Eva Luise
Köhler pays tribute to Alice Smeets for her photo
from Haiti
The young Belgian photographer Alice
Smeets is the winner of the international photo competition
“UNICEF-Photo of the Year”. Her winning
picture shows a girl in the largest slum in Port-au-Prince,
Haiti's capital. Although she has to live between dirt
and rubbish, the girl is wearing a clean white dress
with matching ribbons in her hair whilst walking barefoot
through the mud. “The photo shows us the courage
and energy of a little girl who is growing up in the
face of adversity. Children from the poorest backgrounds
often demonstrate great strength” said UNICEF
patroness Eva Luise Köhler at the award ceremony
on Thursday in Berlin. “The UNICEF-Photo of the
Year is a plea to heed and support these children”.
The 21-year-old photographer,
Alice Smeets, from the city of Eupen in the German-speaking
part of East Belgium, is the youngest winner in the
history of the contest, which was organized for the
first time in 2000. This year, international experts
put forward 1,450 photos by 128 photographers from 31
countries. The jury, chaired by Klaus Honnef, Professor
of the theory of photography, chose the first, second
and third places as well as 11 'honourable mentions'.
UNICEF presented the awards for the 9th time to photos
of high artistic and photo-journalistic quality that
illustrate the living conditions of children. The competition
is supported by the magazine GEO and is financed by
Citibank Germany.
For five hundred years
misfortune and terror have reigned in Haiti. First
it was colonialism and slavery, then came the
dictators. After that followed chronic political
instability and hurricanes. And throughout all
that: hardship, distrust, treachery, poverty,
dirt, destruction, illness, tyranny, oppression,
persecution, death.
People live unprotected in
stinking and burning waste, without work, without
reliable sources of energy, without drinkable
water, without clean air to breath, without money
for their next meal. In the hovels the poorest
of the poor resort to eating dirt simply to fill
their stomachs. In a setting like this, a little
girl in a white dress seems to be a frightened
angel that finds itself in the underworld and
nevertheless determined to fight for a little
bit of beauty.
This glimpse of how hell could look, overwhelmed
the young Belgian photographer, Alice Smeets,
on her first trip to Haiti. The more time she
spent in the country, however, the more this feeling
eased, to be replaced by compassion and a strong
desire to use her photography to raise awareness
for the oppressed and humiliated.
Alice Smeets says: “
I am often asked why I always want to keep returning
to Haiti instead of discovering new countries.
Everyone has a choice in life. Philip Jones Griffith
(photographer for the Magnum Agency, who passed
away in 2008) taught me something important during
my time as his assistant: photographers can either
report on a a wide range of situations in a cursory
fashion, or they can carry out a deep and intensive
examination of just one setting. Both are options,
but the latter gives you the opportunity to continuously
create visual statements that can hopefully lead
to assistance for those suffering.
The rigor mortis affecting the region has spread to
the psyches of the living. At least 70,000 people fell
victim to the apocalyptic earthquake on the 12th May
2008 in the Chinese province of Sichuan. 15 million
houses collapsed. Since then almost 6 million people
have been living in emergency accommodation. This catastrophe
was followed by an earthquake of the soul that caused
no less suffering. The inner world of the survivors
has been shaken to its very core, damaged and traumatized,
and is now haunted by the demons of the horror that
they survived. Their outside world also lacks firm foundations.
Amidst all this, the Israeli photographer, Oded Balilty,
only rarely met a hint of childish light-heartedness.
For whom is the Korengal-Valley in
the Kunar province of northwest Afghanistan the most
dangerous place in the world? Is it the villagers who
find themselves between the fronts? Or the Taliban and
Al-Qaeda fighters? Or the American Soldiers? The risk
is spread gruesomely evenly among all these groups.
The Hungarian photographer, Balazs
Gardi, moves as a neutral observer through this landscape
that is so foreign to him and is shocked by every dead
or injured person that he comes across. He asks himself
whether this madness will ever end, for he can see no
sense to the endless suffering.
Children in Afghanistan are
both unintentionally and intentionally victims of the
violence. They find themselves, for example, between
the fronts when Nato-led security forces move against
insurgents. Taliban fighters intentionally attack schools.
In 2008 alone, there were 256 violent attacks up to
the middle of November – mostly on schools for
girls. 58 people died in these attacks.
Photo:
Balazs Gardi, Hungary, VII Network, Alexia Foundation
