Photographer Jerzy Wierzbicki is the Edge of Humanity Magazine contributor of this documentary photography. From the project ‘The Middle East 1999-2009’. To see Jerzy’s body of work, click on any photograph.

Old Town Luxor 2003 ( house doesn’t exist nowadays )

Back in the early nineties I came across a lot of famous books on archeology, history and oriental culture and that is when the Middle East region became my passion. In 1998, when I was at college, my grandfather took me on a holiday trip to North Africa. Since then, I continued to travel across the Islamic countries as an archeologist and a photographer. Most of the photographs were taken during my archeological missions.

A trip to Iraq in 2003 was an experience I will never forget. I visited it during the autumn season and was able to photograph the part of the country inhabited by the Shia’s, just a few months after the American operations. I witnessed a restoration of the Holy Cities of An Najah and Karbala whilst a lot of pilgrims from Iran and Central Asian countries were visiting them.

Two years later I went to Egypt where the streets of Luxor and Aswan were filled by a warm light, colorful spices and an overwhelming sound of bustle. For me, that was the essence of the oriental world and one of the happiest encounters with Islamic countries. The rest of the photographs were taken in Kurdistan in 2006, followed by the images of the Sultanate of Oman when I settled back here in 2007.

Grass Burning
Type Ziyaret Turkish Kurdistan 2006

Overview on the old ruins in Palmyra. SYRIA 2008

JERZY WIERZBICKI was born on September 23, 1975, in Gdansk, Poland. In 2000 he graduated from Archeology at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland. Wierzbicki works as a photographer at archeological excavations in the Middle East countries. In 2003 went to Iraq as a member – photographer of Babylon Archeological Project. He is a member of the American Society of Media Photographers. In May 2017 he defended the Ph.D thesis in the field of art photography at the National Film School in Łódź.

Wierzbicki took part in numerous individual and group exhibitions in Poland. He received numerous artistic awards, among others: “Humanity Photo Award” second prize in the daily life category, Beijing China in 2004; also 2002 Newsweek Poland – second prize in the daily life category; 2003 Polish Press Photo – third prize in the daily life category.

He became interested in photography in high school. In 1995 he began working on his major project picturing his hometown, Gdansk. At first it was a journey through harbor districts of the city and its canals. He created a series “Gdansk Suburbia” (exhibited at imago fotokunst galerie in Berlin in August 2004 and Side Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne in March to May 2007).

Since 2001 he has been photographing Silesia focusing on showing post industrial areas and people who often struggle for survival after economic changes, resulting in closing many mines and factories, took place. This remains his ongoing project, just like photographing Middle Eastern cultures, which he does while on digs in Syria and Iraq and his travels to Northern Africa.

From 2004-2005 he worked for Samo Zdrowie (Hachette Filipacchi, Poland). Since September 2007 He has lived and worked in the Sultanate of Oman. Since 2009 he has been a press photographer in the “Times of Oman” and Arabic language daily newspaper “Al Shabiba”. Since 2009 till 2014 he is staff photographer in the weekly Y Magazine. In 2015 and 2016 he has cooperated with www.MiddleEasteye.net and BBC news.

His works are held in the collections of the National Museum in Gdansk, National Museum in Wroclaw, Art Museum in Lodz, Museum of History of Photography in Krakow and Centre of Modern Art „Laznia” and NOMUS the New Museum of Art in Gdansk in Poland, as well as in private collections in Poland, Spain, USA, Germany, United Kingdom, Israel, Sultanate of Oman and South Africa.

All images and text © Jerzy Wierzbicki