The project focuses especially on the elderly, involving their family members (children and grandchildren) in the dynamics.
Increase the social inclusion of the rural elderly with creative and technological dynamics and strategies.
Create interactions that involve the elderly and their families in order to strengthen close relationships and family ties, using new technologies.
Develop skills and promote digital inclusion through digital photography for older people in rural areas.
Loneliness and isolation are one of the main social problems identified in Bragança, especially in the small rural villages, with big consequences for the mental health and emotional balance of the elderly. In addition, here they live without social and technological support resources, increasing their loneliness, particularly the isolation.
The digital photography, despite being one of the greatest expressions of visual language, is not a technology widely used by the elderly.
In order to change this reality, in 2011 Azimute started the Introduction to Photography Workshop for the elderly in Portela.
Digital photography is capable of bringing different generations together and increase the elderly social participation, through their photographic production within their family and outside their houses.
The main users of the initiative are people of both sexes, over 65 years old, who live in the small village of Portela (parish of Gondesende), located in the municipality of Bragança, district of Bragança.
The project promoter was Azimute and had the support of the following institutions: Municipality of Bragança and Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.
Azimute started this idea in 2011, as part of the Aldeia Pedagógica de Portela project, with the purpose of empowering the elderly with new knowledge using the new technologies, such as learning to use digital cameras.
With this project, Azimute intended to digitally include the elderly through intergenerational relationships.
The main users of this intergenerational experience were the group of elderly people from the small village of Portela. In addition, their relatives (children and/or grandchildren) and friends also joined this experience.
Photography is an excellent tool to teach people how to see the world in a different way, having today a transversal expression in society, not requiring any special skill or talent. Being accessible in its digital variant, it is an intuitive, fun and democratic artistic expression.
Thus, it was developed a workshop of introduction to photography, where the elderly trained in the following topics: photographic vision (light, perspective and composition); themes (people, nature and animals, landscapes, architecture); camera functions (learning the basics, such as exposure and color control, use of flash); and, of course, photographic practice.
The aim was to convey the pleasure of discovering the environment through the capture of creative digital images with an aesthetic sense, at the same time as a new technology was made known.
As a teaching method, was used video projections and printed portfolios from different authors. Taking into account the target audience (elderly people), the language was simple and the technical aspects were addressed at a basic level but whose practice allowed consistent results.
Azimute bought four Canon digital cameras. On each turn, four participants took the digital camera home for fifteen days. Each one took pictures with the help of their friends and family.
The families (grandchildren – children and young people, sons/daughters, daughters-in-law/sons-in-law, friends) provide different ideas for photographs and also helped to handle the camera.
At the end of the fifteen days, the cameras memory card were full of photos of landscape, portraits and feelings captured by the attentive eyes of the elderly with the input of family and friends.
In the end, the photographs were saved on the computer in folders with the name of each participant
The four cameras were handed over, again, to four other seniors, repeating the process successively until all the members participating in the project had taken pictures.
After this process, all photographs were evaluated by two professional photographers who chose the two best photographs of each participant.
The chosen photographs made part of an exhibition, which was public display at the Bragança Municipal Library. The seniors participants and their families had the opportunity, later on, to see the result of their work. The exhibition was later held at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon.
This project allowed the development of creativity and imagination in older people and brought the elderly closer to family and/or friends through the use of new audiovisual communication technologies.
Validation was proven, as the participants showed great interest in learning on how to use the camera, and were very committed on taking pictures with their family members. It was visible their motivation, confidence and positive self-esteem.
This good-practice qualifies as a success. The project promoted the socialization of the elderly with their relatives and with the community.
If these activities had not been carried out, the elderly would not have the moments of conviviality provided by the project and, in most cases, they would be alone.
It promoted family dynamics in order to strengthen ties, using new technologies, stimulating interaction between the elderly and other generations, whether grandchildren, sons/daughters, sons-in-law, daughters-in-law, helping to break social isolation and loneliness.
This good-practice has provided many benefits for the elderly. It allowed them to improve their quality of life, work on multiple skills, such as concentration, perception, observation; has contributed to social inclusion; has enabled greater contact with the family (see more often the grandchildren, sons/daughters, daughters-in-law, sons-in-law and friends) and kept his mind active.
It allowed the combination of intergenerational communication with new technologies and environmental and cultural themes.
There is capacity for project replication.
Technological advances and digital inclusion are an opportunity and can play a very important role in mitigating one of the biggest social problems related to ageing, emotional loneliness and social isolation.
In order to maintain the good-practice sustainability, it is essential that, in co-design between the team project and the participants, the planning of actions is adapted to their abilities, skills and interests, in a horizontal relationship of constant sharing.
Sustainability is also achieved by the participant’s learning on how to use the digital camera and by developing a passion for photography.
Azimute owns four digital cameras that participants can take home and take pictures.
This is what happens when the elderly request the digital camera so they can use it in their daily lives or on special occasions (e.g. family birthday parties, weddings and baptisms, or even in religious moments, like the processions and church decorations).
This project can be easily replicated or scaled up in rural or urban centers in any region of Portugal or any other country.
The new technologies are present in the daily-life of most people around the world, and the elderly are increasingly interested in feeling included in contemporary society.
The success of this good-practice leads us to believe that the elderly from any region and/or country are open and interested on initiatives similar to this one and will easily feel motivated and enthusiastic to participate.
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