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Last year, Ammar Bowaihl, a Yemeni, Saudi-born, graduated from The Creative School at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU). Today, he is displaying his work, along with 15 other photojournalists and storytellers from across Canada, in the “Points of Departure” exhibition at Union Station from Sept. 16 to Nov. 1.
On Sept. 29, Union Station hosted the exhibition launch at a private event with dozens of attendees.
In 2015, Bowaihl arrived in Toronto unable to speak English. He studied ESL in high school before enrolling at TMU to study photography.
Bowaihl’s project displays a young woman wearing a burgundy traditional dress and headscarf standing in a grassy field beneath electrical transmission lines. She is his sister, “Huda,” who inspired him to take this photograph.
Bowaihl says in an interview to the OTR that Huda was saying that “Bro, I wish I was born here.. I wish I was born here.” One day he asked her, “What would have been different in your life?”
Huda started to give examples: in her thirties, she should be mid-career. She can be a solo traveler, and she can drive a car without being nervous!
Her words inspired Ammar to use his talent to explore migration, belonging, and the complexities of adapting to a new home. Ammar said he thought about her words and felt he betrayed his culture and identity. He also thought about what things they could lose if they were born here.
From these complexities, Ammar decided to photograph his sister to show the internal psychological conflict immigrants face between holding fast to their identity and culture and integrating into a new society to reap its privileges.
Huda said in an interview, “I can’t say I inspired him, but we always been talking about this.” Huda sees that immigrants share the same struggle and the same feeling of being away from their homes. “We’ve been a lot of time, for sure, sitting together and discussing the feeling, like how you feel about being an immigrant here,” she said.
Ammar Bowaihl is not the only photojournalist who has a strong relationship with TMU. Ethan Murphy, a photographer based in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, is participating in the exhibition. He holds a BFA in Image Arts (Photography) from TMU.
Two other artists from the sixteen have a previous professional relationship with TMU Magazine: Chloë Ellingson, a documentary photographer based in Toronto, presents a photograph of Carly Foerster attending a prenatal checkup with her midwives during her third trimester of pregnancy.
Shay Conroy (she/her), a Canadian documentary photographer based in Oshawa. Her work presents five red dresses, a symbol honouring Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-Spirit People, hung from the fence surrounding Brady Landfill in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Installed by family members and supporters, they marked the site where they believed their loved ones remained during years of advocacy to have the landfill searched.
The 16 photographs in the Points of Departure exhibition are the result of the Globe and Mail Foundation’s Photo Academy workshop. According to the website, The Globe Foundation’s training and mentorship program is designed to democratize access to the field, giving emerging and developing storytellers the opportunity to deepen their practice, pursue an independent body of work, and grow as visual journalists.
In a statement, Laura Lavie, Executive Director of the Globe and Mail Foundation, said, the group “is proud to support freely accessible programming that develops and grows Canada’s talented community of photojournalists, bringing new and underrepresented stories across the country to light.”
Reporter, OTR, F2026.
