La bellezza di Paghman – Lorenzo Merlo Ekarrrt

Title: La ragazza di Paghman
Dimensions: 24x30 cm

Heart

Before the colors of her dress, before appreciating the elegance of her shawl, the sweetness of her face and her beauty, before guessing her age, wondering who she is and where she is from, first you see the suffering that imposes itself, clear and strongly felt. There is no visible muscle in the face or covered in the shoulder or neck that is free from this image of pain. And no eyes, always necessary to build emotional bridges, search for compassion in others. The spirit of suffering is expressed without uncertainty. Empathy comes regardless of our gaze, attention and interest.

History

In times of peace, people went to Paghman from Kabul for day trips and vacations. The city was considered the garden of Kabul. It is located in a luxuriant valley, alive with the reflections of the river of the same name, banks lined with kiosks and chykhana (tea rooms). The bombs of the civil war (1992-1996) destroyed any idea of those holidays. But the bombs did not wipe out the origins of the historic agro-pastoral area.

The girl was returning from a hard day's work in the fields on the back of a donkey. Her expression is like a silent scream of a suffering that will never find support, which she can only keep to herself, like the tears that will not run down her face.

Although she was old enough to have to wear the burqa, she did not wear it as per the tradition of the Aimaq ethnic group, originally from the central valleys of the Hindu Kush.

The most common image in the West of the Afghan female figure (in burqa) mainly springs from the Pashtum culture. Instead, women in the Aimaq culture wear very colorful and particularly attractive clothes and robes.

It is by no means usual for a male, western photographer to shoot female figures in Afghanistan.