HAITI - The portfolio of photographer Iris Debelder

Haiti 2013, a documentary project in the village of Gramothe.

In the spring of 2013, I traveled with an adopted relative to her home country in Haiti to work and help out in a clinic in the lush mountain village of Gramothe, north of Port-au-Prince. It was a project organized by The Chance To Dream, under the leadership of Linda Shine Sheppard. A team of 13 volunteers attended 120 to 170 patients a day, with about 4 to 5 teams a year, traveling back and forth to Haiti. I had the opportunity to work with this team as well as document the project, focusing on medical aid, education and agriculture/sustainability. Eventually, the village of Gramothe will become all school and the clinic will move to another location. So often, Haiti has been depicted in the worst circumstances. My documentary is one about hope, perseverance and commitment, warm connections and beautiful souls.

Honorable Mention 2013 AX3

A group of students in Haiti pose for a portrait in their classroom

A group of smiling students and their teacher in Haiti pose for a relaxed portrait

Haitian students in a dimly lit classroom gaze at the camera

A concrete foundation for a building high in the mountains surrounded by clouds in Haiti seen from a birds-eye view

Haitian children attending a dimly lit church

A scene taken from above of a group of Haitian children descending stairs carrying buckets of water

Haitian citizens waiting in long lines at a clinic

Haitian female street food vendors waiting for customers shaded by an umbrella

Interior treatment room of a Haitian clinic

Haitian child being treated by a nurse as another child looks at the camera

Newborn Haitian baby laying in a crib at an orphanage in Port-au-Prince

Three young schoolgirls leaning out of a window looking onwards

Four Haitian men laughing and conversing as they relax in rural background

Young Haitian farmers tending to lush land high up in the mountains

A Haitian farmer tends to his lush land on a hillside in the mountains

Looking down at the lush hillside farms in the mountains of Haiti

An inscription on a wall in Haiti reading "Haiti needs change"

Electrical workers fix power lines on a street in Haiti

Slums in Haiti showing the local poverty and despair after the earthquake

A man holds onto a structure in a pile of destruction on the streets of Haiti

An abandoned truck surrounded by piles of trash in Haiti

A couple of years after the devastating earthquake of 2010, I drove through the streets of Port-au-Prince, witnessing the issues the city is still dealing with. These are just a couple of impressions.