[ ] · · Simon Norfolk, Afghanistan

[fani]

Portrait of Simon Norfolk by Mohammed Khalil at White Light Photo Studio in Kabul.



Biography

Simon was born in Lagos, Nigeria in 1963 and educated in England finishing at Oxford and Bristol Universities with a degree in Philosophy and Sociology. After leaving the Documentary Photography course in Newport, South Wales he worked for far-left publications specializing in work on anti-racist activities and fascist groups, in particular the British National Party. In 1994 he gave up photojournalism in favor of landscape photography.


His book “For Most Of It I Have No Words” about the landscapes of the places that have seen Genocide was published in 1998 to wide approval including praise from the novelist Anne Michaels and Louise Arbour, Chief Prosecutor of the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague. The piece was exhibited around the UK including the Imperial War Museum as an Impressions Gallery (York) touring show and in Europe including the influential Nederlands Foto Institut. The work is now a British Council Touring Exhibition traveling to venues as far removed as the Holocaust Museum in Houston and Photosynkyria (Thessaloniki). His piece “Long time, No see” about Native America was shown at Camerawork, San Francisco in 2001 and the current work from Afghanistan has been shown already at pARTs Gallery Minneapolis, The Griffin Center for Photography in Boston and Galerie Martin Kudlek (Cologne). A raft of exhibitions of the work from Afghanistan called ‘time|bomb’ will take place in September at Open Eye Gallery (Liverpool); Side Gallery (Newcastle); Hereford Photography Festival; Trace Gallery (Weymouth); Photofusion Gallery (London); The British Council (London); the Architecture Museum in Frankfurt and Blue Sky Gallery in Portland, Oregon.


His work is held by private collectors and in the collections of The Portland Art Museum, Oregon; the British Council and the Houston Museum of Fine Arts and the Weismann Art Museum in Minneapolis.


In 2002, Simon won a Silver Award from the Association of Photographers and his Afghan work won the European Publishing Award meaning the book will appear as a book in September 2002 in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian language editions












Afghanistan

The photography in this project was all shot on a cherrywood and brass field camera that uses 'plates' of film 5 inches by 4 inches. This is what gives the photography its great detail and smooth tonalities. It is a cumbersome camera to use; always needing a tripod and a black cloth over my head so that I can focus on the glass screen. The camera attracted a certain amount of derision from the many photojournalists in Kabul who thought it resembled a circus act. However I have often found that the best defence in difficult situations is look like a harmless prick. The camera looks like an antique and this makes people with whom I canít communicate appreciate quickly that I am probably not the CIA or some other threat, nor am I probably worth robbing or kidnapping.The camera also accords with the ordinary Afghan's idea of what a camera should be, since it resembles the cameras of the itinerant street portrait photographers that one sees in every town.




Wrecked Ariana Afghan Airlines jets at Kabul Airport pushed into a mined area at the edge of the apron.





Collapsed avalanche arcading along the road up to the Salang Tunnel. This road through the Hindu Kush was a vital supply line for the warring parties and saw a huge amount of traffic.





Old biplane on a display plinth at the Exhibition Grounds in Kabul. Fighting birds are a source of great pride to Afghan men, but were banned by the Taliban as un-Islamic.





The brickworks at Hussain Khil, east of Kabul. With massive rebuilding taking place in Kabul, the demand for new bricks has soared.




Bullet-scarred outdoor cinema at the Palace of Culture in the Karte Char district of Kabul.





Bullet-scarred apartment building and shops in the Karte Char district of Kabul. This area saw fighting between Hikmetyar and Rabbani and then between Rabbani and the Hazaras.




Track of destroyed Taliban tank at Farm Hada military base near Jalalabad.




ეს არის ძAAAAAAAAAAN მაგარი !!!
Former teahouse in a park next to the Afghan Exhibition of Economic and Social Achievements in the Shah Shahid district of Kabul. Balloons were illegal under the Taliban, but now balloon-sellers are common on the streets of Kabul providing cheap treats for children.

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