When outsiders try to put a lens on the lives of Shanghai's migrants - a group receiving more attention these days - they may well encounter problems of access and privacy. After all, they're on the outside looking in.
In the "My Shanghai" project, however, around 50 children of migrant workers were taught basic photography, armed with cameras, given a roll of film and told to tell their own stories.
The exhibit opens today at TwoCities Gallery at 50 Moganshan Road. Proceeds from sales of some photos will be donated to the Jin Hu Primary School in Minhang District.
On two recent Saturdays, around 35 Chinese and expat volunteers visited the school to glimpse a world quite unlike their own - and to help kids share that world.
Together they taught basic photography to four classes of sixth-graders at the school for migrants' kids. Four expats were the instructors; Chinese volunteers translated.
Film cameras, mainly provided by individuals and schools in the United States, were given to the students to capture their own lives.
The 11 most evocative winning photos have been enlarged and exhibited with around 100 smaller pictures.
"My Shanghai" was launched with a screening of the Academy Award-winning documentary "Born into Brothels," attended by most volunteers. It's about a similar photography project in the red-light district of Kolcata (Calcutta), India.