Unemployment can leave those who most need their voices to be heard, voiceless. In an effort to help with the isolation and issues attached to unemployment, for six months during 2015 HumanCamera brought together a group of over 30 local people to learn about photography, capture their lives in photographs, and share their heartfelt stories. We also asked them to put words to their images, and share with the world a little piece of who they are, where they’re at, and where they hope to go.
From the consequences of unemployment; to depression and anxiety; to what it’s like living in an unfamiliar country as a refugee, the participants express their stories with their photographs, forming fragments and threads that are then bound together with words,and published in this book.
An image of a child’s plane reminds one person of her childhood in Poland and her desire to be a pilot. Another person tells us about a harrowing journey to flee a corrupt government, while yet another sees herself as the outsider struggling to break through closed doors.
These are often visions of hardship and difficulty, sometimes assuaged by humour; but ultimately they can all be seen as expressions of hope.
The work was exhibited publicly before being catalogued in a photo-book.