2020
2020 - a year that will go down in history for its struggles, challenges and fears. But also a year that will be remembered for increased connection, unity and perseverance.
While travel, work, logistics and money has been restricted in 2020, we’ve proven that you can’t restrict hope, creativity and passion. We’re proud of everything we’ve achieved in 2020 and hope you enjoy scrolling through the following photographs and stories of our impact report.
2020’s Photography Trips
Not all work had to stop this year. Our team managed to travel to Guatemala, Rwanda and Tanzania.
Volcanoes and resilience - Guatemala
Adam travelled to Guatemala in March before international travel stopped. Working alongside local filmmaker Daniel, he documented the work of Impact Marathon and the Guatemalan charities they support. Such as, Seres Global who are supporting survivors of the volcano eruption disaster that affected more than 1.7 million people in June 2018.
Seres help young survivors of the disaster to build resilience for future crises and to lead healthy and productive lives.
Hand in Hand Development (HIHD) – Rwanda
In November Bizi visited people supported by HIHD who are working alongside communities living in poverty in Rwanda. HIHD’s diverse projects cover: improving health, sanitation and nutrition, promoting entrepreneurship; and increasing capacity through financial education and training.
As part of his trip Bizi spent time with a community of people living with albinism that HIHD are working with to end discrimination, violence and stigma against them.
Five Talents – Tanzania
Developing and growing community Savings Groups in rural Tanzania, Five Talents UK help people living in poverty to grow their own businesses and improve their financial security. Raymond travelled on behalf of Taking Pictures, Changing Lives to Tanga in Tanzania in November to collect photo and video footage for Five Talent’s Big Give fundraising campaign.
The campaign was a huge success and raised more than £80,000 for their vital work to continue in Tanzania.
Fundraising Success
In March we celebrated a successful Crowdfunding campaign. We were surprised and humbled at the amount as so many people were facing difficult financial circumstances.
When strict Coronavirus restrictions hit in early 2020 our Rwandan photographers struggled to make money. We launched a HARDSHIP FUND to provide financial support and we received such a generous response from our supporters. You provided our photographers with money to pay their rent, to buy staple foods and provide medicines for their families.
Excitingly, the hardship money also gave all three of our Rwanda team time and resources to embark on their own personal photography projects. Proving that while 2020 delivered them all hard times, it would take more than a global pandemic to lockdown their creativity and passion.
Gadi photographed hope and resilience on a remote island
Gadi visited a beautiful island, as part of his job in tourism, where he decided he wanted to do more than accompany visitors. ‘I realised we were focusing on the beauty of the island. But then I said, this family is also beautiful.’ He chose to return to the remote island alone to document the interesting lives of the family living in isolation. Gadi wanted to learn how they cope in a harsh and lonely environment, and to share the story he captured.
Mussa explored the contrast of people’s awareness of Coronavirus in the city vs. the countryside.
‘I saw how poor families in my family village were struggling to get food. And how rich people were buying a lot to store in their homes. But I realised we are all the same when it comes to panicking and fearing this pandemic.’
Granted exclusive access to a city hospital Mussa showed us the realities of Coronavirus in Kigali, Rwanda.
During the first lockdown in Rwanda, Mussa produced a set of photos sharing his family’s experiences during this difficult time. View the photo story
Bizi documented an insightful reflection on motherhood.
'In Rwandan culture a single mother is treated like an outcast, rejected by cultural values'.
During Coronavirus, Bizi has seen how the pandemic added to the cultural, financial and social problems that single mothers in Rwanda face. ‘In this project, I explore the question: what does it mean to be a mother?’
Bizi’s thoughtful approach to interviewing mothers and sharing their stories created a personal and emotive photo story.
Bizi also produced a lockdown story which you can see here
Taking Pictures, Changing Lives featured in…
Our photographs accompanied a Radio 4 fundraising appeal featuring Sandi Toksvig raising money for Five Talents. Five Talents regularly update their website and fundraising pages with our photographs. And their Big Give 2020 campaign was no exception.
Seeing our images featured on Wellers Impact website is exciting. Wellers Impact invests in charities all over the world and our photographs help bring their blogs and work to life. Our photos are helping them to raise awareness and engage people in supporting the charities they are investing in.
wellersimpact.com/our-blog
Photos that Adam took in Bangladesh in 2019 are being well used by LAMB Health. This leaflet they’ve collated is sharing key information with supporters, helping the charity to prove the incredible impact they are having and directing those in need to the health services that LAMB provides.
LAMB Health leaflet
It has been our pleasure to help LAMB Bangladesh launch a brand new website that features a lot of our photos and writing. Our team have helped to restructure, build, design and populate a streamlined and updated website for the charity and the results looks great.
Testimonies
It’s great to share positive testimonies from the charities we work with, to show the impact of our work. But, in this report we also want to share the thoughts of our team who have all had their own challenges in 2020. Challenges that working with Taking Pictures, Changing Lives has helped to overcome…
‘I just wanted to thank you for supporting us during the lockdown. It was really crazy. The money got us moving forward, I was facing rent issues… The money helps us to continue photographing… to keep up with supporters and funders … they need to know what we are up to and that we’re not going to put the cameras down because of the pandemic. We want to continue to photograph to benefit our funders and benefit the world – because this is what it’s all about’. – Mussa
‘Losing my job in 2020 was tough. But I was grateful to continue writing for Taking Pictures, Changing Lives. Writing about the people the team have worked with this year has connected me to amazing stories around the world, inspired me to keep trying and helped me to secure a new job for 2021 in International Development.’ Emily, Writer, UK
Coming up in 2021
The international development world is waking up to the importance of using local people to capture and tell their own stories of impact and change.
It’s so exciting to know that our model of networking with local photographers, filmmakers and storytellers around the world is working and that there is an increased need for our team this year.
We will be fundraising again in 2021 to meet the needs of charities that will need our support more than ever as they respond to and recover from Coronavirus.
From all of us at Taking Pictures, Changing Lives, thank you for your support in 2020.
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