A picture is worth a thousand words. That is why we were delighted to have a guest photographer, Kate Trenerry, come to our last twinning with the teams from Dali and Lysi/Akdogan. Kate is a recent graduate of Carleton College, who is working on a personal project: Walking Walls: A Photographic Journey for Peace. For the project Kate traveled to Israel/Palestine, Cyprus and Northern Ireland to document the effects of the walls that run through portions of these countries, separating communities and neighbors. In the end she will produce a book with photos and essays that she hopes will help raise awareness about the ongoing divisions in these regions.
Here is a quote from Kate’s website describing her mission:
It’s an old story played out with garden fences in backyards and bricks and mortar among international powers. It’s a political cop-out, but timelessly popular: The Great Wall of China, North and South Korea, the Berlin Wall. It’s easy to draw a line on paper, but what happens on the ground is a different story. What happens to communities and individuals when a political, physical wall divides a land and a people that were once whole? My quest is to dig deeper and tell these stories in Israel, Cyprus, and Northern Ireland by walking the walls that divide the neighbors who live there and photographing what I find. I will be posting my photography and writing online and creating a book as a culmination of my work. It is my hope that this project will raise awareness about the deep divisions in the communities I will visit, and help heal these wounds by promoting peaceful integration.
Kate reached out to PPI-CY and we were happy to have her come along and document our bicommunal basketball activities for her project. In addition to visiting PPI-CY, Kate was also taken on a special tour of the buffer zone by the United Nations, who also supported her work. Kate even took the time to write a short blog about here experience. You can see all of the beautiful photos Kate took during her time with PeacePlayers at the PPI-CY Facebook Group here.
