During an artistic residency in Syria in 2007, I had the opportunity to connect with the Kalache family, members of the Kurdish Yazidi community in the village of Afrin, near Aleppo.

A small Kurdish community originally from Iraq, the Yazidis practice a syncretic religion that has long been persecuted. They worship a single God, Malak Taous, the Peacock Angel, which has unjustly led to them being labeled as devil worshippers.

I aimed to offer an empathetic and intimate perspective on their daily lives. Living under restrictions that forbade them from expressing their culture, these shared moments became a space of freedom where they could speak their language, play their music, and introduce me to their place of worship. However, we had to exercise great discretion in this work.

A few years later, I was saddened to learn that half of the family had disappeared during the early years of the war.