John Vink - a photojournalist working on humanity issues in Cambodia, won W. Eugene Smith Award in Humanistic Photography for "Waters from Sahel".
His work touches on issues including
Explore
his websites to enjoy the visual journey to Cambodia.
p.s. excerpt from one of his
interview
Wayne: Why has it been so important for you to cover the “powerless and poor?” Why refugees in particular? From where does that sense of justice and injustice stem in you?
John: Why do you climb a mountain? Because it’s there… I must say I never understood why people talk about well-known people. They have a voice already. So why add more noise? Too much information becomes noise. I never understood (or rather: wanted to accept) the fact that all the media focus on the same topic at the same time. When all the media went to Rwanda, I went to Angola. World news… What is that? Whose world are we talking about? Do you really believe the guy in Cambodia who just got kicked out of the shack he has been living in for the last ten years gives a 100 Riel note about Israel flattening parts of Beyrouth? Is a Hezbollah more important than an Israeli or a Phnom Penh slum dweller? I guess it depends on where the center of your world is. When I look at the Cambodian news, Cambodia is in the middle of the map (not that all Cambodians give a shit about the slum dweller next door mind you)…
I always understood the function of being a photojournalist as a go-between, shuttling between one group of people and another to try and explain how the others are faring. It is a fairly simple job in fact: you identify a group, go there, look around, sniff around, listen, take pictures which try to convey what you saw, smelled, heard, and bring it back to others who don’t have the opportunity of going there. Personally, as a matter of putting the sound balance right, I would go to those groups which have more difficulties in having their voice heard (when the voice is faint it is more interesting for that exact reason: why is it that faint?). Refugees have less voice than others. They are pawns. Minorities have less voice. Victims have less voice. If they had a loud voice (if they were allowed to have a loud voice) they would not be a victim. Power is about shutting up the voice of the others. So it goes like this: you have a faint voice, I’ll try and talk about you. You have a loud voice: I heard you already and I am not interested in more…
I guess it has to do with my parents who taught me to be just, not to cheat, not to lie, and to shut up when the adults are talking…
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