An Egyptian Story - Unearthing Forgotten Memories

Since 2014, Thibaut Kinder has been collecting SD cards found at flea markets, second-hand electronics stores, and online platforms for his project Exhumed Photographs. The shift to digital photography and the immense storage capabilities of SD cards have transformed how we take photos, turning us all into amateur photographers—often compulsively so. These versatile storage devices, used across countless devices, become a “catch-all” for data, as described by Sébastien Leseigneur, often leaving us unaware of what we’ve stored on them.

Despite the illusion of deletion, digital footprints linger. When passed through data recovery software, these abandoned cards reveal deleted but not erased content, exposing fragments of forgotten lives. Through this process, Kinder has amassed nearly 180,000 photographs to date. His work explores the persistence of memory—both individual and collective. By meticulously curating and reordering these images on platforms like Instagram and Tumblr, Kinder rescues visuals otherwise doomed to oblivion, granting them new meaning and an unexpected afterlife.

An Egyptian Story showcases a selection of photographs drawn from approximately 14,640 images sourced from 14 different SD cards. Presented as a book, the project offers a departure from the endless scroll of social media, inviting readers to engage with the material at their own pace. The photos are thoughtfully arranged to create a more cohesive and nuanced narrative.

With a delicate touch, Kinder reveals glimpses of unknown lives, crafting a mysterious and evocative new story from fragments of the past. An Egyptian Story invites readers to reflect on memory, loss, and the surprising power of what is left behind in our digital age.