Red Lounge: Int'l Children and Refugees Rights

Wednesday, 9th of July 2008 at 7:00 pm (19:00)

Opening of the Exhibition

ASYLUM CITY

Photography Project by ActiveVision with Young Refugees from Sudan

At the end of 2006 hundreds of Sudanese refugees arrived to Israel. They are asylum seekers that have been forced to run away from their country, run away from the genocide made by the militants and tribes supported by the government. They have tried to look for asylum in Egypt, however they suffered from constant chasings, harassments and threats of being hand over to the Sudanese government, which means a death sentence. After a long, unbearable and illegal journey they crossed the border to Israel. But here, where they hoped to find asylum, peace and an end to their runaway, their hardship journey hasn't been over and peace is still far away.

As part of the course, the participants experimented with different forms of journalist work, and collected photographs and stories connected to the refugee community and asylum seekers in Tel Aviv. The outcome is collected in a photo-exhibition and a newspaper.

www.activestills.org/activevision

There is a group of youths in Tel Aviv that has arrived to Israel with hope. Each one of them has a different story which end is not clear yet. Behind their modesty, shyness and language barrier hides a unique voice which they wish to speak out.

ActiveVision has initiated a photography course designated for that youths group which had arrived to Israel as refugees from the Darfur region and South Sudan. The purpose of the course is to provide its participants with the knowledge and tools through which they could tell their story and expose their distress. That will be the beginning of their journey, coping as individuals and as a group, with the past from which they escaped as well as with the uncertain future.

However, the purpose of the course is not only in the aspect of the refugees' way of coping with the compelled reality and the issue of their integration, it is also in the means by which the Israeli society is dealing with the same situation and the moral question which is concealed in it. Through the medium of photography a window is opened from which we could glance directly into the refugees' world, as a sort of a mirror, which we hope could serve as a bridge between the groups.

ActiveVision's Asylum City

Opening of the exhibition: Wed, 9th of July at 7 pm

Red Lounge in the Willy Brandt Center Jerusalem
22, Ein Rogel St, J'lem ( Abu Tor )