Catch my slide shows, and stories from Windows of the Soul this fall:

At the 2009 Fall for the Book Festival, Tuesday September 22 at 7:30pm. Join me at the Johnson Center Cinema on George Mason University's Fairfax, Virginia Campus.

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Jean-Francois Leroy, Director and Founder of Visa Pour L'Image on the staircase of Hotel Pams, Perpignan, France

Hello from lovely Perpignan in the south of France, where I am honored to have an exhibition at the renowned international photojournalism festival Visa Pour L'image. This is my third exhibit at Visa Pour L'Image; the first was 21 years ago in 1988, the first year of the festival.

Walking along sun-blasted cobblestone streets, taking shelter in cool shadows along the way, I smell dust, fresh bread and the tang of stewing tomatoes and hot spices; behind tall windows shuttered against the sun, lunch is cooking. A silver-green olive tree stands alone in the center of a tiny square. Fresh laundry moves slightly on lines strung across ancient alleys; a boy dashes through a sharp streak of light.

On Rue Emile Zola I come to Hotel Pams, the base of the festival, where I visited with Visa Pour L'Image founder and Director Jean-Francois Leroy in his office.

Jean-Francois has long given much of his time and heart to photojournalism; he is one of the most important curators and editors in the world, and an enduring, passionate defender of photojournalists. He's in constant motion so soon before the opening of the festival this Saturday, Aug. 29.

Every year there is a theme for the festival, and 2009 has a dramatic one. So, please click here to read an interview with Jean-Francois Leroy, by Caroline Laurent and Lucas Menget on this year's theme at Visa and the future of photojournalism:

Check out NPR's Picture Show today, featuring Windows of the Soul: My Journeys in the Muslim World by photojournalist Alexandra Avakian, published by Focal Point/National Geographic.

At the temporary grave of Ayatollah Khomeini,1989

The stakes for the future of the Islamic Republic are high and the outcome is uncertain at this time. Read more about my experiences in Iran from my fall 2008 post: http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/photography/windowsofthesoul/iran. And view my photos from Iran:

Men standing near a painting of Ayatollah Khomeini

Boy kissing a portrait of Ayatollah Khomeini

Blood of a sacrificed lamb streaks a north Tehran street on the day of mourning for Imam Hussain and the peak of the month of Muharram.

Imam Mosque, Isfahan, Iran

Actress on a movie set, Kish Island, Iran

Women weaving a rug, Heris, Iran

Young couple on Khajou Bridge, Isfahan, Iran

A 17-year-old Kurdish bride at Zarivar Lake, Iran

Dear Readers/Viewers,

Windows of the Soul news includes:

The launch of a new NG Live! DVD in The Photographers series of my slide lecture (and Sam Abell's) at the National Geographic Society, and it includes up close and personal interviews. Learn more and buy the DVD here.

The Windows of the Soul photo exhibit will premier at the 21st edition of the International Festival of Photojournalism Visa Pour L'Image in Perpignan, France.
The dates are August 29th to September 13th. Find out more here.

Windows of the Soul is excerpted in the spring issue of Sarah Lawrence Magazine - read more here.

The Armenian Reporter did an in-depth interview, reprinted here.

On April 9th my photos from mass graves in Syria were shown as a slide show in New York at Columbia University during a forum on the Armenian Genocide moderated by New York Times reporter Andrea Kannapell, featuring Professor Taner Akcam and lawyer Mark Geragos.

Arizona was lovely, moody and beautiful; saw lots coyotes, deer, and other fauna and flora such as Saguaro cactus and plentiful desert spring flowers. Took a trip with my family all the way down to Nogales where we stayed at a gorgeous 300 year old cattle ranch, now an inn. Here is the ranch on a National Geographic map.

Then at the Tucson Festival of Books, I did two slide show/book talks and two signings for The Center for Middle Eastern Studies and the BookStore, University of Arizona, Tucson.

Amanda Shauger of KXCI public radio talked at length with me about the book - hear the interview here.

I did a live segment on KOLD TV and was also interviewed by Tony Paniagua on KUAZ public radio station.

While I was in Arizona, a pow wow took place at the Tohono O'odham reservation. I felt lucky, as I have long been interested in photographing there. Above is a photo of some Native American dancers text messaging behind the San Xavier Church. Thanks and until next time!

On Saturday, February 21 at 8 a.m. (EST) and Sunday, February 22 at 12 a.m. and 1 p.m. (EST), CSPAN2's Book TV featured Alexandra's NG Live! 10/08 slide show and book talk at the National Geographic Society.

On Thursday, February 19, Alexandra and Windows of the Soul were featured in an in-depth interview on Worldview with Jerome McDonnell on Chicago Public Radio, and at a slide show and book signing at FLATEFILEgalleries in Chicago.

Voice of America TV, Radio and website covered Avakian and Windows of the Soul last month, and again on February 21 & February. 22 on the V.O.A. program Conference USA.

CONTACT:
Jeffrey D. Smith

jeffreysmith@contactpressimages.com
Contact Press Images, Inc.
341 West 38th Street -7th fl
New York, NY 10018
Phone: 212-695-7874 or 7875
Fax: 212-695-7768

Traveling in the Islamic Republic of Iran was one of my most personal journeys and is in the second chapter of my book. You probably want to know: why would an American woman with all the freedom in the world want to subject herself to so much time in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a country that has shared mutual official enmity with the United States for thirty years? Why would she go to a place where it is illegal to go outside without wearing Islamic dress and where a U.S. journalist must work with a government approved minder and have permission for every story point she wants to cover?

Deep reasons.

My grandfather Mesrop Avakian was born in Iran. He came to the United States in 1923. But my family roots there stretch back to the distant past when northwestern Iran was part of the vast land of ancient Urartu. I strongly believe in crossing cultural boundaries to visually describe the lives of others, even when politics divide our countries. Indeed I have lived my life that way.

Long before I had the opportunity to go there myself, my father Aram Avakian, the film director and editor, went to scout locations in Iran for a movie he was slated to make with Sean Connery. That was in the Shah's time, the summer of 1978. He came back after a month and told me: "That was a great trip but I'll never be able to make this movie." But why? I asked him. "There's going to be a revolution and this man will come back and take power." He showed me underground fliers and a button with a picture of Ayatollah Khomeini on it, which he was given by his driver. He'd seen demonstrations in the street. I still have the beautiful black and white photos he took on that journey.

The first chance I got to go to the Islamic Republic myself was when Ayatollah Khomeini died. I had been covering the Arab Summit in May 1989 for Time magazine when I read that Ayatollah Khomeini had died. I quickly went to Iran and covered the grieving for him, again for Time. Then the authorities allowed me to stay on and work for almost two precious weeks.

The Holy Shrine of Hazrat Fatemah Ma'soomeh

Sorry for the absence! It is Foto Week here in Washington, D.C., and I've been busy going to exhibitions, events. I also helped hang a photo exhibit I'm part of which was the kick-off event of the week, by Contact Press Images, the photo agency I belong to.

I've also got some photos on exhibit now at the National Geographic Society: www.nationalgeographic.com/museum/exhibitions/focal-point.html

Continuing to expand upon aspects of my book, Windows of the Soul: My Journeys in the Muslim World, published by Focal Point, National Geographic Books' new imprint, and wrapping up the intro chapter, people often ask me what it is like to be a woman in my field, so here we go:

Mogadishu, Somalia

Being a woman working in the Muslim world has mostly been a great experience--one of the most satisfying of my life. Sure, I have been beaten, shot at, and more, as I write about in my book, but these things happen anywhere to anybody in the world during a conflict, most recently in Congo or Georgia. The Muslim world is just like the rest of the planet: It goes through cycles of political change, and sometimes that change can be dramatic.

Hezbollah rally, Baalbek, Lebanon

I have mostly been made to feel at home in the Muslim world. I have made a point to dress modestly and know the local etiquette and culture wherever I have worked. Throughout my career, I have had unusual access to Islamist groups and individuals, including Hamas and Hezbollah, so being a woman has not at all been a disadvantage. Indeed, being a woman has actually been an advantage in that once trust is earned, I have been able to interact with both male and female sides of the conservative Muslim world. Male photographers are usually forbidden entry to the world of conservative Muslim women.

Masked women, Minab, Iran

In the field and on assignment, being a woman helps as much as it hinders. Sometimes people will help you because you are a woman, or think you couldn't possibly be analytical or important enough to be a challenge. Other times they will stop you because they think it's easier to do so.

Being a woman in the photography world is as tough as in any other male-dominated field, although I have mostly been supported spectacularly in my career by the best editors, and am grateful for it. There have also been unfortunate incidents of gender bias and sexual harassment that I have in common with working women in many professions.

Yuai , Southern Sudan

As you will see from my book, there is no difference between me and the toughest, most successful male photographers. My experience as a photojournalist has been exciting and rewarding, and I wouldn't trade back any of it. Being a woman has been an important part of that journey.

Related Links:
www.fotoweekdc.org/
www.contactpressimages.com

Continuing to chat about the personal introduction chapter, the other thing that drew me to cover tough situations in difficult countries undergoing change was that like many American immigrants the Armenian side of my family had experienced some rather challenging events before coming to the United States. My family had to move often between northern Iran, the Caucuses, and Russia, according to the dangers and pressures they faced.

In the photo above, Mount Ararat--where the bible says Noah's ark landed--is Armenia's holy mountain and stands in Turkey. I photographed it from Armenian wheat fields. 

I began learning the details when I was about 20. My family didn't want to tell us about it when we were too young.

My family experienced the Russian Revolution and many of my grandmother's relatives were wiped out in Stalin's Great Terror. And in the early 1800s they barely survived a cholera epidemic in Armenia. The Iranian side of the family also lived through the Constitutional and 1979 Revolutions of Iran.

They fled the Armenian Genocide of 1915 as violence also spilled over the Persian border, plus several smaller massacres before and after that. Turkish Armenian relatives also survived the Genocide. During that time there was no UN in existence to stop the organized killings. There was no bunch of international photojournalists to document it in pictures. But there were some military officers from Germany and Russia who did photograph the killing fields. There were diplomats who witnessed it and reported. The genocide and the massacres were covered well by reporters in the New York Times, National Geographic magazine, and other publications of the day--and extensively in the Arabic press. In 1915 there was no such word as "genocide"--it was created later to describe the Jewish Holocaust and describes other cases of government-organized ethnic cleansing as well.

Also in the front-of-the-book essay is this photo of a Savannah, Georgia, mosque that was burned to the ground in an arson attack in the summer of 2003. The attack followed threatening letters and gunshots fired at the mosque in the night. Muslim Americans were under quite a lot of pressure after 9/11, even though most of them love America as much as any other immigrants.

The other picture, not in the book, is of Sikh Americans who were mistaken for Arabs in November 2004. Their gas station/convenience store was torched in a hate crime in Chesterfield, Virginia, and anti-Arab slogans were spray-painted on trash bins out back.

Though based in Moscow, I traveled widely in Iraq after the first Gulf War and returned in 1999 to cover Iraq's problem with looted archaeology. Saddam Hussein's Iraq was a difficult, miserable, fear-soaked universe crawling with informants. People could not even trust family members, much less neighbors. A child might even unwittingly betray its parents if politics were spoken of openly in the home. The parallels to Stalinism were no coincidence. Saddam used Stalin's tried and true methods to great effect.

I wrote a story for Time magazine in February 1992 about how a Baghdad family had to turn up music and shut windows before they would discuss politics with me, about the young girl who had to be hustled out of danger by an older relative simply because she talked to me. I have never forgotten her. She asked me for a book to read in English and I was not able to give her one. During that trip I visited a Basra nightclub with the writer, also a woman, and our government minder. We spent the evening talking with two prostitutes who told us of their woeful lives, one of them in tears. Then the lights were turned on and army troops marched in, led by an officer. They rounded up all the young men in the club and took them away. I had slipped my camera below the table, and my finger was on the shutter. I was tempted to shoot a picture quietly--just lay the camera on the table. With just one click I would have something. The minder begged me as if he had read my mind: "Don't do it--please. I will be punished." How could I?

This picture was taken on a movie set on Kish Island, Iran, in the Persian Gulf. The Islamic Republic was using Kish as a social testing ground for mild liberalization at that time.

The director was the dissident Bahram Beyzaii. This is his wife, actress Mozhdeh Shamsai. I was fascinated with how actresses navigated Islamic rules. When I visited her during her preparation for a play in Tehran, she donned a wig instead of the customary headscarf to comply with the law against showing one's real hair. For her costume people, attention to covering her wrists was important so as not to break the law by revealing too much, thereby risking the production being shut down. The makeup artist was a man who begged me not to photograph him touching this actress as he applied makeup, as it would have brought scandal upon them. My mother is an actress and my father and stepfather are film and theater directors, so I grew up backstage and on movie sets. I felt very at home in this milieu and was attuned to the restrictions artists have to face in Iran.