July 31, 2006 - Almonte photographer hands over cameras to Haitian high school students, Ottawa Citizen

A Message of Hope

Almonte photographer hands over cameras to Haitian high school students

Richard Starnes
The Ottawa Citizen
Monday, July 31, 2006

Jeff Mills is convinced there is no better way to tell a story than through the eyes of the people living it.

That is why the Almonte photographer and social worker is so enthused about a unique awareness project he has launched with the help of high school students in poverty-ravaged Haiti.

The New York Times has suggested the country is "a nation done in by dictators and disasters ... which means a hungry life and an early death for many of the five million people in Haiti's little villages."

Mr. Mills is convinced an insightful series of photographs taken by Haitian teenagers can show Canadians that Haiti is not a nation in despair, but a nation carrying a message of hope through its young people.

The Young Haitian Documentary Photographers Group is a project born in Mr. Mills' mind after he watched the major documentary movie, Born into Brothels, a very personal look at girls living as prostitutes in India.

"What I saw blew me away," Mr. Mills says. "It had to move anyone interested in art, photography, children, humanitarianism. And it set me thinking."

Early this year, Mr. Mills made arrangements to visit Haiti to volunteer his help through the Rayjon Share care Agency, a Sarnia-based organization dedicated to helping Haitian people.

Dieudonne Batraville, a friend of Mr. Mills' has been the agency's executive director in Haiti for 12 years. She organizes people to build schools, mills, health centres, roads and when she needs to recharge her batteries, she comes home to Almonte.

She welcomed Mr. Mills, who spent time helping people build a road from their village into St. Marc, a city north of the capital, Port-au-Prince. She was also happy to help Mr. Mills set his special project in motion.

"After I saw that movie, I said to myself: 'I'm going to Haiti, I should take some cameras with me now that I know you see the soul of the people through photography'," Mr. Mills says.

"I had no idea what the results would be. I was giving high school children point-and-shoot disposable cameras and none of them had ever held a camera."

The project was enthusiastically grasped by the teenagers. A picture or two might have had a thumb in the frame or nothing more than the back of a person's head. But, for Mr. Mills, most of them offered a remarkably clear documentary of life as Haitians see it.

"They show incredible hope to me," he says. "We get all those stories from foreign correspondents who stay in hotels in Port-au-Prince. It is easy to get someone to take you somewhere to take photographs of the poor and how terrible it is in Haiti.

"But these pictures show the people of St. Marc live with little, but they live with hope, and that is the story I want people to understand."

That is why Mr. Mills sent off a second batch of cameras, why he now has a new batch of film waiting for the funds to be developed, why he is eager to accept more donated cameras that he can get into the hands of Haiti's youth and why he wants to stage an exhibition.

He has also written to Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean -- she was born in Port-au-Prince -- asking for a meeting at which they can "discuss this group and their documentary photography efforts, sponsorship and the use of Rideau Hall as a venue for their exhibit.

"These very artful photographs are tools of self-awareness for the students and a great platform of awareness for us in the first world," he wrote. He is waiting for a response.

Anyone wanting to make donations or provide cameras should contact Mr. Mills at info@rocksandtrees.ca or 613-256-3379.