Sex Worker Entwined With Client by HHS! winner Kate Orne

Kate Orne
Currently residing in New York, New York

Website: www.kateorne.com

Work Statement
Since '00 I have worked among the neediest people in Afghanistan and Pakistan and using photography as a tool to fight against indentured slavery and for the wellbeing of women, children, and animals. My commitment to social causes has become the defining part of my life as an artist. I have worked on several essays in South East Asia where the poor are sentenced to lives of disease and want. Throughout, I have been documenting their struggles in photos -- using art as a connection to wider awareness in the outside world.

Since '05 I have worked among the sex-workers and their families in Pakistan -- being the first photographer to document this shunned community. This body of work examines the uneasy peace between Islamic fundamentalism and profanity in the brothels. Repressive fundamentalist Muslim laws not only shun these women's existence but in some areas make their actions punishable by death. However, in their brothels the women are the breadwinners. This underlying dualism surfaces in portraits of the women sitting proudly on the same beds where they not only service their customers but share with their husbands and children.

I use this project to raise awareness about this little known community, and to raise funds for the two little schools, the first ones ever to offer education to the children of the sex-workers with the mission to break the cycle of children being born into prostitution, sex abuse, drug addiction and crime. There are currently 80 students enrolled.

Bio
Born in Stockholm, Sweden. Based in New York City.

'99 - present
Artist focused largely on women and children issues in developing countries.

'94 - present
Commercial photographer focused on portraiture and fashion.

'02 - Present Established myfarawayfamily.com, an organization providing Afghan refugee children with education and their widowed mothers with micro loans and guidance to start their own businesses. Provided food distributions in Kabul and Peshawar among refugees.

'92 -'94 Editor at Interview magazine.

'88-'91 Producer of still shoots for art and commercial photography.

Publications
The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Esquire, Interview, Artnet.com, Arena, Vibe, Spin, Marie Claire, Dansk, Harpers Bazaar, Glamour, Tokion, +81, Dune among others.

Exhibitions / Selected Awards
2008
Show&Sell Chelsea Art Museum NYC
Sideluck Potshow.
Selected participant, Review Santa Fe.
American Photography 24 Best Photography of 2007

2007
Act of Faith Nordlicht Photofestival, Netherlands 2007. Curated by Wim Melis
Up& Now! Photographic Center Northwest Judged by Charlotte Cotton, curator of LACM
Spectra '07 Silvermine Guild Arts Center Curated by Peter McGill, Pace/McGill Gallery NY