About

Camp Album project is a multimedia platform envisioned as a way for people from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to express their feelings in a safe and anonymous way while raising awareness of the ongoing human rights abuse and cultural genocide that confronts Uyghurs and other Turkic and Muslim minorities in the region.

This site aims to document lived experience, trauma, and resistance through art. Please share this project with people you know who are suffering and need a safe and cathartic medium. Minority artists from the region whose families are directly impacted by the camps are particularly encouraged to contribute to the project. Submissions will be collectively displayed online and at exhibitions worldwide to amplify Uyghur, Kazakh, Kirghiz, Hui, and Tatar diaspora voices and stories. Exhibiting on a single platform will form solidarity and community for healing, and most importantly, give us a stronger voice!

Any genre is welcome, anonymous submission is welcome, you don’t need any art training background. If it comes from heart, it will be precious and authentic.

About Me

I am a postdoctoral researcher now based in North America. I was born and raised in Urumqi, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. I grew up as a member of an “ethnic minority.” All my family members are still in Xinjiang and unable to travel since their passports were confiscated since 2017, and we haven’t seen each other since then.

My alias Yixiaocuo (“a small contingent”, 一小撮) originates from the Chinese Communist Party’s favorite propaganda phrase to denigrate critical voices and dissidents. This highly moralizing judgmental speech act has dehumanized dissidents and justified violence upon them, for example, during the Cultural Revolution and Tiananmen Massacre. I chose this alias deliberately as I believe it is important to stand with the denigrated “small contingent” who fought for truth and democracy in contemporary history of China.

Alone we are small, together we are many.