This post is also available in: French

In botany, the wilting point describes the threshold below which the soil moisture content no longer allows the plant to survive. The plant wilts and eventually dies if these extreme conditions continue. In our world, there are many other tipping points, the in-betweens maintaining a fragile bond between life and death.

The reporter tracks down these precarious balances because he shows the world moving. He plunges into chaos and, seizing the crash, tries to understand it. William Daniels, documentary photographer, has been working on conflict territories, in sensitive areas, for more than ten years. Kyrgyz revolutions, community wars in the Central African Republic, Rohingya exoduses, Kashmir, ex-USSR … Even if these situations have a priori nothing in common, many of them are presenting confused identities, an instability expressing itself by seemingly intractable recurring crises which can even spread far beyond their region of origin.

Over the sixty images gathered in this book, a dialogue opens up, be it based on rapprochement or on confrontation. Demultiplied, the tension is palpable but always connected to a furtive and ephemeral beauty. All is nothing but waiting in the hope for a denouement or in the fear of an even more uncertain future.

Born in Mont-Saint-Aignan in 1977, William Daniels began his photography career in 2002 after taking classes at the IRIS center for photography in Paris. His first reportage takes him to the Philippines. Winner of the Young Challenge Award, he won the Award for social and documentary photography in 2004 with his reportage The Little Ghosts of Manila on the fate of the street children in the Filipino capital. Since then, he has travelled around the world to cover humanitarian crises and armed conflicts, with special attention to the destiny of vulnerable populations. His work has been recognized with numerous international awards, including two World Press awards, the ICRC’s Humanitarian Visa, the Lagardère Foundation Scholarship, the Tim Hetherington Scholarship, the Getty Grant Scholarship.