Tamara Abdul Hadi has an MFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver and has taught photography for multimedia at Concordia and photography intervention courses in Cairo and Beirut. Tamara co-founded Rawiya Collective, which was a collective of 6 women photographers from and working in SWANA (South West Asian, North African Region).
For her residency, Abdul Hadi made collaborative portraits with first generation Canadians and their families in Montreal. She partnered with The Immigrant Workers Centre in Quebec, which defends the rights of immigrants in their places of work and fights for dignity, respect, and justice. Tamara wrote, “Through this work, I want to amplify these people’s humanity first and foremost. I believe a project like this to be at the essence of what photographic documentation and storytelling is and is what drives me as a photographer."
Guarav Sharma
Meet Gaurav Sharma, a social worker, artist and political activist from India. Gaurav came to Canada in 2019 as a political asylee and he is currently a permanent resident. He lives at home with his sister and ill father.
He says “I am at heart an activist and an organizer, and I want to help my people, that is why I work with the Immigrant Workers Center and focus on South Asian Communities. So I can let them know what their rights are in the workforce.”
In this photo Gaurav sits at home on his bed, a place where he spends most of his time when he is not at work on driving Uber eats deliveries.
Mamadou
Mamadou, 41 is an asylum seeker in Montreal currently threatened with deportation. He fled civil war in his home country of Cote d’Ivoire and has been a refugee since the age of 21. “I was a refugee in Burkina Faso Togo, Liberia, Nigeria and Turkey before coming to Canada in 2016. That’s when my story in Canada begins.”
Mamadou worked as an essential worker during the height of the pandemic in 2020 and has been detained three times at the Immigration Detention Centre in Laval.
In this photo, Mamadou sits with his roommates cat, whom he named ‘Meow’ at his home in Montreal.
Mohamad Barry
Mohamad Barry is from Guinea-Conakry and has been in Canada since 2012. “I came here as a refugee and a few years ago I suffered a work accident that prevented me from working for many years. I was not safety trained at work. That lack of training causes a lot of work accidents. I still have limitation and sometimes walk with a cane.”
"I left my country for a reason. It was not safe for me. Why would I have left my own country if I didn’t have to? I miss my family everyday.”
Mohamad says he is now a permanent resident and works at Rogers. “Canada is my home now.”
In this photo Mohamad stands in his favourite park, where he spends a lot of his time in Montreal, Jarry Park.
Ibrahim al Sahhari
Ibrahim al Sahhari sits in his home in Montreal on a Sunday morning. Ibrahim is a former journalist from Egypt that has been living in Canada since 2016.
Klsoom
Klsoom stands in her kitchen at her home in the Parc X neighbourhood of Montreal. Klsoom came to Canada from Pakistan with her husband Gulzar 7 years ago. They are both volunteer social workers who work with the South Asian community in Montreal.
Balkar Singh
Balkar Singh, along with his wife Rajwinder and sons Gursahib and Gurtaj, sit in their living room at home in the Parc X neighbourhood of Montreal. The Singh family hails from Northern India.
Balkar, who began working as a truck driver in Montreal now runs a work placement agency.