Gallery

A 1951 Deardorff 8x10 field camera is a cumbersome choice for capturing humanity on the dusty, rugged outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan. “Picture a tripod camera made of wood and a photographer with a drop cloth over his head,” explains Christopher Cole ’06. “The exposures are long, and the image is projected through the lens upside down and backward, which makes composition difficult.”

But the results can be breathtaking.

Exhibited at a dramatic size (10x6 feet), Cole’s Kabul, 2010 depicts the quotidian experiences of residents of an informal settlement. In the frame, viewers can see hundreds of homes, which at first look like scattered cardboard boxes. On closer inspection of the enlargement, the scene is teeming with people going about their daily lives. That’s the beauty of the 8x10 film negative, Cole says: Sweeping, complex images can be printed at a grand scale to reveal extraordinary details.

Cole’s love of large-format photography was fostered by Joel Sternfeld (visual and studio arts; Noble Foundation Chair in Art and Cultural History) at Sarah Lawrence—where both his mother, Margaret “Maggie” Cole ’87, and sister, Jessica Cole MFA ’01, also earned degrees.

Following graduation, Cole immersed himself in the “intersection of anthropology and economics in the developing world” at the London School of Economics, which led to international humanitarian work with organizations such as the United Nations Development Programme and the Heartland Alliance.

With images like Kabul and others from his series “The Global South,” Cole aims to challenge viewers’ assumptions about urban communities in the developing world. “So often, people’s perceptions of Afghanistan are based purely on what they see in the mainstream news media,” he says, “but the day-to-day reality for many Afghans can be a world apart from that, as I hope the photos are able to convey.” —Patti Harmon