The Photojournalism Hub Calendar 2026 showcasing the incredible work of photojournalists and documentary photographers who have contributed to our mission.
Reflecting back on the last three weeks since the start of the ‘Knowing You’ project, I cannot say how inspiring and meaningful this is proving to be. The project brings together women from White City with different backgrounds, ethnicities and religious beliefs on the common ground of sharing their personal story to one another and develop a photo story of each other.
The aim of the project is to break down barriers and prejudices by creating the basis for bonding and cohesion through getting to know someone of different religious or ethnic background. Our sessions to date in one of the meeting rooms of Our Lady of Fatima Church in White City have explored interview techniques, story structures and photography. Women have shared their earliest memories and meaningful and defining moments and are reflecting, working together from those. And in these questions, inevitably the project has opened up much deeper layers, something that perhaps I did not envisage to be so strong; women have shared painful, joyful, hopeful experiences.
Being together, women shared, has awaken a safe space, a discovery of oneself through another. Who are we? Who am I? – one of the participants asks. Unapologetic, Bold, Beautiful– another participant describes how she tries to convey her perceptions of a fellow participant. ‘Knowing You’ is awakening, connecting and probing reflection on common experiences of being a woman, of dealing with representation of another woman’s story which brings to light aspects of oneself and of ourselves. Despite, the difference of background it seems to connect everyone on this important core. ‘Knowing You’ project is supported by the charity
The Photojournalism Nights is an event that promotes committed and courageous photojournalism and engages the public to social justice and human rights.
The second edition of the Photojournalism Nights at Elephant West gallery was met with an engaged audience, inspirational and talented guest photographers presentations, keynotes by Emma Perfect, global head of diversity and inclusion at Soho House, media partner Photo Archive News, networking and conversations till late at night at the bar/lounge of eclectic Elephant West gallery and the opportunity to bring home one of the donated photographs from the photographers printed with the support of Genesis Imaging UK.
I could not ask for a better night to present and showcase powerful long form photojournalistic projects exposing, reflecting and questioning the current political climate through the notion of European identity and Belonging. Presentations began with Claudia Leisinger with her project Europe Revisited documenting the lives of Roma families living in stark poverty in Serbia which questions the distribution of welfare and resources in Europe. Followed by Pete Boyd, whose work looks at where and how young people think they belong: what it facilitates; how they define who is a member and who not; how they signal their belonging; who they are allowed to be and what they can express; what they consciously adopt and what others foist upon them; and what they have to do to survive it, then to Sukhy Hullait who for 100 days documented in various cities in the UK, the opinions and feelings of people towards Brexit. Finally, we had the presentation of Quetzal Maucci, whose work looks at the lives of children of immigrants in the States and in the UK demonstrating the universality of those people caught in-between belonging. Four people won a photograph each from the raffle tickets and went home with on original print. This was made possible by the donation of the guest photographers and by Genesis Imaging which have supported this event. There were a lot of questions at the Q&A and I am guessing much more later as people stayed behind till late conversing and getting to know each other.
The Photojournalism Nights are organised by the Photojournalism Hub to bring together photojournalists and share their work, discuss important social justice issues in order to engage in a meaningful way to important topics whilst support the photojournalists which often put their lives at risk in doing this. The Photojournalism Nights are run bi-monthly at the Elephant West gallery and the next date will be announced shortly. If you wish to follow our work click here.
Sharing below some photographs from the talk event on youth and crime we held on the 17th September 2019 at the Invention Rooms in White City.
We presented a very diverse group of panellist who shared their experiences and insights on this very important issue: Raheel Butt, who is an ex gang member, Dr.Roger Grimshaw, Research Director of the Centre for Crime and Justice, Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi, investigative journalist and photographer Robin Friend.
The conversations showed different perspectives that included the raw experiences of Raheel Butt, the research of Dr. Grimshaw that points to emotional deprivation and poverty in early years’ link to aggregation to gangs, and Robin’s visual research looking at austerity measures, Brexit and lack of youth provisions as precursors of youth crime.
Once the presentations ended, we asked the public why they came to the event and that was the start of a very powerful sharing of the public’s own experiences, including their own children’ being caught in the fabric of crime, gang membership and radicalisation.
This was a very powerful talk event, matched by a strong feel of wanting to change things in the White City community, a strong fear for the future of children, and a need to connect with each other to look for solutions. The public asked to have their email shared with each other.
The current Covid-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected communities and people who were already marginalised, discriminated, and at the throng of continuous injustices and inequalities. We are bringing together stories, investigations from around the world to highlight and advocate and create the important exposure to leverage and bring about positive changes. In the 9th edition of the Journal on “Injustice & Inequalities: Covid-19”, we present the work of two great photographers Richard Juilliart and Tomás Cajueiro.
Richard Juilliart shares his in-depth and poignant documentary on the conditions of the Rohingya displaced population in Bangladesh. For over twenty years, the Rohingya people have suffered the atrocities of racism, violence and displacement. Their plight has only intensified with the current Covid-19 pandemic rendering them extremely vulnerable to infections due to poor, inadequate, and terrifying living conditions in the refugee camps of Cox Bazar in Bangladesh.
Tomas Cajueiro’s work maps the emptiness of our known world filled by the incessant work of volunteers. Interposing the empty streets with the portrays of those filling them, Tomas is presenting a touching documentation of collective and personal experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The pandemic has widened social inequalities and injustices and this journal is sharing realities, issues and disparities that we need to see, reflect upon and action.
The Rohingya people are a stateless Muslim minority in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine. They have been forced out of Myanmar (also known as Burma) by violence and racism for more than 20 years. Myanmar’s government refuses to recognize the Rohingya people as one of the 135 official minority groups in the country, denying them citizenship as long as they identify as Rohingya. The most recent crisis began in August 2017 when hundreds of thousands of Rohingya people — more than half of whom were children —fled violence against them by seeking refuge in neighboring Bangladesh.
Currently estimated to include a million people, most of these refugees have settled in the Cox’s Bazar region of Bangladesh, living in sprawling refugee camps. The largest camp houses as many people as the City of Baltimore but in a space occupying only five square miles (13 square kilometers). These temporary settlements were put up very quickly, leading to concerns about WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene), shelter and safety for women and girls.
The arrival of COVID-19 in the Cox’s Bazar area has raised concerns about the health of the Rohingya refugees occupying the settlements. The tight spaces, accompanied by the lack of access to basic services, especially healthcare, leave those residing in Cox’s Bazar especially vulnerable to the virus. As a result of these concerns, Bangladesh imposed a complete lockdown on Cox’s Bazar with only critical aid and healthcare staff being allowed to enter and exit the area. Aid agencies working in Cox’s Bazar have mobilized Rohingya volunteers to support hygiene and prevention messaging in order to avoid the spread of COVID-19. As they work to limit the spread within the camps, relief and response workers have started transitioning away from collective points of distribution into delivering supplies directly to the households of people at high-risk of COVID-19.
Despite the best efforts of healthcare organizations, aid agencies and Rohingya volunteers, the first case of COVID-19 in Cox’s Bazar was confirmed on May 15, 2020, with the first death confirmed on May 30, 2020. As of Dec. 31, 2020, more than 360 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed among the Rohingya refugee community in Cox’s Bazar with another 5,200 in the surrounding region. Of those cases, 10 members of the refugee community have died from COVID-19 along with another 72 from the surrounding region. In addition to the toll COVID-19 is taking on the physical health of Rohingya refugees, the increased restrictions on aid and aid workers have also reduced the amount of mental health support available to these displaced people.
Newly arrived Rohingya refugees waiting for food aid at Kutupalong camp on April 16, 2018 in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
Rohingya people walk around as shelters are seen behind them at Kutupalong refugee camp in Maynar Guna, near Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh on April 16, 2018. Rohingya people, who fled from oppression in Myanmar, try to live in hard conditions at makeshift settlements made from bamboo, adobe or nylon at Kutupalong refugee camp. Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence
Newly arrived Rohingya refugees waiting for food aid at Kutupalong camp on April 16, 2018 in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
Newly arrived Rohingya refugees waiting for food aid at Kutupalong camp on April 16, 2018 in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
Rohingya refugee at the Kutupalong transit center . Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
A Rohingya refugee woman holds her young child .
Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
Rohingya refugee is seen at hospital at Kutupalong camp on January 17, 2018 in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
In November 2017 there were 7 named camps in Kutupalong, now there are 20 and there are now approximately 600,000 Rohingya refugees in the Kutupalong refugee camp of Southern Bangladesh. While preparations are now being made for the Monsoon season which is fast approaching.
Rohingya refugee is seen at hospital at Kutupalong camp on January 17, 2018 in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
In November 2017 there were 7 named camps in Kutupalong, now there are 20 and there are now approximately 600,000 Rohingya refugees in the Kutupalong refugee camp of Southern Bangladesh. While preparations are now being made for the Monsoon season which is fast approaching.
A 90-year-old Rohingya refugee talks with his granddaughter. They walked more than 7 days before crossing the border at the Kutupalong transit center. Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
Rohingya refugee at the Kutupalong transit center . Over 650,000 Rohingya have crossed the border to Bangladesh since August last year, fleeing the violence.
It was March 2020 when suddenly everything stopped. Gone in an instant cars horns and noises, the shouting in the bars, the curious glances in the museums, the screams of the kids in the park. Maybe we’ve never really given the proper attention to the importance of all those small details as they have always been there available. Why worry about losing something that we’ve never lost? Then COVID came, and suddenly everything was not there anymore. In just a few weeks, all changed, and we were deprived of these simple but essential things. Nothing has been the same as before. Suddenly the world became empty. However, that void was immediately filled by the volunteers who, wearing a mask, placed themselves at the service of all those who held out a hand in search of help. Volunteers were the human face emerging out of the emergency.
It was in such a situation that ‘Dal vuoto, al volto’ was born. ‘Dal vuoto, al volto’ (‘From the void to the face’) is a photo reportage produced by Tomás Cajueiro that register Turin in the pandemic period through the eyes of a photographer who was recently arrived in the city. A photographic journey under the banner of the strength of a community that, while facing an epochal challenge, sees an important part of its citizens unite to fight the immediate social effects of the inevitable economic crisis.
A project that combines the emptiness of the streets with the faces of the volunteers. Taken partly in the streets of different neighbourhoods and partly within non-profit associations that continue to work, the reportage ‘From the void to the face’ creates a historical testimony of a particular moment characterized by isolation and social distancing but which brings many citizens closer to the values left out in everyday affairs.
Under the silence of the main streets and the solitude of the parks, Turin society has moved and has shown enormous strength and resilience, which is highlighted in the second part of the series: portraits with and without masks, in the foreground, of the volunteers who fight the pandemic in its various aspects. Pictures that show the faces behind the masks, which give a human look to the emergency.
The images were taken in various Turin associations, in partnership with Torino Solidade, Volontariato Torino, Circo li Arci and Case del Quartiere. Remember who the volunteers are facing the health risk, have been at the forefront in the fight against the social impacts caused by Coronavirus emergency.
Tomás Cajueiro is a photographer with a long experience in producing reportages capable of proposing with feeling a reflection on people’s lives and how differences, starting with cultural ones, can ennoble and enrich the world around us.
The Turin Volunteer Service Center promotes and supports Volunteers’ presence and role in Third Sector Entities, with particular reference to Volunteer Organizations, providing free technical, logistical, training, and information support services.
The Turin Volunteer Service Center enthusiastically shared Tomás Cajueiro’s project. It offered a privileged position to tell the world of Turin volunteering and how it mobilized to provide immediate responses to the new needs arising from the health emergency.
I would like to express my thanks to everyone for their Nomination, the wonderful participants, the charity Near Neighbours, the London Faith & Belief and Her Majesty’s Lord Lieutenant of Greater London’s Council on Faith. It is an honour that the Photojournalism Hub’s Knowing You project will be receiving a Certificate of Recognition from the Faith and Belief Forum and Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London’s Council on Faith on the 30th November at The Royal Society of Medicine.
Knowing You photo-book cover with an image of the participants meeting over Zoom during lock-down
A compelling article ‘Supporting communities throughout the lockdown’ by Near Neighbours on the work that the charity supported throughout the ongoing Covid-19 emergency and how the various groups and organisations have found ways of being relationally close to communities and individuals even when they were physically distant. The article recounts heart-rending examples here of projects supported by the charity that carried on supporting their communities during lockdown overcoming communication, technical and logistical challenges. I am very humbled that the project ‘Knowing You’ is among the project described in the article. To read about it: https://www.near-neighbours.org.uk/response-covid
During the summer of 2020, I decided to commit to a photo project documenting the Black Lives Matter demonstrations around London. The tragic death of George Floyd in Minnesota on the 25th May triggered the first demonstration in London on the 31st May 2020. I wanted to use this opportunity to hopefully capture a positive change in our country. I believe that mainstream media are effective at dividing the nation, writing articles that are designed to cause anger, at times it is difficult to find honesty in the writing. I wanted to discover firsthand what the BLM movement was about.
Experiencing the protests, it is clear that there’s a lot of anger and frustration towards racism in the country, and it was insightful to be able to listen to so many passionate speakers sharing their experiences. As a white photographer covering these protests, I quite often had the feeling that maybe I didn’t belong, wondering who I really was to be covering the demonstrations. I now believe that attending the protests has opened my eyes to a lot of things, mainly the fact that just being not racist doesn’t help solve much at all.
A more proactive approach is needed to help create change in the country when it comes to racism. Being more inclusive towards other cultures within a work place is one of the many things to think about. I work as camera crew in the film industry, an industry that is notorious for being dominated by white males. I have however seen a lot of positive change towards the diversion of cultures and gender when it comes to crewing up for productions. One organisation that has been set up is The Hue List, a film and TV crewing service for hiring BAME workers in the UK and EU. A wonderful initiative for helping to create a more diverse group of workers in the UK film and tv industries.
In the process of wanting to be as objective as possible with my project, I also photographed an opposing protest on the 13th June. Far Right and English Defense League supporters turned up in Westminster to counter protest the BLM demonstrations. It didn’t take long to realise that these protesters where basically using this opportunity to have a ‘piss up’ in the park, with little to no agenda to their protesting. Witnessing EDL supporters harassing members of the public, along with aggression towards police and the press, were all things that created a feeling of disgust within me. A placard from a BLM demonstration on Speakers Corner sticks in my mind, ”Racism is not Patriotism”.
I think one of the more eventful days was the 6th June. BLM protesters peacefully marched down Whitehall to the gates of Downing Street. In a dramatic turn of weather, a thunder storm opened up and torrential rain poured down on London in an almost disorientating fashion. This created chaos on the street, riling up protesters as a select group of people began throwing projectiles and smoke grenades towards Metropolitan police and Downing Street. In a turn of events this led to mounted police officers attempting to control the crowds of protesters.
A young protester then pushed his bike into one of the horses, causing the horse to spook and for a police officer to sustain serious injuries. These events all got majorly criticized, with opinions stating that the Met police acted too heavily in this scenario. It was a combination of people turning up to purposefully cause trouble and the police making some bad decisions controlling that. Leading to the BLM movement as a whole receiving backlash from the media for the events that happened that day.
Photojournalist Hub eleventh edition of the Photojournalism Nights presents an amazing line-up of photographers: Barbara Traver, Brian Ongoro, Hannah Kozak.
Barbara Traver, is a photographer based in Spain. She studied at the Espai d’art fotogràfic school (Valencia, Spain) and completed a master’s degree in production and photographic projects at the same centre together with the University of Valencia. That same year, Barbara won a scholarship to study in Madrid (Spain) at the EFTI school, where she took a course in contemporary photography and another in photojournalism and documentary photography. She has self-published two photo-books, exhibited in various national and international venues, and given several lectures where she delves into visual education and bringing photography to all audiences. Barbara is also the founder of @iphotograp.her , a collective of women photographers around the world.
Brian Ongoro, is a photojournalist based in Kisumu, Kenya majoring on documentary, editorial and commercial photography. He has carried out assignments for media houses, news agencies and non-governmental organisations. Brian’s work is known for covering East Africa and has been published nationally and internationally, including BBC, Al Jazeera, Guardian, CNN, Bloomberg, Le Monde. Brian is a contributor of AFP photo.
Hannah Kozak, is a photographer based in Los Angeles, California, who was born to a Polish father and a Guatemalan mother. At the age of ten, she was given a Kodak Brownie camera by her father, Sol, a survivor of eight Nazi forced labour camps and began instinctively capturing images that felt honest and real. While working in a camera store at the age of twenty, Hannah’s life changed when she met a successful stunt woman who became her mentor and helped her start a career in stunts. For over twenty-five years, Hannah followed a career in the film industry capturing images of far away lands, however after decades of standing in for someone else, Hannah has turned the camera on herself documenting subjects that touches her emotionally, including her painful and deeply touching relationship with her mother, powerfully captured in ‘He Threw the Last Punch Too Hard’ photo book and photo story.
The Photojournalism Nights is an event that promotes committed and courageous photojournalism and engages the public to social justice and human rights.
