When photographer Ehsan Hazaveh takes portraits of former refugees in New Zealand, he does not click and walk away – in some cases, the process can take 10 months, and the subject of the photograph has nearly as much input into the final images and accompanying text as he does.
It is a deliberately collaborative affair, one born of a frustration with how frequently people speak on behalf of refugees and are “represented as silent actors and victims”.
Behrouz Boochani, Iran. ‘I was born and grew up amidst an ongoing war. That is all I remember from my childhood. Flashing images of soldiers departing for the war front, jet fighters roaring in the sky and people fleeing villages. I know myself as a son of war and that is why I devoted myself to peace. Fighting for peace is my endless ongoing war’
The latest series from the Wellington-based Iranian photographer, Here We Are, captures people in their homes and at work and will be exhibited in the New Zealand capital ahead of World Refugee Day on 20 June.
“We have doctors, a Pulitzer award winner, cleaners, caregivers, teachers – a whole range of people,” Hazaveh says. “When you put all these people together, [viewers] start to think about the wide range of abilities and capacities – all of them bring something valuable.”
Margaret John Abee, South Sudan. ‘I am holding police paper works in my hands. My son just came out from a coma. A few months ago, a gang member hit my son in the head multiple times using a baseball bat. Because we are black’
Hazaveh speaks of the term “refugee” as being an experience that happens to someone, rather than an identity, which can be used as a fulcrum for narrow and biased perspectives of those branded as such.
“The most important thing in my head that I’m fighting [for], is to detach the idea of refugee to a person, because being a refugee is an event.”
Hazaveh arrived in New Zealand from Tehran to study for his PhD at the media studies department at Victoria University of Wellington, in 2018. Before that, he had documented marginalised communities in rural Iran, winning multiple awards for his work.
Yanet Beshah, Ethiopia. ‘I was a fashion model and studied fashion design in Ethiopia. Now I work as a nail technician at a beauty salon in Wellington. Before that, I worked in Cambridge city where my daughter used to go to school. One day, her teacher asked my daughter to tell others how poor she was before coming to New Zealand, a traumatic experience for my daughter that made her feel embarrassed in front of other students. Now I need to try my best to make her believe that she is not different. We have each other. She comes to my workplace after school and does reading and sketching until I finish the work. To help her regain self-confidence, I am trying to be the mother that she deserves, a role model. One day, I will become a fashion designer which I love and have a qualification in’
An experience following the publication of what would become a viral series capturing a remote village in Iran compelled Hazaveh to rethink how documentary photography could become more ethical.
“My intention was to direct attention and funding to that village, but the outcome was different than what I expected. In the professional photography community, the discussion did not go beyond aesthetic aspects of the story,” he said.
Media outlets then used the photos and reframed the story based on their own agenda, including one news agency that used the images to portray Iranians in a negative way, he said.
Massoud Hossaini, Afghanistan. ‘I escaped Kabul after the Taliban terrorist group took over. Kabul’s dramatic fall was a disaster for all Afghan people who were trying to establish democracy, freedom and justice in their war-torn state. Now I’m in Wellington waiting to see what the future holds for me. I often sit outside of my room and check the news of my homeland’
“Consequently, I decided to attempt to make a more complete representation of the people and leave less space for distorted projections.”
In the four years Hazaveh has been in New Zealand, he has taken numerous photographs of people who have been refugees at some point in their lives, and are now carving out a place in their new country. This is the part of their stories Hazaveh is determined to capture.
“A huge amount of footage on Google search shows just one aspect of this story and I’m trying to create a bigger picture of someone’s experience,” he says.
Sounvilay & Soulivone Phonevilay, Laos. ‘My mum and I share a love for cooking. This is our happy place; the converted garage and the second kitchen which is the heart of our home in Wellington. Here, traditional Laotian food is made from scratch; proving that you can take the person out of the place [Laos], but you can’t take the place [Laos] out of the person’
Instead he asks what someone’s life looks like now. “This is what is missing, there is a huge gap in people’s minds about these people.
“It’s really important for me to give people other lenses, other perspectives, to have it in their pockets.”
Ehsan Hazaveh’s Here We Are exhibition is on show at South Wellington intermediate school in Wellington on 18 June. His 2021 series Mementos will have another showing at Auckland University of Technology from 20–22 June.
