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Visualising Climate Crisis Workshop Participants Announced
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NOOR Celebrates 15 Years at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France

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From April 13 to June 5, the Bibliothèque nationale de France will host the exhibition "This World That Watches Us: 15 Years of NOOR Agency," which celebrates NOOR authors' contribution to visual storytelling.

In addition to the exhibition, a panel discussion with NOOR authors Olga Kravets, Francesco Zizola, Sanne De Wilde and Bénédicte Kurzen was held on April 19 at the François-Mitterrand - Petit auditorium.

The Details

EXHIBITION Dates: WEDNESDAY, APRIL 13 - SUNDAY, JUNE 5

Open: Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday from 10H - 19H & Sunday from 13h - 19h.

Location: Donors’ Gallery at the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Quai François-Mauriac, 75013 Paris.

Created in 2007, NOOR is comprised of 13 award-winning photographers from 9 different nationalities. This year the agency celebrates its fifteenth anniversary. For the occasion, these established visual storytellers delved into their archives to share over sixty prints with the Bibliothèque nationale de France's Department of Prints and Photography.

Photo © Yuri Kozyrev/ NOOR

This collection of images, which highlights global events, will be presented in the François-Mitterrand location in the Donors' Gallery from April 13 to June 5. Titled “This World That Watches Us: 15 Years of NOOR Agency,” this exhibition embodies the motto of one of the agency's founders, Stanley Greene, that "some things simply need to be seen," a maxim for members who continue to demonstrate their photographic intent and commitment to the world around them.

Officially launched during the Visa pour l'Image festival in Perpignan, France, in September 2007 by Stanley Greene and Kadir van Lohuizen, they were soon joined by seven other co-founders, including Pep Bonet, Yuri Kozyrev and Francesco Zizola. This new agency came at a time when the codes of photo-reporting and visual documentation had been turned upside down; budgets were downsizing, and crowd-sourced photojournalism was becoming increasingly prominent. For NOOR members, the aim was to apply their journalistic approaches to shed light on forgotten stories that media organizations gradually turned away from. The creation of this agency, in the form of a cooperative, is all the more poignant for its continued commitment to educating talented young photographers around the world as part of the Nikon-NOOR Academy sponsored by Nikon Europe.

By integrating different themes––reports on elections, wars, ecology, sociological or economic research––with supportive writings, this exhibition is an immersive experience as witnessed by NOOR photographers.

Photo © Tanya Habjouqa/ NOOR

This exhibition is generously supported by Matthew Rothman and the NOOR Documentary Foundation USA. NOOR would also like to thank Nikon for their continued commitment to the agency.

Entry requirements: This exhibition is free to the general public. The Health Pass is compulsory to access the exhibition. It should be noted that the conditions of access may change according to the ongoing health situation. Be sure to consult bnf.fr before your visit.


RSVP is required to attend the panel discussion. Contact 01 53 79 83 00 or evenements@bnf.fr to express interest.

Header Image © Sanne De Wilde/ NOOR

Check out the Panel Discussion held on Tuesday, April 19.

Location: François-Mitterrand - Petit auditorium, Quai François-Mauriac, Paris 13 Arrondissement.

Please note: In French only.

Press

Arte.fr: ‘Photographie : les 15 ans de l'agence Noor’, published on April 21, 2022.

For more information contact:

Samira Damato, Project Manager & Curator

samira@noorimages.com


#expoAgenceNoorBnF

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2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy Participants Announced

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Announcing the 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy participants. From March to April, 45 image-makers will take part in the intensive workshops led by NOOR authors and held respectively in France, Hungary, and Poland.

For this edition of the Nikon-NOOR Academy, three workshops will take place independently in three different countries in Europe. Each workshop has 15 participants and consists of four all-day sessions directed by three NOOR authors. These authors will work closely with participants, sharing experiences, working on portfolios, guiding editing skills, and offering advice on creating impactful visual stories. Additionally, key industry figures will join the sessions to give inspiring lectures on new approaches and innovative practices relating to visual storytelling.

Nikon-NOOR Academy Poland

The workshop in Poland is dedicated to female-identifying and non-binary visual storytellers. It will be held from March 29 to April 1 in Warsaw with NOOR authors Andrea Bruce, Olga Kravets and Tanya Habjouqa.

 

Nikon-NOOR Academy Hungary

Held from April 3 to April 7 in Budapest, Hungary, this workshop will be led by NOOR authors Kadir van Lohuizen, Pep Bonet, and Tanya Habjouqa.

 

Nikon-NOOR Academy France

NOOR authors Francesco Zizola, Sanne De Wilde, and Bénédicte Kurzen will led the Nikon-NOOR Academy workshop from April 11 - April 14 in Paris, France.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

KYLA WOODS | KYLA@NOORIMAGES.COM

 
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Agency and Authorship: Approaches to visual storytelling

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NOOR, in collaboration with the Houston Museum of African American Culture, presents an online conversation about agency and authorship in visual storytelling with Christopher Blay, Sasha Phyars-Burgess, Tanya Habjouqa and Andrea Bruce.

Banner and photo (above) © Tanya Habjouqa/ NOOR

Digital Event | Agency and Authorship: Approaches to visual storytelling, Christopher Blay in conversation with Sasha Phyars-Burgess, Andrea Bruce and Tanya Habjouqa


Thursday, March 3, 2022.

7 PM CET | 1 PM ET

Registration has closed for this event.


On Thursday, March 3, the Chief Curator of the Houston Museum of African American Culture, Christopher Blay, will converse with 2020 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipient Sasha Phyars-Burgess and NOOR members Tanya Habjouqa and Andrea Bruce about agency and authorship in visual storytelling, both as authors in the documentary community and as visual practitioners entering spaces. This conversation will touch on the history of photography and contemplate the role agency has in evolving documentary and journalistic practices.

During the conversation, Sasha will share her work “UNTITLED AND YET TO BE DETERMINED, 41.8949° N, 87.7654° W (AUSTIN)” and Christopher, Andrea, and Tanya will speak to this subject through their own selection of visuals. Each participant will discuss their motivations for different stories as it relates to different environments and how their understanding of self corresponds to their progressing approach to photography.

To view the conversation on March 3, visit the link below.

The Moderator

Christopher Blay

Christopher Blay is the Chief Curator of the Houston Museum of African American Culture. The Liberian-born American artist, writer, and curator was the News Editor at Glasstire Magazine from 2019 - 2021 and served as curator for the Art Corridor Galleries at Tarrant County College in Fort Worth for the ten years prior to Glasstire. Blay has been a guest lecturer at the University of North Texas, Texas Christian University, Tarleton State University, Sam Houston State University, as well as the University of Texas at Arlington and Stephen F. Austin university in Nacogdoches, Texas.

Blay’s writing credit includes art criticism, Op Ed essays, and interviews for the Fort Worth Weekly, Glasstire Magazine, and most recently, the November/December cover article for Art in America Magazine.

Blay has spoken at length about his work at museums such as the Dallas Museum of Art, the Kimbell Art Museum and the Modern Art Museum in Fort Worth. His public lectures also included conferences such as the Texas Society of Architects convention in 2014, New Cities, Future Ruins presented by Southern Methodist University in Dallas in November, 2016, and Texas A&M University in 2021.

A list of awards Blay has received for his work includes the Otis and Velma Davis Dozier travel grant from the Dallas Museum of Art, a Nasher Sculpture Center Artist’s Grant, and Critics Choice awards from the Dallas Observer and the Fort Worth Weekly. Blay has served on jury panels for the Nasher Sculpture Center, Southern Methodist University Meadows Museum's Moss/Chumley award, Big Medium’s Tito’s Prize, as well as numerous University gallery exhibitions including the recent student exhibitions at Texas State University in San Marcos, and the Juried Members exhibition of the South Central Chapter of the Society for Photographic Education in Dallas. The artist hosted a panel discussion on the mural boom in Fort Worth at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth in September.

As an artist, Blay uses photography, video, sculpture, and performance in exhibitions, and his work considers the Black experience in America. His exhibitions and public art projects follow the themes of the Black experience and include the ongoing East Rosedale Monument Project in Fort Worth, Texas, and Dindi (for Annibel) in Dallas' Coombs Creek park near Oak Cliff. His most recent exhibition, Power, Traps, and Targets: New Work by Christopher Blay was exhibited at Big Medium gallery, Austin, Texas, and is part of the Amarillo Biennial-600 in Amarillo, Texas. The exhibition focuses on justice, equality, and race, and will be on view through January, 2022.

Blay is a 2003 Graduate of Texas Christian University with a BFA in Photography with a minor in Art History.

PANALISTS

Sasha Phyars-Burgess

b.1988.

Scorpio.

Black.

Alive.



Tanya Habjouqa

Born in Jordan and raised between Texas and the Middle East, Tanya Habjouqa fuses a mordant sense of irony with unstinting, forensic interrogations of the implications of geopolitical conflict on human lives. Largely focusing on the Middle East, her work on Israel-Palestine, in particular, has been cited as a powerful investigation of the cross-currents of religion, politics, economics, and cultural production. Her project Occupied Pleasures received critical acclaim from Time Magazine and Smithsonian and the project won a World Press Photo award. A leading advocate for new methods in photojournalism and documentary practice, Tanya is the co-founder of the Middle East visual storyteller organization Ruwa, and is a mentor in the Arab Documentary Program, providing marginalized narratives and narrative-creators with the space and skills to tell their stories. She is an artist, educator, and member of NOOR Images. There is always a layer of gravitas and an intuitive sense of metaphor beneath her work.



Andrea Bruce

Andrea Bruce is a documentary photographer who brings attention to people living in the aftermath of war. She concentrates on the social issues that are sometimes ignored and often ignited in war's wake. 

Andrea started working in Iraq in 2003, following the intricacies and obstacles of the conflict experienced by Iraqis and the US military. For over ten years she has chronicled the world's most troubled areas, focusing on Iraq and Afghanistan. For eight years she worked as a staff photographer for The Washington Post and later as part of the VII Network (2010-2011). At The Post, she originated and authored a weekly column called "Unseen Iraq.” She also worked at The Concord Monitor and The St. Petersburg Times and after graduating from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 

Her awards include top honors from the White House News Photographers Association (where she has been named Photographer of the Year four times), several awards from the International Pictures of the Year contest, and the prestigious John Faber Award from the Overseas Press Club in New York. In 2010 she received the WHNPA grant for her work in Ingushetia and was a 2011 recipient of the Alicia Patterson Foundation Fellowship. In 2012 she was the recipient of the first Chris Hondros Fund Award for the “commitment, willingness and sacrifice shown in her work.” The World Press Photo awarded her 2nd prize Daily Life singles for the image 'Soldier's Funeral’ in 2014. In 2016 she was a recipient of the Harvard Nieman Fellowship.

Andrea Bruce was a CatchLight Fellow in 2018 and is currently a National Geographic Explorer. She is presently based in North Carolina and is the author of a weekly bulletin about the region, Down in the County.


FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

KYLA WOODS | KYLA@NOORIMAGES.COM

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February 14, Remembering Stanley Greene

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Join friends, colleagues, and the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipients for an intimate online conversation on February 14 at 7 PM CET that remembers Stanley Greene's life and contribution to photography.

Photo © Stanley Greene/ NOOR

Monday, February 14, 2022

7 PM CET | 1 PM ET

Registration for this event is now closed.

Stanley Greene was known for his poetic, haunting, and unfiltered images, ranging in visual essays on conflict to stories on SF’s thriving underground music scene. During his career, he was the recipient of five World Press Photo awards, the 2016 Lifetime Achievement Visa d’or Award, the 2004 Eugene Smith Grant, and published six books, Somnambule, Marval, 1990; Open Wound, Trolley, 2003; Stanley Greene n°118: Photo Poche n°118, Actes Sud, 2008; The Road to Ruin, Visa pour l'Image, 2008; his photographic memoir Black Passport, Schilt Publishing, 2009; and The Western Front, André Frère Éditions, 2013.

On Monday, February 14, NOOR and NOOR Foundation hosted an online conversation to remember and celebrate the late photojournalist Stanley Greene. This informal conversation will engage friends, colleagues, and the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipients, Sasha Phyars-Burgess and Tako Robakidze, with the acclaimed photographer’s work and methodology. 

This online event was an opportunity to learn about Stanley Greene and interact with his work in a very candid and personal way: through the musings and recollections of his closest companions, and the questions of the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipients.

View the event below.

Remembering Stanley Greene will include the memories and voices of:

  • Andrea Bruce, documentary photographer from the U.S. whose work focuses on people living in the aftermath of war, concentrating on the social issues that are sometimes ignored and often ignited in war's wake. For the past five years she has turned her attention to the U.S. to examine how people define and experience democracy. She is a member of NOOR.

  • Kadir van Lohuizen, photography lecturer and co-founder of NOOR photo agency. He has been a professional photographer since 1988, and has received numerous prizes, including two World Press Photo awards, a Visa D’or for his work in Chad and in 2004 was awarded the prestigious Dutch Dick Scherpenzeel Prize for the best reporting on the developing world.

  • Nina Alvarez, journalist, documentarian, video photographer and assistant professor of journalism at Columbia University. In her documentary work, she has concentrated on women and girls and the impact of migration.

  • Nina Berman, American documentary photographer, filmmaker, author and professor at Columbia University in New York City. She was a NOOR member from 2009-2021.

  • Sasha Phyars-Burgess, Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipient. b.1988. Black. Alive.

  • Tako Robakidze, Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipient and documentary photographer based in Tbilisi, Georgia. Tako has dedicated a significant part of her photographic work to voice the stories of the war and the occupation in Georgia and socioeconomic conditions in regions of the country.

  • Teun Van der Heijden, graphic designer and co-founder of Heijdens Karwei, a graphic design agency based in Amsterdam and New York. Next to running Heijdens Karwei where he has designed award-winning photography books like Black Passport, Diamond Matters, Rape of a Nation, Interrogations, War Porn, among others, Teun is a professor of Visual Design and Hybrid media at the LUCA School of Arts in Genk, Belgium and a faculty member of ICP, the International Center of Photography in New York and mentor of MAPS (Master of Photography and Society) at the KABK Royal Academy of Arts in The Hague.

Stanley Greene

During the early years of his career, Stanley Greene (USA, 1949-2017) produced The Western Front, a unique documentation of San Francisco’s punk scene in the 1970s and 80s. An encounter with W. Eugene Smith turned his energies to photojournalism. Stanley began photographing for magazines, and worked as temporary staff photographer for the New York Newsday.

In 1986, he moved to Paris and began covering events across the globe. By chance, he was on hand to record the fall of the Berlin Wall. The changing political winds in Eastern Europe and Russia brought Greene to a different kind of photojournalism. He soon found himself photographing the myriad aspects of the decline of communism and the break-up of the Soviet Union.

Stanley was a member of the Paris-based photo agency Agence VU from 1991 to 2007. Beginning in 1993, he was based in Moscow working for Liberation, Paris Match, Time, The New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, Le Nouvel Observateur, as well as other international news magazines. In October 1993, Stanley was trapped and almost killed in the White House in Moscow during a coup attempt against Boris Yeltsin. He was the only western journalist inside to cover it. Two of his resulting pictures won World Press Photo awards.

In the early 1990s, Stanley went to Southern Sudan to document the war and famine there for Globe Hebdo (France). He traveled to Bhopal, India, again for Globe Hebdo, to report on the aftermath of the Union Carbide gas poisoning. From 1994 to 2001, Stanley covered the conflict in Chechnya between rebels and Russian armed forces. His in-depth coverage was published in the monograph Open Wound: Chechnya 1994-2003 (Trolley 2003) and in the 1995 publication Dans Les Montagnes Où Vivent Les Aigles (Actes Sud). The work also appeared in Anna Politkovskaya’s book, A Dirty War: A Russian Reporter in Chechnya (2001). In 1994, Stanley was invited by Médecins sans Frontières to document their emergency relief operations during the cholera epidemic in Rwanda and Zaire. He has covered conflict and aftermath in Nagorno-Karabakh, Iraq, Sudan, Darfur, Afghanistan, Kashmir, and Lebanon.

Stanley was awarded a Katrina Media Fellowship from the Open Society Institute in 2006. In 2010, to mark the fifth commemoration of Hurricane Katrina - together with Dutch photographer Kadir van Lohuizen - Stanley made “Those who fell through the cracks”, a collaborative project documenting Katrina's effects on Gulf coast residents. The same year, Stanley’s book Black Passport was published (Schilt). In 2012, Stanley was the guest of honor of the Tbilisi Photo Festival and began his project on e-waste traveling to Nigeria, India, China and Pakistan. 

Stanley has received numerous grants and recognitions including - the Lifetime Achievement Visa d’Or Award (2016), the Aftermath Project Grant (2013), the Prix International Planète Albert Kahn (2011), W. Eugene Smith Award (2004), the Alicia Patterson Fellowship (1998) and five World Press Photo awards. Stanley presented the Sem Presser keynote lecture at the 2017 World Press Photo Award Festival. 

Stanley Greene is a founding member of NOOR. Stanley passed away in Paris, France on May 19th, 2017.

For more information contact:

Kyla Woods: kyla@noorimages.com

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"Capturing Climate Change" with Kadir van Lohuizen Opens in Dar es Salaam on Feb 9

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At the beginning of November 2021, eight Tanzanian and Kenyan photojournalists took part in the collaborative "Capturing Climate Change" program with Kadir van Lohuizen.

The Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tanzania and NOOR Images, in partnership with SNV and JustDiggit, are now proud to present the corresponding exhibition, which will open to the general public on February 9 at the Alliance Française in Dar es Salaam. This event will coincide with a roundtable meeting with candidates from the program on Tuesday, February 8; public portfolio reviews with Photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen and Curator Samira Damato on Wednesday, February 9; and a lecture by Kadir van Lohuizen on Friday, February 11.

Dar es Salaam, TZ – The Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and NOOR Images are proud to present the exhibition “Capturing Climate Change”. 

The climate crisis has an immense impact on our world. Without immediate action, these adverse effects will continue to increase in the upcoming years. This exhibition brings together various visual stories on the climate crisis, from its global consequences to the everyday impact on local communities in Tanzania and Kenya. 

To empower local voices, eight talented photojournalists were selected to take part in a mentorship for the professional development of their visual practice when documenting climate change. The results of this dedicated program, made possible by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and NOOR Images, can be seen throughout this unique exhibition.

The photographic works, developed by four Tanzanian visual storytellers, Calvin Kulaya, Rahabu Manyasani, Imani Nsamila and Michael Mbwambo; and four Kenyan visual storytellers, Anthony Ochieng, Cynthia Maiwa, Billy Miaron and Gordwin Odhiambo; explore many aspects of life, from urban living to wildlife, and engage with both critical and constructive visual journalism to highlight the local impact of the climate crisis. These works are showcased alongside the works of award-winning photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen. 

A series of events will be additionally held at the Alliance Française in Dar es Salaam. This includes:

Tuesday, February 8:

  • 10 am - press conference 

  • 14 pm - roundtable meeting with the photographers

  • 18:30 pm - an invitation only visage of “Capturing Climate Change”

Wednesday, February 9:

  • 10:30 am - portfolio reviews with photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen and Curator, Samira Damato

Friday, February 11:

  • 10 am - Lecture by Kadir van Lohuizen

Pictured below are some of the highlights and behind-the-scenes moments from the program in November.

Photos © Anthony Dar

This exhibition includes a selection of images showcasing the dedicated programs for climate action in Tanzania and Kenya, which are supported by the Netherlands and partners such as SNV and Justdiggit. 

By highlighting these valuable stories through powerful visual journalism, this exhibition aims to inspire climate action, to remind you that change is possible, and that together we can create a better world.

NOOR would like to acknowledge the efforts of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tanzania and Kenya and the support of SNV, JustDiggit, PAWA254, the British Council Tanzania and the Alliance Française in realising this initiative.

For more information, contact:

Samira Damato - Project Manager & Curator for “Capturing Climate Change”

samira@noorimages.com

 
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Applications Open for the 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy

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The 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy includes three intensive workshops that will be held in France, Hungary and Poland. Apply now for the tuition-free initiative.

© Andrea Bruce/ NOOR

Applications are now open for the tuition-free Nikon-NOOR Academy which will be held in France, Hungary and Poland.

For this edition, three workshops will take place independently in three different countries in Europe. Each workshop has 15 participants and consists of four all-day sessions directed by three NOOR authors.These authors will work closely with participants, sharing experiences, working on portfolios, guiding editing skills, and offering advice on creating impactful visual stories. Additionally, key industry figures will join the sessions to give inspiring lectures on new approaches and innovative practices relating to visual storytelling.

Due to COVID19 restrictions, all Nikon NOOR Academy workshops are postponed and will take place in March 2022 at the earliest. These workshops aim to be in-person and will abide by each country’s COVID19 regulations.

The application process

Applicants are encouraged to include in their portfolio a personal project they would like to engage with during the workshop and indicate in their motivation statement what they want to explore concerning that work. Jurors are looking for compelling visuals and stories. It should be noted that each workshop has specific criteria.

All three workshops are tuition-free for participants and open to emerging visual storytellers from the following countries: Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lichtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Morocco, Netherlands, Norway, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, United Kingdom, and Uzbekistan.

Applicants can only apply to one workshop location. Multiple applications to different workshops will not be considered. We strongly encourage photographers to apply to workshop locations in their surrounding regions.

Participants will be chosen by a panel of industry professionals. The deadline to apply is Sunday, January 30, 2022.

NOOR Authors

NOOR authors involved in the 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy include Andrea Bruce, Tanya Habjouqa, Yuri Kozyrev, Olga Kravets, Bénédicte Kurzen, Kadir van Lohuizen, Sanne De Wilde, and Francesco Zizola. Please note that this may be subject to change.

Note: The 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy in Poland is dedicated to female and non-binary identifying talent. Please refer to the application portal for more details.

The 2021 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship Recipient Announced

Introducing the 2021 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipient, Tako Robakidze.

From the project Creeping Borders. Photo © Tako Robakidze.

NOOR, a lens-based cultural institution, and the NOOR Foundation, a non-profit committed to social change through documentary practice, supports the craft and professional aspirations of underrepresented photojournalists whose creative work echoes the commitment and passion with which Stanley approached photography. The 2021 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship recipient is Tako Robakidze for her long-term project 'Creeping Borders', which shows how the Russian occupation in Georgia affects people's daily lives in the villages along the alleged "border" and shares the stories of Internally Displaced Peoples (IDPs) who have suffered along the way.

"It is an absolute honour to receive the prize and fellowship associated with Stanley Greene", says Tako Robakidze. "He knew my country intimately and worked on projects that conveyed the depth of the Caucasus region".

In the 1990s, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian-backed separatists in the Abkhazia and Tskhinvali region started a war to claim independence from Georgia. Up to 300,000 Georgians were displaced. These figures have only increased since the so-called "Five Day War" between Russia and Georgia in 2008, and up to 20% of Georgian territory is now under Russian occupation. Since 2011 Russian armed forces have pursued the policy of so-called "borderization", the installation of artificial barriers along the occupation line.

"I was born one year before the collapse of the Soviet Union", recalls Tako Robakidze. "A series of wars followed in my country. My parents were doctors and worked in hospitals where IDPs from Abkhazia settled. After school, I'd go to the hospital where my mother worked–– I played with children from the IDP families. These are some of my fondest memories, yet I had no accurate understanding of what was happening".

From the project Creeping Borders. Photo © Tako Robakidze.

"Learning about these people, who I had spent my childhood with, and seeing the realities of today, motivated me to pursue this underreported topic, which focuses on displacement. I initially researched borderization in 2015 and visited every village bordering the Tskhinvali region to investigate the consequences of this process", says Robakidze. "It seemed unimaginably absurd to live in this reality, with these changing places without moving from places".  

As the Russian occupation and the shifting of de-facto borders moves deeper, more territories gather behind the barbed-wire fences, leaving the local community without land, harvest, and even residents' own houses. It divides families and communities, preventing people-to-people contact; moreover, kidnapping residents for "illegal border crossing" by the Russian FSB has become almost a common practice. Since the start of the "borderization", more than 1000 people have been detained. Families across the occupation line have to deal with violations of human rights daily. 

"The installation of barbed wire fences and artificial obstacles changed the local population's everyday life, and for odd reasons, this reality has become "normal". With this project, I want to demonstrate the numerous ways mass media can change normalized discourse through awareness. Hopefully, this will lead us all to think about result-based actions".

"With the support of the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship, I am going to create a separate platform on my website dedicated to continuing the stories of people affected by war and those who no longer have a home in their homeland. The platform will focus on Georgia initially; however, it is equally important for me to cover other regional experiences of war. My aim in the next iteration of 'Creeping Borders' is to support opportunities of care, discussion, and empathy within the communities". 

"There are many stories, such as the human toll of borderization, that illustrate 'grey areas' in international relations, and they are not common knowledge to the majority of the world. I hope that my stories somehow can elevate the stories of small countries like Georgia. I want to remind locals and foreigners that the occupation is still ongoing, and somewhere people just like us are suffering from circumstances like this".

‘Creeping Borders’ was produced with the support of the Magnum Foundation as part of the Photography and Social Justice Fellowship. This body of work was exhibited at the 2018 Tbilisi Photo Festival.

TAKO ROBAKIDZE

Biography: Tako Robakidze is a documentary photographer based in Tbilisi, Georgia. In 2008 she received a Bachelor's degree in Law at Tbilisi State University. In conjunction with her university studies, she was enrolled in the documentary photography 'Sepia' and continued her studies for 5 years. In 2015, she received her master's degree from Caucasus University's Graduate School of Journalism. Since 2010 she has worked as a freelance photographer, cooperating with Georgian and international NGOs, covering diverse social topics. 

Since 2015, she has been a member and co-founder of the documentary photo collective ERROR IMAGES. In 2017 she received the Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellowship. In 2020 she was the recipient of the Tbilisi Photography & Multimedia Museum Multimedia Lab Production Grant. In 2020 for her work about Georgian IDPs, she got a production grant from Goethe Institute. Her work is focused on documenting socio-political and economic conditions in Georgia and aspects of daily life, especially in regions of the country and minority groups of society.

2021 PRIZE AND FELLOWSHIP JURY

NOOR acknowledges this year’s Stanley Greene Legacy Prize & Fellowship judges, which included a panel of experts in the visual storytelling field.

  • Tanya Lokshina, associate director for Human Rights Watch's Europe and Central Asia division.

  • Thomas Dworzak, photographer and Magnum Photos Member.

  • Marie Sumalla, deputy head of Le Monde photo department.

  • Andrei Polikanov, visual director of Takie Dela online media.

  • Nestan Nijaradze, co-founder and Artistic Director of Tbilisi Photo Festival.

  • Raisa Borshchigova, senior program officer at Urgent Action Fund.

  • Frank Zuidweg, Nikon Professional Services at Nikon Europe (Amsterdam).

  • Jean-François Camp, president of DUREV Events.

Learn more about the 2021 Fellowship jury.

NOOR additionally extends a special thanks to Nikon. The Stanley Greene Legacy Prize & Fellowship is made possible by Nikon’s sustained support.

Announcing the 2021 Tanzanian and Kenyan Climate Photojournalism Program Participants

In collaboration with the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tanzania and Kenya, the participants of the ‘Capturing Climate Change’ program with Kadir van Lohuizen are Calvin Kulaya, Rahabu Manyasani, Imani Nsamila and Michael Mbwambo (Tanzania) and Anthony Ochieng, Cynthia Maiwa, Billy Miaron and Gordwin Odhiambo (Kenya).

Photo © Calvin Kulaya

Dar es Salaam, TZ – NOOR, a cultural institution based in the Netherlands, announces the attendees of the four-day photojournalism program, ‘Capturing Climate Change’, with renowned photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen. From the 8th to the 11th of November, these eight photojournalists will develop their climate-related visual stories under the guidance of Kadir, encouraging them to strengthen their documentary practice and examine their construction of climate change narratives.

Photo © Anthony Ochieng, from ‘Powering the 'Ghost Town' of Rusinga Island’.

Initiated by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tanzania and Kenya and supported by PAWA254, the British Council Tanzania and the Alliance Française, ‘Capturing Climate Change’ hopes to engage visual journalists, Calvin Kulaya, Rahabu Manyasani, Imani Nsamila and Michael Mbwambo (Tanzania) and Anthony Ochieng, Cynthia Maiwa, Billy Miaron and Gordwin Odhiambo (Kenya), in the global conversation of climate change by elevating the significance of human stories.

“The program will provide these photojournalists with the skills needed to tell stories about how climate change is affecting their communities,” says Kadir van Lohuizen, “[as well as] how to work on long-term projects and create powerful work that will bring awareness and engage with adaptation strategies to confront the climate crisis”.

Photo © Cynthia MaiWa

Undeniably, climate change is impacting the world, and the adverse effects will only increase in the future. Kadir has devoted his career to this critical issue. With his direction, program attendees will produce eight unique and impactful visual stories that highlight the ongoing climate dynamics Tanzanian and Kenyan urban youth face. Afterwards, these productions will be showcased in an exhibition on the climate crisis at a later date in both Tanzania and Kenya.

“This is part of the Netherlands commitment to co-create solutions to global challenges,” says the Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tanzania, H.E. Wiebe de Boer. “Climate change might be the biggest challenge we face at this moment. By empowering the local photojournalists, we hope to contribute to give youth a voice and raise awareness on how the climate crisis affects their communities”.

 

For more information, contact:

Samira Damato - Project Manager & Curator

samira@noorimages.com

The 2021 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize & Fellowship Shortlist

Introducing the 2021 Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship Shortlist: Biayna Mahari, Tako Robakidze and Mouneb Taim.

From left to right: Biayna Mahari, Tako Robakidze and Mouneb Taim.

From left to right: Biayna Mahari, Tako Robakidze and Mouneb Taim.

NOOR, a lens-based cultural institution, and the NOOR Foundation, a non-profit committed to social change through documentary practice, supports the craft and professional aspirations of underrepresented photojournalists whose creative work echoes the commitment and passion with which Stanley approached photography. The 2021 shortlisted candidates for the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship are Biayna Mahari, Tako Robakidze and Mouneb Taim.

“In my opinion, the three shortlisted photographers each represent the courageous dedication that the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship embodies,” says jury member Thomas Dworzak. “Biayna Mahari, an emerging photographer, presented a very intimate, and at times quirky, poetic expression of a well-covered conflict in her own country. Tako Robakidze, on the other hand, concentrated relentlessly on documenting an easily forgotten conflict with an unending commitment. And, Mouneb Taim, a very young photographer, recorded his country's disintegration.”

This iteration of the fellowship focused on applicants based in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Biayna Mahari, positioned between her native country of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, draws on traditional photojournalism and metaphorical photography to investigate the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh and how it intersects with personal identity both in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh; Tako Robakidze, based in Tbilisi, Georgia, explores the impact of Russia’s borderization process on Georgians; and Mouneb Taim, born in Syria and established in Turkey, focused on the Syrian conflict and the humanitarian crisis that ensued.

The 2021 Shortlisted Photographers

Biayna Mahari

Broken TV in a house where refugees from Hadrut currently live. From the project Diary of a non-war photographer. Photo © Biayna Mahari.

Broken TV in a house where refugees from Hadrut currently live. From the project Diary of a non-war photographer. Photo © Biayna Mahari.

Project: Diary of a non-war photographer investigates the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh and how it intersects with personal identity both in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. “On September 27, 2020,” Biayna Mahari writes, “I woke up to a war. I was living my life––planning to meet my friends or maybe read a book, I no longer remember––when all of a sudden, with a single news announcement, I appeared in a conflict zone.”

Since that day, there has been little semblance of the life that existed before. In an effort to understand this new reality, Biayna looked away from the frontline of the conflict, and focused on the intimate details that were shared by others, civilians, who were experiencing the same seismic upheaval. Biayna says: “It’s me standing in the yard watching Arthur burn his own house down in the village’s last hour, and me saying goodbye to the Dadivank monastery before it will be given away, and me drinking beer in the only pub in Stepanakert, talking about the war with the owner, while he cleans his gun.” 

“It's me, but it is not about me. It’s about Armenians trying to survive through grief and loss, about those who took their weapons and went to protect their land, those who didn’t, those who came back home and who didn’t, about life and death, love and hate and, finally, it’s about all of us — humans, who create the wars, suffer from them, and then create them again.”

Biography: Biayna Mahari was born in Yerevan, Armenia in 1989. She began freelancing as a photographer and journalist in 2009, while still a student at the Russian-Armenian University, covering cultural events and festivals, and photographing and interviewing artists like Serj Tankyan and Joe Cocker for local magazines. She has since produced projects on the country's 2018 Velvet Revolution, "La vita è bella," about being trapped in Italy during the Covid19 lockdown, and "Rethinking Quarantine," a set of portraits and interviews made through skype calls with those trapped with her in the same building for a mandatory quarantine. She has produced work for many local NGOs, as well as international organizations such as Unicef, FAO, and the UNDP. Her work has appeared in many local magazines, and in Nouvelle d'Armenie and Liberation in France and La Republica in Italy. In 2020 she was awarded a director fellowship to attend the Documentary Practice and Visual Journalism program at the International Center of Photography in New York.

Tako Robakidze

Marina was a school teacher in the village Kemerti, which is now an occupied territory. After the war in 2008, she and her family settled in an IDP settlement in the village Shavshvebi. Even though people who lived in the Tskhinvali region were in constant war for 20 years, and shootings were part of their everyday life, they still never imagined leaving their houses. Shavshvebi IDP Settlement, Georgia. 2017. From the project Creeping Borders. Photo © Tako Robakidze.

Marina was a school teacher in the village Kemerti, which is now an occupied territory. After the war in 2008, she and her family settled in an IDP settlement in the village Shavshvebi. Even though people who lived in the Tskhinvali region were in constant war for 20 years, and shootings were part of their everyday life, they still never imagined leaving their houses. Shavshvebi IDP Settlement, Georgia. 2017. From the project Creeping Borders. Photo © Tako Robakidze.

Project: "For some people in my country, it is not difficult anymore to imagine going to sleep in their own country and waking up in an occupied territory." –– Tako Robakidze.

Creeping Borders shows how the Russian occupation affects peoples' daily lives in the villages along the so-called "border" and IDPs who have suffered along the way. 

In the 1990s, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian-backed separatists in the Abkhazia and Tskhinvali region started a war to claim independence from Georgia. Up to 300,000 Georgians were displaced. These figures have only increased since the so-called "Five Day War" between Russia and Georgia in 2008, and up to 20% of Georgian territory is now under Russian occupation. Since 2011 Russian armed forces have pursued the policy of so-called "borderization," the installation of artificial barriers along the occupation line. 

As the topic of Russian occupation and the shifting of de-facto borders moves deeper, more territories gather behind the barbed-wire fences, leaving the local community without land, harvest, and even residents' own houses. It divides families and communities, preventing people-to-people contact; moreover, kidnapping residents for "illegal border crossing" by Russian FSB has become almost a common practice. Since the start of the "borderization," more than 1000 people have been detained. Families across the occupation line have to deal with violations of human rights on a daily basis. 

"Creeping Borders" was produced with the support of the Magnum Foundation as part of the Photography and Social Justice Fellowship. This body of work was exhibited at the 2018 Tbilisi Photo Festival.

Biography: Tako Robakidze is a documentary photographer based in Tbilisi, Georgia. In 2008 she got a Bachelor's degree in Law at Tbilisi State University. In conjunction with her university studies, she was enrolled in the documentary photography 'Sepia' and continued her studies for 5 years. In 2015, she received her master's degree from Caucasus University's Graduate School of Journalism. Since 2010 she has worked as a freelance photographer, cooperating with Georgian and international NGOs, covering diverse social topics. 

Since 2015, she has been a member and co-founder of the documentary photo collective ERROR IMAGES. In 2017 she received the Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellowship. In 2020 she was the recipient of the Tbilisi Photography & Multimedia Museum Multimedia Lab Production Grant. In 2020 for her work about Georgian IDPs, she got a production grant from Goethe Institute. Her work is focused on documenting socio-political and economic conditions in Georgia and aspects of daily life, especially in regions of the country and minority groups of society.

Mouneb Taim

An aerial view of a drone showing the terrible destruction in the city of Jobar, on the outskirts of the Syrian capital, Damascus. From the project Idlib - the last rebel stronghold. Photo © Mouneb Taim.

An aerial view of a drone showing the terrible destruction in the city of Jobar, on the outskirts of the Syrian capital, Damascus. From the project Idlib - the last rebel stronghold. Photo © Mouneb Taim.

Project: After more than ten years of conflict, the Syrian regime's forces regained more than ninety percent of areas out of their control. The city of Idlib, in northern Syria, was the opposition forces' last remaining outpost, a place now embedded in the conflict and the promise of defeating the rebel forces for the final time. 

Idlib - the last rebel stronghold, illustrates the struggle of civilians to bypass the war in the besieged region in northern Syria. The lives of residents are markedly different from others: there are airstrikes and bombings between government forces and the rebellion every day. There is an unnaturalness to each day, even though the conflict has taken on some semblance of normalcy to those living there: it is common to see bombs fall, watch people die, and hear the destruction of buildings.

While the truth of this war cannot be denied–– there are no winners or losers––some people are trying to resist the bitterness of this terrible war with their determination, hope, and desire to live. With the support of the Russian forces, the people in Idlib were forced to leave the area after months of violent bombing operations that caused the deaths of thousands. 

Today, more than four million Syrians live in a minimal area. They are effectively human shields, threatened with death from both sides by the militant forces that control the site, the so-called Al-Nusra Front, and the Syrian government, who plan to regain that area. 

Biography: Mouneb Taim, born in 2001, is a photojournalist who covers news stories focusing on social issues. Currently working as a freelance photographer for international agencies, he began his career in photojournalism in 2014 following the murder of his brother, a journalist in Syria. While in his native country, he covered life under siege in Douma, Eastern Ghouta, Idlib, and the countryside of Aleppo until early 2020 when Islamic organizations arrested him in his city for being gay. Mouneb has received several international awards for his work.

2021 Prize and Fellowship Jury

NOOR acknowledges this year’s Fellowship judges, which included a panel of experts in the visual storytelling field.

  • Tanya Lokshina, associate director for Human Rights Watch's Europe and Central Asia division.

  • Thomas Dworzak, photographer and Magnum Photos Member.

  • Marie Sumalla, deputy head of Le Monde photo department.

  • Andrei Polikanov, visual director of Takie Dela online media.

  • Nestan Nijaradze, co-founder and Artistic Director of Tbilisi Photo Festival.

  • Raisa Borshchigova, senior program officer at Urgent Action Fund.

  • Frank Zuidweg, Nikon Professional Services at Nikon Europe (Amsterdam).

  • Jean-François Camp, president of DUREV Events.

Learn more about the 2021 Fellowship jury.

NOOR additionally extends a special thanks to Nikon. The Stanley Greene Legacy Prize & Fellowship is made possible by Nikon’s sustained support.

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Photographers Sanne De Wilde and Bénédicte Kurzen publish their book: Land of Ibeji

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Sanne De Wilde and Bénédicte Kurzen / NOOR

Sanne De Wilde and Bénédicte Kurzen / NOOR

Discover all about the Land of Ibeji


Sanne De Wilde and Bénédicte Kurzen investigate the mythology of twins in Nigeria where the rate of natural twin births is higher than anywhere else in the world. As sacred beings, twins’ magical and spiritual powers are celebrated with mythical fervour, but also condemned as unnatural.It was a path he never would have taken, because he never could have imagined it. 

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‘Land of Ibeji’ is a collaborative photographic project about the mythology of twinhood in Nigeria“Ibeji” meaning 'double birth' and ‘the inseparable two’ in Yoruba stands for the ultimate harmony between two people. The centre of this twin zone is Igbo-Ora, a sleepy southwest town in Nigeria. Through a visual narrative and an aesthetic language that is meant to reflect and empower the Yoruba culture that celebrates twins, the two photographers extend their gaze beyond appearance - with symmetry and resemblance as tools- to open the eyes to the twin as a mythological figure and a powerful metaphor: for the duality within a human being and the duality we experience in the world that surrounds us.

They played with the concept of doubling to create an imaginative photographic story, using double exposures, mirror reflections and colour filters. Through these pictorial processes, the two artists produced inventive double portraits, while also working together as twin-like co-authors. Land of Ibeji is the magical, colourful result.

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About the book

Now for sale in the NOOR Shop!

Next to the regular signed book there is also a limited edition that includes a signed print. There are only 44 of them available!


Order now and receive your book in August 2021

Signed book for €59  excl. VAT and shipping costs

Signed book + signed Fine Art Baryta print (only 44 units available) for €248 excl. VAT and shipping costs

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