Snapshot: Riyadh
▻http://photography.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/17524/snapshot_riyadh
par Pascal Ménoret
In 2007, during the last months of fieldwork, I tried to figure out safe ways of documenting the atmosphere surrounding joyriding, the practice of stealing cars and skidding at full speed on urban highways. The year before, my first outing with joyriders had resulted in a car accident, and I did not want to finish fieldwork in a hospital bed. The police stopped one of my friends while he was filming joyriders and we felt caught between a rock and a hard place. I started photographing the daily life of joyriders, the places they hang out, and some of their performances—but at a respectful distance. Because of police surveillance, even photographing construction sites felt tricky. I stole, rather than took, pictures of the triumphant Doxiadis axis. Designed in 1971 as the new central business district of Riyadh, it was not developed until the 1990s because of land speculation. By then I had mastered the art of taking pictures from behind the wheel and of hiding my camera when passing police patrols. Gone were the days of innocence, when I felt comfortable enough to walk in the open with a camera. I was now trying to turn constraints—some imaginary, others real—into opportunities.
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-2bDejq9RjBc/U0rPSBQmSvI/AAAAAAAACgs/77QlVO020TE/d/16.JPG 
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-xNKdmtoEn-w/U0rO-fK_oEI/AAAAAAAACfs/JUh1xlSy7w0/d/07.JPG #Arabie_Saoudite #Ryadh