Background to the exhibition

It all began in 2002 with a discussion between Joana Abriel, a volunteer with Enfants du Monde, and Yannick Cochand , manager of the association's youth programme…

…Children's charities working in developing countries are engaged in a daily effort to understand and combat the effects of poverty on children's lives as they support projects striving to give them a better future. But how do the children themselves view their situation? How do they see the world around them? What are their dreams for the future?

Faced with these unanswered questions, we decided to let the children speak for themselves, in both developed and developing countries…

And so the "Through the Eyes of a Child" project was born: assisted by volunteers and EdM partner associations working in the field, more than 100 children from Switzerland to Bangladesh, Bolivia and Burkina Faso were invited to take a picture and write a caption to convey their idea of wealth, poverty and the future.

The experiment was first tried in 2002, in El Salvador , in the little community of Santa Marta . Joana, her camera, and a small group of children. The photographs were developed then displayed on a classroom wall. But the moment she turned her back, the children peeled them off to take home!

In 2003, a second – successful – attempt was made in El Salvador . The photographs were brought back, and their quality strengthened Enfants du Monde's determination to pursue the project in other countries, other settings. Workshops were held in La Paz , Bolivia , among Maya communities in the highlands of Guatemala , in villages in the Zanskar mountains of India , in a shanty town in Dhaka , Bangladesh , in the countryside around the small town of Saponé in Burkina Faso , on the Indian Ocean island of Sakatia , Madagascar , and in the towns and countryside of Switzerland .

In September 2006, we received no less than 300 photographs, taken and commented on by 103 children living in very different circumstances… Their work often revealed unexpected ideas on wealth, poverty and the future, making us reflect on our own values. These very positive results encouraged Enfants du Monde to organise the "Through the Eyes of a Child" exhibition as a way of presenting the children's thought-provoking work to a wider audience.

The photographs were selected by a jury of 22 children from Geneva, brought together by the Acacias Neighbourhood Centre: the children were asked to choose the photos "they liked most", those "which surprised them and raised questions in their minds", and those "which best illustrated the themes of poverty, wealth and the future". For the exhibition 49 photographs were finally chosen.

All the photographs and captions produced by the children are presented in an on-line exhibition, to give exposure to all of those who took part in the exercise.

Staged many times in Switzerland, the exhibition has always stimulated a great deal of interest in schools, which led Enfants du Monde to design a supplementary teaching pack: "What does it mean to be rich or poor?" for use in the classroom with 9 to 15 year olds.