Personal themes

PUBLISHED
AUGUST, 23RD 2021

COUNTRIES INVOLVED

NETHERLANDS

JAPAN

INDIA

ISRAEL

ITALY

ESMEE VAN ZEEVENTER

During the curfew I noticed there were still a lot of parties and get togethers. I thought everybody just risked going home late at night and hoped for the best, instead I found out that sleepovers had become a thing again! To avoid the risk of getting a fine, friends decided to stay over. All these people in sleeping bags, scattered around the student flats.

ARKO DATTO

The five images here explore the thematic of covid protocol, documenting people in moments of solitude and isolation during the high days of the second wave in and around Kolkata.

AVISHAG SHAAR YASHUV

Often, when I’m on a portrait shoot, I ask my subject to “smile with their eyes” (aka, ‘smize’.) Many have found this instruction quite perplexing; that is, until one day, we all woke up to a deadly global pandemic, and to the reality of mandatory face covering.
Our smiles spent almost a year under cloak and cover; as well as a range of other emotions we would otherwise be expressing through our faces. And so, this past year, for most if not all of us, the saying, ‘the eyes are the windows to the soul,’ has never held truer.

CLAUDIO MAJORANA

For many of us, the pandemic has changed the way we think about the places we live. Being confined indoors not only amplified the need to spend time outdoors but also challenged what we considered quality of life and living comfort.

Leaving the city for the countryside has become an increasingly common choice, especially for those who can do part of their work from home.

Whether permanent or temporary, this new situation must make us think about the future of cities and the choice of places in which we live.

COVID and Personal themes

Four themes are common to all six countries, but next to that each photographer has chosen two personal themes that they are most passionate about. Here we show their first personal theme. The themes are very diverse: from the Olympics in Japan to masks in Israel and from social distancing in Italy to sleepovers in the Netherlands.