The photographs in the exhibition were, largely, taken in war-torn Kobane in the de facto autonomous region in northern Syria (Rojava in Kurdish) during the five-month siege by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and after its liberation in January 2015. The battle for the liberation of Kobane, led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) with the support of U.S. military airstrikes, is considered a turning point in the fight against ISIS. The exhibition also documents the plight of some of the refugees fleeing the war in the Middle East.

Conflict, Resistance, Displacement is an exhibition made by Re-Build and independent curator Kosha Hussain.

Re-Build is a registered charity founded to help reconstruct the homes of those displaced by war with the objective of helping them to return. The funds raised through this exhibition will go towards rebuilding the city of Kobane, which was 80% destroyed by the war, and to help the refugees from the region.

Biographies

Maryam Ashrafi is based in Paris and has been covering Kurdish issues in Northern Iraq, Syria and Europe for the past three years. She is particularly interested in the experience of Kurdish women both in terms of their participation in the conflict and more general issues around emancipation struggles. Ashrafi travelled to Kobane a few weeks after its liberation in January 2015 where she documented the lives of frontline fighters as well as the displaced who were returning to the area. She returned to Kobane in 2016 to cover the ongoing war with ISIS in the surrounding areas.

Kobane, Syria, 2014. Smoke columns from a coalition airstrike on an ISIS target over the besieged city. Photograph: Frédéric Lafargue/The Guardian Foundation

Frédéric Lafargue is an award-winning photojournalist who specialises in the Middle East. He has covered major news stories and conflicts in Iraq, Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Iran, Syria, Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon. He is the only photojournalist to cover the siege of Kobane at the end of 2014 and he returned in the immediate wake of its liberation from ISIS in January 2015. He also documented the liberation of Sinjar district, Iraq from ISIS in November 2015.



Lafargue’s images have been published in major newspapers and magazines around the world, including Newsweek, Time, Life, Paris Match, Le Monde, Libération the New York Times, GEO, Der Spiegel, Stern, the Guardian, Il Corriere de la Sera, El Mundo, El Pais.

Syrian refugees, Budapest, Hungary, 2015. In response to the influx of refugees, the Hungarian authorities close Keleti Train Station. When it is re-opened, all international trains are cancelled. Eventually, the Hungarian authorities charter dozens of buses to clear the station, an operation that takes about three hours to complete. Photograph: Antonio Olmos/The Observer

Antonio Zazueta Olmos is a photojournalist who has worked covering issues concerning human rights, the environment and conflict. He has worked extensively in the Americas, the Middle East and Africa for newspapers and magazines around the world as well as leading NGOs. His work is published regularly in the Observer and Guardian Newspapers in the UK. In 2001 Antonio was awarded a World Press 1st place in the People in the News Category for his work in Palestinian Territories. Antonio’s work has been exhibited widely and his first book, “The Landscape of Murder” was published recently documenting the sites of homicides in London.

You can see the exhibition at the Guardian’s London office from the 16th of January till the 28th of February.