The Ana Collection - Dolls that tell the stories of war-torn Syrian children
During my trip to Lebanon in February this year someone told me about the Ana Collection. Beatifully embroiderd dolls which all tell a story - the story of war-torn Syrian mothers and children. The embroideries are inspired by the Syrian children's dreams and hopes.
The two founders, Melina and Marianne Moussalli who themselves are of Syrian decent, want the voices of those children to be heard.
I had the chance to meet them in person and talk about their social enterprise, the syrian war and the refugee situation.
You also offer workshops to children teaching them arts and crafts, how did you come about doing that?
My sister studied fine arts and arts restauration and I studied graphic design with a minor in arts education which honestly I though I would never going to use. The studio my sister was using for her arts restaurations was too big. Therefore, we started exploring possibilities of what we could do with the space. That's when the idea with the art studio came up. That's been four years now. We teach courses every day to children as little as six months old but mostly we offer after school activities.
Tell me how you came from teaching art classes to making dolls?
Every mother's day we used to do an art project with the kids that we would eventually sell. Once that was pillows, another time that was tote bags. In 2016 my mom was playing around with a book on how to make dolls. So she made a doll and we ended up embroidering and doodling on it. We liked it so much that we decided to do it as a project for mothers day. But we didn't want to sell a doll that has no meaning to it.
The exhibition was supposed to last two months but the dolls sold out on that day.
So my mom is originally from Syria, from Aleppo to be exact. We lived there our whole life up until university. That's why we decided to dedicate the dolls to the Syrian mothers. My aunt is still living in Aleppo helping displaced families, so we asked her to collect their stories and send them to us. Then I ended up contacting an NGO here in Lebanon who run a women's workshop for Syrian refugees. We met with the women and ever since they embroider our dolls. Honestly, we never thought this project would become so big. We thought it would just be a one-off thing for mothersday. But what happened was that we got the chance to exhibit our dolls at Mar Mikhael. The exhibition was supposed to last two months but the dolls sold out on that day.
So you experienced the war in Syria?
We actually left before the war started. My aunt is still living in Aleppo because she's always been helping people in need. So when the war happened she said that there was no way that she was going to leave when they needed her the most. So she stayed and together with other volunteers she has helped over 800 displaced families.
So when the war happened she said that there was no way that she was going to leave when they needed her the most
So back to the NGO you're working with here in Beirut. Can you tell me more about your work with them?
The NGO we are currently working with is called Basmeh & Zeitooneh. They recently underwent some incremental changes as they stopped receiving any more fundings. The government is cracking down on NGOs that opened during the war. So the women's workshop couldn't sustain itself anymore. There is someone that now tries to turn the NGO into a social enterprise so that they can at least make some profits to pay the women a fixed salary. Right now they receive money for each embroidered doll. So the NGO gives themselves a year to see if the changes pay off. Meanwhile we will be looking for alternative NGOs to work with because it takes some time to train the women.
How much training does it take?
It very much depends on their skills because a lot of the women already know how to embroider. The embroideries are quite simple and we initially print the drawing onto the dolls so they just have to follow the lines.
In what way are the embroideries on the dolls connected to the stories of the Syrian mothers and their children?
So the dolls carry the names of the Syrian mothers and we usually draw the dream of her child on the doll. We strongly encourage the kids from whom we get the stories to draw the stories out. Art for kids is a strong way of expressing themselves. So some kids indeed send us their drawings.
Fadi for example - We asked him what he wants to do when he grows up and he said his dream is to get married.
Additionally, we always write down the stories and put them on a little pocket in the doll's back.
Art for kids is a strong way of expressing themselves
How does your aunt go about collecting these stories?
She works with 800 families in need - together with the other volunteers she distributes food baskets, medical baskets, school books and financial donations. My aunt is in frequent contact with all these women from whom she sends us the stories. We have twenty-one different dolls that all tell a different story. The proceeds of those dolls all go back to those families.
So it's refugees in Lebanon embroidering the dolls who get paid for every doll they embroider and the proceeds of the dolls sales go back to the Syrian families in Aleppo. It's basically refugees helping refugees.
You give the refugees working in the NGOs workshop here in Lebanon a possibility to self-sustain themselves...
Yes, that's what we're trying to do. We want to empower these women through the workshop. We have one woman working in the workshop for example that now knows how to manage and she has learned a lot of stuff through her work in the workshop. She is even teaching an assistant now to pass on her knowledge. We started out with only ten women working on our dolls but at some point over 200 women were working on them.
It's refugees helping refugees.
So you personally brief them? Or how often do you visit the women?
When it first started it all happened very quickly. Initially, we wanted to embroider all the dolls by ourselves and just send over the proceeds. But with the exhibition coming closer we realized that there was no way that we would manage to embroider that many dolls. Therefore, we started looking into other possibilities. That's when we realized that we could actually let refugees embroider the dolls. So I initiated contact with the NGO and gave them our samples. That's how it all started. Now every time that we have a new product we go there, show them our samples and explain to them what we want. They are happy to see us and always get excited when we have new projects for them.
Just to clarify: All the women who work in the workshop are Syrian refugees?
Yes, all of them are refugees from Syria. The women are living at the Shatila refugee camp which was originally set up for Palestinian refugees. Since the start of the Syrian Civil war many Syrians have joined the camp and its population is estimated to be between 10'000 to 22'000 people.
So the NGO provides them with a chance for a fresh start?
Exactly. In Syria it's not very common to see women work outside their home. It's the husband that goes working while the women stay at home. But there was a big shift when the war happened. A lot of them lost their husbands or their husbands are still battling in the war. The women mostly don't have a proper education; the workshop for them is a way to support their family.
Because Lebanon is still suffering the consequences of its own war, they don't have a very powerful infrastructure to support many refugees. Yet, out of all neighbouring countries, Lebanon has the most amount of refugees.
How do these Syrian refugees get support?
The Lebanese government tried to help them as much as possible. They provided camps for them but because Lebanon is still suffering the consequences of its own war, they don't have a very powerful infrastructure to support many refugees. Yet, out of all neighbouring countries, Lebanon has the most amount of refugees and the government doesn't have the power to sustain them all - luckily many funds came from abroad. Here in Lebanon there is a lot of mixed emotions about the refugees because of the whole history of the Syrians already being in Lebanon. Some Lebanese are concerned that they steal their jobs and suffocate the system.
What stories are the drawings on the dolls based on?
It's mostly about the children's dreams and hopes for the future. We ask them for example how they imagine the country they're emigrating to is going to be like. Or what they want to be when they grow up. With children, as opposed to war traumatized adults, you see that there are still a lot of hopes and dreams left. That's why we want to keep our dolls so colorful. We want to remind people that kids in the end of the day are still kids- regardless of the war they're living in. They are very innocent and their imagination is still very strong. That's the beautiful thing about children. And then there comes a time where it all stops-where life hits.
Adults look at the war and they don't see the light at the end of tunnel as easily as a kid might just see the light
Why do you think that as adults we suddenly lose our imagination and our ability for creative expression?
For children drawing is effortless - unlike for many adults for whom it can be a tiring process. Adults put way too much thought into every brushstroke they make, pay attention to every single detail. Children don't think as much and their imagination is still very vivid. They are still able to dream. Adults look at the war and they don't see the light at the end of the tunnel as easily as a kid might just see the light.
How did you come up with the name Ana collection?
Ana means "I". Because all of the sentences of the stories begin with "I am". We wanted to remind people that there are still people inside Aleppo. People who are all individuals and each one has a story to tell. Because at some point the refugees were just portrayed as a mass by the media: "the refugees". People forgot the individuals behind those masses, so that's why we called our collection the Ana Collection-because there is an individual story behind each person. And we need to remember and tell their stories to understand.
We want to remind people that the group being referred to as "refugees" by the media is still a group made up of individuals and their stories.
What do you wish for the future?
Honestly, I feel like from that first day when we went to the exhibition and all our dolls sold out we realized how much potential this has and how much talent those women posess. This is what we try to show the world: Just because they're labelled as refugees doesn't mean they don't have any talents. Also, we want to show with our dolls that you are able of doing beautiful things that at the same time contribute to a good cause. Our wish is to continue helping women to sustain themselves. So that women teach women. It's a circle of empowerment.
Check out the Ana Collection online: https://www.theanacollection.org
Support the NGO Basmeh & Zeitnooneh: https://www.basmeh-zeitooneh.org