“After I’d done the work on the kidnapped school girls, I had the opportunity to further explore using objects to tell stories when I worked on a project for the New York Times about Westerners who were held hostage by ISIS and Al Qaeda. I didn’t know what they would keep from their time in captivity, but I knew I wanted to find out. Many kept objects that showed the restrictions and constraints of life as a hostage. This toothbrush was kept by a French journalist who was imprisoned by ISIS in Raqqa, a town in northern Syria. His captors chiseled down the handle so it couldn’t be used as a weapon.”