Six years ago, Boko Haram kidnapped 276 schoolgirls. Where are they now?

In 2020, to reflect on the 6th anniversary of the infamous kidnapping of the “Chibok girls” in Nigeria, photographer Bénédicte Kurzen and writer Nina Strochlic documented the lives of the girls, some of them now women, today. Always with collaboration and consent in mind, Mallory and Bénédicte set out to make portraits of the women on their own terms. Using colorful backdrops, and giving them the time to dress and appear as they preferred, Bénédicte photographed each woman, then printed their images and asked them to decorate their portrait with paint and words that felt significant to them, reflecting on what they wanted the world to know and gave them a copy of their portrait to keep. It was important to the entire story team that this was a story about resilience and empowerment, and that the women drove that narrative, not just about loss and tragedy.