About the learner:

Abdelhakim Asnabla was born in Morocco, where he was studying political science. However, due to his political views, he had to discontinue his studies and lost most of his civil rights. This compelled him to leave his home country, and in 2011, he fled to Turkey. From there, he travelled through several Balkan countries before finally reaching Slovenia to seek international protection. In 2013, he was granted refugee status.

This is how he describes himself in his words: “My life experiences as a political activist, prisoner, and refugee have equipped me with valuable skills, including fluency in Arabic, English, Slovenian, French, and proficiency in multiple Arabic dialects. These experiences have also given me the ability to understand and communicate with people from different regions, speaking diverse languages, and carrying their hopes, uncertainties, and traumas.”

You can listen to Abdelhakim`s story where he explains his motivation to create Extended Eyes photostory here:

About the project:

Extended Eyes

I produced a photostory about a refugee Edgar Alexander, who was detained in a detention centre (Postojna) because he was not granted asylum. After years of living in a country he called home for 6 years, his freedom was taken away. In those 6 years, he learned how to live and love the city of Ljubljana and its people. I stepped in contact with him and offered to support him in the only way I could, as a photographer, through photography.

I started by asking Alexander to name three favourite places in Ljubljana. The places were: Asylum Home, farm of horses and Metelkova.

I visited all places in one day instead of Edgar Alexander and was present there in his name. I took photos and sent them to him so he could have a feeling of freedom. So my camera became Edar’s Extended Eyes.

The photo story is a dialogue between Edgar, a person who lost his freedom and me, a photographer who had also experienced, ten years ago, for five months and twelve days, the very same detention centre. Therefore I know very well how it feels to be detained without any misconduct; for Alexander Postojna (detention centre) is the end of his journey in Europe and for me, on the other hand, it was a new beginning of a journey in exile…

You can view the photostory on this link: https://express.adobe.com/page/EolrV0C26Fck6/

Hakim is an Art is Us participant supported by APIS Institute, Slovenia.