Photo Credit: Marat Mirzoev, Dushanbe, Tajikistan
Our Stories, Our Images, Our Futures, an exhibition of photographs by youth in Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, India and Canada will open to the public from April 30 to May 31, at the Ismaili Centre Toronto as an Open Exhibition in the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival.
More than just an exhibit of outstanding and beautiful photographs, Our Stories, Our Images, Our Futures shows how putting a camera into a young person’s hands gives them a visual vocabulary and a new language.
Zulfikar Hirji
Curated by York University Professor Zulfikar Hirji and Fredric Roberts (The Fredric Roberts Photography Workshops), the exhibition is the outcome of an unique collaboration between the Aga Khan Development Network and The Fredric Roberts Photography Workshops.
Since 2014, 20 youth (10 boys and 10 girls), ranging in age from 14 to 18 years old, from urban and rural backgrounds in each country have acquired remarkable technical proficiency with cameras and editing, aesthetic sensibilities and story-telling skills, said Hirji. The outcome is a remarkable group of photographs that depict the intense workings of emergency rooms and the hum of industrial sites, the smiles of elders, the play of younger children, and the breathtaking beauty of the natural world.