Jo-Anne McArthur & We Animals
Jo-Anne McArthur is an award-winning Canadian photojournalist and the founder of We Animals. For fifteen years, she has travelled the world, documenting our complex relationships with animals. We Animals images have been used by hundreds of organizations, publishers, and academics to advocate for animals. McArthur is a sought-after speaker and is the author of two books, We Animals (2014), and Captive (2017). She was the subject of an award-winning documentary, The Ghosts in Our Machine, released worldwide in 2013. In 2017, McArthur and the We Animals team launched the We Animals Archive, a resource where thousands of images are made available for free to anyone helping animals.
Please Don’t Turn Away
“Powerfully disturbing. These images take us to dark and hidden places visited by only a few determined and courageous individuals like Jo-Anne McArthur. They reveal the secret practices that many people will not want to know about. For the animals’ sake, I beg that you will not only look but feel.” – Dr. Jane Goodall
Images of animals as they exist in the human world show the depths of human cruelty, but also the boundlessness of our compassion. Looking at – and truly seeing – the pain of animals trapped in cages on factory farms, held in chains behind a circus tent, reaching out from between the bars of a zoo’s exhibit; seeing these realities is the first step towards acknowledging humanity’s complicity with the suffering experienced by these individuals. To simply show suffering is not enough, however; the storyteller who seeks to make change for animals must create images that challenge the viewer to look, but compelling enough that the viewer does not turn away. The dark reality of our treatment of animals is contrasted by the tireless work of those working to liberate them, and by the lives of the rescued, rehabilitated, and respected animals. Through both stories of suffering and stories of hope, McArthur’s images are crafted to inform and to inspire. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for not turning away.
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