Writing with Light: A Photography Workshop with imaRge

Photo © Yury Li-Toroptsov

For several months, I have been volunteering with imaRge, an association committed to supporting young people and individuals facing psychological, relational, or social difficulties. For more than thirty years, imaRge has been developing work in listening, prevention, and creative mediation in Issy-les-Moulineaux.

I assist with the Creation and Listening Workshop, co-facilitated by psychiatrist Dr Daniel Barache and ceramic artist Agnès de Montrond, alongside Françoise Lagune, a workshop volunteer. This creative mediation space notably offers work with clay, a primary, archaic, and sensory material that engages both the body and the imagination. Modelling sometimes allows what remains difficult to put into words to take shape, brings inner images to the surface, and opens a space for expression and symbolisation. It also helps participants come into contact with emotions deeply buried in the psyche.

Within this framework, I also created and facilitated a monthly photography workshop at the Anne Frank Youth Centre. This workshop was intended for young people who wished to explore photography as a means of expression, observation, and creation.

Photography has a particular quality. It allows us to look at the world differently and to give form to certain experiences or inner states that are sometimes difficult to express directly. To photograph is also to learn how to observe, choose, frame, and develop a different kind of attention to one’s environment.

Over the course of the sessions, participants experimented with different photographic approaches and learned to express something of themselves through images. Some photographs speak of solitude, light, movement, or connection. Others simply bear witness to a personal way of inhabiting a place or a moment.

Today, this workshop is coming to an end, and an exhibition is being prepared. It will present a selection of the work produced this year by the participants. The aim of this exhibition is to share and highlight their perspectives and creations.

I would like to thank Stéfany and Charlotte for opening the doors of their workshop to me and for their help throughout the project. I also thank the team at the Anne Frank Youth Centre, as well as its director, Philippe, for their support and commitment in preparing this exhibition.

I would also like to thank the other members of the imaRge team, especially Isabelle, Jeanne, Chantal, and Martine, whose valuable work provides support and presence for young people and families.

Above all, thank you to the participants in the photography workshop for their commitment and their images throughout this year.

To learn more about the work carried out by imaRge, I invite you to visit their website and to spread the word about their actions. Supporting this kind of organisation, sharing their initiatives, or speaking about their work helps keep these spaces of listening and support alive.