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In this birthday party portrait, teenage girls celebrate in secret in Afghanistan
In this birthday party portrait, teenage girls celebrate in secret in Afghanistan
The photograph could have been taken at any birthday party: three girls in dresses standing side-by-side in a living room, balloons and streamers strung up around an entryway. The subjects could be friends or sisters, each with long brown hair that falls past their waists.
But with their faces turned away from the camera, there’s a reason for their anonymity, and a deeper significance to their unveiled hair. The girls live in Kabul under the increasingly watchful eyes of the Taliban, who returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021 when US troops abruptly withdrew from the country. After initially pledging to honor women’s rights, the Taliban has nearly erased women from public life, sending girls behind closed doors, even to mark occasions such as these.
Taken earlier this year by Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Kiana Hayeri, the portrait is just one of many images from a six-month body of work showing the lives of Afghan women as the Taliban has continually stripped them of their basic rights, including requiring veiling in public and banning the sounds of their voices, as well as prohibiting them from secondary school, much of the workforce and many social spaces. Working with French researcher Mélissa Cornet, the pair’s collaborative report “No Woman’s Land” received funding from the Carmignac Photojournalism Award and is exhibiting in Paris this month as a mix of photographs, videos and collaborative art with Afghan girls.
Hayeri and Cornet traveled to seven provinces and met with more than 100 women during the first half of the year for the report. They met in 2018 in Kabul and have both lived in Afghanistan on and off for several years. Hayeri was present during the chaos of the US military’s withdrawal, and Cornet returned soon after.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/13/style/kiana-hayeri-snap-teenage-girls-afghanistan/index.html
The photograph could have been taken at any birthday party: three girls in dresses standing side-by-side in a living room, balloons and streamers strung up around an entryway. The subjects could be friends or sisters, each with long brown hair that falls past their waists.
But with their faces turned away from the camera, there’s a reason for their anonymity, and a deeper significance to their unveiled hair. The girls live in Kabul under the increasingly watchful eyes of the Taliban, who returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021 when US troops abruptly withdrew from the country. After initially pledging to honor women’s rights, the Taliban has nearly erased women from public life, sending girls behind closed doors, even to mark occasions such as these.
Taken earlier this year by Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Kiana Hayeri, the portrait is just one of many images from a six-month body of work showing the lives of Afghan women as the Taliban has continually stripped them of their basic rights, including requiring veiling in public and banning the sounds of their voices, as well as prohibiting them from secondary school, much of the workforce and many social spaces. Working with French researcher Mélissa Cornet, the pair’s collaborative report “No Woman’s Land” received funding from the Carmignac Photojournalism Award and is exhibiting in Paris this month as a mix of photographs, videos and collaborative art with Afghan girls.
Hayeri and Cornet traveled to seven provinces and met with more than 100 women during the first half of the year for the report. They met in 2018 in Kabul and have both lived in Afghanistan on and off for several years. Hayeri was present during the chaos of the US military’s withdrawal, and Cornet returned soon after.
" After initially pledging to honor women’s rights"
Promises are just words.
7 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
Fuck the Patriarchy!
You know, Cherokee women were leaders in their own right and could also be warriors. Lineage was matrilineal.
The Irish called them weak because of it.
I thought we were moving forward as a species...thought we could do better...
I am not fond of this timeline 
