How do you seize the essence of somebody who needs to stay nameless? This was one of the challenges French Algerian photographer Camille Farrah Lenain confronted as half of her collection on queer Muslim life in France. In her cinematic and dreamlike portraits, we see a determine partly obscured in a translucent pink veil, gazing into an ornate mirror. Elsewhere, a tightly-cropped picture captures a transgender man’s mid-section, revealing a vertical scar and hand calmly resting in opposition to patterned pants.
The snapshots are half of Lenain’s new photobook, “Made of Smokeless Fire,” launched by Loose Joints Publishing. “It’s important for me to understand the people I’m photographing to the fullest,” stated Lenain of the six-year venture which concerned round 50 LGBTQ+ contributors (recognized by first identify or initials solely) from throughout the nation. The images are accompanied by poetic fragments of textual content from a number of sitters on their religion, wishes and recollections. While some have lower off all contact with their households, others have cast fragile paths in direction of reconciliation. The vary of experiences is as various because the contributors.
Because many – although not all – contributors most well-liked to stay unidentifiable, Lenain tapped into the wealthy visible grammar of Islam: henna-covered palms, white pigeons, an Amazigh (or Berber) image of freedom, and the recurring motif of smoke. In one picture, a younger sitter with the Arabic phrase for ‘justice’ painted on her cheek gazes sensuously into the digicam, whereas flooding the body with wafts of smoke.
The ebook title refers to jinn, the supernatural creatures described within the Qur’an as “made of smokeless fire.” “It’s common to believe that queer Muslims are the way they are because they’ve been possessed by jinn, even though these entities are neither good nor bad,” defined Lenain. Much like the best way the phrase ‘queer’ has been reappropriated in recent times, Lenain needs the identical for LGBTQ+ Muslims and the time period. “By reclaiming your own relationship to jinn, you stop giving power to others weaponizing it against you.”
A beloved uncle – and unanswered questions
The seed for the collection was planted years in the past, after Lenain heard a radio interview with Ludovic-Mohamed Zahed, the Marseille-based homosexual imam who based Europe’s first inclusive mosque – and who later helped her recruit sitters for portraits.
But the one one that actually set the entire endeavour in movement was Lenain’s beloved uncle Farid, a homosexual and HIV-positive man who handed away in 2013. One of her mom’s eight siblings, Farid was the glue that held the Paris-based aspect of her Algerian household collectively. “We spent an enormous amount of time together at dinners, celebrating birthdays, Christmas and Eid,” Lenain defined in a video name from the Solarium gallery in Marseille, throughout a launch occasion for the ebook. “Even though he was often ill, he was also radiant, laughed loudly, loved his Madonna tapes, always teased us, and was everyone’s favourite brother or uncle.”
After his passing, the household tasked Lenain with archiving his images and scanning his visible mementos. She started mourning the conversations she’d by no means be capable of have. “His homosexuality was not surprising for me,” she writes within the ebook. But as she started to query her personal, she yearned to ask him: “did you believe in God? Would you have felt it necessary to come out to your parents? Were you able to feel fully gay and Arab in France?”
It’s unlikely that Farid would have answered sure to that final query. Despite France being dwelling to at least one of the biggest Muslim populations in Europe, queer Muslims are sometimes rendered invisible, stated Lenain, pointing to situations of normalized hate rhetoric against LGBTQ+ people, and rising Islamophobia. Last 12 months noticed a sharp uptick in anti-Muslim acts, according to French officials, up nearly 90% on 2024.
“In France, there’s palpable stigma – it’s basically the rhetoric of the far right – this hatred towards Black, Arab and visibly Muslim people,” stated Lenain, who’s now based mostly within the US, between New Orleans and New York. “For people to simply exist in society, on the streets or at work, can be an uphill battle. Add sexual orientation or gender identity to that equation and people often feel forced into silence.”
In current years, Lenain has exhibited these portraits in partnership with grassroots organizations that help LGBTQ+ and Muslim populations. “I always make sure those who’ve shared their time and stories are involved,” she stated, including that might entail writing textual content for the ebook, talking at an occasion, or presenting their work alongside her personal. She cites two visible activists who impressed her social outreach: Nan Goldin and Zanele Muholi.
Both photographers based collectives that respectively fight the opioid epidemic and champion Black LGBTQ+ visibility in South Africa. “Much like them, my process always starts with the collective,” defined Lenain. “Photography has in the past been guilty of exploiting marginalized groups, but it can also be a powerful tool for healing and empowerment.”
An important instance of Lenain’s empathetic method lies in a single arresting portrait of a hand peeking by a thick, pink curtain whereas holding pearl-white prayer beads. At one level throughout the venture, the participant requested Leniain to take away the {photograph}. Even although the individual was not recognizable, she stated the picture “felt deeply connected to a moment in their journey toward embracing their queerness – a journey that was still fragile, new, unfolding.”
While Lenain initially grieved the loss of the picture, she consented. “The people I photograph should retain some agency over how the images we make together are used,” she stated. “That means leaving room and time for change, conversation, and growth.” Ultimately, the individual opted to incorporate the picture – one thing Lenain sees as a development towards embracing their full self.
Lenain dedicates the ebook to her uncle Farid, to a luminous sitter named Lamine, who handed away throughout the venture’s lifespan, and to all “queered and racialized bodies – bodies in liminality.” Some of the ebook’s most shifting photos are intriguingly devoid of human presence. Such as a heat, ethereal picture of what seems to be a vacant, graffiti-scrawled seaside constructing within the suburban port simply outdoors Marseille, made well-known by post-impressionist painters like Cézanne.
“This is actually not water,” stated Lenain, revealing that the wall opening frames a sliver of sunlit floor past. “But I love that people often think it is – a reminder that this work is not only documentary and invites viewers to use their imagination.”
Windows and doorways are recurring motifs within the collection, and Lenain sees them as representing “the fixed in-betweenness of these queer Muslim experiences: whether or not to remain inside, hidden however secure, or outdoors, free however dealing with many obstacles and judgment.
“It is also the portal to our ancestors, to Farid, and the space between our world and the divine.”