Collective Lens: Photography for Social Change

by Kathleen Hennessy, Director of Photography at the San Francisco Chronicle, and Activist Award Director at PhotoPhilanthropy.

I have wanted to go Guatemala for many years after hearing of its colorful people and lush landscapes. Being a photojournalist, I didn’t want a vacation. I wanted to get inside, to experience the place in a deeper way. Fellow photojournalist and longtime friend Barbara Ries and I teamed up and contacted a couple of non-profits to see if we could offer pro-bono photography and video for them to use to increase donations and awareness for the families they serve.

We connected with Mayan Families, a small non-profit working with indigenous people in the Lake Atitlan area, about four hours from Guatemala City. Through education, community programs and construction projects, Mayan Families works to improve lives of struggling families and individuals while being sensitive to the ongoing traditions of the indigenous culture.  The program is run by Australian native Sharon Smart-Poage, a caring, calm and good-humored soul. She has a great affinity for the Guatemalan people, has adopted two Guatemalan children and employs over 35 local residents.

Our goal was to tell a story that showed how Mayan Families has a direct impact on the local community. Smart-Poage introduced us to the dimpled smile of Claudia Jona, an 11 year-old Mayan girl who has lived a difficult life and has just recently started to go to school, well behind most children.

Claudia’s story, like most stories of impoverished lives, is heartbreaking and complex. Her mother committed suicide when she was two. Abandoned by her father, she was left with her half-blind grandmother, Andrea. Mayan Families found her in rags and provided her with a sponsor that would support her schooling and buy her traditional clothes she could wear to class. Claudia was thrilled. She had been so sad and angry to watch the other kids go to school while she had to work caring for other people’s babies at wages so meager it wasn’t enough to provide her with daily food.

We first met Claudia and her grandmother in their small hillside hut. It was a primitive setting with a dirt floor, no electricity, running water or stove, only a shared wooden bed frame without a mattress. The encounter was a bit awkward as we were introduced as photographers, which prompted them to stoically pose for the camera. But it was only the beginning and as she changed into her one white ruffled traditional blouse we sensed her new found pride.

The next day we visited Claudia at school. She was all smiles in class, happy to make the most of the gift that she had been given, a chance for a better future through education. Standing head and shoulders above the other children and almost twice the age of some, she rested her arms around them as she shouted out answers to the lesson. She concentrated on the sentences in her book even though her belly was empty and her toe was sticking out from her shoes that were too small for her growing feet.

I’m not sure at what moment it was but I had started to care for this sweet young girl. I wanted to buy her shoes; I wanted to hug her. Was it her infectious laugh or her dark shining eyes that drew me in? It didn’t matter; I just cared.

Being journalists, we are trained not to get too close, to be objective. How can you be objective when it comes to a suffering child? But, here, I am not working as a journalist. I am a volunteer.  I have permission to care.  I have permission to give.

Barb and I were moved into action. Something we hoped our photography would do for Mayan Families. We went to the local market and purchased sandals and a traditional peach colored blouse for Claudia. We donated a hope chest to her, built by another volunteer teaching local boys carpentry skills.

On our last day with Claudia, she spoke about her past in her native tongue, Kaqchikel, because she did not know the Spanish words to describe her pain. She cried. She told us most days she only has one meal a day, some beans in the morning and if she’s lucky a tortilla with salt in the evening. And then I cried. I had permission.