Blood Diamond: Kadir van Lohuizen Photography

As a graduate student at the International Center of Photography (ICP), I often benefit from access to an impressive network of photographers, educators, editors and intellectuals in the media world (and what world is not the media world, these days?)

This past Tuesday, at our weekly photojournalism studies seminar, Kadir van Lohuizen and Stanley Greene, who were members of Agence VU in Paris, visited our class and shared their work, their thoughts and their experiences. If you are not familiar with them as photographers, you should check out their work (click on their names below).

Kadir van Lohuizen is most recognized for his work following the trail of diamonds from Sierra Leone to Saks Fifth Avenue. Working with NGOs (non-governmental organizations), which were the only source of funding he was able to procure in advance of embarking upon his journey, he was able to spend the better part of a year traveling the world in an attempt to stay on the trail of diamonds.

One of the NGOs with whom he has worked closely is Global Witness. You can read their UN reports and more about the situation by going to their "combating conflict diamonds" page.

If you haven't already seen the movie, Blood Diamond, (read and listen to a discussion on NPR) with Leonardo DiCaprio, you might check that out, as well. I haven't seen the film, but van Lohuizen indicated that, putting the Hollywood-isms aside, it's a pretty accurate portrayal of how bloody the diamond industry is.

You can learn more about van Lohuizen's experience, and background on the terms "blood diamond" and "conflict diamond" by reading his exhibition artist statement on the Soros Foundation's Open Society Institute website. Here is an excerpt:

"In the 1990s, I covered the fighting in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo), Sierra Leone, and Angola, conflicts that were often dismissed as tribal wars, the final convulsions of the Cold War. By degrees, however, these conflicts turned into struggles over diamonds.

The diamond deposits, for the most part, were controlled by the Angolan and Sierra Leonean rebels, who used the gems as a means to buy weapons. Governments got in on the act, and the terms "blood diamond" and "conflict diamond" were born."

Stanley Greene was also on hand to talk about his work, offering the students gathered at ICP a moving and vulnerable testimony. Greene and van Louhizen have been colleagues while they worked with Agence VU, and more recently as co-grantees with the support of the Soros Foundation to document both the damage in Mississippi and Louisiana, as well as post-Katrina responses by the government. You'll find this online about Greene:

Stanley Greene (US. B. 1949) was born in Harlem, and as a teenager was a member of the Black Panthers and an anti-Vietnam War activist. An encounter with W. Eugene Smith turned his energies to photography. By chance he was on hand to record the fall of the Berlin Wall, which made him a much-sought-after photojournalist. He has photographed wars and poverty in Sudan, Croatia and India, and made a great impression with the photo book Open Wound: Chechnya 1994-2000. Greene is represented by Agence Vu, and won the W. Eugene Smith Award in 2004.

Stanley's most recent work, at least that was shared with us, is with regard to a new website he is finalizing. I don't have the URL at this time, but will update in a future post so that you can read his words and hear his voice, personally. Meanwhile, check out images he took in Chad and in Katrina (an excerpt of images from Louisiana, An Unnatural Disaster,
can be seen online).