Children of the Shadows: Afghanistan in Black and White

Photographer

JIANAN FAN

Category

Special Category - Smartphone Photography

Company

CHUNG-ANG UNIVERSITY

Submission Group

Student

Year

2025

Country / Region:

China

This photographs, captured entirely on a Huawei P50 Pro smartphone, explores the fragile intersections of history, conflict, and everyday life in contemporary Afghanistan. Shot in black and white, the images strip away distraction and present an unflinching gaze at a society caught between memory and survival. The photographs resist a linear narrative. Instead, they form a fragmented but cohesive portrait of Afghanistan as seen through the immediacy of a first-person encounter. The choice of mobile photography is not merely technical but conceptual: it allows for proximity, spontaneity, and a sense of unmediated witnessing.