Photography on Fleek: Favela Edition

November, 2015

Its been an exciting past few weeks at the project and much to share!

One of my jobs at the project is to help run an after school club to keep kids off the streets and place them into a productive environment. Most of the kids who come for this programming are my local neighbors

and those living on our street, Rua Trampolim. These kids have become my pals, I pass them every day either playing soccer, sitting outside of the few stores on our street or getting up to other shenanigans. Not to mention, one of my 10 year old students never fails to stop me in the street, pick me up with one hand and twirl me around in front of her friends. I'm not quite sure how this became a thing but she finds it incredibly amusing that she is both bigger and stronger then her 23 year old teacher (story of my life).

Our students are constantly hanging out on our street, doing who knows what during the day but as soon as the clock strikes 3:50 they run to be the first ones into after school club at 4pm. This makes me genuinely happy, the fact that they are so excited and count down the minutes until the project is open for them. I love these kids and my team and I decided that we wanted to do something special just for them; something they could feel proud of and would remember. This is where the photography exhibition came into play.

Two of my team members spear headed the project, we started taking our students out of the project during club hours in order for them to take pictures of their favorite parts of the favela. On days that I went out with the kids they took me to the most random and obscure of areas. To the top of soccer fields, to random mounds of trash and bricks with chickens casually roaming, to the free sports complex across the pasarela, to a capoeira match and to some awesome areal views of the favela. Basically the kids took me all around town, snapping away, capturing anything and everything. By the end of the two weeks we had some amazing shots that really captured the favela, not to mention some hilarious selfies, shots of random chickens and probably 100 photos of some of our young divas trying to models (put a camera into a Brazilian teen's hand and Beyonce is unleashed). Overall we had some stunning photos to be displayed.

After this, we blew up two photos from each student, mounted them, made bios and produced our own photography exhibition for the community. We invited everyone on our street as well as the family and friends of our students for a snazzy night of wine and cheese (soda for the youngsters of course) in order to showcase their photos and vision. It was an amazing turn out and the kids were so excited and proud to see their photos blown up and displayed for their community. If these photos were up in a gallery I wouldn't believe that 6-10 year olds took them..( and honestly I don't even think my kiddies knew what they were taking photos of half the time).

It was a very special night for my team and most especially for the kids, they deserved it. It was an opportunity for them to see what they are capable of, to see that they can create something beautiful whether it be through photography or any other project that they set their minds to. #mychildprodigies 📷