Photographer Jodi Bieber

Jodi Bieber’s bags have been lost in transit. It’s a familiar inconvenience for many airline travellers, but Bieber is particularly anxious: almost all the clothes she owns are somewhere between Amsterdam and Vienna. Lucky, then, that she has kept her camera in her carry-on luggage, for this is her raison d’être. The peripatetic Bieber is in Austria for that city’s opening of the World Press Photo Exhibition. She is the star turn. Her portrayal of a quietly defiant young Afghan woman, Bibi Aisha, has taken top prize in the organisation’s annual international press photography contest.The photographer saw the beauty within; the world sees an 18-year-old mutilated by the Taliban. They cut off her nose and ears in retribution for running away from her husband’s house. Aisha’s subsequent publicised plight sparked more than sympathy and revulsion. Her appearance on the cover of Time helped politicise the debate over whether Nato troops should remain in Afghanistan. Supporters of the status quo said Aisha’s face symbolised the reasons for staying; those who wanted the troops withdrawn said the photo was an emotional piece of propaganda – “war porn”. Whatever the merits of those beliefs, they reaped results for both artist and subject.

                                         >>>Jodi Bieber