deBuren

Last year the young photographer Pieter-Jan De Pue graduated as a film director from RITS in Brussels. Last summer he went to Afghanistan for four months where he made photo-reportages for the International Red Cross, Demining, Solidarité Afghanistan Belgique and the Dutch Committee for Afghanistan.

Together with his interpreter Gholam Hasan, De Pue travelled on foot and on horseback through the Afghan Hindu Kush mountains by way of the Panshir Valley towards the Warghan Corridor and Pamir, and on to China. The trail included the ancient Silk Route which Marco Polo used on his voyages of discovery to China. Once they had arrived on the 'roof of the world' ? the place where Pakistan, Tadzikistan and China meet, they crossed the border into China where they were arrested by Chinese border soldiers.  Following a brief sojourn in a Chinese army camp, Pieter-Jan and Hasan were incarcerated for a month in Taxorghan prison in northwest China. Hasan was suspected of being a member of the Taliban and an opium smuggler and Pieter-Jan as a spy for the American army as part of the ISAF armed forces in Afghanistan.

Following a month's imprisonment and innumerable interrogations they were released once again in the mountains of Pamir, on the border of Afghanistan. Their freedom was short-lived, however, as before long they were captured by a Kyrgyzic community who thought they were members of Al Qaeda.

Pieter-Jan De Pue's visual journey is on exhibition at deBuren. The weeks of travelling through an area inhabited by Kyrgyz nomads, encounters with local warlords, being offered hospitality by opium traffickers and people smuggling precious stones in a region coloured red by poppies and bristling with arms that perpetuate the war in Southern Afghanistan.

www.pieterjandepue.be