Biography

Anne de Henning began her career as a photo reporter in the late 1960s. At age 23, she embarked on the Trans-Siberian Railway on her way to Vietnam. Crossing the Taiga forest blanketed in deep snow, she made a stop at Irkoutsk to walk on the ice-covered Baikal lake. After a stay in Japan and Hong Kong, she arrived in Vietnam where she photographed the war with the U.S. Army.

Vietnam, 1969

In 1971 she covered the Bangladesh Liberation War.

Michel Laurent pins on my shirt a Bangladesh flag given by freedom fighters.
The Pulitzer prize-winner would be the last photographer to be killed during
the Vietnam war in 1975 at age 29.

She was based in Hong Kong for several years, during which she traveled across Southeast Asia photographing several tribes in Laos, Thailand and Borneo. On one of her trips, she sailed on a junk across the China Sea to the Philippines and photographed the Sea Gypsies in the Sulu archipelago. In Sarawak, she went up river in a dugout, living in a longhouse with the Dayaks in the heart of the Borneo jungle.

In a Yao village in the Golden Triangle, where I heard a man had walked on the moon,
Laos, 1969.

With the Iban chieftain of a longhouse, Sarawak, Borneo, 1971.

With Pathet Lao soldiers in Laos, 1975.

In India, where she photographed extensively in the 1970s and 1980s, she chose to work in black and white, turning its vibrant colors into a rich palette of greys.

With my husband Raghubir Singh in Jaipur, 1978.
(Photo: Bruno Barbey)

From 1999 to 2005 she photographed the 38 bridges of Paris. A show of this body of work toured the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle East where it was exhibited in Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and Dubai, and in the cities of Gaza, Ramallah and Hebron. A selection from this series is in the collection of the Musée Carnavalet in Paris.

In 2005 Anne de Henning photographed the life onboard a French Navy ship on an anti- terrorist mission in the Gulf of Aden (Task Force 150). The project took her from Toulon to Djibouti through the Suez Canal. Following a stopover in Oman, she became fascinated with the region, its history, people and their cultures, its diverse architectural styles and stunning natural landscapes. In 2006 she started a long-term project on the Arabian Peninsula. The deliberate use of vivid colors in otherwise austere natural environments prompted her to revert to color photography.

In the course of her travels in Yemen she documented two projects submitted to the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, the restoration of the Amiriya mosque and madrasa in Rada and an urban development project in Shibam. Both were among the award winners in 2007.

In 2011 Anne de Henning was invited on an artist residency by the “Service de cooperation et d’action culturelle” at the French Consulate General in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The work resulting from her residency was published in the book Carnet de Résidence, Djeddah, Arabie Saoudite.

Jeddah, 2011

During several artist residencies in Marrakech at the Riad Denise Masson in 2011 and 2012, at the invitation of the Institut Français du Maroc, she worked on a project documenting the practices of the three Abrahamic religions - Islam, Judaism and Christianity - in Marrakech, Essaouira and the High Atlas. The work was exhibited in Marrakech and Essaouira.

In 2013 she documented for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture the project for the revitalisation of Birzeit historic centre, in Palestine. The project was among the award winners in 2013.

Exhibitions

        Contemporary Morocco and Religion: Islamic, Jewish and Christian Practices
        (Essaouira, Marrakech and its region):
          2012-2013 Institut Français du Maroc, Marrakech
          2012 Alliance Franco-Marocaine, Essaouira

        Arabian Peninsula
          2009 Galery f5,6, Munich
          2008 Galery ART77, Paris
          2008 Cultural Center of the Yemeni Embassy, Paris
          2006 Musée de la Marine du Trocadéro, Paris

        Bridges of Paris
          2012 Alliance Française and Circolo Eridano, Torino, Italy
          2008 Royal Mirage and Alliance Française, Dubai
          2007 Centre Culturel Français, Doha, Qatar
          2007 Maison Jamsheer, Centre Franco-Bahreinien, Muharraq, Bahrain
          2007 Centre Culturel Français, Gaza, Ramallah and Hebron, Palestine
          2006 Omanese Society of Fine Arts with the French Embassy, Muscat, Oman
          2002 Biennale of Contemporary Art, Issy les Moulineaux, France

Collections

          Musée Carnavalet, Paris
          Musée de la Marine du Trocadéro, Paris
          Private collections in France and abroad

Monographs

          Carnet de Résidence, Djeddah, Arabie Saoudite
          Des Hommes de temps-La Mémoire des roches (ANDRA)
          Découvre la magie de l'objet avec ARMAN (Le Chêne-Hachette)
          Dessine des personnages avec BOISROND (Le Chêne-Hachette)
          L'Inde des mille fêtes (Gallimard)
          Les montagnes toits du monde (Gallimard)
          Les grandes villes du monde (Nathan)

Main press publications

          Vogue, Le Monde, Elle, Bunte, The New York Times, The Observer, National Geographic, Paris Match