JACKBIO15
Jack Dabaghian has enjoyed a long and successful career, spanning 30 years of dedication to journalism and photography and reflecting his fascination for the power of images. Born in Beirut in 1961, he covered the Lebanese Civil War as a war photographer, bearing witness to the conflict that tore the nation apart. Following a successful career in Europe, where Jack honed his interest in the aesthetic image through fashion photography, he took up the directorship of the Middle East photo service at Reuters. In his 20 years as a war photographer, Jack covered the Iran/Iraq war and the conflicts in Lebanon, Palestine, Rwanda, Zaire, Algeria and Iraq. His images were published in leading international titles such as Newsweek, Time Magazine, The International Herald Tribune, The New York Times, Paris Match and The Economist, to name but a few. Through his war images, Jack has testified unflinchingly to the violence and agony of humankind. His ethos has ever been to highlight the hatred and destruction wrought by the conflicts of these past few decades. After 25 long years of photographing conflict, Jack's need to distance himself from the monstrosity and barbarity of war and from the proximity to death and destruction led him to develop a humanistic approach to his work. Through his more recent images, Jack investigates a peaceful, fundamentally kind and authentic humanity. Devoid of conflict and aggression, sublimating the murderous impulse of man, his photography is centred on experiencing the aesthetic and the wonder of human creativity. In 2012, Jack started working on personal projects including identity, global warming and abandonned places. A war photographer turned ethno-photographer, Jack captures the beauty and creativity of nomadic tribes in Asia and Africa. His images testify to the visual and artistic nature of ancestral societies and to our own nostalgia for a blessed earliest paradise. Despite the threat of an encroaching modern world, the hope is that these images do not become documents of what once was, but rather pay tribute to the continued existence of vibrant peoples and cultures.