THE SPIRASI PHOTOGRAPHY PROJECT

PROJECT STATEMENT
In this project I have sought to enable those that have traditionally been the subject of documentary photography to become its creator - to have control over how they are perceived by the rest of the world, while simultaneously teaching a new skill which can enhance their lives.

"'Power to the People' was the oft-heard clarion call of the 1960's. Now, at last, the disenfranchised and marginalised, the voiceless and others have the tools to speak in the universal language that is photography. Long may their eloquence enlighten and delight us."

Philip Jones Griffiths, President of Magnum Photos 1980-1985

Today - more than any other time in history - images bombard and envelop us. Television, print and the Internet unceasingly present images of people to emulate or help… historical icons to remember… products we need. It's within this new world of constant visual imagery, and the need for shock-value or aesthetic beauty, that photojournalism today must compete; to make a single image stand out and to get us to take the image – and what it is depicting – seriously.

With visual saturation comes indifference. Many of the images we witness of war or famine, disease or extreme difficulty no longer touch us - the people depicted are elsewhere, their plight irrelevant to our lives. Rarely do we have the opportunity to get close to these "static" people, to really glimpse their lives, to see them as active individuals with views and opinions rather than as photographic subjects.

No picture, of course, depicts 'truth'. A photo simply reflects reality - a moment of time bordered and framed, shot by an individual and singled out by another. This project enabled people to document their own lives, as only they can really know them. In doing so this project channeled the unique subjectivity of the participants into a direct and powerful form of human communication.

I hope this project has enlarged the lives of its participants…and ours, too. Through witnessing the daily challenges of people as they see them, we get closer to truly understanding their lives and needs, and are perhaps moved ourselves to help bring about change.

The images produced by this group offer extraordinary insights into ways of life, captured by the very people that live, fight and challenge them on a daily basis.