Changing the World, One Print at a Time

By Amy Selwyn, NX

Few companies are driven by a heartfelt commitment to tell the world's stories. Well, meet Nuru Project. This organization, co-founded by John Barrett Reed, sells photojournalism prints to support compelling non-profits and storytellers (photojournalists), connecting the key players through a love of and a curiosity about the world's stories.

The concept is fantastic: Sell photojournalism prints to support compelling non-profit organizations and storytellers alike. Introducing Nuru Project. Nuru means light in Swahili, photography being the medium of light. The non-profits include Acumen Fund, Architecture for Humanity, Kiva, Malaria No More, Millennium Promise, Partners in Health and Pencils of Promise, and the storytellers are photojournalists from around the world, whose work ranges from Sufi shrines in Pakistan to the effects of mountaintop removal mining on American , and from the Sundurban forest in Bangladesh to the thunderous waves crashing El Malecon, Havana, Cuba.

Nuru Project divides all revenue from prints sold at events and on its website as follows: 50% to the non-profit partner the buyer selects at checkout; 25% to the photographer and 25% to Nuru Project. All printing costs are borne by Nuru Project, meaning a full 50% goes to the non-profit and a full 25% goes to the photographer.

I caught up with Nuru Project's co-founder, John Barrett Reed, or just JB as he is known, to find out more. A photographer, JB's work has appeared in The New York Times, Bloomberg News, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, and the International Herald Tribune. In 2004, JB was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to document youths living in the Mathare Valley slums of Nairobi, Kenya. The resulting images were featured in multiple gallery exhibitions and won an award from the National Press Photographers Association. The experience fueled his belief that photography can be an agent for social change and led him to co-found Nuru Project.

AS: One of the driving concepts behind Nuru seems to be that photography can be an agent for social change. Can you tell us more about that? What got you to that idea?

JB: I came to the idea that photojournalism could be an agent for social change very organically. In 2004, I had a Fulbright to go to Kenya to spend a year photographing a group of guys my age living in Nairobi's Mathare Valley slums. When the trip was over, I felt a sense of obligation to help them because of all they'd given me in terms of time, access, and friendship. So when I moved back to Boston, I created a gallery show, sold my prints and sent the proceeds back a local non-profit working in Mathare Valley. I understand that rationale behind the ethic of objectivity in journalism. And yet my gut just told me after my trip to Kenya that engaging my subjects in this way was the right thing for me to do.

AS: Nuru features works by photojournalists, rather than photographers more generally. What is it about journalism that you feel is vital to Nuru's mission?

JB: Nuru Project grew out of this experience and the desire to continue sharing stories about social challenges facing the world in order to raise support for non-profits working to solve those challenges. We do that by selling photojournalism prints. I suppose one can raise funds by selling anything, really. For example, we could sell conceptual fine art photography. There are lots of social enterprise groups currently selling shoes, t-shirts, wristbands, you name it. We chose photojournalism prints not only because I'm a photojournalist and prints are a passion of mine, but also because as objects, photojournalism prints are innately imbued with great meaning. They tell compelling stories of real people living in the communities where our non-profit partners work. As a Nuru Project customer, you are connecting with people across the globe even as your funds are going to support them.

AS: Last week, I participated in an online conversation with AP photographer Nick Ut. Nick's iconic images from Vietnam are among the most powerful from the entire war. Do you feel that still photography carries greater power to capture a single moment than video? Or do you feel they serve different purposes?

JB: One of the challenges facing Nuru Project, or any group that works exclusively with still images, is the increasing interest in video. Video is wonderful at capturing events and stories as they unfold. I believe it's a far better medium for this kind of storytelling than photo essays. To tell you the truth, I don't even like photo essays that much. But even in the YouTube age, photography retains its unique ability to freeze a moment. With video, each frame is always followed by the next frame. But stills give the viewer time to ponder and question, to think deeply. Many would say, "Yes, but stills lack context." We are sensitive to that and provide handwritten back stories both to let the viewer inside the photojournalist's head and also to flesh out the broader context.

AS: How do you choose which photojournalists to represent in Nuru? And how do you select the particular images?

JB: An incredibly important part of the recipe at Nuru Project is selecting the right prints. Through a lot of trial and error, we've found that people respond most to images that are true to the social challenges people face around the world, but that frame those stories in terms of hope, overcoming, and struggle. They also seem to be more drawn to prints that feature a single individual, which I think says something about our audience's desire to connect.

AS: Do you know anything about the people who are buying images from Nuru? What motivates them?

JB:I was reading a newsletter recently by one of our non-profit partners, Acumen Fund. In describing the challenges of successfully investing in social innovations around the world, they teased out the difference between "push" and "pull" products. A "push" product is one that an entrepreneur sells to her customers by arguing they should buy it because it's good for them. A healthcare innovation would be a good example. On the other hand, a  "pull" product is one customers demand because they want it. An iPhone would be an example. When we started out, we thought of our prints as "the coolest way to give to non-profits", which is really positioning them as "push" products: "Buy these prints because it's the right thing to do!" But as we listened to our customers, we heard over and over again that their principle motivation was that they wanted the prints themselves. The desire to give to non-profits was a strong but secondary motivation.

Initially, I was disappointed to find that because I interpreted that to mean people were having a superficial engagement with the work. I felt they were seeing the prints as decor. But as I  listened more, I realized that people were really moved by the powerful and compelling stories. At that point I realized that we were not really selling prints as fundraising tools, we were selling stories and connection and meaning that all took place on the walls of people's homes. Whereas I'd assumed we were selling a "push" product, in fact we were selling a "pull" product. With that insight, we've begun to re-imagine the story we tell about these prints and who our potential partners might be. Instead of "the coolest way to give to non-profits", we now believe our prints are "the most meaningful way to decorate your home". Whereas we were using the tagline, "Buy photojournalism prints to support non-profits", we're now simply saying, "Stories for your Walls". We used to think that non-profits would be our main distribution partners. But we're now exploring partnerships with socially responsible furniture stores, because those are places people go to buy objects with meaning to fill their homes.

We have two prints that have consistently generated the most interest thus far. One is of a woman wading into the Bay of Bengal by Kirk Mastin I  think people respond to this image because it paints an image of release, of transcendence, of possibility. The other is Alex Masi's print of little Poonam squatting in the rain in Bhopal, India. This image is perhaps more difficult because Masi has done such a fantastic job keeping up with Poonam and providing us with details. For example, we know the environmental catastrophe that took place in the area and Masi relates how it has impacted Poonam's brother. And yet I suspect this detail and the opportunity that it offers for a more concrete connection is also what draws people to the print.
 
Be sure to check out Nuru Project, www.nuruproject.org to see some incredible work from photojournalists from around the world.