The main objective of the project was to inspire kids at Bourj Al Shamali camp to channel some of their energies into learning about and using black and white photography. It hopes to enable them to learn that their voice can be heard and understood in a different and meaningful way. The project wants to depart from the stigmatic portraying of refugees as passive victims and to work with the kids to facilitate the expression of their views of everyday life in a camp.
To achieve this, the project carried out two one-week workshops in Bourj Al Shamali camps during September 2002, with groups of 10 to 12 kids. The basics of photography were taught using the example of pinhole photography and the opportunity to take photographs of their lives encouraged with the Holga camera (a simple 120mm camera).
During the first three days of the workshop, each student built a simple pinhole camera, in order to learn and understand the basic concept of light in photography. Photos were taken from the rooftop of the (social) center and were then developed in a temporary dark room installed in one of the bathrooms of the center going through the basic photographic processes. The kids learnt all the steps involved in developing and printing simple photos taken with their hand-made cardboard cameras.
After this introduction to photography, they were taught how to use the“Holga" camera and were encouraged to take photos in their time of the camp and their lives – whatever they wanted. The Holga is quite a particular camera – it is very simple and very cheap. It is not a throw-away camera so it can be reused. The beauty of it is that it uses 120mm film, which is the same used by professional photographers as it captures more detail, rather than the 35mm film used in standard photography. In addition the images are squares, rather than the 35mm films that produce rectangular images. As these are cheap camera, they come with faults and so the images are blurred on the edges, giving them a special touch.
