Photographer Yusuke Suzuki: Discovering the meaning of war
Nadine Wojcik eg
October 10, 2016
Japanese photographer Yusuke Suzuki has just received the Award for Young Emerging Talents at the Berlin Photo Biennial. To understand what war means, he traveled to Syria, Afghanistan and the Greek island of Lesbos.
Image: USK Photography
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Photographer Yusuke Suzuki: Discovering the meaning of war
Japanese photographer Yusuke Suzuki has just received the Award for Young Emerging Talents at the Berlin Photo Biennial. To understand what war means, he traveled to Syria, Afghanistan and the Greek island of Lesbos.
Image: USK Photography
Total destruction
Photographer Yusuke Suzuki travelled over the Turkish border into Aleppo, in Syria. This picture in his series "City of Chaos" shows a once-lively shopping street. "When I arrived in Aleppo, I realized that there wasn't any water, gas, electricity, nor medicine, schools, jobs or baby milk here, he said.
Image: USK Photography
Bitterly cold
"As blankets were handed out, people were screaming to get one. No one had enough gas to heat and the winter was super cold," recalls Yusuke Suzuki, who took this picture in Aleppo in January.
Image: USK Photography
Friends
The Japanese photographer traveled to Syria with the help of a contact in the Free Syrian Army. They immediately became friends; thanks to him, Suzuki was warmly received among Syrian families. The photographer lived with the people in modest houses that were often already overcrowded with members of the extended family who had lost their own homes.
Image: USK Photography
Up on the front
The photographer accompanied the fighters of the Free Syrian Army to the front. "We often drank tea and they were joking around. Sometimes they'd even keep telling jokes when the first shots were fired at the front," Suzuki recalls. However, the mood would quickly change as shelling intensified. The photographer could feel he wasn't the only one to fear for his life.
Image: USK Photography
Desperate arrival
On the island of Lesbos, the Japanese photographer documented the refugee crisis. "Some 20 to 25 fully packed boats arrived every day," recalls Suzuki.
Image: USK Photography
What's next?
Yusuke Suzuki says he experienced "heartbreaking moments" on Lesbos. He didn't find it easy to shoot photos of the people's pain and despair. "But someone has to tell these stories," believes the photographer.
Image: USK Photography
First professional project in Afghanistan
In 2006, at the age of 21, Yusuke Suzuki traveled to Afghanistan for the first time and took his first professional photos there. The trip changed him: until then, Suzuki had planned on becoming a guitarist but decided to focus on photography instead.
Image: USK Photography
Everyday life in war-torn country
What did the young Japanese photographer know about war and peace? This is the question Yusuke Suzuki kept asking himself while travelling through Afghanistan. He discovered that everyday life was not only despair and destruction. He also captured its beauty.
Image: USK Photography
Award-winning photography
"I wanted to understand the meaning of war. I wanted to see, hear and feel how people manage to live with war," says Suzuki about his Afghanistan series. For his authentic reporting, Yusuke Suzuki has won the Berlin Photo Biennial Award for Young Emerging Talents.
Image: USK Photography
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Yusuke Suzuki's perception of the world changed when he discovered harsh realities during a trip to the Philippines with friends. Later, in 2006, he traveled to Afghanistan and met photographers and journalists. They inspired him to buy a camera.
Rather than pursuing his music studies, he decided to go to New York to study journalism and photography and become a freelance photographer.
"Photography has the power to make change," the photographer has written on his website. For his work, he traveled to some of the world's most difficult locations, covering battlefronts in the streets of Aleppo, forgotten daily life in Afghanistan, the desolate area around the Aral Sea and the sadness in Fukushima just after the Japanese nuclear disaster. "Someone has to tell these stories," says Yusuke Suzuki. Despite all the desperate situations, he always manages to show glimpses of beauty and tranquility in his photos.
His work has now been recognized at the Berlin Photo Biennial, where he received the Young Emerging Talents Award. It is the Japanese photographer's 11th award.
His photos are on display along with the works of more than 440 artists at the Palazzo Italia in Berlin up to October 30.
