Pictographers was founded in eight countries across four continents.
Though the essence of the idea existed long before - as mental images, wisdom and other found things collected across the landscape of isolated and troubling places - it didn’t coalesce until a conversation on the way from war-torn northern Uganda back to that country’s capital, Kampala.
Since then the idea has further materialized in remote Chinese villages, on the humid plains of western Nepal, amid tea bushes in northeastern India and inside the gers of Mongolia’s Gobi Desert. It has been sharpened by phone conversations, instant message chats and emails from wherever we may be.
After hundreds of hours and thousands of miles, we are Pictographers.
Thatcher Hullerman Cook
I am a freelance photographer specializing in humanitarian issues. My mandate is to broaden the awareness of the plight of the forgotten citizens of the world. I spend time in regions that get little or no media attention and bring these situations to the attention of the public through advocacy, exhibitions and publications. Over the past decade, I’ve found myself concentrating on forced human migration and statelessness: in particular, the disenfranchised refugees, nomads and gypsies who anonymously inhabit our world.
For me, photography is more about my social interaction with the subject than it is about the technique of making a photograph. Experiencing the life and culture of the people I photograph is what I do.
The moment I snap a photograph, I only have the capacity to think about the event unfolding in front of my lens. I know I am responsible for everything in the frame – and I take this responsibility seriously. After all, I have chosen photography as more than a vocation. I’ve chosen it as the primary means of expressing myself.
I have spent my career living, photographing and traveling among nomads and over time I have become nomadic myself. People without a country or home are the folks I feel most at home with. The primary outlet for my photography has been non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Through these organizations I have witnessed first-hand the human condition in more than fifty countries.
In the past few years, my career has evolved and I now spend as much time teaching photography workshops as I do shooting assignments. I am co-founding Pictographers to bring teaching and documentary fieldwork together as a new means of expression, education and action.
Roger O. Burks, Jr.
As a writer specializing in international relief and development issues, I’ve found that the most powerful stories are those that opt for humanity over high concept; those that draw parallels between people and explore kinship.
The fieldwork that precedes humanitarian writing stresses keen observation, careful listening and verification of facts. Objectivity is crucial in situations where the rawness of human emotion is so overt. However, as a writer, I also believe that these emotions can - and should - be documented to create an honest narrative that more deeply and strongly connects reader to subject. This nascent bond often leads to action that addresses a need.
Humanitarian storytelling is a means of taking people to places they’ve never been, guiding them through unfamiliar cultures, introducing them to communities facing difficult challenges and, finally, inspiring and empowering those readers to extend the hand of support to families they’ve never met - all in just a few hundred words.
One of my favorite things about humanitarian writing is seeing the response it engenders. I truly believe that most people want to help those less fortunate, but don’t know exactly how to go about it. Give them the means to take action - and an idea of whom they’ll be helping - and the best of human kindness shines through.
I’ve seen that kind of generosity in action as a writer for Mercy Corps: the storytelling approach on the website has attracted more than $35 million in online donations since March 2004. These stories have also been used to establish a tangible brand identity throughout the organization, resulting in an unprecedented influx of private donations over the same period of time for not only disasters, but also long-term development work.
Simple, powerful stories combined with beautiful, relevant photographs capture the imagination like little else can and make a difference for families in the world’s most isolated and challenging places. As co-founder, I envision Pictographers as an advocate for advancing humanitarian storytelling as a means of social change, as well as a new way to train activists to use such storytelling to make the world a better place.