Leila Dambar, sister of Said Dambar, killed in 2010 by the Moroccan Police. Since it's not clear how and why he was killed, the family has left the body for over one year at the morgue, asking for an autopsy. Laayoune. 2012.
Elghalia Djimi, a victim of forced disappearance for 3 years and 7 moths in a Moroccan secret prison. She spent the whole time blindfolded. She is now an activist for Saharawi's human right. Laayoune. 2012.
Said Dambar was killed in 2010 by the Moroccan Police. Since it's not clear until now how and why he was killed, the family has left the body for over one year at the morgue, asking for an autopsy. Laayoune. 2012.
The mother of Said Dambar, killed in 2010 by the Moroccan Police. Since it's not clear until now how and why he was killed, the family has left the body for over one year at the morgue, asking for an autopsy. Laayoune. 2012.
Gajmoula Maoloud Abaaya was separated from the rest of her family who escaped during the war in the refugee camps in Algeria. She hasn’t seen her mother or her husband since 1976. She remained alone with her 15-day old daughter Fatimatou. Family picture with her sister. Laayoune. 2012.
Elghalia Djimi, a victim of forced disappearance for 3 years and 7 moths in a Moroccan secret prison. She spent the whole time blindfolded. She is now an activist for Saharawi's human right. Here with her husband and a friend on the vally of Saguia El Hamra. Laayoune. 2012.
Elghalia Djimi, a victim of forced disappearance for 3 years and 7 moths in a Moroccan secret prison. She spent the whole time blindfolded. She is now an activist for Saharawi's human right. Layyoune. 2012.
Night in the desert. Elghalia Djimi, victim of forced disappearance for 3 years and 7 moths in a Moroccan secret prison. She spent the whole time blindfolded. She is now an activist for Saharawi's human right. Laayoune. 2012.
Young woman beaten by the police during the Saharawi peaceful manifestation on Friday 13 January 2012. Layyoune.
Young woman beaten by the police during the Saharawi peaceful manifestation on Friday 13 January 2012. Layyoune.
A young woman repeatedly arrested for being an activist for Saharawi Human Rights, takes care of her sister beaten by the police during a demonstration on Friday 13, January, 2012. Layyoune. 2012
Soukaina Jid Ahloud, a victim of forced disappearance from 1981 to 1991 in a Moroccan secret prison. While she was disappeared her youngest daughter, 9 months old, died of starvation. Now she is a very well known activist for Saharawi human rights. Smara. 2012
Soukaina Jid Ahloud, a victim of forced disappearance from 1981 to 1991 in a Moroccan secret prison. While she was disappeared her youngest daughter, 9 months old, died of starvation. Now she is a very well known activist for Saharawi human rights. Smara. 2012
In Southern Algeria, in a rocky desert where about 200,000 Saharawis have been living as refugees for more than 30 years, you can find in almost every school and in every house a picture of Aminatou Haidar as a holy icon. This 43 year-old woman, known as “The Gandhi of Western Sahara, has become the symbol of Saharawis’ pacific resistance in this territory, a former Spanish colony still contested by Morocco and Polisario Front, the Saharawi government in Southern Algeria refugee camps.
Aminatou has been in prison many times and her health is still suffering, but she also has succeeded in travelling all over the world to take several awards as a defender of human rights and to explain how hard life is for Saharawis in Western Sahara: divided by a wall from their families in the Algerian camps; still waiting for a referendum that is supposed to establish the sovereignty on Western Sahara.
Aminatou Haidar is not the only woman with a central role in Saharawis’ history and society. Both in Algerian camps and in Western Sahara, women represent the pillars of this atypical and advanced Muslim society. Here, women go to universities (mostly offered by foreign “friend” countries as Cuba, Libya and Algeria), they teach in schools, they work as doctors and engineers. And they are wives and mothers as well. A peculiarity of nomadic people but also a paradoxical heritage of a long war: the conflict with Morocco started in 1975 and ended in 1991, and during all this period Saharawi men were committed to battle, so women had to build State and society.
My project focuses on that: portraits and everyday life of Saharawi women, in the refugee camps and in the towns of Western Sahara. Although 20 years have passed since the end of war, tension is still present and strong, mostly in so-called “occupied territories” where Saharawis are a minority surrounded by Moroccans and often denounce violence, torture and violations of their human rights.
Simona Ghizzoni was born in Reggio Emilia, Italy, in 1977. After studying the classics, she attended the Istituto Superiore di Arti Visive e Fotografia in Padua, where she graduated in 2002. She went on to gain an MA in the history of photography from the University of Bologna in 2007, with a thesis on the history of psychiatric photography.
Since 2005 Ghizzoni has committed herself to reportage and personal research projects, especially concerning the condition of women. In 2006 she was selected for the Reflexions Master class, held by the photographer Giorgia Fiorio and the curator Gabriel Bauret. In the same year she tied for first prize at the FNAC photo contest, with the work ‘Scars', an essay on Sarajevo ten years after the end of the war.
She won the 3rd prize single portrait at World Press Photo 2008 with an image part of her work “Odd Days," a work on eating disorders.
Her self-portrait series “In Between” was exposed at Paris Photo 2008.
In 2009 her reportage “Ghosts” on landmines victims in Cambodia was awarded by 2nd prize Magazine Feature Pictures Story at POYI (Los Angeles). In the same year the work “Odd Days” was awarded with Photoespaña Ojodepez Award for Human Values. “Odd Days” has been exhibited at the New York Photo Festival, May 2011, and at Photoespaña 2010.
Ghizzoni was selected to be part of the 16th Joop Swart Masterclass. Two projects by Simona Ghizzoni, "Lie in Wait" (stories of Iraqi women in Jordan) and "My Beauty Is Dead To You" have been pre-selected in the "reality" short films category at the Capodarco community prize 2011.
Ghizzoni is based in Rome and represented by Contrasto and Forma Gallery.
Call of the Valley – Returning to Destroyed Village Life in Eastern Turkey
Searching for Lost Lives: Where Killing is a Means to Many Ends
