Book of the Week

Afghanistan
by Chris Steele-Perkins

Afghanistan is a collaboration between photographer Chris Steele-Perkins and famed Afghan poet Sayd Bahodine Majrouh. In attempting to capture the continuing cycles of everyday life despite the country’s harsh reality of war, Steele-Perkins has created a celebration of Afghanistan, which he visited numerous times in the course of five years. "It was heroic, beautiful, violent, twisted, gracious, and tragic," Steele-Perkins explains. "The experience of being there works its way into one's being; an infection of the soul demanding that you return."

All my photographs are portraits—self-portraits, because you can’t photograph someone without reflecting, echoing, like a bat sending out a signal that comes back to you. You get not only a picture of who you’re photographing, but you get a picture of yourself at the same time.

Bruce Davidson