Ja Nou We L/The Way We See It

CHALLENGE

Grassroots women’s voices, people actually living in the camps, had the most important information and access to inform recovery efforts. One problem was that all reporting about Haiti was by the foreign press. And recovery efforts rarely included the vast majority of women in Haiti, represented by grassroots leaders, while they were disproportionately affected by gender-based violence (GBV), especially in the camps.

OVERVIEW

Digital Democracy trained KOFAVIV, a local service provider and advocacy organization that serves women survivors of GBV and is made up of 2000 members. We trained its leadership in basic photography and how to capture their experience in the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti which killed over 300,000 people and produced the highest rate of rape in the world at that time.

Impact

Abby secured a partnership with ELK studios, a NYC based Photography Agency. With Digital Democracy, we curated all content for an exhibition catalog and worked with the leadership of KOFAVIV, who wrote an essay for the exhibition catalog. Digital Democracy and Elk Studios produced a launch event at Splashlight Studios with the two leaders from KOFAVIV that raised over $20,000 for the continuation of KOFAVIV’s photography program. The launch also resulted in press to help raise awareness about the realities of Haitian women at a time when much discussion was taking place about how to best respond to the 2010 earthquake and the crisis of GBV. The catalog is written in both English and Haitian Creole. The exhibition catalog and photo collection of the 47 original photos are available here, and benefit the women in Haiti. It was viewed by UN officials, reporters, NGO leaders, and other influencers, and gave the women legitimacy and visibility.

The goal of the series was to enable Haitian women to share their own views of life from the camps, the insecurity they faced, and ultimately to be able to tell their own stories. The collection of photographs helped Haitian women survivors of GBV ultimately operate a photography program, independent of the organizations that collaborated on the launch, and helped with other programs, like influencing millions of dollars in U.S. Aid and KOFAVIV’s hotline, which sent ambulances to women who texted for treatment of sexual and gender based violence.

SELECTED PRESS COVERAGE

Cool Hunting, ARC the Magazine, Fotovisura, International Center for Photography, Flavorpill, boblagesphotography.blogspot.com

Abby Goldberg co-led the Haiti Program at Digital Democracy. Worked in collaboration with ELK Studios, Splashlight Studios, and KOFAVIV.