Ideas worth spreading

Everyday objects, tragic histories

1,072,039 views | Ziyah Gafić • TED2014

Ziyah Gafić photographs everyday objects—watches, shoes, glasses. But these images are deceptively simple; the items in them have been exhumed from the mass graves of the Bosnian War. Gafić, a TED Fellow and Sarajevo native, is photographing every item from these graves in order to create a living archive of the identities of those lost.

Ziyah Gafić photographs everyday objects—watches, shoes, glasses. But these images are deceptively simple; the items in them have been exhumed from the mass graves of the Bosnian War. Gafić, a TED Fellow and Sarajevo native, is photographing every item from these graves in order to create a living archive of the identities of those lost.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

About the speaker

Ziyah Gafić

Photographer + storyteller

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To help him come to terms with the tragedy of his own homeland, Bosnian photographer Ziyah Gafić turns his camera on the aftermath of conflict, showing his images in galleries, in books and on Instagram.

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.