PHOTOS: Photographs from Kurdistan win award

Award-winning photographer Sebastian Meyer

LOS ANGELES, United States (Kurdistan 24) - Award-winning photographer Sebastian Meyer's forthcoming book "Under Every Yard of Sky"  borrows its title from the Abdullah Peshew's well-known poem "Serbazy Wn."

Meyer's photos taken between 2008-2014 in Kurdistan Region won the 2017 PDN's Storytellers prize, a narrative photography competition of documentaries and visual journalism.

"Victims of genocide under Saddam Hussein, Iraq's Kurds had a short period of peace and prosperity after his capture in 2003, up until 2014 when they became targets of the Islamic State," PDN jury said.

But Meyer's photos cover more than war and destruction.

In his own words, they "explores the intimate, tender and paradoxical aspects of Iraq's Kurdish people who are forever caught in the unresolved turmoil that haunts their region."

Placed somewhere between modernity and tradition, Kurdistan Region's every city, almost every street embodies contradictions.

The autonomous region is open and growing yet close and receding at the same time, harsh and wounded but also kind and incredibly hospitable. 

A retired man is reading a book while a girl swings on a rope attached to a water tower. (Photo: Sebastian Meyer)
A retired man is reading a book while a girl swings on a rope attached to a water tower. (Photo: Sebastian Meyer)

Born and raised in New York City, Meyer discovered photography in high school and pursued it as a hobby through college.

"My third year in college, I was studying in Paris and using the darkroom of an American photographer who lived there. She gave me a book of Magnum photographs. I’d never heard of photojournalism before that, but I immediately fell in love with the images in the book," he told Kurdistan 24.

He graduated in in 2002 and started working for local newspapers in Manchester, UK.

"I started shooting video around 2010 when the Canon 5D Mark II camera came out. It was a normal photo camera that also shot HD video. Over time I became increasingly interested in video and now I shoot both video and photos," Meyer said.

He was introduced to Kurdistan in 2008 when the British film director Gwynne Roberts hired him for his "Kurdistan Memory Project."

A long term project, "Kurdistan Memory Project" details Kurdistan Region history through photographs, videos, and archive materials.

During the 6 weeks that Meyer worked as a photographer for Roberts, he "fell in love" with the region.

A family in their home in Khanqin. (Photo: Sebastian Meyer)
A family in their home in Khanqin. (Photo: Sebastian Meyer)

"I knew very little about Iraqi Kurdistan before I arrived, but after spending almost two months there, I knew I had to come back," Meyer said.

When he came back in 2009, Meyer lived more or less full time in Kurdistan until 2014, an adventure that resulted in "A Place We Call Kurdistan" photo series and gifted him insights and memories.

"One of the strongest memories I have is going to photograph a family from Qandil that had been displaced because of a recent bombing in their village. They were living in a tent by the side of a river.

"My friends, two Kurdish photographers, and I spent a few hours talking with the family and photographing them. Then, just before lunchtime, we made excuses to leave because we knew they didn’t have very much food and we didn’t want them to feel they need to feed us.

"We walked about 20 minutes up the river where we put our cameras down and went for a swim. A few minutes after we got out and were drying ourselves on the rocks, we spotted the youngest son of the family coming up the road.

"As he got closer, we saw he was carrying bread and yogurt. When he arrived the told us that his family had sent him to deliver us the food.

"These memories of hospitality and generosity are the strongest from Kurdistan," Meyer said.

"Under Every Yard of Sky" will be published in the fall of 2017, by Red Hook Editions.