Photojournalist Robert Nickelsberg has been covering Afghanistan since 1988, when he accompanied a group of mujahideen crossing the border from Pakistan as part of an assignment for Time. Since then, he has returned regularly to document the unending conflict in that country. Recently, his collection of photographs Afghanistan: A Distant War (2013) was published to considerable acclaim. He will speak at Vassar on Monday, February 3 at 5:30 pm in the Sanders Classroom Spitzer Auditoirum (room 212), presenting a slideshow of images from his book. The event, which is sponsored by the English Department and the American Studies Program, is free and open to the public.
Nickelsberg’s lecture and slideshow will lead viewers through the violent phases that have seized Afghanistan, most recently with the arrival of the Americans in 2001.The New Yorker described Afghanistan: A Distant War as “a stunning collection” and “a moving and indispensable book.”
Nickelsberg has worked as a Time magazine contract photographer for nearly thirty years, specializing in political and cultural change in developing countries. After covering Central and South America in the 1980s he established his base in Asia. Living in New Delhi from 1988 to 1999, Nickelsberg recorded the rise of religious extremism in South Asia. His assignments have also encompassed Iraq, Kuwait, Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma, and Indonesia. His images have appeared in publications and broadcasts that include Time, The New York Times, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, Life, the Financial Times, the Guardian, Paris Match, Stern, CNN, and NBC. His photographs have been exhibited at The Philadelphia Museum of Art, the International Center of Photography, Ohio State University, and at the New America Foundation in New York.
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