Ellen Wallace
Zalmai for the UNHCR, 2009, DRC
I spend a lot of time looking at excellent photos, but every now and again a photographer stands so far above the crowd that he or she really makes me pause. Zalmaï Ahad, whose photos for the UNHCR of Democratic Republic of Congo refugees feature in our GenevaLunch article on the Gimme Shelter fundraising effort, are simply beautiful. Refugees photos can too often be heart-wrenching but the people seem distant from our comfortable, civilized lives: Zaimat makes his people very real for us.
He may be less well known than filmmaker Ben Affleck, who is also working with UNHCR on the project, but his photos are so arresting that the images are likely to stay with some of us longer than the short film made by Affleck, however good.
Zalmaï Ahad is, in addition, a neighbour: he is part of a group of photographers based in Nyon, the Association Focale, and he studied photography in Lausanne and Yverdon. He is very much also the product of his own refugee background. As a 15-year-old he fled his native Afghanistan when the Russians invaded. His work, well worth exploring on his web site, includes photo reporting from Afghanistan, Cuba and the DRC, among other parts of the world.
GenevaLunch, 14 April 2009.
Filed under: Media
Tags: Afghanistan, Ben Affleck, Congo, DRC, photography, refugees, UNHCR, Zalmai
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