Resilience - stories of women inspiring change: Alexandria, Egypt

 Via World Press Photo Foundation

February 6, 2024

Anna Boyiazis: Swim instructor Chema, 17, snaps her fingers as she disappears underwater in Nungwi, Zanzibar, 2016

Resilience - stories of women inspiring change: Alexandria, Egypt featuring Gallery photographer Anna Boyiazis

01 February 2024 to  21 February 2024

The World Press Photo Foundation, the Kingdom of the Netherlands present a selection of stories, awarded in the annual World Press Photo Contest from 2000 to 2021, that highlight the resilience and challenges of women, girls and communities around the world.

Gender equality and justice is a fundamental human right critical in supporting cohesive societies. Yet women around the world face deeply entrenched inequality and remain underrepresented in political and economic roles. Worldwide in 2021, women represented just 26.1% of some 35,500 parliament seats, only 22.6% of over 3,400 ministers, and 27% of all managerial positions. Violence against women prevails as a serious global health and protection issue. An estimated one in three women will experience physical or sexual abuse in her lifetime.


This joint exhibition conveys the commitment of the Netherlands to women’s rights and gender equality and justice. Multiple voices, documented by 17 photographers of 13 different nationalities, offer insights into issues including sexism, gender-based violence, reproductive rights, and access to equal opportunities. The selection of stories explores how women and gender issues have evolved in the 21st century and how photojournalism has developed in the ways of portraying them.


See a selection of the stories and photographs on display.




Event information
Location
IFE (Institut français d'Egypte à Alexandrie)
30 Nabi Daniel street, Al Attarin Sharq,
Al Attarin, Alexandria


Visiting hours
Monday to Thursday : 9.00 - 21.00
Friday and Saturday: 10.00 - 20.00
Sunday : 9.00 - 21.00


Tickets
Free

Anna Boyiazis Featured in The Guardian's "The Big Bicture"

 Via The Guardian

October 15, 2023

The big picture: Zanzibari schoolgirls enjoy the liberation of floating

Anna Boyiazis: Kijini primary school students learn to float, swim and perform rescues in the Indian Ocean off Mnyuni, Zanzibar, 2016

Anna Boyiazis’s tranquil image captures a group of Muslim girls, previously not allowed to swim, during a lesson

Tim Adams

Sun 15 Oct 2023 

Life on the island of Zanzibar is intimate with the surrounding ocean, but for many years women in the majority Muslim population were prohibited from learning to swim. Two things changed that. The first was the advent of the full-body swimsuit, or burkini. The second was a project called Panje (a Swahili word that translates as “big fish”), which was established by an NGO in 2011 to support young people in Nungwi village find employment. Panje taught women in the village to swim for the first time and encouraged them in turn to become swimming teachers, challenging entrenched patriarchal models of learning.

The photographer Anna Boyiazis also had the sea in her bones. She grew up in California; the origins of her family were on the Aegean Islands of Greece. In 2017, as part of a project called Finding Freedom in the Water, Boyiazis spent a long time persuading the Islamic authorities in Nungwi to allow her to photograph the women involved in the Panje initiative, so that the idea could be promoted as an example to other communities – not least because the east coast of Africa has some of the highest rates of drowning in the world.

Boyiazis’s “Burkini Island” series featured in National Geographic and won numerous prizes, including a World Press award and a Unicef photo of the year award. This picture – which captures all of the simple liberation of floating; the women, eyes closed, seem transported far beyond the mundane reality of their water-carrier buoyancy aids.

Speaking of her series, Boyiazis has said: “It would have been torture for me as a woman to grow up in Zanzibar and not be allowed to swim. This project was the definite merging of two of my favourite worlds, being in the water and taking pictures.”

View more from the series here.

Anna Boyiazis' "Finding Freedom In The Water" For World Photography Day

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A post shared by World Press Photo Foundation (@worldpressphoto)

Via World Press Photo on Instagram

August 18, 2023

In honor of World Photography Day on 19 August, we asked our executive director to share an image from our archive that she finds impactful. Joumana selected this image by Anna Boyiazis (@annaboyiazis), from the project ‘Finding Freedom in the Water,’ awarded in the 2018 Contest.⁣

There is a mesmerizing quality to this image that is both relaxing and daunting. Relaxing in the peace that you feel when you look at the girl’s faces floating in the water and daunting in its unfortunate reference to migrants dying at sea. However when you understand that the girls are students learning how to swim and perform rescues in Zanzibar, then you start to read the image in a new light. And, when you know that one of the highest causes of mortality in Zanzibar is drowning, especially for girls who have been discouraged from learning to swim because of the absence of modest swimwear, then you understand the image differently.

What I am moved by here is not only the extraordinary beauty of the photograph itself, but also the symbol that lies in these girls taking the power in their hands and learning how to swim, in order to challenge and change their reality and our misconception.” - Joumana El Zein Koury, World Press Photo executive director

Pictured here, students from the Kijini Primary School learn to swim and perform rescues in the Indian Ocean, off Muyuni Beach, Zanzibar. Traditionally, girls in the Zanzibar Archipelago have been discouraged from learning how to swim, largely due to the absence of modest swimwear. But in villages on the northern tip of Zanzibar, the Panje Project (panje translates as ‘big fish’) is providing opportunities for local women and girls to learn swimming skills in full-length swimsuits, so that they can enter the water without compromising their cultural or religious beliefs.

View more from Anna Boyiazis' "Finding Freedom In The Water' here.