Photographer James Mollison's fascinating and thought-provoking new book 'Where Children Sleep' tells the diverse stories of children around the world, through portraits and pictures of their bedrooms. Inspired by the quote "all children are born equal" Mollison has created a collection of photographs which proves this statement to be untrue. Mollison documents the personal spaces of kids around the world, from the middle-class and prosperous to the strikingly impoverished.
The Children are all between 4-17 but their backgrounds and futures couldn't be more different. There is Bilal, the Bedouin shepheard boy who sleeps with his father's heard of goats; Kaya in Tokyo whose proud mother spends $1,000 per month on her dresses; Indira, a Nepalese girl who has worked in a granite quarry since she was three years old and Ankhohxet, the Kraho boy who sleeps on the floor of a hut in the Amazon.
Over the course of four years, Mollison captured more than a hundred images of children and their bedrooms, with support from independent organization Save the Children. Born in Kenya and raised in England, the artist lives and works in Italy, with his own multicultural upbringing inspiring this moving collection of photos spanning countries as diverse as Senegal, Lesotho, Nepal, China, India, Brazil, and the United States.
During the project Mollison thought about his own childhood experiences: "When asked to come up with an idea for engaging with children's rights, I found myself thinking about my bedroom: how significant it was during my childhood, and how it reflected what I had and who I was. it occurred to me that a way to address some of the complex situations and social issues affecting children would be to look at the bedrooms of children in all kinds of different circumstances."
"I hope this book will help children think about inequality, within and between societies around the world," says Mollison in his introduction, "and perhaps start to figure out how, in their own lives, they may respond."
Indira, a Nepalese girl who has worked in a granite quarry since she was three years old
Jasmine the beauty pagent princess
Bilal, a Bedouin boy who sleeps with his father's heard of goats
Four-year-old Kaya lives in an apartment in Tokyo, Japan. Her mother spends $1,000 per month on her dresses.
Four-year-old Jivan lives in a skyscraper in Brooklyn, New York, USA
Seventeen-year-old 'X' lives in a 'favela' in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Eight-year-old Harrison lives in a mansion in New Jersey, USA
This unnamed four-year-old boy lives on the outskirts of Rome, Italy. He and his family all sleep on the mattress in the photograph
Fifteen-year-old Risa lives in a teahouse in Kyoto, Japan
Fourteen-year-old Rhiannon lives in Darvel, Scotland
