Since October 9, 2024, the Palais de l’Institut de France in Paris has hosted the exhibition “Our Afghan family, memories of a vanished life” by photographer Olivier Jobard, winner in 2022 of the Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière – Academy of Fine Arts . The businessman and patron was present for the opening evening, which took place in the presence of other renowned photographers, Yann Arthus-Bertrand and Guillaume Herbaut, 2024 winner of the Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière Photography Prize – Académie of fine arts for the 15th edition, with his project “Ukraine, invisible wounds”.
The Academy of Fine Arts is hosting, from October 10 to November 24, 2024, the exhibition “Our Afghan family, memories of a vanished life” by Olivier Jobard. Working in Afghanistan for three decades, he has studied issues linked to exile for more than twenty years, focusing, in his words, on “individualize migration“.
Thanks to this Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière Photography Prize, Olivier Jobard has been working on the project for two years “Our Afghan family, memories of a vanished life” which allowed him to cross the border of intimacy. For ten years he followed the exile of Ghorban, a young Afghan who fled his country to join France in 2010. He found his four brothers and sisters Aziza, Sima, Mehrab and Sohrab, repatriated to France when the Taliban took power in the summer of 2021.
According to the website of the Academy of Fine Arts“this exhibition bears witness to the memories of their native land and their new life in France in particular in contact with the photographer’s sons, Elias and Léon, and will present the traces of their past in this new Afghanistan in the hands of the Taliban. It will also shed light on the feelings of loss and uprooting linked to this exile.“.
The exhibition is part of the 13th edition of the Photo Saint-Germain festival from October 30 to November 23, 2024 and the 2024 edition of Paris Photo organized from November 7 to 10, 2024.
Who is Olivier Jobard?
Born in 1970 in Paris, Olivier Jobard At the age of 20, he joined the Louis Lumière school and the Sipa Press agency. He spent two decades there covering news for the magazine press. In 2000, he went to Sangatte where he met Afghan, Chechen, Iraqi, Bosnian exiles… all fleeing wars that he had covered as a photojournalist. From their discussions in this last caravanserai was born the desire to study migration issues. In 1999, he went to the Panjshir valley to meet Commander Massoud, then to western Afghanistan under the first Taliban regime. In his documentary work, his main ally is time: “I stay with people as long as they want me, to create a relationship of trust that goes beyond the scope of my work.”
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