Children Playing On Eid Morning, Kabul - Limited Edition of 25 Print

I lived in Kabul, Afghanistan, for over three years while making a feature documentary film called Angels Are Made Of Light. While there it became my habit to take a stills camera on our days off from filming and go through the old Kabul neighborhoods south of the Kabul river to make portraits and panoramic images. Street pictures. Whenever I made a portrait of someone in the neighborhood, I would always make sure to print out a copy at my favorite photo shop near Shar-e Nouw and hand-deliver it to that person back in their neighborhood a few days later. It was always easy to find people again because I was literally carrying their picture, and everyone in the neighborhood knows everyone else. Soon there was a steady stream of people asking to have their portraits made - more than I could have ever accommodated. It was great for them - many never had a good picture of themselves made before - and wonderful for me, since I loved making the images. Over time I was able to gain enough acceptance to make an unique series of documentary images in the old neighborhoods of Kabul, at a particular historical moment, the end of the Karzai era. Of all the places I have photographed, Afghanistan was - perhaps surprisingly - one of the most open, once people started to know you. I think the key to working there was to spend an enormous amount of time getting to know everyone in a particular area. Also, I always worked with very reliable local people as my guides and interpreters, and this was the fundamental point that kept me safe and productive during the years I spent in Afghanistan. I encourage those who would like to know more about Afghanistan to rent or buy my Angels Are Made Of Light documentary on iTunes/AppleTV - it is an immersion into the world of this photograph. This image of children playing on Eid morning in Kabul is special to me because it instantly recalls the atmosphere of that neighborhood. On the south side of the Kabul River, in the middle of the city, there is a series of old neighborhoods between Jada-e-Maiwand and Asheqan Arafan. This was an area that suffered terribly during the Afghan civil war in the 1990s. Many of the buildings were destroyed, houses smashed and lives scattered by the artillery and rockets that had been fired between areas of Kabul held by rival armed groups until the Taliban took over in 1995. Now in this neighborhood, two decades after the arrival of the American military in Afghanistan, one can still see the ruins of the civil war strewn about. This was one corner where the houses looked intact from the past era. There is a water well and a mosque facing out into an irregular courtyard at an intersection of archways and paths. There was a large leafy tree with spreading branches. I filmed and photographed in this particular courtyard several times in various seasons. It was October, 2013, and Eid morning. I had been in Afghanistan since the autumn of 2011, so by then I felt comfortable walking around in the city, and my photography had improved. I had begun making large panoramic images that combine many exposures. But in this image, I decided to make it a one-snap, one-picture - the old-fashioned kind of photograph - with my favorite 24mm lens. I wanted to inscribe the full scene taking place, and also to convey a sense of the space and the character of the neighborhood in a single exposure. It was quite early, and there was this awning coming down from the building on the left that gave my lens shelter from direct sunlight while allowing me to gather up all that delicious backlight from the low autumn sun. The awning itself is a thing of beauty, with both translucent limon edges and reflected sunlight from the cobblestones undulating from the burnt orange tarpaulin material in the center. On Eid morning it's traditional for all the kids to get new clothes and gifts - usually money and toys. Here you can see the boys are wearing their new clothes and playing with their toy guns - a favorite toy of Afghan boys in Kabul, and an echo of the decades of war that have ravaged Afghanistan. The beauty of a moment like this comes when all of the subjects in the photograph spontaneously organize themselves within the frame. Out of a chaotic scene suddenly a visual harmonic arrangement emerges - just for an instant. As a photographer sometimes you must pick your spot and hold your ground for a minute until the momentary pattern unfolds. This is the most engaging sort of photograph to make. As with observational filmmaking, it puts one continuously in the instantaneous present, but also always looking over the shoulder of the near future - of what is about to happen. To be ready when the visual future arrives - and it's all happening continuously - now, now, now and again now. A never-ending series of engraved moments that one really only sees - or is deeply aware of - when one is in the process of making pictures. The picture-making process slows time down to a stop and provides enough space to consider how things are. I enjoy images that are un-staged and authentically documentary in nature. Just as I struggle to record real life, unscripted moments in my documentaries, I am interested in making photographs that register real life as it is happening and allow the viewer into the scene. Even when I am making a portrait I am trying to capture not just the personality of the person, but also them at that moment, however they may be. Often in a documentary film I edit out material where people acknowledge the camera - I do this because it's easier for the viewer to feel immersed in the world of the film if the camera is invisible - and in my documentary films that's the feeling I want. But in photography, although I enjoy making perfectly candid observational images, I also like pictures of people in which they observe the observer. The most arresting pictures of people are often those in which we experience the sensation of being looked at by them directly, as if there were no lens, no camera, no photographer and no photograph, but rather a real connection as between two humans through a direct gaze across open space. This effect works for me in a photograph or a painting - an unmoving image - better than in motion, as in a film. And for good reason: In a still, if someone meets your gaze, they'll be meeting it always and forever. As you recall, when François Truffaut zooms in on the face of Jean-Pierre Léaud in the final shot of The 400 Blows, it is a still image they are zooming into, not a moving image - the moment when Jean-Pierre Léaud makes eye contact with the audience. Still images are admirably suited for this, because they will always win in a staring contest. The idea behind all of my work in Afghanistan and the other West Asian countries where I have lived over the past decades has always been to express to a broader audience the beautiful humanity that I found all around me. The people in these countries have suffered greatly through various wars and conflicts, but their character remains stronger than ever. My films and photographs are love poems to my friends and all the people I met and worked with, who kindly collaborated with me in a shared pursuit. A portion of my income goes to support people I have filmed and worked with in the past, their education and the upkeep of their families. This image is a limited edition of 25 27 x 16 inches, which includes a 2-inch white border The printed image is 23 x 12 inches Signed limited edition print Rendered on museum quality Hahnemühle Photo Rag paper, made by a fine art printer using archival inks in the United States. About the paper: Hahnemühle papers are designed for archival storage are acid-free, which makes them highly resistant to ageing. The paper is also lignin-free, which means it should consist of linters or alpha-cellulose. Lignin-free paper does not yellow.

Print:Giclee on Fine Art Paper

Size:12 W x 8 H x 0.1 D in

Size with Frame:17.25 W x 13.25 H x 1.2 D in

Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.