These images describe the quieter side of the recent historic upheaval in Yemen. They were made in Sanaa, the capital, during the escalation of street protests and ensuing transition from the ruling president to a temporary government. A shift considered impossible until it actually happened and that remains contested by loyalists, including the former president himself who remains in the country.
They are moments of contemplation; alone, amongst friends, at work or in leisure. Brief asides from the demonstrations, fighting and politicking that marked those months and remain commonplace. The physical aspect of the city and the faces and behaviors of its residents offering a distillation of the dense and layered experience of those facing crisis and social change.
There was an inevitable soul searching, perhaps not always conscious, amongst the Yemenis I knew. The palpable fervor and idealism of the initial protest period and risking of life for ideals simultaneously pushed back by the anxiety that despite popular action, the decisions were being taken elsewhere. The promise of the shifts that were taking place frustrated by the stubbornness of old patterns; whether of thought, action or power. The photographs are a record of this conflicted state and resulting fragility.
