MUMBAI, INDIA
100CAMERAS X COMMIT2CHANGE
100cameras X Commit2Change is a part of a 3 class course that is custom designed by 100cameras to equip passionate creatives with the tools to empower youth in a community they care about with the opportunity to learn how to process their stories and create change.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
In Winter of 2018, Commit2Change partnered with 100cameras to lead a program with the girls of Seva Sadan, an orphanage in Mumbai, India. Commit2Change (C2C) is a non-profit organization that is dedicated to creating systemic change by educating abandoned and impoverished girls in India.
Oftentimes, our assumption about those who live lives unlike ours is colored by the stories we hear and pictures we paint. We decide that “adolescent orphan girls”, who have often undergone tremendous hardship and emotional trauma, are likely to see the world with weary eyes and backs turned, unlikely to notice the silver lining or find greener pastures. We assume that their pasts, marked by negligence, violence, illness, or extreme poverty, have done irreversible damage to their futures.
Photo by Mansi in Mumbai during the 100cameras course.
When given a camera and asked to capture her life through photography, most girls revealed an unexpected optimism. Their photographs alluded to their personal stories - not tragic nods to their childhood, but an homage to the simple pleasures of the everyday. The program uncovered something unexpected: these girls may be carved from a painful past but still insist on daily hope. However different that might look, however uniquely their hope might manifest.
What we expect to see versus what the photographer shows us in her photographs creates a pleasant contradiction. We are left surprised and inspired - compelled to see her reality differently.
And in this way, the photographer becomes a catalyst for change in her world and ours.
STUDENT IMAGE GALLERY
Follow us on social media to see images from the field as captured by Falak, Tulsi, and the student photographers.