Current Events
HC, 10.75 x 10.75 inches, 180 pages, 106 duotone and 44 four-color photographs
ISBN: 978-1-57687-482-0
$49.95
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I Am Because We Are
Photographs by: Kristen Ashburn
Foreword by: Madonna
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"Ashburn's photos drive home the devastation that HIV/AIDS has wrought on individuals, families and communities in Africa. In the children’s faces, we see their pain but also their promise. Their future is ours and ours is theirs. This book is a call to action for us to take part in our shared future."
-John Legend
"The first time I saw Kristen Ashburn's photographs was when a friend emailed me a short slideshow of her work. I casually opened it, but then stopped everything I was doing and sat mesmerized, tears welling up. Her pictures are extraordinary, taking us to the depths of suffering, but at the same time somehow managing to bring a sense of humanity, hope and—yes—beauty. It is this startling combination that enables them to inspire not just admiration, but a desire to respond. This book is physical proof of the power of photography to move hearts and minds in our ever more interconnected world."
-Chris Anderson
“I AM BECAUSE WE ARE is a book that touches the heart. In photographing the grieving, devastated, still beautiful, children of Malawi, victims of the AIDS epidemic that has murdered their parents, Kristen Ashburn gives everyone on the planet the opportunity to come to the aid of those most bereaved and helpless in this world. It is a rare gift she gives: for we know in our deepest emotions that without the world coming to the defense and care of these children, the least of these, there will be no world peace. Children were not meant to grow up alone; they were meant to know always that there are adults on earth responsible for looking after them. We, all of us, are the ones.”
-Alice Walker
I Am Because We Are is the companion volume to the acclaimed forthcoming documentary by Nathan Rissman and Madonna. This book of images by award-winning photojournalist Kristen Ashburn provides an intimate look at the lives of eight children featured in the film and reveals the harsh reality of the AIDS pandemic throughout southern Africa.
The title is derived from the concept of “Ubuntu,” a belief in African spirituality that says all humanity is connected, that we cannot be ourselves without community and that an individual’s well-being is dependent upon the well-being of others.
The book contains heart-wrenching stories that are a call to action. In a country of 13 million people, over one million are orphans. Looking into the hearts and minds of children who have suffered more than one can imagine, the book provides an unflinching view of life at the center of the global AIDS crisis.
Ultimately viewers come to understand that this is not just a story about orphans in Malawi, but about global responsibility and human interconnectedness.
I Am Because We Are includes a foreword by Madonna, an afterword by Ashburn, excerpts from interviews with Malawian children, their biographies, and extended captions. Author proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to the charitable organization Raising Malawi for their extensive work with orphans throughout Malawi.
Kristen Ashburn’s photographs and stories from the Middle East, Europe, and Africa have appeared in many publications worldwide. Her accolades include a 2007 Emmy Award nomination, two World Press Photo prizes, a Getty Foundation grant in 2006, Canon’s Female Photojournalist Award in 2004, and other honors. She began photographing the impact of AIDS in southern Africa in 2001, and since then has also produced stories on the war in Iraq, Jewish settlers and suicide bombers in Israel’s occupied territories, and the aftermath of the tsunami in Sri Lanka and Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. In addition to her humanitarian photography, Ashburn is one of the directors of Through the Eyes of Children: The Rwanda Project, a charity that teaches photography to Rwandan orphans of the 1994 genocide and supports them through the sale of their images. Ashburn lives in New York City and is represented by Contact Press Images.
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