LAUNCHING BILINGUAL PORTFOLIO SITE FOR THE ARAB DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY PROGRAM
Fathi Hawas
The Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (AFAC), the Prince Claus Fund (PCF), and Magnum Foundation are pleased to announce the release of the Arab Documentary Photography Program’s new Arabic-English website, featuring the rich body of nearly 60 projects produced since the program’s launch in 2014.
The new ADPP website presents a special highlight on the program’s sixth cohort (2019-2020) of documentary photographers who recently completed the program:
In her photo project I Was Younger Yesterday, Yemeni photographer Thana Faroq looks at the lives in limbo of asylum seekers whose refugee statuses were denied by The Netherlands, and are fighting the threat of deportation, stuck in a never-ending waiting mode.
Thana Faroq
A Permanent Wound by Egyptian photographer and visual artist Somaya Abdelrahman, is a personal documentary journey addressing the subject of female genital mutilation in Egypt and beyond. Herself a survivor, Somaya explores the myths and misconceptions that justify the continuation of this ritual despite its criminalization through a law enactment in 2008.
Sudanese visual storyteller Salih Basheer’s social photo story, The Home Seekers, reflects the lack of belonging felt by Sudanese refugees in Cairo, and the racial discrimination they experience every day in public places, in public transportation, or walking down the streets.
Salih Basheer
Research-based visual artist and photographer Mohammed Alkouh questions the rampant urban development of the past decades in Kuwait through his project Failaka is a Beautiful Island, realizing with time that Failaka Island was a metaphor of a generational trauma– a trauma that was passed from his mother’s generation to his own.
I Have Been Here Before by Egyptian photographer and visual storyteller Dania Hany, is a personal narrative that leads the viewer on an exploration of Dania’s family roots.
Another personal narrative from Egypt, Margined in a Supposed Green by Fathi Hawas is a huis clos representation of his own experience producing music along with other youths in the peripheral town of Kafr El Dawar.
Staying within the personal realm, De l’air by Lola Khalfa from Algeria offers the interpretations of a little girl, from snippets of memory, attempting to understand the path and choices of her family, thereby weaving a story of family, history, and gender.
Lola Khalfa
Bahraini photographer Mariam Alarab draws an intimate portrait of her country in But Hope is Born from the Suffering Womb.
Lebanese documentary photographer Manu Ferneini’s project, A Bigger Room, portrays the symbolic aspect of violence faced by migrant domestic workers in Lebanon, particularly in the private realm.
The ADPP is an initiative that provides support and mentorship to photographers from across the Arab region. AFAC and the Prince Claus Fund, in partnership with Magnum Foundation, established the ADPP in 2014 to stimulate compelling work by Arab photographers working across a range of experimental styles of storytelling.The ADPP ha embarked on its 7th cycle in 2020 with a new group of 11 documentary photographers from 6 Arab countries.