The female weightlifters from one of Iraq’s most notorious neighborhoods
In Sight recently talked to photographer Emilienne Malfatto about her experience documenting the female weightlifters of Iraq’s Sadr City. Here’s what she had to say: I started working in Iraq in 2014 as a special envoy for AFP (Agence France-Presse). A few months later, I moved to Iraqi Kurdistan as a freelancer. For almost two […]Emilienne Malfatto writes for The Washington Post:
In Sight recently talked to photographer Emilienne Malfatto about her experience documenting the female weightlifters of Iraq’s Sadr City. Here’s what she had to say:
I started working in Iraq in 2014 as a special envoy for AFP (Agence France-Presse). A few months later, I moved to Iraqi Kurdistan as a freelancer. For almost two years, I covered the war against ISIS, then decided I needed a break from conflict, and started working in southern and central Iraq.
Sadr’s City female weightlifters is one of those stories you hear about and that stays in your mind. I first learned about the team reading an old AFP article. That was more than a year ago — but it took a very long time to get access. The girls and the coach were hard to locate, and the usual social media tracking didn’t work, and, given what Sadr City is, the “wandering and asking around” approach was not much of an option. I was stuck.
