Kristina Steiner

 

SANGUMA

I haven’t seen the real thing with my naked eye. The belief in black magic revives from ancient times with an incredible outbreak of violence in Papua New Guinea. Ancient beliefs in sorcery or Sanguma are being catapulted into the modern age, driving incredible outbreaks of violence against women in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. If something unwanted or inexplicable occurs in a village individuals, mostly commonly women, are accused of committing black magic or of being a witch. They will be outcast from their homes, attacked and often killed. These are not secret crimes. An outraged mob will torture the accused women with archaic tools to death in public while no one is willing to help and the perpetrators will mostly not be sentenced. Visiting the most remote areas Kristina talked to victims, survivors, offenders, police men, surviving dependents, researchers, human right defenders and people trying to help bring a resolution to this cyclical violence. She visited the torturing sites, the graves, the funeral piles and the burnt down property. She took pictures and short interviews.

Kristina Steiner

Kristina Steiner is a freelance photographer, photo journalist and visual storyteller who is based in the North of Germany. Born by the northern German coastline Kristina left the north right after finishing school. She lived and worked in various ways in Africa and Latin America. She received an apprenticeship diploma in portrait photography in Munich, Germany. After studying photography design and communications in Berlin and Mexico City, Kristina graduated from university in photography design. For her graduation project which was founded by the academic association of Germany she photographed a reportage within the Zapatista rebells community in the mountains in the South of Mexico. She assisted some well known portrait photographers for a couple of years before studying photojournalism in Aarhus, Denmark. Kristina’s work centers around portrait, reportage and corporate. She is very interested in women‘s topics, people, their identity and their resistance. As she grew up by the Baltic Sea and lives there again now, the ocean became a life accompanying topic for her.