News & Photos

Images from Africa

Faces of Sierra Leone and Sudan, a photographic exhibition by former aid worker, Rhett McDonald, is now on display at the Centre.

Rhett recently returned home to Penola after nine years spent travelling and working in the USA, Europe and also Africa where, in the spirit of Mary MacKillop, he saw a need and did what he could to remedy it.

He was saddened by the poverty, the systemic corruption, and particularly the trauma suffered by children exposed to the brutality of civil war in Sierra Leone and the conflict in Darfur.

However, what he so sensitively reflects in the images of this moving and powerful exhibition and also through his strong personal commentary on them, is the enduring human capacity for hope.

 

Captured in the image, Show No Emotion, is a struggle between culture and instinct, as two young girls from the Red Cross school for street children at Nyala, Darfur, receive stationery donated by the Mary MacKillop Memorial School in Penola and presented by Rhett in 2007.

 

Now thirty-six years of age, he is helping young people here as a Christian pastoral support worker at Penola Primary and High Schools. He also works with the St Joseph's, Penola, Children's Activity Group who, on seeing the exhibition, reflected upon their own lives and those of the African children.

Entry to Faces of Sierra Leone and Sudan is free, but Rhett welcomes donations at the Centre to Childcare International, specifically for its work in Africa.