.
Thomas Vanden Driessche was born in Leuven in 1979. Holder of a master's degree in journalism and a master's degree in humanitarian management, he has been working for the United Nation Development program in Morocco, for the Belgian Red Cross and for the International Committee of the Red Cross Delegation to the European Union and the NATO. Freelance photographer working regularly for the Belgian news magazine Le Vif L'Express since 2010, Thomas joined Out Of Focus in February 2011 and his since early 2012 a nominee photograph in the french agency Picturetank.
Strongly attached to the "New Documentary Tradition", his photography is often frontal and tries to split up reality with a special emphasis on portrait.
His most recent photographic series tackle Contemporary India and its fast growing economy. Thomas is also working on a long-term project on some forms of trivialization of violence in Europe.
Rewarded with a "Parole Photographique" price in 2009 and five PX3 awards in 2010-2011, his work has been recently displayed in Paris (MK2 Library, Gare de l'Est, Galerie Dupon), in Lille (Transphotographiques 2011) and in Brussels (Palais des Beaux-Arts, The Egg). In 2011, Thomas was invited to be a jury member of the prestigious "Visa d'or Humanitaire" awards.
Thomas lives and works for the moment in Brussels
