Every Friday, for 10 consecutive weeks, The Eye of Photography will publish one of the 34 portraits of war photographers made by Alizé Le Maoult. This week, we honor Bulent Kilic, from Turkey.
Bulent Kilic was born in Turkey in 1979, working for Agence France Presse since 2005. He was named Best Photographer of the Year in 2014 by Time,The Guardian for his reporting in Ukraine, the Islamic State in Iraq, Syria and Turkey. He is also the head of the AFP photo service in Istanbul.
I met Bulent Kilic in Perpignan in September 2015. I knew his powerful and always very sensitive photographs. He agreed for me to take his portrait “back to the wall” after a long day spent with media, as he received the Visa d’or in the news category of the photojournalism Festival Visa pour l’Image. He received this prize for his work done at the Turkish border on Syrians who were fleeing away the war in their country. He gave me five seconds to do his portrait before escaping… I was frustrated. We met again in Amsterdam for the World Press Photos Days in April 2016. It was the right time. Bulent was about to receive another prize the same day in the evening. He was available and happy to do again this “aborted shooting” in better conditions. We walked through canals and small streets to find the right wall and the good light.
Bulent Kilic explains the choice of this picture that for him symbolizes war : “I have been watching the war for Kobane from Turkey, outside of Syria for some months. Finally I went in on the east side. While walking through the rubble, a guy with his sniper rifle ‘dragounov’ stopped his car in front of me. He asked me if I wanted to see some interesting stuff… We walked inside Kobane and finally I found him watching the dead city. I felt he had lost himself in the city. He was thinking about what had happened and I guessed and felt the same way he did. Musa, a marksman, was a 25 years old fighter and was one among the important fighters in war in Kobane. He died two months after this picture was taken, but I think he was happy about this picture because it bore witness to what ‘they’ had done.”
Alizé Le Maoult
Alizé Le Maoult, Through their eyes…
From October 1 to December 31, 2016
Musée de la Grande Guerre
Rue Lazare Ponticelli, 77100 Meaux, France
