You Don't Die

Marie Sumalla and Ghazal Golshiri » You Don't Die

"Dear Jina, you don't die, your name becomes a symbol".

On 16 September 2022, twenty-two-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini died in a Tehran hospital. Three days earlier, she had been arrested by the police because her attitude did not conform to the dress codes in force in the Islamic Republic of Iran – her hair was too visible and her trousers were unsuitable; she had received blows to the head while in police custody and fallen into a coma. One death, one injustice too many, inflamed the Iranian people. They took over the public space, defied the most violent condemnations, filmed and photographed. They are writing the story of an uprising whose cry “Woman, Life, Freedom” is historic. A war of life against death that has persisted ever since, and whose images Iranians are persisting in for freedom, against the regime.

The body of photographs and videos in this exhibition was assembled and authenticated for Le Monde’s coverage of the 2022 uprising following the death of Mahsa Jina Amini in Iran. The authors of these images, taken mainly from social networks, are mostly Iranian citizens who requested anonymity. Others agreed to be named despite the risks.