Works like the Palestinian anthology film From Ground Zero<\/i> highlight cinema as an increasingly important and insightful two-way street for communicating beyond the sensationalized dimensions of life in Gaza today. Other projects have also taken up this effort, including a series of stop-motion animation workshops<\/a> in Gaza led by animator and educator\u00a0Haneen Koraz<\/b><\/a>, who began in the field of visual arts in 2012. Today, she is joined by\u00a0Nour A-Jawad<\/b>\u00a0and Shorouq Darwish<\/b>, both of whom assist with the project. Even though the workshops began as a way to engage children and encourage an expressive outlet for young people, they quickly became increasingly popular amongst other interested individuals who have been internally displaced to Deir al-Balah in southern Gaza.<\/p>\n To learn more about this grassroots endeavor, Zippy Frames spoke with Haneen and Nour about the workshops -with special thanks to Rawda Harb for assistance in translating during the interview.<\/p>\n Zippy Frames: What were the project’s origins, and how did it first come about?<\/b><\/p>\n Haneen Koraz and Nour A-Jawad: <\/b>I [Haneen] started [with animation education] in 2012, and the other two ladies [Nour and Shorouq] started in 2019. We started working with kids in schools and different community centers, talking about children’s hopes, dreams, and goals for the future. It was fun stuff like that in a more academic or community context. This was before the war, before the genocide. After the genocide started, for the first few months, we were very scared and didn\u2019t go anywhere. We didn\u2019t know where to go, but we had moved to the south when the bombing started. We were there for the first few months, but we didn\u2019t know what to do. Then, a previous student actually reached out to ask, \u201cI would love to do something; I want to do stop motion. Can you please help me? I don\u2019t know what supplies I would need.\u201d We said, sure, let\u2019s do it. Then, the first workshop project started with ‘A Day in the Tent’<\/a>\u00a0[shown previously at StopTrik<\/a>]\u2014that\u2019s the animation where they\u2019re talking about the life they have.<\/p>\n ZF: What have you seen in terms of impact, emotional responses, educational trajectories, and so on in the participants?<\/b><\/p>\n H.K & N. A-J.: <\/b>First, we started with workshops for children. When the parents would come, for instance, the mothers would go in with the kids just to take part in the workshop because it was so much fun. But you can imagine how tough it was for the kids. They were like, \u201cI have to go get wood so that we can start a fire and cook, and then I have to do a workshop on top of this!\u201d The kids were worried about how they would juggle these responsibilities, but they really wanted to do it. It was very exciting for them because they really wanted to make it work. They would be running to the workshops just so they could take part. Then, when the parents were there, they said, \u201cWe would like to do something, too.\u201d That\u2019s when we started another workshop for women and others interested in participating, which was also very successful. Amid a genocide, when you have no space and nothing else happening, it was a pleasurable activity and a hobby\u2014a fun thing they were doing.<\/p>\n But also, as you can see in ‘ A Day in the Tent’, the participants also wanted to address a problem they were facing. They wanted to communicate something. They wanted the world to know what they were going through. We began to train people who have hearing disabilities. We trained them through a workshop, and then those people went on to train another cohort of people with hearing disabilities. It became a train-the-trainer situation without really intending to do so. The overall response and results have been amazing.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Haneen presents to a group of workshop participants.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ZF: <\/strong>As animation is a way for participants to express themselves and show what they\u2019re going through, were certain emotions or stories that began to stand out?<\/b>\u00a0<\/p>\n H. K. & N. A-J. <\/b>One particular story touched me [Noor] because the participants were doing a lot of storytelling. We showed the children a movie, asking them to think of hopes and dreams and go from there. We were expecting somebody to say that they hoped the war ends or something, and one child simply said they wished for a bar of chocolate, because chocolate was non-existent in Gaza for a while, or sugar at all\u2014we couldn\u2019t eat anything sweet. We do a lot of storytelling, focused on listening and doing things from the ground up. We give the kids a keyword around which to build something and to go forward. There are a lot of emotions\u2014anger, sadness, empathy, pity, fear. But random things would inspire some of the animations, like one on eggs. There were no eggs\u2014so they couldn\u2019t bake anything and couldn\u2019t eat any. It was a lot of things like this [that they began animating]\u2014versus being afraid of the sounds of the drones and planes. All of these feelings intersected with where they were living. However, we are lucky because we still have homes that haven\u2019t been bombed, whereas a lot of kids and participants are either in tents or refuge spots that are in schools, for instance. It adds layers to the feelings and complications of the emotions.<\/p>\n ZF: Stop-motion animation requires resources and often physical materials if it\u2019s not digital. What were the challenges when it came to the material side of the workshop?<\/b>\u00a0<\/p>\n H. K. & N. A-J.: <\/b>During the war, when we were trying to start up, we didn\u2019t find any art materials in the south. These only exist in the north of Gaza, and this is where some of the factories that make the art supplies we are using are located. There were also some factories in the north of Gaza that are, of course, now all decimated. They\u2019re gone and bombed. We used to have a studio but lost everything\u2014lights, cameras, laptops, valuable things. When we were trying, three months later, to start up with things, not only were the materials almost non-existent or rare to find, but if you found them, everything was three to ten times the price. For example, something that cost three dollars before the war cost 30 during the war. We\u2019re artists, so to begin with, we don\u2019t have large salaries. We don\u2019t have this financial blanket to fall back on.\u00a0<\/p>\n Then, we were doing the workshops in the south in tents. The tents aren\u2019t equipped properly\u2014they don\u2019t have tables and chairs where people can sit, cut, and draw. We had to become very creative and asked people to bring things with them: \u201cDo you have a pot at home? Do you have a tray?\u201d Then, we could use it as a makeshift table. We tried to be very flexible and find simple solutions for everything. There was a particular time when we really needed stuff. In a previous workshop, we gave a gift package to people with hearing disabilities to say thank you. It was a generous gift package with some lights and paper. We were very reluctant to ask for it back and to borrow the materials, but we thought it didn\u2019t hurt to ask. We wrote to them on WhatsApp and were amazed by the response. The 12 people we had given these packages to came to the house with cameras and lights and everything. One of our little jokes was that we couldn\u2019t find sticky blue tack anymore.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Children living in a camp for internally displaced Palestinians watch stop-motion animated films.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ZF: Circumstances are constantly changing, and naturally, there are greater questions about safety at hand. Where do you want to take the project’s future, and how can the broader global community help achieve these goals?<\/b><\/p>\n H.K & N. A-J.: <\/b>The goal is to give as many children as possible an hour to express what they\u2019re feeling from the war and what they\u2019re seeing every day. But also, we want it to be something where they\u2019re free and can work with their hands to make something creative and beautiful they\u2019re proud of. Cartoons are a nice, easy way for a message to spread. There are always two things that happen with the workshops. There is always a discussion circle that happens. We tend to show things on a screen and it\u2019s a bit loud, so inadvertently, passersby see the projects. They\u2019ll poke their heads in and say, \u201cHey, that\u2019s what we\u2019re going through, or that\u2019s a good solution.\u201d It triggers a conversation. During the discussion circles, people also talk about what they\u2019re working on or what they\u2019re doing. For instance, maybe a few tents share a bathroom, and after the workshop, people start to talk and say, \u201cWhy don\u2019t we try to build another bathroom or try to dig so that the sewers go the other way?\u201d We\u2019re trying to show a different way to survive the genocide and show who these people are.\u00a0Instead, we’re trying to send out a beautiful, artistic message.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n You can watch more about the stop-motion workshops here<\/a> and follow Haneen Koraz’s Instagram here<\/a>\u00a0for the latest updates on the workshops. You can also directly support the workshops with a financial donation via\u00a0Patreon<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0GoFundMe<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n![\"haneen](\"https:\/\/www.zippyframes.com\/images\/stories\/others\/haneen_and_stop-motion_animation_workshop.jpg\")
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