IF WE CHOOSE TO LOOK

Skoll World Forum Exhibition, Bonn Square, Oxford

April 20 - 24, 2026

Just walk to Bonn Square. Step into the open air this April and meet some of the most extraordinary people on the planet. Through stunning documentary photography, The PhotoBridge Project brings you face to face with communities in Kenya, Syria, India, Sri Lanka, Haiti, and the United States – people who, in the face of environmental, political, and social challenges, show what courage, solidarity and the human spirit can achieve. Their signs, their symbols, their stories.

Always here. Always visible – if we choose to look.

This is an exhibition without walls, open and free for everyone. Outside in Bonn Square, and inside The Sidebar housed in New Road Baptist Church, these stories will spark a week of conversation, collaboration and ideas.

Step outside, step inside.

The Exhibition

Through powerful imagery The PhotoBridge Project brings to life the human stories behind displacement through striking, context-rich photography developed in collaboration with local communities around the world. The exhibit highlights communities, capturing experiences of trauma, resilience, and healing, and creating a space where shared experiences can spark empathy and reflection.

From displaced communities near Khartoum in Sudan, to fishing villages in Haiti confronting ecological collapse, widows in India facing systemic injustice, teenage survivors in Sri Lanka building futures with support from Emerge Lanka, and migrant families navigating the asylum system in the United States, the images reveal both hardship and the courage, agency, and creativity that sustain these communities.

A young girl and boy holding younger children in their arms look out of an open door in a home.
A women standing in front of bags of charcoal laughs at a market in Cap-Haïtien where charcoal made from mangrove wood is sold.

Exhibition Themes

By centering the work of local organizations and the voices of those directly impacted, The PhotoBridge Project offers an intimate, immersive encounter that invites visitors to witness, understand, and connect with the realities of displacement.

People standing on a shoreline covered in plastic waste in Cap Haitien

Climate Crisis

Haiti: FoProBim fishing communities and mangrove restoration amid ecological collapse.

Olivier Jobard (Emmy Award winner), September 2025

Fondation pour la Protection de la Biodiversité Marine (FoProBiM), Cap Hatien, Haiti

Anita (29) and her 5 children - married at 12, Anita lost her husband to kidney failure caused by years of self-medication to endure hard fieldwork.

Systemic Violence

India: Jagar Pratishthan widows of farmers confronting debt, illness, and injustice.

Chloé Sharrock, September 2025

Jagar Pratishthan, Maharashtra, India

Boy sitting in a chair in a home in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Protection of Vulnerable Populations

Sri Lanka: Emerge Lanka teenage survivors of child sexual abuse building futures through trauma-informed support.

Guillaume Binet, January 2026

Emerge Lanka, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Protestors gather outside of Baltimore Immigration Court as Kilmar Abrego Garcia appears inside for a deportation hearing.

Asylum and Persecution

USA: Holy Trinity Migrant Support La Familia: families navigating the asylum system and those who accompany them.

Agnès Dherbeys, August 2025

The Holy Trinity Migrant Familia, Washington, DC, USA

A group of girls outside the Palestinian house Mjedel School in Syria, Damascus viewed through the window of an abandoned vehicle.

Displacement and Conflict

Syria: Al-Beit al-Felastini (The Palestinian House) provides essential services to the Palestinian community living in the Yarmouk camp of Damascus. 

Olivier Jobard, February 2026

Al-Beit al-Felastini, Yarmouk, Damascus, Syria

Youth in Nairobi dancing and playing music.

Marginalized Youth

Kenya: Inuka Cultural Center youth using dance and music to create futures and defy stereotypes.

Guillaume Binet, July 2025

The Inuka Cultural Centre, Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya

About The PhotoBridge Project

The PhotoBridge Project aims to address the chronic lack of support for locally rooted, on-the-ground actors by transforming their visibility and the way their work is seen and valued. 

It works through a partnership-based model, where award-winning photojournalists work in close collaboration with local organizations to create dignity-centered visual stories. Local organizations and communities are actively involved in image selection and caption writing, ensuring trust, accountability, and ethical use of photos. Storytelling is treated as long-term infrastructure rather than a one-off fundraising tool, creating lasting visual assets that organizations control and can deploy across fundraising, communications, investment, and public engagement for years to come.

The PhotoBridge Project delivers impact across three interconnected channels: philanthropic, policy, and cultural venues unlocking traditional funding for grassroots organizations, providing credible visual evidence for advocacy and policy influence, and positioning work in galleries, museums, and conferences where dominant narratives can be challenged and power reshaped.

The news fades…we stay.

RSVP and Questions

Karen Lambert

karen@thephotobridgeproject.org

+1 773 882 4042