Vivid street shots of life in modern Haiti
- Text by Miss Rosen
- Photography by Hatnim Lee /
The only nation to arise from a successful slave revolt, on New Year’s Day 1804, Haiti became the very first Black republic to win independence from European imperialists anywhere in the world. For the past two centuries, the country’s self-sovereignty has come at a hefty price, as Haiti continues to pay France war reparations and gets subjected to political destabilisation by several regimes working inside the United States.
On January 12, 2010, disaster struck when Haiti was hit by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake killing up to 300,000 people and leaving 1.6 million homeless. The people of the beautiful island, who had already lived through so much, had once again become caught in a cycle of destruction that they’re still fighting to overcome.
After the earthquake, Korean-American photographer Hatnim Lee traveled to Haiti with a group from Fordham University’s law program. It was her first time doing relief work on the island – but it would not be her last. Most recently, in January 2018, Lee returned to Haiti to work with Project Medishare, which has been providing healthcare to the island for almost 25 years.
Lee spent her days photographing inside mobile maternity clinics serving the women of the nation, which has one highest maternal mortality rates in the world. When she wasn’t working, Lee would take her camera on to the streets, documenting the people she met along the way and crafting a portrait of the Haitian people as they live today.
“The capital city of Port-au-Prince seems like a tropical hazard,” Lee observes. “It’s beautiful, lush, and green but there are no sidewalks sometimes. There are big holes in the ground. The roads are really bumpy. There’s lots of pollution, lots of traffic, people hanging from cars. It’s very hectic. There isn’t a lot of electricity or running water in a lot of areas, so at night it can get really dark.”
Out in the countryside, it’s an entirely different world. Here, Lee, working with Project Medishare, Lee encountered people who live off the grid. “It’s hard for them to leave their towns because they don’t even have roads to walk on,” she explains. “They’re just walking through fields.”
Lee immediately felt at home among the people, who she describes as strong, kind, and generous. “I feel very connected to Haiti and I think it is because the people have been through so much, and it’s an everyday struggle for them. They are a strong people and are tough love. I’m drawn to that. It takes a moment for them to warm up, but they will watch out for you.”
For Lee, the act of making pictures was a conversation all its own, for she doesn’t speak French and only knows a little bit of Spanish. Yet the verbal language barrier changed the way she could communicate, using hand gestures and facial expressions to bridge the divide. The result was a body of work made from the pure intention to connect, to share a moment between strangers with the world outside.
“When I am shooting in Haiti, I kind of like not being able to have a conversation with people because you don’t really need words to make pictures,” Lee reveals. “It takes a step out, and you can communicate on a very instinctual level because you don’t have words to save you. I am careful not to take advantage. They don’t have anyone to protect them so I try to be respectful. It’s like going to someone else’s home. You’re the visitor.”
See more of Hatnim Lee’s work on her official website.
Follow Miss Rosen on Twitter.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
Latest on Huck
Exploring the impact of colonialism on Australia’s Indigenous communities
New exhibition, ‘Under a Southern Star: Identity and Environment in Australian Photography’ interrogates the use of photography as a tool of objectification and subjugation.
Written by: Miss Rosen
My sister disappeared when we were children. Years later, I retraced her footsteps
After a car crash that saw Magnum photographer Lindokuhle Sobekwa hospitalised, his sister ran away from their home in South Africa. His new photobook, I Carry Her Photo With Me, documents his journey in search of her.
Written by: Lindokuhle Sobekwa
Inside New York City’s hedonistic 2000s skateboarding scene
New photobook, ‘Epicly Later’d’ is a lucid survey of the early naughties New York skate scene and its party culture.
Written by: Isaac Muk
Did we create a generation of prudes?
Has the crushing of ‘teen’ entertainment and our failure to represent the full breadth of adolescent experience produced generation Zzz? Emma Garland investigates.
Written by: Emma Garland
How to shoot the world’s most gruelling race
Photographer R. Perry Flowers documented the 2023 edition of the Winter Death Race and talked through the experience in Huck 81.
Written by: Josh Jones
An epic portrait of 20th Century America
‘Al Satterwhite: A Retrospective’ brings together scenes from this storied chapter of American life, when long form reportage was the hallmark of legacy media.
Written by: Miss Rosen