Lukas Birk

Photo Peshawar delves into the largely unexplored culture of photography in the Pakistani frontier city of Peshawar from the 1940s to the present day. Photography in Peshawar has historically and culturally found itself caught between the creative and conservative forces of both India and Afghanistan. Variously borne of British rule, the Partition of India, war in neighboring Afghanistan, the rise of the Taliban, local tribal law, a historical prohibition on image-making in Islam, the practice of purdah (the veiling of females in public), and the regional movie industry, there is a tangible stress between the practice of photography as it is pursued and the culture in which it is lived.

With nearly hundred and fifty photographs, each more stunning than the earlier, ‘photography as craft is what this splendid volume examines—photography at the living, bleeding intersection of culture, war, frontier and fantasy, the sheer human inventiveness that results from a magnificent and tragic brew of technology and history.'

Published in association with PIX Publishing… (plus d'informations)

The book presents a record of unseen images from shaming ceremonies held during the Cultural Revolution in Chongqing, China. The prosecuted people depicted in the book were dissidents, intellectuals and opponents of the Communist Party who were publicly punished during the violent period of the late 1960s.

Records like these are very rare and have not yet found their way into public discussions in China or internationally. As only official photographers were allowed to document these prosecutions, it is almost impossible to find such images in private albums. This led to the idea to collage the images with Chinese photo albums that were produced in the same period and were widely used by members of the public to keep their memories alive. These kind of albums are often beautifully illustrated with ideas of prosperity and the development of society.

The images were given to me by an anonymous person in Chongqing, in 2015. We decided to publish the book with a very basic introduction to the time period in English and Chinese, hoping to provide space for interpreting the images further.

Clearly, the Cultural Revolution is not the only violent period that is not found in private photo albums or is still actively suppressed from public discussions by governing powers. Post-World War I & II colonial atrocities, for example, are still hardly to be found in Western history books and very rarely talked about in public.

This book is not about facts but rather offers an idea on how to bring impersonal images of violence into a personal space of discussion… (plus d'informations)