“We often enjoy browsing through children’s books with old photos. But that is not the case for everyone. Some people see someone in the photo who is not them. Then they see a little boy even though they are now a woman. That is painful. Your youth is then not captured on screen.”
Hein-Jan Keijzer, director of the Pride Photo Award Foundation, talks about the open-air exhibition at the Wheem in Meppel. There you will find the Pride Photo Exhibition, consisting of ten large photo panels with photos on both sides of themes and issues facing the LGBTQIA+ community. This concerns, for example, human rights in different countries, diversity in the workplace or LGBT among people with intellectual disabilities.
The exhibition shows some photos submitted for the Pride Photo Award. About 6,000 photos are submitted every year.
The theme of the exhibition is ‘The Process of Change’. Keijzer clarifies the theme using the winning photo. The photo shows a young trans man Ky Smiley (20 years old) with his 5-year-old brother. Ky was born as a girl, but underwent gender reassignment surgery last year. “You can still see it from his scar on the chest,” Keijzer points out. The photo was taken for a school assignment. “But he didn’t dare hand it in.” With the necessary support, he submitted the photo for the Pride Photo Award, which he managed to win.
The photos on the panels include a short story and a QR code. When people scan it, they can listen to an audio fragment about the photo and read more information. “We hope it makes people think,” says Keijzer. “That you walk past it and think: ‘I haven’t looked at it like that before’.”
Last year it was in Assen, and now in Meppel. “We think it is extremely important to pay attention to this,” says councilor Jeannet Bos. “This is a very important issue that cannot receive enough attention.” The exhibition will visit Drenthe again next year. It is not yet known where it will be next year.
The Pride Photo Exhibition visits all provinces. The photos can be seen in Drenthe until Wednesday, October 11. In Drenthe it coincides with Rainbow Week, from October 7 to 15. The photos can also be seen in De Nieuwe Kolk in Assen.