João Coelho is Portuguese, born in 1964 in Angola, where he lived the very first years of his life before leaving the territory with his family during the war of independence. He had several lives: a lawyer in Portugal, he worked for several years in the banking sector, then became, fifteen years ago, a consultant in social development in the African country where he was born and in which he hadn’t set foot in thirty years. Coelho’s passion for photography dates back to adolescence, but he only really launched himself on a large scale in 2019, in his native land, with “a strong desire to tell the life and work of people generally unknown or ignored”. Portraits, situations, which tell “stories of suffering or joy, strength or despair, disappointment or mutual aid, but which aim to show the resilience of human beings in the face of adversity and hardship. ‘uncertainty of the future’.
Very quickly, the photographer became known internationally, has multiplied the distinctions, and finds himself, at the end of the year, one of the winners of the “Greatest photo competition in the world”, an event created by the magazine Photo, a French reference in terms of images, forty-one years ago. First reserved for amateurs, it is now open to everyone, with creativity and quality as the only criteria. L’Express, partner of the 2022 edition, alongside Leica or Studio Harcourt, chose to honor the winner in the photojournalism category: João Coelho was thus awarded the L’Express Prize by a jury made up of Dalila Babaci, deputy editor-in-chief of our weekly’s photo department, and Sylvie Barco, visual artist photographer. All the winners of the competition will be the subject of a dedicated issue in the bimonthly which will hit newsstands at the end of December.
The kingdom of flies, is the title of the shot awarded by L’Express. João Coelho shot this striking portrait in late 2021 in southern Angola. In his lens, a man searches for food scraps in a pile of rubbish that a swarm of aggressive flies is fighting over. “This photo is part of a project about the daily life of this community who live and work in a landfill, collecting metal, cardboard and plastic to resell them to recycling companies. They are called ‘The Forgotten’, because these people seem to have been forgotten by the rest of the world as if they were the children of an inferior God”, explains the artist, whom the human condition has always fascinated and whose study has been an essential driving force in his work. . “More than an aesthetic goal, I intend my photography to arouse feelings, emotions, and to convey messages”, he claims.
The aesthetics are there though. From this fight between man and flies, João Coelho creates, in black and white, an apocalyptic setting, where only insects and a few privileged humans have survived. Where are the others ? The photograph does not say so, but opens the door to multiple hypotheses. Coelho, having become a photographer, intends to continue, through his images, his actions of social solidarity. Its objective: through its notoriety (exhibitions in Italy and Spain, book to be published), to create support around this Angolan community to provide it with water, medical care and a school.