PORTFOLIO Images - Courtesy of the artist. Writer - Sabrina DeTurk, art historian, curator, writer and educator.
Samer Mohdad: Writing in Light Diversity, connection and contradiction in the modern Arab world In the summer of 1985, Samer Mohdad followed his
young boys learning to shoot a military rifle but also
cousin Kamal into the heart of the ‘Mountain War’
learning traditional Palestinian dances, reflecting
being fought between the Christian Phalangists and
the profound disjunctions brought on by war. His
the Druze Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) in the Chouf
photographic style is both straightforward and
region of Lebanon. Kamal, Druze like Mohdad and
dramatic; children often face the camera directly,
a commander in the PSP, had agreed to allow his
but the viewer is also drawn to backgrounds filled
cousin to record the events of the summer’s campaign.
with shadow, in which secondary elements of the
Mohdad emerged from the experience with both a
photo can tell a deeper story.
film titled Le but (‘The goal’) and a drive to continue his education as a filmmaker. He was 19 years old.
In 1996, Mohdad’s second book, Retour a Gaza (Return to Gaza), reflected the experiences of 415
I wrote in light the stories of people from countries marked by centuries of clashes, and captured moments in time that make us face our realities as Arabs with deeper conviction.
Mohdad would return to Lebanon during the
men who were expelled from Gaza to South Lebanon
holidays while completing his bachelor’s degree
in 1992 because of their connections to Hamas or
in photography at the École supérieure des arts
to other Islamist organizations. Collaborating with
Saint-Luc de Liège in Belgium and continued
reporter Andreas Dietrich, Mohdad visited the men in
photographing the ongoing civil war in the country.
the Marj az-Zohour displacement camp in 1993 and
After his graduation in 1988, he was employed
then again in Gaza after their return in the summer
by Agence Vu, a French photojournalism agency,
of 1994. As with War Children, the photographs in
for which he continued to shoot features on the
Return to Gaza reflect Mohdad’s ability to capture
Lebanese conflict. From all of this work came his
both individual pathos and a larger sense of
first book, Les enfants de la guerre, Liban, 1985-
determination in the face of desperate circumstances.
1992 (War Children, Lebanon, 1985-1992) which was
In a photo of Fadlallah Abu Taylakh taken at Marj
published in France in 1993. Photos from the book
az-Zohour, Mohdad portrays the exiled Palestinian
joy on the face of this man as he plays with his child
were exhibited in Beirut and France and Mohdad
as he changes clothes behind a makeshift screen
lights up the photo. Mohdad notes that many of the
began to acquire a reputation for capturing both the
stretched in front of the forbidding rocky landscape
men he photographed for the project, including Abu
horror and the banality of persistent warfare, using
of South Lebanon. Only his face is visible, his eyes
Taylakh, later rose to positions of authority within
a style evocative of street photography as much as
fixed in the so-called “thousand-yard stare” familiar
Hamas and, thus, the work documents not only
of war photography.
to war photographers who have captured that vacant,
their particular experience but a broader sense of
resigned look on the faces of hundreds of soldiers
the growing importance of Hamas as a force to be
In War Children, Mohdad shows us the children
over the years. A second photo of Abu Taylakh, taken
reckoned with in Middle East politics. As Mohdad
of Southern Lebanon’s refugee camps in places
in Gaza after his return from the camp, shows him
writes in the introduction to the book, “Besides telling
like Ain el-Helweh, near Saida, where the Palestine
lying on the floor, laughing as he hoists his young
a story of exile and return, one that touches on the
Liberation Organization recruited child soldiers
daughter into the air. The surroundings are scarcely
destiny of the Palestinian people, Return to Gaza
known as Lion Cubs. Mohdad photographed these
less bleak than those of the previous photo, yet the
witnesses the beginnings of this rise to power.”
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