Photography Workshop Sierra Leone

While visiting Sierra Leone with UNICEF, I met a group of teenagers that published a small magazine about their struggles, problems and dreams: The Pikin News. I noticed they had no pictures in the magazine and explained to them how important it was to show their daily lives also with images. They laughed at me. They asked me how I thought they would buy a camera to take pictures as most of their families lived on salaries of 5 to 10 dollars a month. I felt pretty stupid. I made them a promise that I would go back, with cameras, and teach them how to use them. Back in New York I contacted a few cameras and computers manufacturers, but nobody was interested in giving me anything for free for the project. Out of frustration, I bought 40 compact digital cameras with all the accessories needed and as I was setting out to buy a bunch of laptops, my friend David de Rothschild donated 10 of them with his foundation Sculpt the Future. I went back to Sierra Leone, and with the help of UNICEF that put a car and a driver at my disposal, I traveled to 3 different towns and  finally gave my workshop to over 100 teenagers. My videographer friend Marco Mignani traveled with me to cover the filming part. I’ve included pictures of the journey between villages.