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AHN INTERVIEW: Nancy McGirr, Founder and Director of Foto Kids in Guatemala
"Photography is a great tool. The creative arts are a great tool. Art Programs so often are dismissed as a luxury. But kids who have exposure to art, learn to express themselves. If they are encouraged in the creative arts, they are excited about learning. This opens many doors for them." - Nancy McGirr
This article is based on a telephone interview with Nancy in March 2004.
In 1991, Foto Kids founder Nancy McGirr had been traveling through South America working as a photojournalist. When she reached Guatemala, she decided to stay. Intrigued by the impoverished community living in Guatemala City's vast garbage dump, she began photographing there. However, she quickly became curious about how this world looked to those living in it, and so she started a small photography class of 6 children ages 5-12 years old. And Foto Kids (previously called Out of the Dump) was born. Today Foto Kids works with over 150 young people from the poorest of barrios in 5 different locations in Guatemala and Honduras, helping these children develop useful, employable skills and a means for expression and self-discovery.
Nancy learned very quickly that placing cameras in the hands of these children is a very powerful experience. It allows them to claim their world in a new way and express themselves more fully. She has witnessed a huge correlation between learning a creative art and becoming excited about learning in general. Photography then opens the doors for many of these kids to a much larger sense of self and their potential in the world.
 Because Foto Kids is dedicated to breaking the cycle of poverty, they require participating children to attend school, and Foto Kids provides many educational scholarships. The results have been very significant particularly in light of the neighborhood pressure to start work and a family right away. For example, Marta Lopez was 5-1/2 years old when she began making pictures with Foto Kids - now she has just graduated from high school with a 9.6 grade point average and is teaching three of Foto Kids' courses. Eight of the early students who are now young adults with university degrees have created their own advertising agency. Nancy speaks warmly of seeing a child, whose parents cannot read or write, pick up and enjoy a book of Pablo Neruda's poetry. It is these kinds of moments -- watching the children grow and blossom and get ahead -- that deeply inspires Nancy in her work.
Out of the Dump is a book featuring the
work of students from Foto Kids.
You can purchase it by going to the
Foto Kids web site.
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The work is very rewarding, but it is by no means easy. Nancy earns no salary and she and her two staff members work a long 6-day week. They are aided by volunteers who are required to make a 6 month to a year commitment and be fluent in Spanish. They are challenged to continually raise funds and also to constantly reinvent the curriculum as students come back year after year. Overtime, the courses have expanded to include digital imaging, computer-generated graphic design, video, creative writing, theater, advertising, ecology and English. Nancy dreams in the future of opening a public photography school and being able to pay past students to teach there.
When asked what advice she would give others who were interested in using the arts to make a positive difference in society, Nancy replied, "Just go for it. DonŐt worry about funding - it will come. But start small. Start the program first, then look for money to support it. Start with 5 kids. Doors open. Don't try to fund first. Just go for it. If you put energy out there, eventually energy comes back."
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FEATURED BOOK
I Wanna Take Me a Picture:
Teaching Photography and Writing to Children
by Wendy Ewald
coauthored by Alexandra Lightfoot
 Wendy Ewald has traveled around the world, teaching underprivelieged children to express themselves through photography. Her years of experience have culminated in a program she calls Literacy Through Photography. She outlines that program here in I Wanna Take Me a Picture. This is an excellent guide for anyone wishing to introduce children to the expressive power of photography. The book includes the practical elements of curriculum, assignments, and resources intermixed with stories from her travels, and insights on how to teach children to "read" photographs, create meaning, and combine images with writing.
This softcover book has 176 pages and includes many black and white photographs by Ewald and her students. Published in 2001 by the Center for Documentary Photography and Beacon Press, it sells for $18. Click here to order through Amazon.com.
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An Excerpt from I Wanna Take Me a Picture
"My cousin-sister Kamu and Hansi
are holding the mirror while I take
a picture of myself."
-Hansi Jhivabhai, India
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"When I began working in Vichya, a rural village in India, the children had few ideas about what they wanted to photograph. They certainly didn't feel that their own lives were worthy of memorializing with pictures. When pressed, they'd say that if they ever went to the city, sometime in the nebulous future, there might be an image worth bringing back. What is true for these children in rural India, is true for almost any children, no matter where they live, when I first give them a camera and ask them to explore their lives.
In order to expand the children's notion of photography, I give them assignments that are relevant to their lives, starting with what they know intimately -- their own selves and their families: then outward, to their communities; and from there to a more freewheeling concept, their dreams. I also urge them to write about themselves, their families, and their fantasies either before or after making their pictures.
I explain that as photographers and writers, we are observers of the world, real and imagined. Who we are and where we stand when we watch the world determines how we see and what we record."
To learn more about Literacy Through Photography including workshops for teachers, visit http://cds.aas.duke.edu/ltp/index.html
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FEATURED LINK
 First Exposures: Youth Opportunities in Photography
www.sfcamerawork.org/mentoring.html
Based in San Francisco, First Exposures is a unique mentoring/photographic education program for young people sponsored by SF Camerawork. Students ages 11 - 18 are recruited from local agencies serving young people with backgrounds of homelessness or low-income living situations. Mentors are photographers with a commitment to youth empowerment through education. Their goal is not only to help develop a creative outlet for their students to express themselves in a safe and supportive environment, but also to encourage them to grow and become articulate, confident, and responsible young adults. |
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FEATURED LINK
Youth in Focus
www.youthinfocus.org
The mission of Youth in Focus is to empower urban teens, through photography, to experience their world in new ways and make positive changes in their lives. Based in Seattle, WA, Youth in Focus gives local youth the opportunity to express themselves visually in a supportive environment. Classes with Youth in Focus ignite the imagination and provide valuable life and work skills.
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READERS RESPOND
Please send your thoughts and feedback on this month's news page to ahn@artheals.org. We would love to hear from you.
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