Twana's Box by Lukas Birk

Twana’s Box can be described in many ways: a journey through a photographer’s rare archive, documenting the Kurdistan region of Iraq from 1974-1992; a son’s quest to find his lost father, who was murdered by a military regime; a young man’s way to piece together the fragments of a scattered family in a scattered culture; the becoming of a photographer who, through the stories of others, starts to understand his own identity in times of war.

Twana’s Box is not only the photo book that holds a selection of Twana Abdullah’s archive; it is a unique insight into a time and place in a region that has since completely transformed. Rawsht has spent years piecing together his father’s negatives and stories. His archival work inspired him to become a photographer himself, working for Metrography—the first independent Iraqi photo agency—before immigrating to Europe.

” This archive opens a door for us through which we can enter the unknown minimal history that historians seldom write about. A photograph is always an invitation for us to think of the moments that played out in front of the camera, and after it was captured, it helps us to see things which we cannot see with our bare eyes. In the case of this photographer, what is made visible is human endeavour….” Baktyar Ali