In this cross-section of the last 3 years of his work, spread over two rooms, Yamam Nabeel’s wide use of street photography becomes clear. Shot on film and unedited, his photographs contain indelible slices of reality. His use photography as human memory locates his practice within the long tradition of photographers as outsider storytellers, archivists of the overlooked. By turns romantic and everyday, Nabeel’s work evokes a unique sense of identity within shifting city life.
Yamam has noted that his history of migrancy -living within 7 countries before reaching eighteen years of age- has left him an eternal observer on the periphery. He observes, however, that this distance has given him the capacity to ‘show people to each other’, being able to draw connections and see our shared humanity wherever he goes. In his writing and photography both, Nabeel celebrates the beauty of the stranger waiting for the bus and the woman walking a dog.
This drive to document puts him into conversation with many of his photographic forebears. Robert Capa and his empathetic war photography, Saul Leiter’s rainswept New York, Josef Koudelka’s immersion into Roma communities; all were immigrants and outsiders using photography as their own records in the absence of mainstream representation. In capturing fleeting moments on film, it becomes possible to accumulate an identity. Nabeel joins a heritage of self-creation, and in this collection of photographs he hopes to share some of his world with you.
"Like shards of broken mirrors, collected over time and from far-away places, these images from lands I am a stranger in reflect my fragmented self.
At four, it was my first time leaving Baghdad, the home that I no longer recognize, but the eternal home keeping my story safely until I return. Then to Paris, the first city that welcomed me; to Budapest, city that keeps my memories; and finally to London, the metropolis, the city that welcomes everyone and keeps them apart, the place I know the most but the place that knows me the least.
Like a daydream that seems real enough to believe, I have gathered these pieces of strangers in order to make sense of the world. Standing close, but not so close as to be part of them, I walked in these cities. I breathed them in, deep into my soul, so I that might be able to understand them without wanting to belong.
I keep travelling, feeding my hunger to be on the periphery. At the same time I have yearned to mend these shards into a whole story that somebody might recognize.
These photos each tell a story without words, evoking emotions without having to shout, imagining a world I can finally call home." - Yamam Nabeel