Extinguished
I just saw on the BBC that three victims have been named, and one of them is Khadija Saye. The artist Khadija Saye.
It’s been a real journey, tears shed, highs and lows, but mama, I’m an artist exhibiting at the Venice Biennale and the blessings are abundant!
Her Facebook cover photo is also unbearably poignant:
Perhaps the view from the flat she shared with her mother on the 20th floor.
Isaac Shawo age 5:
Syrian refugee Mohammed Alhajali
This is so important; I’m so glad you do this. Make people out of the numbers; give them faces, and the tragedy becomes a human tragedy, not just an abstract. It’s too easy to ignore X number of people killed; it’s harder to look at those faces and dismiss it as just another statistic.
Truth. I know that from my own reactions – seeing people’s portrait photos in reporting on these things just makes me LOSE IT instantly…they always look so vulnerable.
I think the first time I did it systematically was the school in Peshawar. Then Garissa in Kenya…then Charleston, which just about did me in.