An upcoming Vancouver photography exhibit will offer a unique look at the city's gritty downtown Eastside as seen by the residents who live there. It's the result of a program that puts cameras in the hands of locals and asks them to document a neighbourhood that Canadians only know as the country's poorest postal code.
More than three dozen photographs selected during this year's Hope in the Shadows contest will be on display at Vancouver's Pendulum Gallery, beginning Tuesday.
The show, now in its ninth year, is the culmination of this year's contest, which drew more than 4,000 images of the neighbourhood for consideration.
A selection of photographs is compiled in a calendar, which homeless and low-income residents then sell on the city's streets, outside Skytrain stations and other venues.
For this year's program, 170 participants were trained to run their own micro-business, selling the calendars.
Photographs from each show are also sold to the public. The photographer receives 60 per cent of the proceeds.
The initiative is run by Hope in the Shadows, a Vancouver charity that works with residents in low-income neighbourhoods throughout the city.
Project director Paul Ryan said he sees a change in those who participate in the program, when they are given an opportunity to make a difference in their community.
"They can actually go out there and not only are they standing up for themselves, they're standing up for the downtown Eastside," Ryan said.
Kim Washburn's photograph of a woman reaching out a window of the Carnegie Center, where locals can have a meal or otherwise seek refuge, was selected for the cover of the 2012 calendar.
Washburn told CTV News that the image of the woman's outstretched hands, reaching for flowers blooming outside the window, represents hope.
"With this calendar, you know, it gives people a positive way to be part of society, to be part of this community," he said.
The exhibit runs until Oct. 29.
With a report from CTV's Vancouver Bureau Chief Sarah Galashan
