Ny Rano no Aina
The Distance to Water in Madagascar’s Grand Sud
In July 2026, I travelled with my wife, Lucia, from Fort Dauphin to Toliara, crossing Madagascar’s Grand Sud from east to west. We began without a predetermined narrative, allowing the route, the people we met and the situations encountered along the way to shape the work.
Distance quickly took on a different meaning. Short stretches on a map required hours of driving along deeply rutted tracks, through sand and across dry riverbeds. At times, the road continued for long stretches without another vehicle or settlement in sight. A breakdown in the middle of this vast landscape became part of a journey defined by uncertainty, difficult terrain and unexpected encounters.
Water soon emerged as its central thread. At Lake Anony, children crossed an exposed lakebed carrying yellow jerrycans. Near Tsihombe, families dug into the Manambovo riverbed and waited for groundwater to seep through the sand. Farther west, several villages depended on a single well in the dry bed of the Linta.
The title Ny Rano no Aina means “Water is life” in Malagasy. The photographs document not only the search for water, but also the time, distance and physical labour required to transport it. Yet the people photographed cannot be defined by scarcity alone.
The journey was shaped above all by human encounters: the curiosity with which we were welcomed, moments of laughter and trust, and the pride with which people shared their work, traditions and culture. Resilience appeared in practical and deeply rooted forms, through knowledge passed between generations, the organization of family and community life, and the ability to adapt to demanding surroundings without surrendering a sense of identity.
Beyond water, the series follows rural markets, childhood, fishing and belief. Along the coast, Vezo communities draw food and income from the sea, navigating in wooden pirogues and passing down their knowledge of winds, currents and fishing grounds. Women wear masonjoany, children play among boats and dunes, fishermen work together to bring their nets ashore, and an ombiasy practises the divinatory tradition of sikidy.
Madagascar is conventionally described as comprising eighteen principal ethnocultural groups, although such classifications cannot fully represent identities that often overlap and evolve. We encountered only a small part of that diversity. This selection does not attempt to offer a comprehensive portrait of the country or to speak for the people photographed. It records specific places, lives and encounters along one route across southern Madagascar.
