Teen documents isolation around the world
Langley student connects with people virtually to set up poignant photographs
A 17-year-old Langley student has been documenting the personal experiences of strangers around the world during this pandemic one photo at a time.
Asalah Youssef of the Langley Fine Arts School said the Screenshots of Home project came about from a yearning to create and connect with people who are united in isolation.
“I mean, the whole world was told to stay at home,” she said.
Youssef said she was seeing people connect virtually, which got her thinking about photography in a different way.
“I put down my regular camera, pushed my Canon camera to the side and picked up my phone to start photographing people virtually.”
Since April, she has photographed 45 people from different parts of the world including Lebanon, the U.S., England, Costa Rica, Tanzania,
Ecuador, France, Mexico and Israel.
The teen reaches out to people through Instagram, tells them about her project and asks if they want to participate, she said, adding she met some people through friends.
“The beginning is just us having a conversation because, as you can imagine, I’m asking something quite personal of them — to have a FaceTime call and to document them and photograph them.”
She eventually leads them through lighting, posing and where to position their phone, then takes a screen shot, Youssef explained.
“It’s a beautiful collaboration between me and someone who, most of the time, I have never met before.”
The clarity of the photos surprised her, she said with a laugh.
“Sometimes you can see the glitchiness of the photograph and, you know what, I kind of embrace that because I think … it’s telling of the way it was taken,” she said.
“But sometimes you can’t even tell it’s on FaceTime, which is also quite beautiful.”
These photos, Youssef said, are helping her stay in the present, embrace and work with the situation, and look for joy and beauty in every day.
“It is highlighting the more personal part of this pandemic and the experience of quarantining at home. A hundred years from now, people are going to look at these photographs and see all different experiences and get a really personal look into this pandemic.”