Afghanistan or The Perils of Freedom

In Afghanistan, award-winning Australian photographer Stephen Dupont has covered everything from civil war and the rise of the Taliban in the 1990s to the launch of Operation Enduring Freedom and the ongoing war on terrorism. This book features selections from his portfolio Afghanistan, 1993-2008, as well as photographs from the series Axe Me Biggie, whose title is a phonetic rendering of the Dari for “Mister, take my picture!”  Dupont made these portraits during the course of one day (March 13, 2006) with a Polaroid camera in a makeshift studio in the streets of Kabul. Together, these photographs tell a story of poverty, warfare, and broken promises, but also of perseverance and hope, as they refocus attention on the state of Afghanistan today.

This book was a companion to Dupont's first solo exhibition in the United States, presented at The New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street.