Open Theme nominee

Together, the photographs present the strange reality of life in Nagorno-Karabakh. Everywhere the stigmata of war are present. It is visible both in the landscape and on the faces of its inhabitants. A decor that is not without reminding us of the violence of the war. A "frozen" conflict that can resurface at any moment. So, how does everyday life resonate when one lives in a perpetually suspended time on the brink of war?

How does such an existence affect culture, traditions, architecture? This project, which began in 2016, seeks to understand the inhabitants of this region, their struggle for independence and why, despite years of unrest, they remain committed to this cause. For the majority of the inhabitants, living here is an act of resistance.

They are the characters, inevitably tragic, of an endless war. In a world imbued with patriotism and military culture, where misfortunes and intimate dramas feed the collective heroism. It is both a documentation of his past and present, and an attempt to understand his future.

Alexis Pazoumian (1988) is a French photographer and filmmaker of Armenian origin based in Paris. His work is oriented towards social documentary, focusing on communities living on the margins of society. From the favelas of Rio, in the United States, and more recently in Siberia and Armenia, notions of humanity, identity and society are at the heart of his work.

In 2017, he publishes his first book "Faubourg Treme" at Editions André Frère on the daily life of the African-American community in New Orleans. This book was distributed in France, the United Kingdom and the United States.

His new book "Sacha" on the impact of climate change on the daily life of a reindeer herder in Siberia will be released in bookstores in February 2020. He regularly disseminates his work in the press such as: The Washington post, The Guardian, National Geographic, Der Spiegel, Vanity Fair, Vogue and Libération. In December 2020, his new documentary film on the Nagorno-Karabakh region is broadcast on the French television channel Arte. He is preparing a new book and a long documentary on the same subject.