A photobook documenting everyday life in Afghanistan through the lens of a vanishing photographic tradition.
A New Light is a photobook by Argentine photojournalist Rodrigo Abd. In the years following the collapse of the Taliban regime after the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001, Abd spent several months in the country on assignment and learned how to use the traditional Afghan box camera, or kamra-e-faoree—a handmade wooden device that functions both as camera and darkroom.
Simple, inexpensive and portable, this instant camera was widely used on the streets of Afghanistan throughout the twentieth century, especially for making and printing identification portraits quickly and easily. During the first Taliban regime, however, from 1996 to 2001, the photographing of people and animals was banned as contrary to Islamic teaching, and many of these cameras were destroyed. By the time such restrictions were lifted, the digital era had arrived, and the box camera was gradually becoming obsolete. For A New Light, Abd returned to Afghanistan and employed this disappearing photographic culture to record how people’s lives had changed—in both positive and painful ways—during the “peacetime” two years after the withdrawal of US forces and the Taliban’s return to power. His deeply affecting photographs reveal a country that is, in some respects, experiencing its most secure and peaceful moment in decades, while also showing that the price many have paid for this stability is almost unimaginable.
First edition of 500 copies.
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Title: A New Light
Artist: Rodrigo Abd
Publisher: Fraglich Publishing, 2025
Format: Hardcover notebook in slipcase
Size: 100 × 150 mm
Pages: 166
Language: Arabic / English
Edition: First edition of 500 copies
ISBN: 978-3-903616-00-4
