Paolo Woods was born of Canadian and Dutch parentage. He grew up in Italy lived in Paris and is now based in Haiti. Paolo Woods ran a laboratory and a photo gallery in Florence, Italy, before dedicating himself to documentary photography in 1998. He is devoted to long-term projects that blend photography with investigative journalism. In 2003, with the journalist Serge Michel, he published the book Un monde de Brut (A Crude World). Tackling the subject of oil, this story involved working in, among other places, Angola, Russia, Kazakhstan, Texas and Iraq. In 2004 he published the book American Chaos, a detailed reportage on western debacle in Afghanistan and Iraq. Both books have been published in France and Italy, and as magazine pieces in 15 different countries. In 2007/2008 he has documented the spectacular rise of the Chinese in Africa.
The book Chinafrica, again cosigned with Serge Michel, has been published in France and translated in twelve languages including English, Spanish and Chinese. In 2010 he completed the project Walk on my Eyes, an intimate portrait of the Iranian society. The book has been published in France in summer 2010 and the show has premiered at the Festival of Arles in France. It is currently touring.
His work regularly appears in Time, Newsweek, le Monde, Geo and many other international publications.
He has had solo exhibitions in France, US, Italy, China, Spain, Holland and Austria and numerous group shows around the world.
His pictures are in the French National Library, the FNAC collection and the collection of the Sheik Saud Al-Thani in Qatar. For his work he has received various prizes including a World Press Photo for his work in Iraq, the “Alstom prize for Journalism”, the GRIN prize in Italy and the Open Society’s Moving Walls. Anastasia Gallery represents him in New York.
In a year when photobook publishing seemed to reach an all-time high, here are 10 notable photobooks that were selected by a group of photography experts from around the world.
Paolo Woods has been photographing Haiti since the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake. In his work, he looks past the standard iconography of disaster to find a people striving to build their own nation, their own state, against all odds.
