Triple Exposure ‘Lens’ Students the Tools to Develop Their Self-Identities

Over the past three weeks, students in TYO’s Triple Exposure Photography Program have been using new camera techniques to creatively express themselves through photography. Self-portraits have challenged students to place themselves, the photographers, in front of the camera before anything else. Enhancing their self-awareness and personal identities has been the first step toward capturing their individual perspectives of life in Nablus. In doing this, TYO’s amateur photographers have sought to transcend language and visually express who they are, where they come from, and how they feel. By using photography to represent how they see themselves, what they wish they were like, and how they think others see them, students build confidence, self-esteem, and creative thinking skills that have become scarce in a country where schools fail to adequately build these traits in their students. Efforts in beginner and advanced classes alike have resulted in the composition of profound and poignant photographs depicting their personalities, identities, and a broad spectrum of emotions from fear and anger to self-confidence and pride.

These photos serve as glimpses of the characters and emotions that are too difficult for Nablus’s youth to communicate with words. The camera not only provides an opportunity for TYO’s Triple Exposure students to express themselves but also acts as a medium through which they can channel the frustrations, fears, and anger that come with life under the current political situation.

Over the next several weeks, Triple Exposure will encourage students to extrapolate the creative expression skills they’ve developed thus far up to and beyond the bounds of their community, country, region, and finally their world.