#whereicomefrom

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Malike Sidibe’s Photography Is a Celebration of Diversity and Freedom

To see more of Malike’s photography, follow @malikesidibe on Instagram.

“Being from Africa and moving to New York City, I feel like there’s so much inspiration everywhere. I spend half my time walking down the street just looking around,” says 20-year-old photography student Malike Sidibe (@malikesidibe). “When I’m creating, I try to go out of my comfort zone. Do something I’ve never done just to see where it takes me.” At 13, Malike moved from a strict household in Guinea to the US, without speaking a word of English. “When I first moved, I never knew that I was interested in becoming a photographer, but it was something I’ve always appreciated,” says Malike. “My dad wants me to be a cab driver, but I’ve decided to follow my dream of becoming a fashion photographer instead. I feel like my whole goal is to show my little brothers: don’t be afraid to try anything you want. You have the freedom to do so.” #WhereIComeFrom

[mabdulghany]

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How Artist Kayla Briët Creates Her Own Narrative

To see more from Kayla’s life and work, follow @kaylabriet on Instagram.

“I was raised in a multigenerational home, under the same roof with my mom, dad, aunt, uncles and grandparents,” recalls Kayla Briët (@kaylabriet), a 20-year-old filmmaker, composer and artist from Southern California. “On my mother’s side, I’m Dutch-Indonesian and Chinese. My father is Anishinaabe, a member of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation of Kansas. One weekend, my grandma would be teaching me how to fold dumplings, and the next weekend, my mom would be sewing me a traditional outfit to wear at a powwow. My dad would teach me different dance steps; I loved being immersed in the sounds of the singers and the heartbeat of drums.

“But growing up with these different backgrounds was really confusing. I never felt like I was enough — I was not Chinese enough, Indonesian enough or native enough. I lost my voice because I didn’t really fit in anywhere. To form my own narrative, I learned the stories of my heritage and culture and connected them together. The first medium that gave me a voice was music — I could create my own worlds through soundscapes and songs. Then I taught myself filmmaking, because I wanted to explore the power of a visual form. Through storytelling, I’m able to explore identity and how fluid it is. We’re all ever-changing, like chameleons.” #WhereIComeFrom

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Photographer Madz Rehorek Grew Up with Color and Light

To see more of Madz’s photographs, follow @madl_enka on Instagram.

“I grew up with stories in my house, and it had a big impact on my visual imagination,” says 26-year-old Australia-based photographer Madz Rehorek (@madl_enka). “My grandma was a writer and a puppeteer, and used to read out loud her Czech fairy tales to me at night. They were visually descriptive, surreal, dark and magical. I used to delve into those stories and imagine her characters skipping through scenes full of color and light. One I remember her telling me was about lovers traveling through the night, which referred to her and my grandfather when they fled Prague to come to Australia in 1968 during the time of the Soviet Union.

“I was always drawing, making things and getting messy. Then I started photographing, simply enjoying the process of meeting new people and taking their portrait. Most of the people I photograph are close to me. My aim is to steal a bit of them while they’re really comfortable. I love shooting on medium format film just as much as my phone — I’m seeking out threads of color and veins of light that play with each other.” #WhereIComeFrom

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In Pursuit of Home with Egyptian photojournalist @elshamyme

To see more from Mohammed, follow @elshamyme on Instagram

Mohammed Elshamy (@elshamyme) is still looking for a home. Born in Cairo, raised in Lagos and working around the world as a photojournalist since the age of 17, he recalls a life as an outsider. “When I was only a few weeks old, my family moved to West Africa, where I spent most of my formative years. In Nigeria, I went to a public school and, despite being African myself, I could never feel welcome in the place I spent most of my life in — I did not look like I belonged.”

Now 23 years old and based in New York, Mohammed is weary, but still pursuing his journey. “It’s very challenging to be an Arab Muslim during the rise of extreme voices around the world calling for a refugee lockdown, violence against Muslims and further marginalizing minority and vulnerable populations,” he says. “But I find it very important to witness and document this dark but historic era.” #WhereIComeFrom

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From Romania to Canada with Photojournalist @dianazeynebalhindawi on #WorldRefugeeDay

June 20th marks #WorldRefugeeDay, a day to honor the men, women and children who must flee their homes under threat of persecution and violence.

“Photography allows me to stay on the move, much like I did throughout my childhood and young adult years,” recounts photojournalist Diana Zeyneb Alhindawi (@dianazeynebalhindawi), who was born in Romania to an Iraqi father and Romanian mother. “Our family faced repeated harassment under the communist regime, but returning to Iraq was not an option for my father,” she says. “He would have been killed.”

The family moved to Syria, then back to Romania, where they applied for asylum in Germany, but were rejected.

“We ended up living in a refugee camp in former Yugoslavia, and were accepted for resettlement in Canada just before my 8th birthday,” says Diana. We were the perfect refugee family — my mother and father had professional degrees, and my brother and I were young enough to easily integrate into a new society and national identity.”

Diana now divides her time between Brooklyn, New York, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. “I started working in humanitarian aid because I wanted to help people in the types of situations my family went through,” she says. Four years ago, she decided to turn to a career in photography. “It lets me immerse myself in the lives of others, and to continue working with those experiencing some of the world’s harshest realities.” #WhereIComeFrom

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The Way @antimodel Brandise Danesewich Sees the World

To see more of her life and work, follow @antimodel on Instagram.

“My first modeling contract was in Japan when I was 13,” says model, photographer and TV and radio personality Brandise Danesewich (@antimodel). “I’m Canadian, but I spent the majority of my youth in Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia before moving to New York, and later settling in Los Angeles. I was generally the black sheep, punk outcast among my modeling peers, so I quickly discovered music and photography as a refuge. I realized I could intimately access all my favorite worlds with a camera.

My work flow is a little unconventional, but luckily it works for me and the way I see the world. I grew up in the last generation before the smartphone era, so I make prints and often re-photograph the prints, or even photograph my monitor or the back of my camera, adding in window light, artificial light sources, reflections, animate and inanimate objects.

A few years ago, I left LA for Palm Springs, California. I have always had an undeniable magnetic attraction to the desert — it’s a magical place. I spend more time on the road than at home and use the desert as a basecamp. I was born with sand in my veins. The desert is a great place to both come back to and to leave.” #WhereIComeFrom

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Seeking Refuge Across the Ocean with Barat Ali Batoor

To see more of Batoor’s photography, follow (@bbatoor) on Instagram.

“On the second night of our boat trip, the sea went rough and our boat leaked. One of the pumps stopped working and water was pouring in faster than the single pump could take out. The boat was floating in the sea like a matchbox.” Looking back at this photograph, photojournalist Barat Ali Batoor (@bbatoor) recalls his perilous journey in 2012 across the Indian Ocean, seeking refuge from Pakistan.

Batoor is Hazara, a marginalized ethnic group from Afghanistan, his parents’ birth country. He grew up in Pakistan, but moved to Afghanistan to work as a photojournalist. However he found himself targeted in both countries for his ethnicity and his profession and was forced to flee. “I am far from my family, but Melbourne is my home now,” says Batoor, who, after nine months in Indonesia, was relocated to Australia through the UN refugee agency’s resettlement program. “I have been welcomed warmly here. Taking photos of everyday life is important for me now, because when I look back, I see what we had and what we have lost. #WhereIComeFrom, life was uncertain. You never knew whether you would come back home safe.”