On July 25, 2007 Deviwo Projects will hold a multi-media exhibition of Ghanaian children’s photography and writing from the Zongo Junction Youth Photo Program.
Staged at the Bogardus Mansion in Tribeca (75 Murray Street, NY NY), the event will celebrate the release of “I Am The Only One You Saw,” a collection of photos and essays by Edward Chao, twelve-year-old student in Ghana, West Africa. All proceeds and from print and book sales will go to the Deviwo Projects Scholarship Fund, which provides support for children in Madina Accra to further their education.
The Zongo Junction Youth Photo Program took place over a yearlong period at the Gina Internatinoal School in Madina Accra, Ghana. Local and foreign photographers led a series of after-school workshops in which students learned the basics of point-and-shoot photography and went out on assignments to document their neighborhoods. The program culminated with the students holding an exhibition of their work that took place at the University of Ghana in January 2006.
Co-founded by Sam Bathrick and Ghanaian photographer Godwin Azameti, Deviwo Projects is a collective of visual artists, media makers, writers and teachers who seek to enable youth in Ghana with the skills to document, preserve, and re-invent their own culture. The collective was formed in response to the growing sentiment that Africa, a continent of diverse people and culture, has become narrowly definited–both in the West and by many within Africa itself–through the words and lenses of foreign visitors.