Observation#5

Brian Sokol — A photographer who reveals the life of refugee

While I was completing the research blog for photography, the first impression to Brian Sokol’s work — ‘The Most Important Thing’, by asking the refugee what will you bring if you now need to flee to another country? This group of people are the refugee’s holding their ‘most important thing’ that they are going to take with them.

Eighty-five year old Torjam Alamin poses for a portrait in Jamam refugee camp in Maban County, South Sudan on August 7th, 2012. When war came to Sudan's Blue Nile State, Torjam first fled his village of Ahmar, hoping to find safety in neighboring Kukur. However, the conflict followed him there, and he and his family left Kukur during the night, carrying next to nothing with them. The most important things that Torjam was able to bring with him were the plastic bottles he holds here. One carried drinking water, the other cooking oil. "All I could carry was this, and an ax. We couldn't bring much, and even had to leave some other old people behind." Note: Pictured refugees hold the most important single item which they carried with them from Blue Nile. The photographer's intent is to follow up and complete a matching series in several months to see what the most important item in their new lives is.

With black background which made the subject stood out more, is an old man sitting on the blanket holding two empty drink bottles in each of his hand. His white shirt wrinkled up which seemed very old with few blots on it. The intense black eyes were smiling at the camera, they are more like the focal point of these photograph to me. His hands have injured with some paint on the fingers and mud inside his nails, he must be working to survive under this challenging condition. The two plastic bottles could not be see through because they were plastered with mud, and there was no water in both of them.

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