Project: World on the Move
Staggering numbers
While it can indeed be easy to be turned off by news about events around the world that don’t appear to have a direct bearing on our daily lives, the scale of the international refugee crises that’s unfolding perhaps needs to be spelt out to emphasise why this is something that, like it or not, is going to affect all of us in some way or other.
“Between 2015 and 2023, over 117 million people globally have been forced to flee their homes due to conflict or persecution,” says Theresa. “At that massive rate of violence and destruction, that equates to one person becoming a refugee every two seconds. Think about it: that’s every two seconds for the last nine years and counting…
“Hearing statistics like this is staggering to us. We have a hard time picturing what numbers that massive even mean. And if we can’t picture this crisis, how can we work towards solving it? For us, we start one face at a time. There can be a tendency for some of the public to confuse a person who happens to be living in a bad, dirty or dangerous situation as being a bad, dirty or dangerous person, and clearly that is not the case. We show people with their inherent courage, beauty, dignity and grace.”
The Power of Faces
In Daniel and Theresa’s global photo project ‘The Power of Faces,’ the pair intentionally crop out the context of the refugee camps because they are looking to focus on the individuals, not merely their label as a ‘refugee.’ For a fuller perspective,however,they also wanted to depict theoften-inhumanelivingconditionsthatdisplaced people are forced to endure every day, with the hope that this will encourage progress, provide relief and mobilise resources to spur immediate action, as well as also developing long-term solutions to address this humanitarian crisis.
“We’re seeking to raise awareness of injustice and inequality around the world through our photography, our words and our actions,” says Daniel. “We started The Power of Faces portrait project because we realised most refugees have lost all their material possessions, including their treasured family photographs. Rather than just taking from refugees as journalists and advocates – taking their photos, taking their stories – we wanted also to give something back if possible.
“Having a physical photo of family or friends to hold in one’s hands can be a great comfort in times of need, so we bring portable photo printers and instant cameras into refugee camps and give people proper portraits for them to keep. In many cases these will be the only physical photos they own since fleeing their homes.”
