Skip to content

Search for:

THE WORLD OF LIBERATUM
FEATURES
NEWS
FILMS
FESTIVALS & SUMMITS
CULTURAL HONOUR
VIDEOS
PARTICIPANTS
LIFESAVING CONVERSATIONS
LIBERATUM FOUNDATION
COLLABORATIONS
PARTNERS
ABOUT
CONTACT
HOME

Vimeo
Facebook
YouTube
Twitter
Instagram

VIDEOS

A CONVERSATION WITH STEVE MCCURRY IN INDIA

A Liberatum conversation with Steve McCurry on his travels and love story with India

Share this:

Twitter
Facebook

Like this:

Like Loading...

PHARRELL WILLIAMS ON SYNAESTHESIA

WILL SMITH GOES TO INDIA WITH LIBERATUM

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Instagram

Search for:

liberatum

Global Multimedia and Multidisciplinary Cultural Organization Empowering and Inspiring Minds to Promote Social Change and Raise Consciousness

Happy 24th Birthday Mr LMVB! The most adorable LUC

Happy 24th Birthday Mr LMVB! The most adorable LUCAS 🎈🎊🦋💛🐞 @braziliansweetheart Love from all of us at Liberatum.

𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐀𝐑𝐄 𝐀 𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍 𝐀𝐓 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐌𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓

Let us imagine that life is a river. Most people are clinging to the bank, afraid to let go and risk being carried along by the current of the river. At a certain point, each of us must be willing to simply let go, and trust the river to carry us along safely. At this point, we learn to “go with the flow” — and it feels wonderful. Once we have become accustomed to being in the flow of the river, we can begin to look ahead and guide our course onward, deciding where the course looks best, steering the way around boulders and snags, and choosing which of the many channels and branches of the river we prefer to follow, all the while still “going with the flow.

We have to understand in a deep way that having what we truly want in life contributes to the general state of human happiness and supports others in creating more happiness for themselves.

Remember, you are a new person at every new moment. Every day is a new day, and each one is an opportunity to realize the wonderful, loving, and lovable person you truly are. .
- Shakti Gawain

Photographer 📸 @jacobjonasthecompany

𝐅𝐄𝐄𝐋 𝐀𝐒 𝐅𝐑𝐄𝐄 𝐀𝐒 𝐁𝐈𝐑𝐃𝐒

We are not going to change the whole world, but we can change ourselves and feel free as birds. We can be serene even in the midst of calamities and, by our serenity, make others more tranquil. Serenity is contagious. If we smile at someone, he or she will smile back. And a smile costs nothing. We should plague everyone with joy. If we are to die in a minute, why not die happily, laughing?

If you do not pour water on your plant, what will happen? It will slowly wither and die. Our habits will also slowly wither and die away if we do not give them an opportunity to manifest. You need not fight to stop a habit. Just don’t give it an opportunity to repeat itself.

The moment you understand yourself as the true Self, you find such peace and bliss that the impressions of the petty enjoyments you experienced before become as ordinary specks of light in front of the brilliant sun.
- Swami Satchidananda

Photographers 📸 @siermond @nicholas.fols 🧑🏻‍🦰👩🏼 @jaelefo @bartencoenvangolen

𝐀 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐏𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐎𝐆

𝐀 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐏𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐎𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐏𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍

In “Go-Sees” my goal is to desexualize the body by discouraging the subject from sexually inviting posing, a gaze giving permission to objectify etc.

Desexualising the nude body by removing clothing may sound counterintuitive but if we look at clothing across culture, clothes often tell us how and where to look by creating "flattering" shapes, or they're used to partially or completely cover up bodies (burqas for example).
However both extremes have the same outcome— they intentionally or unintentionally suggest a way of looking. As if to say, “look at these bodily features OR pretend these bodily features do not exist”. By not seeing anything people often look for something, and in turn begin fetishizing what they cannot see under the drapes of fabric.

Additionally it is relevant to ask where adult nudity is permissible outside of sexual and medical context— both acts invasive and coupled with evaluation whether objective or subjective. Where is the nude body free of judgement when in presence of another person?

I hope my nudes are able to demystify, desexualise and hopefully present bodies on the female spectrum as natural and human, free from the scopophilic gaze. - Julia SH @juliashoots

Photographer 📸 @juliashoots

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐄 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐀𝐋𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐘 𝐀𝐑𝐄

Ultimately, happiness comes down to choosing between the discomfort of becoming aware of your mental afflictions and the discomfort of being ruled by them.

We choose ignorance because we can. We choose awareness because we can. Samsara and nirvana are simply different points of view based on the choices we make in how to examine and understand our experience. There’s nothing magical about nirvana and nothing bad or wrong about samsara. If you’re determined to think of yourself as limited, fearful, vulnerable, or scarred by past experience, know only that you have chosen to do so, and that the opportunity to experience yourself differently is always available.

Let your own experience serve as your guide and inspiration. Let yourself enjoy the view as you travel along the path. The view is your own mind, and because your mind is already enlightened, if you take the opportunity to rest awhile along the journey, eventually you’ll realize that the place you want to reach is the place you already are.
- Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Photographer 📸 @muratozkasim 👩🏾 @monique_dior_zebedee_model

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐈 $𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐈𝐆𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐇𝐔𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐁𝐄𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 We believe human begins have existed for only a small fraction of cosmic history, because human race has been improving so rapidly in knowledge and technology that if people had been around for millions of years, the human race would be much further along in it's mastery. It is hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behavior is determined by physical law, so it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion. Recent experiments in neuroscience support the view that it is our physical brain, following the known laws of science, that determines our actions, and not some agency that exists outside those laws. For example, a study of patients undergoing awake brain surgery found that by electrically stimulating the appropriate regions of the brain, one could create in the patient the desire to move the hand, arm or foot, or to move the lips and talk. It is hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behaviour is determined by physical law, so it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion. - Stephen Hawking Photographer 📸 @brunopedro.mz$

𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐒𝐎𝐔𝐋 𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐍

𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐒𝐎𝐔𝐋 𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇 𝐘𝐎𝐔

Every experience that you have and will have upon the Earth encourages the alignment of your personality with your soul. Every circumstance and situation gives you the opportunity to choose this path, to allow your soul to shine through you, to bring into the physical world through you its unending and unfathomable reverence for and love of Life.

The decisions that you make and the actions that you take upon the Earth are the means by which you evolve. At each moment you choose the intentions that will shape your experiences and those things upon which you will focus your attention. These choices affect your evolutionary process. This is so for each person.

As the anger, or the fear, within a personality builds, the world in which it lives increasingly reflects the anger, or the fear, that it must heal, so that eventually, ultimately, the personality will see that it is creating its own experiences and perceptions, that its righteous anger or justifiable fear originates within itself, and therefore can be replaced by other perceptions and experiences only through the force of its own being.

The soul is not physical, yet it is the force field of your being.
- Gary Zukav

Photographer 📸 @__adey__

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐋 𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐏𝐒

The balance of power in romantic relationships is a difficult topic to articulate with words, especially when in most cultures, women are taught to be subservient to male partners.

But a significant age difference can throw a wrench in the gears of this standard, making room for subverting gender norms and exploring new ways of establishing romantic dynamics. In reality, dominance often ebbs and flows with time, and as each individual evolves, their relationship changes with it.

These power dynamics are given visual representation in the work of photographer Pixy Liao, who for the past twelve years has documented her long-term relationship with her much-younger boyfriend Moro.

The images in Experimental Relationship symbolize her initial dominance over Moro, and how this has evolved into something more balanced over time. Using visual references to stories, television and iconography, Pixy’s images track the fluctuations in her relationship, all in front of her own lens. - Cat Lachowskyj @lensculture

Photographer 📸 @bloodypixy Pixy Liao

𝐌𝐀𝐊𝐄 𝐀 𝐑𝐀𝐃𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐋

𝐌𝐀𝐊𝐄 𝐀 𝐑𝐀𝐃𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐋 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐄

Make a radical change in your lifestyle and begin to boldly do things which you may previously never have thought of doing, or been too hesitant to attempt. So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservation, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future.

The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun.

If you want to get more out of life, you must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life that will at first appear to you to be crazy. But once you become accustomed to such a life you will see its full meaning and its incredible beauty. - Jon Krakauer

Photographer 📸 @tosinshotit _ 👦🏾👩🏾 @emmanuel.boatengg @yanjusofine_

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐒 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐈𝐍𝐕𝐈𝐓𝐄

There is no desire that anyone holds for any other reason than that they believe they will feel better in the achievement of it. Whether it is a material object, a physical state of being, a relationship, a condition, or a circumstance - at the heart of every desire is the desire to feel good. And so, the standard of success in life is not the things or the money - the standard of success is absolutely the amount of joy you feel.

Success is about a happy life, and a happy life is just a string of happy moments. But most people do not allow the happy moments because they are so busy trying to get a happy life.

Unwanted Things Cannot Jump into Your Experience Uninvited Freedom from the fear of unwanted experiences will never be achieved by trying to control the behavior or desires of others. Your freedom can only be allowed by adjusting your own vibrational point of attraction. Without a knowledge of the Law of Attraction, and without a conscious awareness of what you are doing with your own vibrational point of attraction, it is understandable why you would attempt to control the circumstances that surround you.

But you cannot control the many circumstances that surround you. However, once you learn about the Law of Attraction, and once you are aware of the way your thoughts feel, you will never again feel fear about unwanted things jumping into your experience. You will understand that nothing can jump into your experience without your invitation.

Since there is no assertion in this attraction-based Universe, if you do not achieve vibrational harmony with it, it cannot come to you; and unless you do achieve vibrational harmony with it, it cannot come to you.
- Esther Hicks

Photographer 📸 @photographerasaf

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐉𝐎𝐘 𝐎𝐅 𝐆𝐈𝐕𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐎𝐍𝐆𝐈𝐍𝐆

Joy is the reward, really, of seeking to give joy to others. When you show compassion, when you show caring, when you show love to others, do things for others, in a wonderful way you have a deep joy that you can get in no other way. You can’t buy it with money. You can be the richest person on Earth, but if you care only about yourself, I can bet my bottom dollar you will not be happy and joyful. But when you are caring, compassionate, more concerned about the welfare of others than about your own, wonderfully, wonderfully, you suddenly feel a warm glow in your heart, because you have, in fact, wiped the tears from the eyes of another.

I’ve sometimes joked and said God doesn’t know very much math, because when you give to others, it should be that you are subtracting from yourself. But in this incredible kind of way—I’ve certainly found that to be the case so many times—you gave and it then seems like in fact you are making space for more to be given to you.

If you live with fear and consider yourself as something special then automatically, emotionally, you are distanced from others. You then create the basis for feelings of alienation from others and loneliness. So, I never consider, even when giving a talk to a large crowd, that I am something special, I am 'His Holiness the Dalai Lama' . . . I always emphasize that when I meet people, we are all the same human beings. A thousand people -- same human being. Ten thousand or a hundred thousand -- same human being -- mentally, emotionally, and physically. Then, you see, no barrier. Then my mind remains completely calm and relaxed. If too much emphasis on myself, and I start to think I'm something special, then more anxiety, more nervousness.
- Dalai Lama XIV

Photographer 📸 Steve McCurry @stevemccurryofficial

𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋 𝐒𝐌𝐈𝐓

𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋 𝐒𝐌𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐌𝐄𝐓 𝐏𝐄𝐋𝐄 𝐀𝐓 𝐋𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐌

Liberatum founder Pablo Ganguli introduces Pelé to Will Smith. Mr Smith and Pelé both took part at Liberatum curated conversations at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit in New Delhi in October 2018 with Liberatum as the creative partner #Liberatum @hindustantimes

𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐄𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐑

𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐄𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐈𝐕𝐀𝐋 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐄𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐄

Sometimes when I meet old friends, it reminds me how quickly time passes. And it makes me wonder if we've utilized our time properly or not. Proper utilization of time is so important. While we have this body, and especially this amazing human brain, I think every minute is something precious.

Our day-to-day existence is very much alive with hope, although there is no guarantee of our future. There is no guarantee that tomorrow at this time we will be here. But we are working for that purely on the basis of hope. So, we need to make the best use of our time.

I believe that the proper utilization of time is this: if you can, serve other people, other sentient beings. If not, at least refrain from harming them. I think that is the whole basis of my philosophy.

So, let us reflect what is truly of value in life, what gives meaning to our lives, and set our priorities on the basis of that. The purpose of our life needs to be positive. We weren't born with the purpose of causing trouble, harming others. For our life to be of value, I think we must develop basic good human qualities—warmth, kindness, compassion. Then our life becomes meaningful and more peaceful—happier. - Dalai Lama XIV

Photographer 📸 Heji Shin @hejishin

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐈𝐌𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐀 𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐏

Truth has no path, and that is the beauty of truth, it is living. A dead thing has a path to it because it is static, but when you see that the truth is something living, moving, which has no resting place, which is in no temple, mosque or church, which no religion, no teacher, no philosopher, nobody can lead you to - then you will also see that this living thing is what you actually are.

In all our relationships each one of us builds an image about the other and these two images have relationship, not the human beings themselves... The actual relationship between two human beings or between many human beings completely ends when there is the formation of images.

In the life, we generally lead there is very little solitude. Even when we are alone our lives are crowded by so many influences, so much knowledge, so many memories of so many experiences, so much anxiety, misery and conflict that our minds become duller and duller, more and more insensitive, functioning in a monotonous routine. Are we ever alone? Or are we carrying with us all the burdens of yesterday?
- Jiddu Krishnamurti

Photographer 📸 @jadebeallphotography

𝐌𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐈𝐍 𝐂𝐇𝐈

𝐌𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐈𝐍 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐇𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐄 𝐘𝐎𝐔

This was the year when I was sexually abused by an Indian man who lived in the same building as me. He had known me since I was 8 or 9. I knew his children and his wife. But I didn’t even realise at the time that it was abuse and completely wrong. He did it repeatedly. I didn’t understand. I think he was over 45. I was under 15. I can’t say that I was hurt or upset but looking back, what he did was horrifying. And criminal. He took advantage of a child. An innocent boy.

This is rife all over the world. Especially in places like India and Brazil where children and adults don’t have any clear boundaries and everybody lives together in very small spaces. Teach your children to always tell you about these incidents before it is too late. He told me he needed my sperm for his wife as he wasn’t able to become a father anymore. What a sick mind. He would come into my house and touch me while my grandmother would cook in the kitchen. Certainly not an uneventful childhood. But he did not break me. Nor did the countless other appalling and violent experiences that I have had since then.

But millions of other children and young people do not experience that same fate, so I created the Liberatum platform to address these crucial issues in the world, highlight extraordinary human beings making a difference every day, and hopefully help change things for the better. - Pablo Ganguli

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐀𝐂𝐂𝐄𝐏𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐄𝐗𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐎𝐑𝐃𝐈𝐍𝐀𝐑𝐘 𝐁𝐎𝐃𝐈𝐄𝐒

Every experience that you have and will have upon the Earth encourages the alignment of your personality with your soul. Every circumstance and situation gives you the opportunity to choose this path, to allow your soul to shine through you, to bring into the physical world through you its unending and unfathomable reverence for and love of Life.

The decisions that you make and the actions that you take upon the Earth are the means by which you evolve. At each moment you choose the intentions that will shape your experiences and those things upon which you will focus your attention. These choices affect your evolutionary process. This is so for each person.

As the anger, or the fear, within a personality builds, the world in which it lives increasingly reflects the anger, or the fear, that it must heal, so that eventually, ultimately, the personality will see that it is creating its own experiences and perceptions, that its righteous anger or justifiable fear originates within itself, and therefore can be replaced by other perceptions and experiences only through the force of its own being.

When perception of the physical world is limited to the five-sensory modality, the basis of life in the physical arena becomes fear. Power to control the environment, and those within the environment appears to be essential.
- Gary Zukav

Photographer 📸 @michellevdijk 👦🏾👩🏻 @kokeadile @yvesmark.chery

𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐅 𝐀𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐘𝐒𝐈𝐒

𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐅 𝐀𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐘𝐒𝐈𝐒 𝐈𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐒𝐓 𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐒

Self-realization is the knowing in all parts of body, mind, and soul that you are now in possession of the kingdom of God; that you do not have to pray that it come to you; that God’s omnipresence is your omnipresence; and that all that you need to do is improve your knowing.

The wave is the same as the ocean, though it is not the whole ocean. So each wave of creation is a part of the eternal Ocean of Spirit. The Ocean can exist without the waves, but the waves cannot exist without the Ocean.

Millions of people never analyze themselves. Mentally they are mechanical products of the factory of their environment, preoccupied with breakfast, lunch, and dinner, working and sleeping, and going here and there to be entertained. They don’t know what or why they are seeking, nor why they never realize complete happiness and lasting satisfaction. By evading self-analysis, people go on being robots, conditioned by their environment. True self-analysis is the greatest art of progress.
- Paramahansa Yogananda

Photographer 📸 @abreupaulo

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐔𝐒𝐄, 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐎𝐔𝐋 𝐃𝐎𝐄𝐒𝐍'𝐓 𝐒𝐄𝐄 𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐈𝐍 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄

Love is not a state, a feeling, a disposition, but an exchange, uneven, fraught with history, with ghosts, with longings that are more or less legible to those who try to see one another with their own faulty vision.

What makes for a livable world is no idle question. It is not merely a question for philosophers. It is posed in various idioms all the time by people in various walks of life. If that makes them all philosophers, then that is a conclusion I am happy to embrace. It becomes a question for ethics, I think, not only when we ask the personal question, what makes my own life bearable, but when we ask, from a position of power, and from the point of view of distributive justice, what makes, or ought to make, the lives of others bearable?

Somewhere in the answer we find ourselves not only committed to a certain view of what life is, and what it should be, but also of what constitutes the human, the distinctively human life, and what does not. There is always a risk of anthropocentrism here if one assumes that the distinctively human life is valuable--or most valuable--or is the only way to think the problem of value. But perhaps to counter that tendency it is necessary to ask both the question of life and the question of the human, and not to let them fully collapse into one another.
- Judith Butler

Photographer 📸 Martin Machaj @martinmachaj

𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐇𝐔𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐈𝐒

𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐇𝐔𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐈𝐒 𝐀𝐍 𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐈𝐒𝐓

If someone is not treating you with love and respect, it is a gift if they walk away from you. If that person doesn't walk away, you will surely endure many years of suffering with him or her. Walking away may hurt for a while, but your heart will eventually heal. Then you can choose what you really want. You will find that you don't need to trust others as much as you need to trust yourself to make the right choices.

If others tell us something we make assumptions, and if they don't tell us something we make assumptions to fulfill our need to know and to replace the need to communicate. Even if we hear something and we don't understand we make assumptions about what it means and then believe the assumptions. We make all sorts of assumptions because we don't have the courage to ask questions.

God is life. God is life in action. The best way to say, "I love you, God," is to live your life doing your best. The best way to say, "Thank you, God," is by letting go of the past and living in the present moment, right here and now. Whatever life takes away from you, let it go. When you surrender and let go of the past, you allow yourself to be fully alive in the moment. Letting go of the past means you can enjoy the dream that is happening right now.

Every human is an artist. The dream of your life is to make beautiful art. - Don Miguel Ruiz

Photographer 📸 @pipgraphy

𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐀𝐌𝐄

𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐀𝐌𝐄 𝐒𝐔𝐍

This photo series was created in collaboration with the Josephat Torner Foundation and ‘Stichting Afrikaanse Albino's’ to raise awareness about the circumstances of people with albinism (PWA) in Tanzania.

In Tanzania, when you have albinism, you are thought to be evil. There even is a price on the head of children with albinism since killing a person with albinism is considered to bring good luck. The fears and superstitions surrounding albinism run very deep in Tanzanian society. So deep that many women who give birth to a child with albinism are told to kill the baby at birth. If she refuses, she and the baby will become outcasts.

Many children with albinism are denied the most fundamental human rights. They are despised and taught that they are evil, that their existence is a curse. They live in constant fear of brutal attacks.

Many of those who have been attacked are young children. In December of 2014, a 4 year-old girl with albinism named Pendo Emmanuelle, was taken from her mother’s arms. Police have yet to find her body. In February 2015, Yohana Bahati, a boy of just 18 months, was taken from his home, his mother’s face slashed with machetes as she tried to protect her son. She narrowly survived. Days later, little Yohana’s body was recovered from a forest, where he was found face down in the mud with his arms and legs hacked off.

Because of killings like this, many children with albinism now live in camps. Rejected by and cut-off from their families, they live separate from society in order to keep them safe. In some of the camps the living circumstances are horrible, with even basic care lacking. And this separation doesn’t solve the problems. It doesn’t help with integration. It doesn’t give them a chance to grow into valued and respected members of society. They are secluded, kept apart, hidden, often mistreated and shamed. That’s why the mission of the Josephat Torner Foundation is social acceptance and inclusion. - @marinkamasseus

Photographer 📸 Marinka Masséus @marinkamasseus

Load More... Follow on Instagram

ABOUT
CULTURAL HONOUR
FEATURES
FESTIVALS
FILMS
LIBERATUM FOUNDATION
LIFESAVING CONVERSATIONS
PARTICIPANTS, COLLABORATORS AND GUESTS
PARTNERS
THE WORLD OF LIBERATUM
VIDEOS
CONTACT

Powered by aThemes.

%d bloggers like this: