World's best photojournalism at Visa Pour l’Image 2017

4 September 2017

Every year, some of the best photographic stories are on show in Perpignan, France, at the annual Visa Pour l’Image. In 2017, the festival runs from 2 September until 19 September. Besides exhibitions from some of the world’s most respected photojournalists, including Daniel Berehulak, Ed Kashi, Larry Towell, Michael Nichols, and Ferhat Bouda, and the World Press Photo exhibition, the festival will also feature a number of screenings, talks, panel discussions, and awards.

Below are a handful of festival exhibition highlights. Festival details and the full program can be found here.

Seleciton of festival exhibitions and highlights

Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

“They are Slaughtering Us Like Animals”
Inside President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal antidrug campaign in the Philippines.

You hear a murder scene before you see it: the desperate cries of a new widow, the piercing sirens of police cars, the thud, thud, thud of the rain drumming on the pavement of a Manila alleyway, and on the back of Romeo Torres Fontanilla. Tigas, as Mr. Fontanilla was known, was lying face down in the street when I pulled up after 1 am. He was 37. Gunned down, witnesses said, by two unknown men on a motorbike. The downpour had washed his blood into the gutter.

Jimji (6), in anguish screaming “Papa!” before the funeral of Jimboy Bolasa (25). His body, showing signs of torture as well as gunshot wounds, was found under a bridge. The police said he was a drug dealer, but according to his family, Bolasa had surrendered earlier, answering President Duterte's call to follow what was supposed to be a drug-treatment program. Manila, October 10, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.
Jimji (6), in anguish screaming “Papa!” before the funeral of Jimboy Bolasa (25). His body, showing signs of torture as well as gunshot wounds, was found under a bridge. The police said he was a drug dealer, but according to his family, Bolasa had surrendered earlier, answering President Duterte's call to follow what was supposed to be a drug-treatment program. Manila, October 10, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.

The rain-soaked alley in the Pasay district of Manila was my seventeenth crime scene on my eleventh day in the capital of the Philippines. I had come to document the bloody and chaotic campaign against drugs that President Rodrigo Duterte began after taking office on June 30, 2016. Since then, over 3,000 people have been slain at the hands of the police alone.

Over my 35 days in the country, I photographed 57 murder victims at 41 sites. I witnessed bloody scenes almost everywhere: on the sidewalk, on train tracks, outside a girls’ school, 7-Eleven stores and McDonald’s, on mattresses in bedrooms and sofas in living-rooms. I watched as a woman peeked through her fingers at one of these grisly sights, shielding herself while taking one last glance at the man killed in the middle of a busy road.

Relatives overcome with grief seeing the bodies of Frederick Mafe and Arjay Lumbago sprawled in the street. Manila, October 3, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.
Relatives overcome with grief seeing the bodies of Frederick Mafe and Arjay Lumbago sprawled in the street. Manila, October 3, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.

Not far away, I found Michael Araja, dead in front of a “sari sari” kiosk, shot down by two men on a motorcycle, a common tactic known as “riding in tandem.” In another neighbourhood, a bloodied Barbie doll lay next to 17-year-old Erika and her boyfriend, Jericho (23). “They are slaughtering us like animals,” said a bystander, too scared to give his name.

I have worked in sixty countries, covered wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I spent much of 2014 living inside West Africa’s Ebola zone in the grips of fear and death, but what I experienced in the Philippines was a new level of ruthlessness: police officers summarily shooting anyone suspected of drug dealing or use, vigilantes responding to President Duterte’s call to “slaughter them all.” In October, he had said “You can expect 20,000 or 30,000 more.” And in December, after a telephone call with President-elect Trump, he reported that Mr. Trump had endorsed his brutal antidrug campaign: “He said that, well, we are doing it as a sovereign nation, the right way.”

Michael Araja (29) was one of a number of people gunned down at a “sari-sari” street kiosk. Neighbors said he had gone to buy cigarettes and a drink for his wife when he was shot dead by two men on a motorcycle, a “riding in tandem killing” which is a common modus operandi. Officers from SOCO (Scene Of the Crime Operations) are gathering evidence. Manila, October 2, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.
Michael Araja (29) was one of a number of people gunned down at a “sari-sari” street kiosk. Neighbors said he had gone to buy cigarettes and a drink for his wife when he was shot dead by two men on a motorcycle, a “riding in tandem killing” which is a common modus operandi. Officers from SOCO (Scene Of the Crime Operations) are gathering evidence. Manila, October 2, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times.

Zohra Bensemra / Reuters

Lives on a Wire

The first important photograph Zohra Bensemra took showed the aftermath of a suicide car bomb attack in the middle of the Algerian capital. She was 24. “It was the first time I had ever seen bodies lying on the ground. I spent all day crying, I went to bed in tears. The next day I woke up like a new person. I realized that this is what photography is for me: showing the suffering caused by war.”

Ferhat Bouda / Agence VU’

Winner of the 2016 Pierre & Alexandra Boulat Award supported by LaScam
Berbers in Morocco, resisting and defending their culture
Touda, seen with her daughter, was spending a few days with her sister. Tinfgam, Atlas Mountains, 2016. © Ferhat Bouda / Agence VU’. Winner of the Pierre & Alexandra Boulat Award 2016 sponsored by LaScam
Touda, seen with her daughter, was spending a few days with her sister. Tinfgam, Atlas Mountains, 2016.
© Ferhat Bouda / Agence VU’. Winner of the Pierre & Alexandra Boulat Award 2016 sponsored by LaScam

Renée C. Byer

“No Safe Place,” Life in the U.S. for Afghan Refugees

Alvaro Canovas / Paris Match

Regaining Mosul, a bitter struggle
November 6, 2016, between Gogjali and the village of Bazwaya east of Mosul. Whenever there was a break in fighting, civilians fled the front line, seeking protection behind lines held by the Iraqi Armed Forces. © Alvaro Canovas / Paris Match.
November 6, 2016, between Gogjali and the village of Bazwaya east of Mosul. Whenever there was a break in fighting, civilians fled the front line, seeking protection behind lines held by the Iraqi Armed Forces.
© Alvaro Canovas / Paris Match.

Sarah Caron for Le Figaro Magazine

Inshallah Cuba!

Stephen Dock

Human Trafficking – the Scourge of Nepal

Stanley Greene / NOOR

Tribute
February 14, 1949, New York - May 19, 2017, Paris

There are the fashion shots from the very beginning of his career, and his coverage of the rock and punk scene in California, before he changed paths and turned to photojournalism. Stanley Greene’s photographic opus is vast indeed.

The old souk in the Old City of Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage site: once the most charming 4,000 square meters in the Middle East, the most famous postcard in Syria, a vertigo of voices, of tales and colors, overflowing with life. Now all that remains is rubble. April 2, 2013. © Stanley Greene / NOOR.
The old souk in the Old City of Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage site: once the most charming 4,000 square meters in the Middle East, the most famous postcard in Syria, a vertigo of voices, of tales and colors, overflowing with life. Now all that remains is rubble. April 2, 2013. © Stanley Greene / NOOR.
Grozny, Chechnya, January 1995. “Death in Grozny.” Outline of a body in the snow, after a Russian rocket attack: black ash, dark snow, shattered glass, trees now ragged stumps, their branches snapped off by the blasts. The streets of Grozny were a no man's land. © Stanley Greene / NOOR.
Grozny, Chechnya, January 1995. “Death in Grozny.” Outline of a body in the snow, after a Russian rocket attack: black ash, dark snow, shattered glass, trees now ragged stumps, their branches snapped off by the blasts. The streets of Grozny were a no man's land. © Stanley Greene / NOOR.
owntown Grozny, Chechnya, April 2001. Since the death of her child Zelina often stares into the distance, her eyes seeking something far away, so elusive. She says she is already dead, and if only time would hurry up. © Stanley Greene / NOOR.
owntown Grozny, Chechnya, April 2001. Since the death of her child Zelina often stares into the distance, her eyes seeking something far away, so elusive. She says she is already dead, and if only time would hurry up.
© Stanley Greene / NOOR.

Ed Kashi / VII

CKDu – In The Hot Zone

Over the past four years, I have made seven trips to Nicaragua, El Salvador, India, and Sri Lanka to document Chronic Kidney Disease of unknown origin (CKDu), a deadly epidemic that has primarily, and devastatingly, impacted poor, rural, farm workers and their families.

Jorge Martin Bonilla (29), the youngest of six brothers, three of whom are also suffering from CKDu [Chronic Kidney Disease of unknown origin], worked on sugarcane plantations for five years before contracting CKDu in 2004. He died this morning. Chichigalpa, Nicaragua, April 30, 2014. © Ed Kashi / VII.
Jorge Martin Bonilla (29), the youngest of six brothers, three of whom are also suffering from CKDu [Chronic Kidney Disease of unknown origin], worked on sugarcane plantations for five years before contracting CKDu in 2004. He died this morning. Chichigalpa, Nicaragua, April 30, 2014. © Ed Kashi / VII.
At Narayana Medical College, Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, India. January, 2016. © Ed Kashi / VII.
At Narayana Medical College, Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, India. January, 2016. © Ed Kashi / VII.

Darcy Padilla / Agence VU’

Canon Female Photojournalist Award 2016 supported by ELLE Magazine
Dreamers
A tribal member of the Pine Ridge Reservation displaying his “Indian Angel” tattoo. Whiteclay, Nebraska, is a town near the South Dakota border with a population of ten, and where, every year, nearly five million cans of beer are sold, mostly to members of tribes on the Reservation where alcohol is banned. That was until April 2017 when Nebraska officials voted to revoke the liquor licenses of four stores in Whiteclay. © Darcy Padilla / Agence VU’. Winner of the Canon Female Photojournalist Award 2016 supported by ELLE Magazine.
A tribal member of the Pine Ridge Reservation displaying his “Indian Angel” tattoo. Whiteclay, Nebraska, is a town near the South Dakota border with a population of ten, and where, every year, nearly five million cans of beer are sold, mostly to members of tribes on the Reservation where alcohol is banned. That was until April 2017 when Nebraska officials voted to revoke the liquor licenses of four stores in Whiteclay.
© Darcy Padilla / Agence VU’. Winner of the Canon Female Photojournalist Award 2016
supported by ELLE Magazine.

Marco Longari / AFP

Crowds and Solitude in Africa

How do we confront the theme of identity in an area – the African continent – where loyalty to traditional values and the pull towards a global sense of belonging give rise to such deep and apparent contradictions? Which prism do photographers use when recognizing the cracks produced by the stereotypical depiction of apparent otherness?

de la danse des roseaux célébrée par le roi zoulou Goodwill Zwelithini. Palais royal Enyokeni, Nongoma, KwaZulu-Natal, septembre 2014. © Marco Longari / AFP A South African albino posing with other girls for the now traditional Reed Dance ceremony celebrated by the Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini. Enyokeni Royal Palace, Nongoma, KwaZulu-Natal, September, 2014. © Marco Longari / AFP.
de la danse des roseaux célébrée par le roi zoulou Goodwill Zwelithini. Palais royal Enyokeni, Nongoma, KwaZulu-Natal, septembre 2014. © Marco Longari / AFP A South African albino posing with other girls for the now traditional Reed Dance ceremony celebrated by the Zulu King Goodwill Zwelithini. Enyokeni Royal Palace, Nongoma, KwaZulu-Natal, September, 2014. © Marco Longari / AFP.