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listening to the voices and seeing the vision
of children
Through Children’s Eyes is a good news story at a time in our history when it seems there’s precious little that’s
positive being told.
Of course, not all the stories in Papua New Guinea are those we would celebrate. With over 800 languages
spoken and huge diversity of culture, the country is one of the most complex and difficult in the world. That there
are profound social, economic and political problems is obvious. The vast number of volunteer and salaried
workers from many countries of the world people working in PNG, is testament to widespread recognition that
development in PNG struggles to keep pace with need. This, in spite of the of great resource wealth within the
country and consistent with a loss of cultural ways of life that have previously sustained and kept individuals and
communities strong.
The idea for the project ‘Through Children’s Eyes’ grew out of an inspiring conversation I had with Nigel Spence,
the CEO of ChildFund Australia, in early 2007, during which he expressed a commitment to research that has the
capacity to build greater awareness of community development needs, by seeking and ‘listening’ to the
perceptions of children. Philosophically this approach underpins the overall approach of ChildFund Australia, an
organisation that works in partnership with children and their communities, to create lasting and meaningful
change through sustainable community development and the promotion of children’s rights.
I believe wholeheartedly in the capacity of the visual image to transcend intellectual, language and cultural
barriers. Teaching children how to use a digital camera would establish an equal and comfortable starting place
for them to visually capture their lives and for us to visit their world, to see what they see and to tap into their
instinctual awareness of the joys and dreams, the fears and perceived inadequacies of their experience.
The ‘Photo Voice’ approach is not new, having been very effectively used in India, in Indigenous Australian
communities, and last year in PNG to reflect upon the way adolescents in Port Moresby view their city.
Words serve us well. But pictures have the capacity to speak a thousand of them. And in a world both profoundly
analytical and politically driven, the view that is presented by children through their photographs is immediate,
honest and clear.
So it was decided that children from both Papua New Guinea and Australia would be chosen to participate. In this
way, it would be possible to present the place at which the lives of children regardless of culture intersect, and
where, due to circumstance and experiential opportunity, they never will. Due to the difficulty of access to many of
the ChildFund Program Areas in Central and Gulf Provinces of PNG, three of six ChildFund Program Areas were
chosen – Hood Lagoon and Lebogoro in Central Province and Meii in Gulf Province. Thirty seven children were
selected by the communities of nine villages. At the same time, thirteen rural children from Queensland, NSW, SA,
Victoria and Tasmania, whose families sponsor one or more children in PNG, were invited to participate.
In PNG, the project team travelled to each of the communities for 3 – 4 days. Camera training took place on one
day and then the children had a full day to photograph whatever and wherever they chose. Film was taken of each
of the children as they took their photos and of the environment in which they live. Clearly, this special project was
a great and much anticipated event for the whole community – with great encouragement and support given to the
children, and by the children one to the other. At night a screen was set up in a place central to each village and
film from the day and images taken by the children shown. The whole community from the very youngest to the
oldest, crammed together on woven grass mats, would scream with laughter when someone they knew appeared,
larger than life, on the screen.
This is the reality of community life in PNG. These are great people. But like people everywhere they have their
issues internal and external to the community and especially in terms of striving to marry old ways with the
demands of a contemporary world. Women together, men together, working, sharing, being – no loneliness but
precious little personal space either. The children have an uncomplicated life, mostly lived outside where they
play, fish and hunt and help their parents with gardens and house work. Their stories speak of pride in their way of
life and joy in the connectedness they feel.
It was harder for the Australian children, in that being so spread across the country, with the exception of three
children who were visited by the project team, they received their cameras and instructions by post and worked

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alone in taking their photographs. There could be no impetus and excitement generated by the group dynamic,
just as they were unable to work together with friends, sharing ideas and stories, laughing about their mistakes
and just having fun. There is nevertheless, much revealed in their wonderful photographs. How different rural
Australia is to the rural areas of PNG - how vast and dry the country, how big and well equipped the schools; how
different the experience of nuclear family existence to village life in Papua New Guinea.
Children have an immense capacity to look at the world and its details and to respond spontaneously to that
without sifting it first through the layers of conditioning, fear and ego that gradually edits the expression of adults.
What they see is the detail of the world – its shape and colour - aesthetically capturing the poetry of their
environment, while simultaneously revealing truths to us about where we have come from and what we have
become. There is no self consciousness in their expression, just the unattached joy of doing. They readily show
their feelings, diffusing a sense of what and how from their immediate environment. Like any form of personal
expression, the photos also show the personalities of the children- where and how they live, play, eat and sleep.
We are guided through their child world.
At the same time, children’s awareness of their life and themselves also changes and develops. By encouraging
them to look at what fills the viewfinder, they are seeing the experience of their daily life with new eyes and from a
different perspective. Eyes light upon what’s important and share without thinking – a celebration.
Lauren makes ‘a memory‘ of her grandparents – perhaps realising they may not always be there.
Kepina celebrates being at school ‘because through education I will become someone’.
Winnie says his village is a place ‘where everyone is so kind’
Anthony loves his animals ‘because they love and comfort me and I love them back’. From today Kila has decided
to become a photographer.
These 50 children are living witnesses of their lives.
For those of us with eyes to see and ears to hear, their visual voices tell us about their reality, their experience of
that reality and what we might do to redress the balance.
Jeannie Heynatz
Project Manager
Through Children’s Eyes