Michael Shaw's outstanding blog, BagNewsNotes, is featuring the work of photojournalist Lori Grinker.Michael writes:
In response to an inattentive domestic media and the lack of visual documentation, Lori Grinker has been pursuing the story of Iraqi civilians fleeing the war.In April, and again in September 2007, she traveled to Amman to photograph Iraqis forced to leave their families, homes and livelihoods for a life of cramped, substandard living conditions, inactivity, and waiting for the time when it will be safe to return to Iraq, or hear that they have found sanctuary in another country. And those are the “lucky” ones. Many of her subjects are in Amman to repair their bodies, only to be to be repatriated to a war zone after they are “healed.”
In the case above, the young man (call him Amer) was burned in an explosion while walking past a fuel truck in Baghdad. We see the 16-year old coming out of the recovery room after having surgery to fix the contracted fingers on his right hand. He faced the same surgery on his left hand a couple of month later.
I encourage you to see Lori's work being featured at 'The Bag,' as well as at her own site.
2 comments:
I have not posted here in some time due to the constraint of my work and limited time, but I was going back through the comments and I saw a quote from Elanor Roosevelt about letting ourselves being open to compassion; It is funny how, sometimes in our daily lives the universe opens a window into the soul. I recently had to tell a young girl that I was going to take care of her grandmother who was going to the OR for a high risk procedure, and I could not find the words because it suddenly dawned on me the love and concern this grandchild had for her grandmother. It was as if God or if you prefer the universe had suddenly grabbed me and held me still. I think of this blog as the same. It is a way for the universe to grab us a hold us still and see into those individuals who are unfamiliar to us otherwise and understand the burden of their struggles, whether American soldiers or Iraqi citizens. And to that end I witness for peace and love
Thanks very much for your comment, Wasim. Very moving.
I have also not posted here in a long time, even though I posted a diary based on this model almost each day at DailyKos, MyLeftWing, and Booman Tribune for a little over 2 years.
My posting dropped off last year at about this time when Kos noted that he needed to apply strict controls on the use of copyrighted materials. That's when I moved to this site.
My wife had the first of two surgeries last March (she's doing great), and my posting here dropped off even more so, down to what you see now.
I fell out of what had become an important part of each day - to search wire service photo archives, and to browse poetry sources. Those times were as you describe: an opportunity to be still, and to try to understand, in some small way, the burdens of others.
I've told myself before that I need to get back into this practice. Perhaps your thoughtful note is the reminder that I need to do so.
Thanks.
Post a Comment