The lens as lever

Amazing things can happen if you capture the real essence of a moment.

It is a rectangular frame.  It is the click of a shutter. It is a moment frozen in time. For me, photography is about the choice to combine those three elements- frame, shutter and moment- in order to bear witness. Behind the lens I have learned; amazing things can happen.

July 2008, for instance, I was travelling in Uganda doing a photoshoot for Hospice Africa Uganda (a palliative care organisation working to support patients with HIV/AIDS and cancer). Accompanying some of the nurses and social workers on visits to patient’s homes, I had a rare chance to see their work in action. We entered the home of one elderly lady in Kampala. The house was a modest, simple affair: four plain walls, a bed, and very little else. The patient, in a lot of pain, was very weak. As the nurses began to care for her, I just stood back to observe their delicate and beautiful interaction (the hospice care team have a gentle touch).  

Before we left I asked the lady if I could take her portrait. “Yes”, she said smiling. Looking like she would never have had the energy to do so, she hoisted herself up on her bed, turned to me and serenely leaned gently into the camera lens. What resulted was an image, not of a woman dying in poverty, but a woman living with dignity and pride. I showed her the image on the camera’s digital screen. “I never realised I looked so beautiful”, she said. “Yes, you do, you look amazingly beautiful” I replied. Her smile followed me out of the room. That simple interaction will forever serve me as a powerful reminder: to reach beyond initial impressions and try to capture the real essense of a moment.

So often the images we see of the developing world paint a picture of one endless intractable problem. They depict drought, famine, war, misery, doom and endless gloom. They show people too weak or corrupt to care. True, the global problems that we face are huge and the issues serious, but my travels have taught me to look behind the sterotype to see the dignity and the pride within people, and their search for collecitve solutions. Photography has provided me with a tool to put faces and stories on statistics. It is a way to give voice to the people who are at the brunt end of political policies, or who do not have access to a voice themselves. It is a way to see into new worlds, with fresh eyes, and importantly, it is a tool which can stimulate debate and action.

On previous travels in San Francisco I met a photographer, Tony Deifell, who told me a story. While at home one day the phone rang. It was a young child, working on a school assignment who asked him, “Why do you do what you do?”  “Why?” he  seriously wondered, and in pausing to conjure a response (which was more difficult than he had anticipated), he realised what a powerful question it really is. Since then, Tony has asked the question to thousands of others, (abbreviated as WDYDWYD?) asking them to respond on a piece of card to the question, and then taking a portrait of them while holding it.

Intrigued with the idea, I decided to bring the same question to Ireland, posing it to Ireland’s social entrepreneurs, (people working for social change here in Ireland). Their responses, in turn have inspired me- answers like: “I want to create a sense of belonging”, “I want to leave a positive legacy”, “So I won’t have regrets”, “It would be wrong to do nothing”. They are answers which invite us all to think bigger and be bolder, and it is through that magic combination of frame, shutter and moment that the inspiration can happen. (see more here and learn about social entreprenuers here.)

Photos alone are not enough to make social change happen. Action is required. But action can only happen if there is awareness, and that is where photography can play a huge role. Photos are a way into debate, to catalyse opinion, to provoke a response, and if done well; they can I believe, inspire action. That then for me is one of my goals, blazen large in my own rectangular frame.

Words and Image by Clare Mulvany

Clare Mulvany’s book of writing and photography, One Wild Life, interviews with social entrepreneurs around the globe was released in April 2009, published by The Collin’s Press. See SpunOut.ie for further updates.