Roni Ben Ari
Photographer @ self employed / Based in Israel
My name is Roni Ben Ari. I am an Israeli photographer, curator and multimedia Artist.
My work is characterized mostly by the long term study of social issues in which the human landscape comprises the main part.
I adore people, whoever they are and wherever I meet them. I have tremendous empathy for the “other” as well as an ability to get close and offer them a warm hug. My patience and ability to listen have helped me to reach people others have labeled “the walking transparent.” With my camera I present their daily lives and humanity as a mirror to the cultured world that ignores their very existence.
The subjects that I photograph in stills and video are universal, and as such, they allow me to document in many places around the world, while I encounter over and over again the weak, the deprived and the silenced who are always found on the margins of society: minorities, the elderly, migrants, prostitutes and ecology. These are just a small part of the long list.
The many projects I exhibit all over the world shine a spotlight on the society living in the shadows, with the photographs serving as a kind of journalistic essay, the role of which is to prod government bodies, NGOS, and private initiatives into action to expand the laws protecting the weak and enforce them.