Picturing Community Engagement -

White City Place Holds PhotojoWhite City Place | 18 April 2019

In April 2019, Photojournalism Hub brought together photographers, community organisations and practitioners at White City Place for a discussion exploring participatory photography and ways of working with communities.

Curated by Photojournalism Hub founder and director Cinzia D’Ambrosi, the event brought together Tom Elkins, CEO of PhotoVoice; Andy Fearn, Director of Protection Approaches; photographer and FotoSynthesis director Ingrid Guyon; and photographers Becky Warnock and Grace Gelder, whose work includes participatory approaches.

The discussion explored how photography can be used collaboratively with communities and considered different methodologies for engaging people in projects that address sensitive social issues.

A central part of the event was the question of how community outreach can be developed in a respectful and safe way. During the Q&A, local community members asked the speakers about building meaningful relationships, reaching people who may be excluded from traditional photography projects and ensuring that participation does not cause further harm.

The speakers drew on their own experiences of working with communities around sensitive subjects, including projects involving young people and self-harm.

The event reflected an important strand of Photojournalism Hub’s early work: bringing practitioners together to question how photojournalism is made, who gets to tell stories and how photographers can work responsibly with the people whose lives they document.

It also reflects the Hub’s wider commitment to using photography not simply to represent communities, but to engage people in the process of telling stories and addressing issues that matter to them.

Read the original article on White City Place:
White City Place Holds Photojournalism Hub Talk on ‘Picturing Community Engagement