Camera Obscura

Narrow Focus, by Andy Lerner

Andy Lerner — Thu, 16 May 2013 20:30:50 +0000

A rare peppermint porcelain crab, taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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Text and photos by Andy Lerner.

I’ve always likened SCUBA diving in the ocean to visiting a foreign country. You don’t really feel like you belong there, you only know a little bit of the language, and your stay is temporary. If you’re an underwater photographer, you do everything you can to fight against every bit of that. You do your best to understand the behavior and customs in this foreign place so you can be at the right place at the right time for a photographic opportunity.

Wire coral goby. Taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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You try hard to blend in even though you’re the only one blowing bubbles. And you try your best to keep your breathing slow and steady to extend your time underwater for as long as possible. On top of all of that is the additional task of finding something unique to photograph in a world where nearly everything seems unique. It’s a place filled with strange and wonderful life, so settling on a subject is not easy.

Juvenile anemonefish, taken in Sulawesi, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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This search often leads me to macro photography. In an enormous place measured in miles, meters, and fathoms, working in millimeters is a pretty amazing experience. If you buy my foreign visitor premise, then working in macro is like looking for some weird little out of the way villages in that foreign country. Tiny outposts with tiny inhabitants.

Whip coral goby hiding. Taken in Fiji.
© Andy Lerner
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There is so much of this mini life going on that they really can seem like little civilizations. There are homes and territories, enemies and hideouts. There are places and times where the residents like to eat, and places and times where they like to get cleaned and groomed. This all takes some getting used to. Lots of study and observation go into figuring this out. But once you learn the ropes and get a feel for how things work, you can start to get a handle on how to find some worthy subjects.

Purple anemone shrimp. Taken in Wakatobi, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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Keep in mind that the inhabitants I’m looking for are very small. Have I mentioned millimeters? Often smaller than postage stamp. Tiny. Little crabs, shrimp, baby cuttlefish, nudibranchs or fish eggs. A lot of stuff you might have to look up in a reference book later. Occasionally you find an extremely tiny creature living on another creature you thought was plenty small enough. It’s pretty amazing to say the least.

Green xeno shrimp on wire coral. Taken in Fiji.
© Andy Lerner
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The good news is that after some experience, I’ve learned to tame my own sense of awe with this miniature world enough to try for a couple of decent shots. Once my eyes and brain adjust to working in this little environment, I get completely absorbed. A sort of tunnel vision takes over. My breathing slows. I block out the bigger stuff and train my eyes on the details. It’s one of the few times in my life when nothing else matters. It’s just me, the sound of my breathing, and whatever I can find. It becomes a kind of meditation. Can you tell that this is the best part of it for me?

Bubble coral with goby, taken in Sulawesi, Inodnesia.
© Andy Lerner
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I look for little shadows or movement. Little phantoms scurrying out of my way. I look under rocks, in the sand, coral or on other animals. Many of these tiny things are camouflaged for their own survival. Brown on brown, red on red etc. It takes some concentration. When I’m lucky I might spot a pair of eyes reflecting back from my flashlight, or a shadow bolting into a tiny hole. Often, by the time I see movement it’s probably too late – whatever it was is already gone and what I saw may have just been a couple of grains of sand kicked up as it was leaving. When and if I finally I find something, I have to evaluate whether there’s a worthy composition to be had (which can be insane while shooting under a rock or through coral polyps and the depth of field is fractions of an inch). There are also tons of things that are interesting to see but make lousy subjects for an appealing photograph.

Unknown species of crab riding on a sea cucumber. Taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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Remaining motionless is maybe the biggest task, not only for the sake of the photograph, but so as not to scare the little critter away. It’s not unusual to use half of my dive just inching next toward a subject, working my way closer as it gets used to my being there. It fosters a sort of relationship where both you and the critter are waiting to figure out what each other’s next move is going to be. It’s a careful dance where your dance partner could leave the floor at any minute.

Yellow crinoid shrimp inside crinoid. Taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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All of the tension of the “dance” is in the continued cooperation of nature, and as we all know nature isn’t predictable or cooperative. But that’s exactly what brings me there. The challenge of experiencing and capturing something that is difficult or impossible to repeat.

Portrait of a hermit crab. Taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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Sometimes you need to be satisfied with your first shot, because the strobe flash, or an awkward movement, or just the whim of the creature can be all it takes to finish your photo session. You don’t always get a 2nd shot. But occasionally you get lucky, and all of the stealth moves, calm breathing, and patience pays off. Maybe you get a few shots, and maybe you even get to try a few different ideas until you get something that works.

Unknown species of octopus in sand, taken in Bali, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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When I return topside, the trance is broken and it’s a bit of a shock to the system. After spending an hour or more photographing a creature as small as a thumbtack, and being in that meditative state it induces in me, it can be jarring to deal with life-sized objects again… let alone people. It takes a few minutes.

Pygmy seahorse in sea fan, taken in Sulawesi, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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When I finally come around, it’s not unusual for me to come back to the boat to hear other divers talking about much bigger stuff they saw in the water while I was concentrating on macro. In Indonesia this past winter I apparently missed a 14 ft. whale shark. A 14 ft. whale shark is a very hard thing to miss. Unless of course you’re focused on other things.

For more underwater photography, please visit Andy Lerner website.

Squat lobster on a sponge. Taken in Raja Ampat, Indonesia.
© Andy Lerner
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Saint-Petersburg, Childhood of many faces, by Yana Feldman

Yana Feldman — Fri, 10 May 2013 17:34:30 +0000

Flour alphabet
© Yana Feldman
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Text and photos by Yana Feldman.

I would like to present my photo project “Saint-Petersburg. Childhood of many faces”, that is dedicated to children of different nationalities in Saint-Petersburg from families where the national traditions, customs and family traditions are really saved.

Buck drums
© Yana Feldman
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I started to think over this project, when I was studying on the 4-th term in Saint-Petersburg State University of Culture and Arts. Being a student (and still now) I appreciated the work of American photographer Steve McCurry. I had the idea to make something of this kind. With the kids as the main heroes of my project. However, that time I did not have clearly formulated concept of my future project.
Then one day I got spontaneously my first shot series that further on leaded to start my work.

Together with my husband, we strolled slowly in the center of Saint-Petersburg, when he saw a group of gypsies Luli, who mingled with the crowd near the market and asked for alms. I decided to make some shots. To tell you the truth – at first time I was slightly frightened to start photographing them. I understood of course that we were in the heart of Saint-Petersburg, not a Middle Eastern or Indian town, but I still have not stopped thinking that they can yell at me, prohibit to shoot, do something else like this. Luckily, nothing happened. Although I shot mainly behind the back of her father. A sort of human shield for me.

Offense
© Yana Feldman
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Photographs turned out to be very lively, not staged at all. I still had no idea how I should use that series for me, so I just put it aside that days.

Next heroes of my project, I found, when I was invited to reportage a holiday in the Jewish boarding school for boys. For me, it was a new experience, so I asked for permission to stay on one of the lessons to see how it looked like. I made some good shots from there, one of which became lately the presentation of my project.

Give me a hint!
© Yana Feldman
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That is probably after the second shot I have formed the final vision of my future project. I realized that I wanted to do a project on children of different nationalities who live in Saint-Petersburg. I deliberately turned down the opportunity to make shots in hinterland and/or other cities/countries. Originally is was an idea just to take pictures of children of different nationalities; further on it turned into a definitive decision to devote that project for those children who observe family traditions, culture, and any features that are transmitted in their families from generation to generation, all together at the same time living in a multinational city. Representing the people of different nationalities in my project, I want to show those children who, despite the fact that they live in St. Petersburg, don’t forget their traditions, celebrate holidays, study in special schools, and follow in their culture. In my opinion, no one can honestly convey the emotions and mood but a child.

I just tried to distance myself from a national perspective and to focus on some cultural and family values. But as it turned out – to do so would not be easy. After all, many family and cultural characteristics of families in some way connected with the national peculiarities of these same families.

The second home
© Yana Feldman
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Other heroes of his project, I began to search for different ways: through a variety of acquaintances, friends of friends, random encounters. With the help of social networks in which I methodically sought out by community groups and relevant words combinations. Finding such groups, I contacted the organizers, explained to them who I was and what I wanted from them, asked to give me the contact of families with children of a certain age, and whose families follow the traditions. Many people denied participating in my project because they did not understand who I was and what I did. Yes, and judge for yourself – here is some stranger, who says that your family is interesting for him and he wants to shoot all of you (sometimes to visit your house). How many people would immediately agree to help him?

If you take the statistics – two or three persons answered me from each of a dozen messages I wrote. One or two families welcomed to become my heroes from a dozen of those, who firstly answered me. However, most of them immediately expressed their willingness to dress children in a national costume. In addition, according to my question what kind of family or cultural characteristics they observed in their family – puzzled shrug and said that they had nothing except costume.

Unfortunately, too little families keep even any family traditions (eg, Sunday dinners, recipes from their grandparents, and skills from father to son, etc.), and mind of their historical roots a fortiori. Perhaps this is because big city forces people to assimilate, to live in a different rhythm, subordinates its own rules. While searching for heroes to my project, I encountered hundreds of families who, unfortunately, could not “confirm” their national identity.

Granny's pie
© Yana Feldman
Please visit Saint-Petersburg, Childhood of many faces, by Yana Feldman for the full size image.

Of course, there were also positive responses. With the help of my friends, I suggested to contact a Georgian family, which as it turned out, through the generations from mother to daughter passed branded prescription hachapuri in Adjara.

With the help of social networks, I was lucky to find few more future heroes – a Tatar family, whose younger generation had settled in Saint-Petersburg long time ago, and great-grandparents lived near Kazan. However, they often come to visit her great-grandchildren, and great-grandfather (who was the religious head of his homeland) taught his great-grandson the precepts of holy book Koran with each visit.

A link of generation
© Yana Feldman
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In addition, with the help of social networks, and through the personal contacts I was able to meet and visit the calligraphy lesson in boarding school for the children of Japanese businesspersons and diplomats. At the Korean Cultural Center, where boys learned the tradition of drumming Buck. The Islamic center where young children from the Central Asian republics and the countries of central Africa were studying the Arabic alphabet, drawing the letters on the flour. The Armenian Church. I visited the Turkish and Sudanese families, where I could see the art of drawing with paint on the water – Ebru, as well as traditional outfits of young Sudanese girls.

The art of calligraphy
© Yana Feldman
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Random article in the newspaper about a family of ropewalkers who acted at festivals, fairs and public events in various cities of the CIS led me to be acquainted with this amazing family. Along with hundreds of other spectators, I was able to see how the young Seyfulla performed exercises on the trapeze (of course with the safety net). However, he was only 3.5 years!

Hereditary rope-walker
© Yana Feldman
Please visit Saint-Petersburg, Childhood of many faces, by Yana Feldman for the full size image.

The most incredible adventure happened with me when I, accompanied by a volunteer travelled to Gypsy village on the suburbs of Saint-Petersburg. Before that trip, I had very vague thoughts who the Gypsies were, where and how they lived. In addition, of course, I could not even imagine then 20-30 miles from my house might be a big gypsy camp. I met several families, looked through the difficult conditions of their living. Nevertheless, I tried to depict on my photographs all that range of positive emotions and feelings that are unique to every kid.

Pumping water for cooking
© Yana Feldman
Please visit Saint-Petersburg, Childhood of many faces, by Yana Feldman for the full size image.

There were many other equally interesting meetings and photo series. Sometimes the natives of big city never suspect the existence of some nations and nationalities, living together with them. Even they much less know about how that people live. Nevertheless, it is worthy of attention. This will help to build intercultural and interfaith dialogue, to present and reveal the life of the representatives of different nations, to remove stereotypes and clichés from the minds of different people.

It may seem that all my heroes are ordinary children, but of different age and appearance. However, it is not true. I set myself the task to open the door to the small world of every family, to be acquainted with the culture of each character, which is stored only inside and not visible from outside. Family, lifestyle, religion – all these are just begin to govern the children and we can only guess about his future fate.

Male from the birth
© Yana Feldman
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For me personally, in this project “Saint-Petersburg. Childhood of many faces” it was also important to preserve and pass on the aesthetics of the photographs. I did not make the task, and did not want to shoot and show the blood, dirt and any other thrill, which, unfortunately, sometimes common in modern documentary projects. After all, no matter what – the children always remain children. Nevertheless, at the same time, I specifically refused to shoot glamorous baby photo. Can you even suggest how family and cultural traditions in some way be related to the “puppet” kids?

Easter
© Yana Feldman
Please visit Saint-Petersburg, Childhood of many faces, by Yana Feldman for the full size image.

Somewhere in the middle of a project, I decided that after the diploma work I would like to continue working over this project. By that time, it had already become a part of me. In addition, when I was offered (after graduating) to hold an exhibition at the gallery of the Saint-Petersburg State Academic Capella, I realized that I was ready to exhibit my project to the vast audience. I started preparing for the exhibition, which also became my first solo exhibition. The exhibition opened in mid-January 2013. A short time later, I was offered to present an exhibition in Minsk.

From myself I would like to wish all the readers: look for unusual ideas, do not dwell on the simple. Having found an exceptional story – in any case do not give in to difficulties! After all, the more ambitious and more complex you set a goal – the more pleasant you will be, when achieve it!

For more photos, please visit Yana Feldman website.

Africa inside
© Yana Feldman
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China’s landscape through the lens of three Western photographers

Marine Cabos — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 12:38:13 +0000

Old Factories #1, Fushun Aluminum Smelter, Fushun City, Liaoning Province, 2005
© Edward Burtynsky
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Text by Marine Cabos, photos by Nadav Kander, Edward_Burtynsky and Ian Teh.

I have always enjoyed experiencing landscape as well as contemplating all sorts of pictorial representations of it. To me, depicting landscape is a mean by which a photographer attempts to understand the mystery of nature, while trying to understand his/her own place within it.

Chongqing I, Chongqing Municipality
© Nadav Kander
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Although I do not have any kind of creative talent whatsoever, I have always been eager to watch, speak, and write about art. I guess this is one of the main reasons why I decided to plunge myself into Art History with a special focus on photography. Indeed over the past six years I developed a keen interest in photography and especially photography depicting China’s landscapes throughout the centuries.

Farmland. Linfen, Shanxi, China.
© Ian Teh
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Since then I could not stop searching for photographers that have extensively worked in China, whatever their origins. One day I came across the powerful artworks created by Edward Burynsky, Nadav Kander, and Ian Teh. When I saw their photographs for the first time, I immediately asked myself to what extend these Westerners can participate in the shaping of China’s image? One might find this question puzzling at first especially if one assumes natives would necessarily provide a “truer” gaze than outsiders. But to me (as for many people specialised in the field of photography of China) there is no such thing as a consensus in what constitute core elements of ‘Chinese photography’; instead I am more interested in the variations of photographers’ gaze through the depictions a common subject matter.

Bao Steel #8, Shanghai, 2005
© Edward Burtynsky
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These three photographers created compelling images representing China’s landscape in its largest sense. By that I mean their notion of landscape does not only refer to the natural world, but also to places that range from man-altered to industrial zone, cityscape, cultural landscapes and other types of sceneries. Let me introduce briefly what they managed to photograph when they were in China.

Chongqing II, Chongqing Municipality © Nadav Kander
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Over his twenty-five years career, the Canadian Edward Burtynsky (born in 1955 in Canada) developed keen eyesight of man-made alterations upon nature caused by the pursuit of modernization, which he conscientiously captured across Northern America. Burtynsky’s anxiety to engender the audience’s awakening of such disrupted sceneries leaded him to China, where he engaged in a series of photographs depicting human and environmental costs of the tremendous economic boom China is undergoing. For five years starting from 2002, Burtynsky explored the ‘Middle Country’ by scrutinising on the one hand the urban revolution with his series Urban Renewal, on the other by following the industrial production processes: from the collection of energy with his series on the Three Gorges Dam; the human labour with Manufacturing; the steel producers with Steel and Coal; the collapsed heavy industry due to mid-90s restructuring with Old Industry; the ships production in ports with Shipyards; to finally the recycling process with Recycling. His large-sized photographs offer a paradoxical commentary vacillating between deadpan and bleak impressions on the China’s changing landscape.

A new luxury residential development built next to a an industrial complex. Linfen, Shanxi, China.
© Ian Teh
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Regarding Nadav Kander (born in 1961 in Israel), his contribution to the shaping of China’s landscape was also significant. His Yangtze series – which resulted from five trips initiated in 2006 – shows an interesting account that mingles the pictorial tradition of portraying the river sceneries, and an unavoidable social commentary about the unnatural development within natural settings and its consequences on the population. Although he tried as much as he could to maintain a distance because of his awareness of being an outsider, Kander ultimately re-enacted individual and collective sentiments of rootlessness commonly felt by not only the Chinese he met, but also himself as an Israeli-born South African living in England. His photographs propose a journey navigating by the river on traditional boats, walking across broken bridges, ending in nearby cities with leisured people.

China Recycling #9, Circuit Boards, Guiyu, Guangdong Province, 2004
© Edward Burtynsky
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Finally, the Chinese-British Ian Teh (born in 1971; based in London) also experienced China since 2006 through a solo initiatory journey in which he wanted to discover the industrial hinterlands. His series Traces: Dark Clouds offers photographs of Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Liaoning and other provinces across China. Teh chose these specific places for they revealed another side of the so-called ‘China’s miracle’: the environmental sacrifices of perfecting the country and their side effects left for the future generations. Apparently Teh continues to work on China according to three of his projects entitled Merging Boundaries (in which he looks into the Sino-Russian and Sino-Korean limits), The Vanishing – Altered Landscapes and Displaced Lives on the Yangtze River, Tainted Landscapes 1: Birth to a New Coal Power Station, and Tainted Landscapes 2: Heavy Industry in Linfen, China’s most Polluted City.

Chongqing XI, Chongqing Municipality
© Nadav Kander
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It was quite a shock to discover their work; needless to say that I immediately fell in love with them. At that time I just arrived in London and I was visiting randomly galleries near Old Street. I ended up in the Flowers Gallery where I had the chance to meet Chris Littlewood, the Director of Photography. I talked about these three photographers (who were all exhibited at least once in the gallery) and asked him if he thought they were creating divergent and/or similar representations of China. Chris replied that:

The riverbed of the Kuye River, a subsidiary to the Yellow River
© Ian Teh
Please visit China’s landscape through the lens of three Western photographers for the full size image.

“On the one hand they obviously explored a common subject, yet all possess a different gaze. Kander for instance took a very indirect, poetic, personal approach opposite to documentary considerations. His Yantze series reflected an atmosphere that embraced a wide range of sensations and feelings, such as alienation or sadness. Contrarily, Burtynsky’s gaze is direct, almost rough, highly distanced – literally and judgementally. The magnitude of his panoramic photographs mingled documentary and pictorial approach to landscape through which he strived to provoke sustainability awareness. As for Teh, his method to first spent days in the place in order to gain trust and proximity with the people, then taking photographs recall somehow journalistic practices. Ultimately, the trio engaged in a ‘China-centric’ photographic dialogue that possesses highly intuitive and pictorial dimensions, thus leading the viewer to be visually overwhelmed and trapped.”

Manufacturing #18, Cankun Factory, Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, 2005
© Edward Burtynsky
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Chris’ insightful comments enhanced even more my passion about landscape photography of China. In truth although these three photographers belong to different cultures (thus assumedly possess dissimilar cultural conditioning) they nonetheless share astonishing similarities. First, they reify the timeless Western attraction for China cultural and aesthetic paradigm. Second, all combine with verve highly aesthetic and documentary-inflected viewpoints so that to create panoramic photographs, which transform urban or natural landscape into paradoxical sites of quietness, unsettledness, alienation, and sublimity at the same time. Third, none of them dictate an easy answer to such destructions; instead they aim to leave the spectator free of deciding whether there is any ethical implication.

Yibin I (Bathers), Sichuan Province
© Nadav Kander
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Rather than affirm their gaze as condemnations of Chinese harsh disruption of either natural or urban landscapes, they have chosen a more insightful path in problematising their photographs’ capacities of showing diverse intuitive and emotional responses to another culture environment, which eventually appear relevant in both Chinese and global contexts. Ultimately I also believe Burtynsky, Kander and Teh shed light on the existing links between China and the West.

For more visual stories about China, please visit Marine Cabos Photography of China.

Urban Renewal #6, Apartment Complex, Jiangjun ao, Hong Kong, 2004
© Edward Burtynsky
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Bonneval-sur-Arc and the End of Winter, by Steven Nestor

Steven Nestor — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 07:24:56 +0000

Text and photos by Steven Nestor.

In the summer of 1996 I was lying in a Parisian park listening to an article being read aloud on the events surrounding the disaster that had befallen climbers on Everest the previous May. Although I’d never been overly fascinated with mountains or mountain life, the story left quite an impression on me. Despite the most modern of communications, equipment and planning, nature had intervened at a time of her choosing to take eight climbers. Further increasing my new found interest in mountains, and in particular the cold, I later read Jon Krakauer’s (controversial) Into Thin Air. There followed readings of other stories like Touching the Void or the epic tale of Toni Kurz’s last climb. In my mind’s eye I began to better envisage our insignificance and fragility when pitted against a collusion of mountains and nature aiming to eradicate our daring incursions.

I’m not sure whether it’s because of these extreme stories, but whenever I was skiing I preferred overcast or snowy days that hinted at something greater beyond the order of colour-coded slopes under a serene blue sky. Despite a hyper rationalized world, there must still be some residual memory of eons ago when life was dictated to by unkind winters, dragons and God. Although today you can get back into your house or car, the elements pushing against you are the same that wore Ötzi down once-upon-a-time ago. And the snow in the picturesque skiing village that you brush against on a sub-zero night when your breath is turned to crystals is the same that numbs the life out of the lost climber. It’s the same that stopped Napoleon and Hitler.

* * *

Lying on the valley floor at 1,800m the small French alpine town of Bonneval-sur-Arc is effectively the end of the road as the next hamlet is cut off and abandoned over the winter months. In late December of 2011 I was back for a week’s stay. For much of the time we were there heavy snowfalls and wind dominated, closing slopes and leaving us unsure as to whether we would be able to leave the valley on time. The locals said it was some of the worst weather they had experienced in 20 years. In Europe’s east dozens succumbed as a deep arctic chill expanded westward.

In a time with claims that the earth is warming at such a pace that entire mountain ranges will be snow free within our lifetime, I for one found being enveloped in a snowstorm to be comforting. Somehow all seemed well again in this incomprehensible and perpetually lost world. The winter before, Ireland and Britain had been gripped by uncharacteristically cold weather and, care of the “end is nigh” media, I had heard for the first time talk about the Maunder Minimum of prolonged freezing winters in Europe. Most notable was the so-called Great Frost of 1683–84 when the river Thames froze for weeks with ice recorded as being nearly 30cm thick. Now with the unexpected presence of an unusually and unexpectedly cold winter some experts were speculating as to the possibilities of its return.

In the midst of a harsh alpine winter, I had time to reflect on representations of winter in art and in particular, two painters. There was the acute memory of Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow, so much easier to recall in the white cold than googling it online or standing before it in a climate-controlled museum. I was beginning to understand this painting as a “report” or message beyond a superficial admiration of the painter’s technique: this is winter, this is what it does to our world.

The other painter to occupy my thoughts was the far lesser known – though equally impressive – Tino Aime with his depictions of northern Piedmont in deep overcast winters in a waning light and void of colour, except for the odd bright berry. While he has painted in modern times his work perfectly illustrates that still emptiness of the outwardly lifeless mountain village in the dead of winter. Nowadays, however, many of those villages have been abandoned and, steadily roofless, blend into the mountains’ rocks, forests and snow. Life had been too tough. Others are only for the fair weather visitors or have been transformed for the skiing season.

Returning to Bonneval-sur-Arc for a second time meant being surer of what photographic treatment and approach the valley could be given. I didn’t want to try to work on or extract what little colour was in evidence or focus on the postcard village. Rather, I wanted to shoot on black and white transparency to best record the subtleties of tone in what is largely a monochromatic landscape mostly devoid of human presence. I was determined to immerse myself for as extended a time as was possible in this alien landscape, from the morning to after sundown when few, if anyone, was still out beyond the village, and surely no one else with a camera.

Even though modern transportation and infrastructure desensitizes the traveller, time spend in the Alps in winter cannot fail to impress. Beyond the roads, paths and slopes lies an inhospitable and impassable beauty evident to even the most uninterested traveller. Snow changes everything. Walking is laboured and subtler features obscured. Sounds are muffled and the flat light wipes away all texture, compressing surfaces to the flatness of a clean page. I pass the Risques d’avalanches sign on a snowshoe track no wider than my shoulders. Leave it and you’re knee or thigh deep in snow. There may be no more dragons or desire for a god in many, but I strangely feel that I somehow shouldn’t be there recreationally. It’s unnatural and what is understood as beauty by me and the multitudes of other urbanites has been termed ‘White Death’ by others. Hannibal’s sure dreams of taking Rome vanished along with 18,000 of his men in these mountains. I should never have been able to reach this valley with such ease. At most I ought to be cloistered in one of Aime’s dormant villages longing for the spring and the opening of meadows and passes. I’m riding some freak spike in world history that allows people go wherever they choose. I’m on the top of Babel. And I have equally become aware of nature’s ambivalence towards the sole walker. ‘And Petit-Jean said to me — “You see that [snow]? Do you see it? Well, it doesn’t see you!”’

Of course I cannot claim that I took these photographs solely because of painters and talk of cold cycles. But, in this altered environment I felt I could come closer to the vision transmitted by these artists and the possibility of a new Great Frost. It was in this frame of mind that I sought to engage with the same essential physical elements presented to and by the likes of Bruegel and Aime, and to capture the malign muteness and vastness of a pronounced winter in the mountains in an epoch of severance from that which thwarted our ancestors.

* * *

When walking alone in the snow towards the valley’s end it becomes clearer how the immediacy of all things Internet and a fully mapped world can lead us in our predominantly urban lives to forget what our scale once meant and the utter indifference of nature. Once upon a time the snows isolated communities for months on end. Ötzi was held for three millennia before being given up, but now it’s only a three hour drive from Turin, or 45mm away on a 1:1 200 000 map. And I can’t pretend that I’m blind to the diverting beauty of this place, or that I don’t enjoy it on the same level as those I’m with.

Then I remembered the booms during the snowstorm at night. High up the mountains they were detonating bombs to curb the risk of avalanche. So even at the most inaccessible heights we can exercise control remotely. I’m forced to reconsider my work and my dwelling on the old significance of winter in the mountains. It’s January 1st 2012 and I’ve photographed the descente aux flambeaux. They’re serving free hot chocolate and vin brulé. Editing my work I reassess the merits of an earlier colour image from the valley: the framing reminiscent of Aime’s landscapes. It’s pretty. I like it. And although I had been very pleased with the black and white approach, now I’m not so sure there’s much truth in my images beyond a pure analogue recording. They’re half the story, if. They’re what I wanted and got – few surprises – but I am increasingly aware that my careful, deliberate framing has conjured up a false reading of this place. Despite Godard’s seemingly infallible declaration in Le Petit Soldat that “la photographie c’est la vérité. Et le cinéma c’est vingt-quatre fois la vérité par seconde” – photography is the truth and cinema, 24 times the truth per second – as a practitioner it’s so obviously not. In my view finding in Bonneval-sur-Arc I conjured up a deceit. The snow and mountains are still the same that took the lost wanderer, but that’s all but irrelevant today.

And now it’s late December 2012 and I’m in Gressoney-La-Trinité: one day’s skiing in the falling snow. I can’t see a thing because my visor and glasses keep fogging. I don’t like skiing anymore, and the mountains in winter a little less. The next day the slopes are mercifully closed due to high winds.

Snow tyres and chains. In 30 minutes or so we’ll be clear of all the pretty suggestive snow and onto the dry drab plane below. Home in an hour and a half.

We always complain about the motorway tolls.

It is the end of winter.

For more stories and photos, please visit Steven Nestor website.

May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel

Sara Macel — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 02:10:43 +0000

In the Company Car in 1981, Spring, Texas
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

Text and photos by Sara Macel.

For years, I traveled on road-trips throughout America taking photographs. Only recently did I make the connection between my desire for the road and the fact that my father, for the past forty years, has traveled these same routes as a telephone pole salesman. In the age of cell phones and data-reception towers, telephone poles, as both components and symbols of communication, are less vital than they once were. As my father is reaching the end of his career, the traveling salesman’s role in society is also entering its twilight.

My project, May the Road Rise to Meet You, explores the life of a businessman alone on the road. The initial goal was to create a visual narrative of the past 40 years of my father’s professional life, separate from our shared family structure and experience. My father is a man defined by his job and devoted to his family. Considering how much time he spends on the road, he was remarkably present during my childhood. Only occasionally did I really feel his absence, and as I got older, I became more and more curious about where he went when his car pulled out of the driveway. When he announced to the family that he plans to retire in a few years, I knew this could possibly be my only chance to get in that car with him.

House of Pies, Houston, Texas
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

To tackle the enormous task of creating visual imagery to represent an entire life on the road, I approached this project from multiple angles. I re-traced my father’s steps by going back to places he visited and photographed places he may have passed along the way. Meanwhile, I traveled with my father and documented him on the road in present day. I also collected ephemera from his home office and created my own ephemera that represents or comments on my perception of the life of “the salesman.”

Motel Notes, Hampton Inn, St. Louis, Missouri
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

Elements of fact and fiction play a significant part in both my image-making. By going to places my father may have visited in the past, I am attempting to put myself in his shoes. Some of the scenes I photographed are based on stories he has told me over the years and notes I found in his files; others are a mixture of my imagination and the portrayals of salesmen from movies and television. Since very little photographic evidence of my father’s work life exists, popularized images of traveling businessmen work to fill in the blanks in my imagination and memory.

By digitally altering some of my original medium-format photographs (as in “House of Pies, Houston, Texas”) to match the look and feel of old snapshots, I am imagining that this collection of snapshots belongs to my father and was taken on one of his trips away from home when I was a child. Combining actual ephemera (the motel notes he wrote to himself, for example) with fictionalized ephemera (my digitally-aged medium-format “snapshots”) is another way of retracing his steps and building a collection of tangible relics that represent his life away from home.

Boots, Seaford, New York
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

As much as I am channeling the past through my father, I am also trailing the ghosts of earlier road-trip photographers. The genre of road-trip photography has been well-explored by Robert Frank, Stephen Shore, Joel Sternfeld, Alec Soth, and Justine Kurland, so it has been a challenge to bring something new to the table. My favorite road photography projects were created by men and communicate a sense of freedom and male wandering. And even in Kurland’s This Train is Bound for Glory, the road sings its reckless siren song. I find the experience of being a woman alone on the road to be very different. When I travel, I feel a sense of freedom and desire to throw caution to the wind, but there is also an unmistakable fog of vulnerability. It is a fear that has, at times, held me back from getting the shot I want and left me wondering how or if the situation might differ were I a male photographer. This project allowed me to channel those desires by experiencing the road from my father’s perspective, and in doing so, combine the genres of road-trip and family photography.

7:00 AM, Denny’s Breakfast, Spring, Texas
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

My dad has a motto for almost any situation. On one of our road-trips, when I asked him about dealing with customers, he told me: “There’s always that old saying that you don’t know someone until you walk a few miles in their moccasins.” When I started this project, I set out to rediscover my father as a man separate from his role in our family and explore the alternating sadness and freedom of a life spent alone on the open road. What I found in chasing this initially elusive male figure is that I can never fully know my father or what it is like to be a man alone on the road.

The Towering Figure, Huntsville, Texas
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

The title of the project, May the Road Rise to Meet You, is an old Irish blessing often said in my family. I believe it resonates for us because my father is so often away from home traveling on the road alone. For years, there has been a ceramic plaque in my parents’ kitchen, just above the stove, that says: “May the road rise to meet you / May the wind be ever at your back / May the sun shine warm upon your face / And the rain fall softly on your fields / And until we meet again / May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.”

Me and Dad on the road, San Antonio, Texas
© Sara Macel
Please visit May the Road Rise to Meet You, by Sara Macel for the full size image.

In the end, this project became less about the American landscape or traveling salesmen or Robert Frank and more about distance: the emotional and physical distance between me and my dad, the vast expanses of land he travels to this day, and the memories of that brief little stretch of time when we got to travel together.

For more from Sara Macel, please follow her on twitter, facebook or tumblr.

Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan

Gráinne Quinlan — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 15:46:51 +0000

Athlone Strawboys, County Westmeath
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

Text and photos by Gráinne Quinlan.

I have always enjoyed the thrill of combining adventurous travel with my love of photography. Photographing the Irish Strawboys offered this to me and more, taking me on an Alice in Wonderland adventure — an unimaginable journey that brought me to parts of Ireland, my home country, which I had never seen before and where I met with characters who will forever stay etched on my mind — the Strawboys.

Aughakillymaude Mummers, Fermanagh
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

My engagement with the Strawboys opened the door to a world unknown to me — a world of exuberant costume and magnetic performance going beyond any spectacle I had seen before, certainly in Ireland or indeed Europe.

The lead up to my ‘discovery’ of the Irish Strawboys is perhaps equally interesting and deserves its own part in this story.

Aughakillymaude Mummers, Fermanagh
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

I had recently submitted my thesis in my final year in my photography degree at the Dublin Instititue of Technology, after spending almost twelve months of arduous writing, involving late nights, reedits and copious amounts of caffeine.

My chosen subject was the great Malian photographer Seydou Keita. For months I had immersed myself in Keita’s stunning imagery and style. My research immersed me in the culture of Mali — its music, sculpture and paintings — a cultural kaleidoscope that is as uplifting as it is inspiring.

Balina Strawboys, County Mayo
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

In addition to Keitas’ kinetic imagery, with his choice of simple backdrop and subjects
that appear in front of the camera with ease and grace, I spent hours poring over images of the Dogon tribes people. The esoteric culture of the Dogon tribe in southern Mali, is enthralling to the eyes and ears unfamiliar with such practices. Their sensually detailed carved masks and ruffled costumes filled me with wonder and fueled a curiosity in me of masking traditions.

Cleamairí an Chorráin (The Currane Strawboys), County Mayo
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

By January 2012, each of the fourth year photography students at D.I.T were let loose to fully concentrate on their photographic practice and subject of their own choice. Ideas for projects were considered in trepidation as each student was aware that the resulting images would be displayed in National Photographic Archive and in Dublin’s Gallery of Photography. As a culmination of four years intense study, it needed to pack a visual punch for audience members alike be they family, friends and even the wider general public.

Fingal Mummers, North County Dublin
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

During my search for a suitably visual striking topic and in line with my peeked interested in masking, I began to hear of a strange custom involving strikingly disguised people who attended weddings in the West of Ireland — particulary County Mayo where the tradition remains prevalent today. During the celebrations these masked Strawboys, as I learned they were called, would arrive unannounced to the reception and provide entertainment through song, dance and poetry to the surprised onlookers who, no doubt, would have been particularly amazed by their elaborate costumes.

Fingal Mummers, North County Dublin
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

My search for images of the Strawboys invariably indicated that the highly visual Strawboy performance had largely only ever been captured by amateurs and the occasional local photographer. It was the idea that this unique performance had only ever been captured by amateurs that instilled in me an eagerness to record this colourful practice formally, away from the distractions of the performance.

Historically, the tradition was most prevalent in rural areas of Ireland. The Strawboys would arrive at a bridal breakfast party in the brides home, sometimes down a chimney or by banging loudly on the front door with a mock menacing tone. Disguised in masks made of straw — a cheap material readily available in Ireland at the time — the Strawboys would regale the wedding guests with song and horseplay. Often they would be uninvited neighbours looking to gain access to the celebration and to partake of the refreshments on offer in return for lively entertainment.

Fingle Mummers, County Dublin
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

Archival letters held at the National Folklore Collection in the University College of Dublin (UCD) suggest that many people in rural Ireland would expect the Strawboys arrival at any given wedding reception and in some cases despite the guise, their identity was clear to all through body shape and spoken word. By the 50s however, the tradition had petered out in many areas with mass emigration and a change in farming practices that led to the demise of straw.

John Street Wrenboys, Dingle, Kerry
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

Once I began to reach out and contact the still existing Strawboy troupes, much to my delight, my phone calls where always greeted with an eager and welcoming response: “No problem, how many Strawboys do you want for your photo?”.

Arranging visits to various parts of rural Ireland where the Strawboy tradition is still practiced was a photographer’s dream. I travelled over the Connor Pass in County Kerry, had tea with an eighty year old Strawboy in his bucolic kitchen in County Fermanagh and returned to Dublin with my very own strawmask gifted to me by the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum in Belfast.

Sligo Strawboys, County Sligo
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

The people I met, are as one might suspect, entertaining storytellers or seanchaí’s — the Irish word for storyteller. After agreeing to sit for a formal portrait they told tales and gave reason for their Strawboy participation. Many of the stories recalled were humble, honest and humorous. Not only does the tradition allow group members to practice music and song, it offers to a means to socialize and to engage with a rural community that otherwise stays in the confines of a home.

Beneath the fears and worries attached to exhibiting, intuitively I felt that exhibiting portraits of Stawboys, would remind viewers of photography’s potent power. It was has always been my belief that photography’s greatest attribute is its ability to educate people, in as much as literature or the spoken word. The Strawboy tradition that I focused on was largely unknown — an almost forgotten anachronism from a different time in Ireland. This was certainly true amongst the groups of people that I shared the idea with, and for this reason I felt compelled to follow my idea.

The Armagh Rhymers, Armagh
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

In terms of how I approached each portrait, I was able to drawing inspiration from my recent studies. Using a tried and tested formula — certainly influenced by Keita — I placed the emphasis on the performer’s visual presentation rather than the commotion of an energetic performance. The format of a formal portrait, I like to think, shows the Strawboys as stately and noble looking befitting their striking and imposing visual aesthetic.

For more photos and stories, please visit Gráinne Quinlan website.

The Erris Strawboys, County Mayo
© Gráinne Quinlan
Please visit Strawboys, by Gráinne Quinlan for the full size image.

If you take a photograph, di Valentina Maistri

Valentina Maistri — Sun, 27 Jan 2013 21:02:30 +0000

Testo e foto di Valentina Maistri.

Senza filtri per l’odore, senza pareti per i colpi al cuore.

A volte lascio che la mia mente spazi libera. È per me un atto di coraggio.

Il sentimento che più spesso mi accompagna è l’angoscia.

Quella sensazione di cadere nel vuoto senza riuscire a portarsi dietro niente, senza essere capaci di aggrapparsi per rallentare la caduta.

Ho paura di dimenticare, dimenticarmi un gesto, un sorriso, un profumo.

Di lasciare che qualcosa, qualsiasi cosa, scivoli fuori dalle mie mani, sfugga alla mia percezione. Il mio modo di affrontare questo, di affrontare me stessa, sono le fotografie.

Mi aiutano a rendere tangibile quello che mi circonda, sono un promemoria per la mia angoscia : “enjoy the little things”.

Vivi delle piccole cose, assapora ogni momento, crogiolati in ogni emozione.

Rimango perplessa davanti ai grandi gesti, ho sempre di gran lunga preferito quel piccolo particolare, quel dettaglio che pochi notano, che solo chi ha voglia di guardarsi attorno percepisce. Spesso sorrido di questa mia attenzione, mi fa sentire parte di un èlite : l’èlite di chi non ha voglia di perdersi niente, di quei fortunati a cui basta poco per ritrovare se stessi.

È questo che ci fa andare avanti, che ci aiuta a crescere.

Le mie foto da una parte riproducono il bisogno della mia mente di rappresentare quello che provo, per affrontarlo, per ricordarlo, per amarlo. Dall’altra costituiscono un tentativo di imprigionare un attimo, un momento non definito che nel tempo dello scatto assume un significato particolare.

Congela l’istante, l’emozione, evoca un ricordo. Senza maschere, senza filtri.

Così le mie foto, come me, sono “spaccate in due” tra il passato ed il presente.

Ho sempre avuto il terrore di vivere a metà : sospesa in un limbo di un “forse” grigiore.

Non ho mai creduto alle parole sussurrate, né alle pacche sulle spalle. Penso che la vita vada vissuta con energia, passione e coraggio. Per questo bisogna sapersi esporre : all’amore, all’odio, alle passioni alle proprie emozioni, alle critiche, agli altri. Sbilanciarsi. Attenti a non cadere nell’indifferenza, degli altri, o nella nostra apatia.

Non lasciarsi trasportare dagli eventi, liberarsi dalla routine e dalle abitudini, attenti a non farsi imprigionare dalle regole del vivere comune.

Per questo sono sempre stata quella che doveva per forza andare oltre al limite, esagerare. Giocavo con il fuoco anche quando non andava fatto .

Per sentire la vita scorrere nelle vene, l’adrenalina, la follia dell’attimo e l’inquietudine dell’attimo seguente, i polmoni aperti, il cuore che scoppia.

Questa inquietudine mi fa muovere, mi aiuta a scoprire chi sono, mi fa camminare, mi mette alla prova in continuazione. Lungo questa strada mi sono aggrappata alla fotografia e non sono caduta nel vuoto.

Le emozioni si amplificano, i ricordi vengono imprigionati nella tela della nostra memoria. Niente viene perso, lasciato in balia del tempo. Tutto è dove dovrebbe essere. Così come deve essere.

Adoro il confronto con “l’altro”, l’incontro e lo scontro. Vedere le cose in un’altra prospettiva, imparare ad ampliare il modo in cui percepisco il mondo. Esplorare emozioni che non mi appartengono. Creare un contatto.

Credo molto nell’amicizia, nel legame che si forma tra persone che condividono un pezzo della loro storia. Sono i tratti di queste persone che mi fanno impazzire e non riuscirei a smettere di guardare. Sono i loro occhi e i loro modi che mi affascinano.

Sono le loro emozioni che stravolgono le mie.

Passo molto tempo ad osservare le persone, mi invaghisco della loro mimica, mi immagino la loro storia, i loro pensieri, la loro giornata.

Ho sempre amato i volti in particolare, li prediligo di gran lunga ai paessaggi. Solitamente fotografo persone amiche, la loro storia non mi è sconosciuta e attraverso la macchina mi immagino di riuscire a catturare un pezzo di quello che sono, io, loro, complici di aver colto insieme l’attimo.

Ma alle volte mi capita di voler cercare il particolare, il dettaglio o l’ emozione che non è chiara nemmeno nella mia testa, per questo mi capita di camminare per ore, da sola, cercando.

Nel momento in cui scatto la fotografia è tutto più definito. Sorrido sollevata.

Anche se non sempre viene come me la ero immaginata. Ma ciò rende tutto solo più affascinante : mi offre un’altra percezione.

Ho sempre creduto che una fotografia dovesse emozionare chi la guarda, ora penso che prima di tutto debba emozionare chi la scatta. È una visione forse un po’ egoistica dell’arte, ma soprattutto ne è una visione umile, senza pretese, semplice e senza fronzoli come dev’essere.

Fotografo per me, per mantenere in equilibrio il mio animo instabile, lunatico.

Le maschere mi hanno sempre incuriosito. Ti coprono, ti nascondono, ti proteggono : lo trovo ridicolo. Se qualcosa sta sul tuo viso necessariamente ti impedisce di respirare, di vivere.

La fotografia è il mio modo per togliermi la maschera, per essere me stessa, per stare nuda davanti a tutta la scuola.

Senza filtri per l’odore di sigaretta, senza pareti per i colpi al cuore.

Mettermi a nudo non mi spaventa, mi incuriosisce affrontare il futuro, è inevitabile, è il passato che mi inquieta. In qualche modo non sono mai riuscita a chiudere i ricordi nei cassetti, a sigillarli in una bottiglia in modo da averli lì, nel mio bagaglio, non sulla mia strada. Il mio subconscio prova spesso a rimuoverli, ma ovviamente non si possono mai cancellare, ci sarà sempre un colore, un odore, un’atmosfera che te li riporta alla mente, che te li sbatte in faccia con cattiveria togliendoti il respiro.

A volte sono le fotografie di oggi ad evocare ciò che accadde ieri. Quando succede sono pronta ad affrontarlo, quando vedo che con la mia fotografia ho il controllo della situazione allora non fa così paura. Detto io legge, non il mio subconscio, non la mia coscienza.

Così riesco a camminare guardando in avanti. A lasciare scivolare dietro le mie spalle ciò che non dovrebbe più condizionarmi ma che fa parte di me e lo farà sempre.

Così imbocco nuovi sentieri.

Adoro mettermi alla prova in questo modo.

Tutto ciò mi fa sentire viva, mi aiuta a dare un senso alle emozioni.

In questo modo riesco ad organizzare quello che provo, ad affrontarlo qualora sia necessario. Mi basta uno scatto, e quello che prima era caotico e indistinto d’improvviso assume una forma, un colore, un odore. Nel momento in cui capisci ciò che senti allora non è così difficile starci davanti.

Una fotografia non è lo scopo, non fotografo per fare una bella foto, ma essa è per me il tramite attraverso il quale il mio inconscio si lega alla realtà, per il quale le mie emozioni diventano concrete.

Attraverso le immagini mi metto a nudo, rinchiudo in esse una parte di me per poi osservarla. Analiticamente mi scruto come davanti a uno specchio, evidenzio i punti di forza e i difetti, ciò che andrà limato e ciò che invece dovrà essere esaltato. Nessuno dovrebbe compiacersi di se stesso, ma questo modo mi prendo cura della mia anima, mi voglio più bene.

Londoners over the border, di Elettra Paolinelli

Elettra Paolinelli — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 14:48:56 +0000

Una storia su Canning Town, Londra, UK. Reportage realizzato nell’agosto 2012 da Elettra Paolinelli.

Internauta alla continua ricerca di oggetti di mio interesse, come oggi si fa rovistando tra le informazioni multimediali ricercate su Google, Youtube e Facebook, ho cercato nel mondo.

Manovich sostiene che il mondo oggi sia una raccolta infinita e destrutturata di immagini, testi e altri record di dati; ed è nel mondo che ho trovato il database per raccontare una storia, una storia che narrasse l’assenza, una storia a proposito del vuoto, una storia che descrivesse la mancanza.

Questa è la storia di un “gap”, una storia sull’alienazione.

Vivevo a Londra, precisamente a Canning Town, ad Est della City.

Ogni sera tornavo a casa stanca e con gli occhi rossi, come me, frotte di pendolari si accalcavano sulla metro gremita, affollando lo spazio claustrofobico. Alla fermata “Canning Town” scendevano quasi tutti, e lì il flusso prepotente di uomini e donne si biforcava. Molti prendevano la mia strada, ma nessuno si parlava; tutti continuavano a camminare a passo spedito quasi ci fosse qualcuno ad inseguirli o stesse cominciando a piovere; ognuno a viso abbassato, molti con le cuffie alle orecchie. A volte incrociavo gli occhi stanchi di quegli abitanti-zombie, e quell’istante fugace mi faceva scorgere per un attimo la loro anima triste; alcuni consumavano bevande in piedi, avvicinandosi alla fermata del bus, altri chiaccheravano al cellulare o leggevano il giornale della sera, ma nessuno mi parlava mai. Quella massa multiforme di persone si disperdeva tra le viuzze, entravano dentro abitazioni sudate di umido, e venivano ingoiati da ascensori che sembravano serpenti famelici, ma nessuno si salutava, nessuno accennava un sorriso, nessuno si conosceva.

Nella strada verso casa respiravo l’odore acre delle ciminiere vicine, sentivo lo sfrigolio dei cavi elettrici sulla mia testa, e le sneakers ai miei piedi grattavano l’asfalto ritmiche, vedevo le finestre illuminate e sagome di persone che si muovevano all’interno di quei rettangoli luminosi, quasi fossero fotografie in movimento, ma erano tutti soli, sempre.

Vedevo micro-storie, micro-mondi dispersi in un magma di confusione e desolazione, vedevo esseri umani tristi e soli e incapaci di intessere relazioni, ognuno nel suo guscio, la sua piccola “monade”, la propria stanza.

La memoria che ho di questi luoghi e che ho cercato di raccontare attraverso il mezzo fotografico è una memoria grossolana, cruda e crudele, memore solo di cio che è a dismisura d’uomo, memore solo del caos di quelle notti calme, di quei luoghi paradosso, luoghi in cui il silenzio è sordità.

La mia percezione di questo quartiere si legava al concetto di violenza tenera, di angoscia tranquilla, di urlo silenzioso.

Come potevo raccontare tutto questo? La fotografia diventò così il mio unico strumento di narrazione di una quotidianità esasperata, disperata.

L’impressione visiva che Canning Town mi dava di se stessa, era di un luogo frammentario e disgregato, senza strutture, un pastone omogeneo di singolarità locali, distribuite casualmente.

Essa era per me assimilabile a una discarica opaca, impenetrabile allo sguardo, un luogo del caos, dove le tracce si confondevano, corpi e indizi scomparivano.

Solo la fotografia fermava per me gli unici attimi di senso, in questo panorama liquido e magmatico.

Di giorno ripercorrevo i luoghi di Canning Town secondo una modalità ondivaga, che tuttavia andava costruendo una sovrapposizione di storie, una stratificazione di vite ed eventi che diventavano mano a mano leggibili grazie alla rilettura di questi in chiave fotografica.

Questa “Londra oltre i confini” andava prima di tutto percepita, respirata, vissuta, e solo in un secondo momento raccontata per mezzo di fotografie.

Solo vivendo questi luoghi riuscivo a comprendere a pieno la loro anima, la loro essenza, la loro storia, bloccandoli in “frame” per mezzo delle mie fotografie, quasi si trattasse di un film che io avevo bisogno di bloccare per comprendere, digerire, vedere, discernere.

Il racconto diventava sempre piu intimo ed intento a ricercare le ragioni alienanti nei comportamenti piu semplici, quotidiani e radicati, nelle pieghe nascoste e insospettate delle storie umane.

Mi aggiravo con la mia macchina fotografica tra le stradine e i cavalcavia, le zone residenziali e i grattacieli, cercando un’omogeneità impossibile e documentando l’urbanistica fantasiosa, l’abbandono delle aree comuni, l’edificazione di fortezze private.

In questo quartiere nessuno era vicino di nessuno, e ogni casa, ogni persona era una singola entità disgregata dal contesto; nessuno si conosceva e tutti accuratamente si evitavano l’un l’altro. Ogni casa esibiva almeno due o tre grosse antenne paraboliche, quasi fossero bandiere pirata da sventolare sui tetti e qualcuno aveva murato addirittura le finestre dei piani inferiori. Di cosa avevano paura? Questo quartiere-dormitorio di giorno si trasformava in un quartiere fantasma dove rare apparizioni umane scandivano il mio lento peregrinare. Le persone si guardavano i piedi, guardavano i messaggi sul proprio Blackberry, ma non si guardavano mai attorno. Io invece mi fermavo, guardavo le case, le strade vuote e scattavo fotografie, avevo come l’impressione di essere la prima a rivolgere l’attenzione a quei luoghi di periferia. Mi sentivo come un’esploratrice che campiona per la prima volta la giungla vergine e come tale cercavo di capire le abitudini dei suoi abitanti, usi e costumi di un popolo così diverso da me. Ma ogni sforzo di comprensione era vano, ogni contatto bruscamente interrotto.

In questo rumore ottico in cui le relazioni scomparivano ed assieme ad esse il contesto si dissolveva, in questo spazio senza memoria in cui tutti i fenomeni diventavano virtuali, pensai che era inutile cercare un senso, perchè in esso si generavano significati fantasma, pure allucinazioni, causate dall’inerzia percettiva.

L’atto del fotografare diventava così sempre più un atto di documentazione, e mi appellavo con urgenza sempre maggiore alla potenza mostratrice della fotografia, a quella sua capacità congenita di additare la realtà, di dire solamente “Hic et Nunc”.

Non volevo dare un’interpretazione a ciò che vedevo, volevo solo dire: “Questo è quello che sta succedendo qui e ora”. Mi appellavo all’inconscio tecnologico di Vaccari, eppure la mia anima essendo lì presente non poteva che influenzare i miei scatti. Come secondo i principi della meccanica quantistica l’osservatore influenza l’esperimento, così nei miei scatti c’era molto più “me” di quanto volessi. Tuttavia quel modo di fare e intendere la fotografia, forse il più primordiale, quello che si illudeva di catturare la pura e semplice realtà, e che invece proponeva personalissime visioni, è forse da considerarsi oggi il più efficace per descivere una realtà, uno stato d’animo, una situazione in essere per cui è difficile trovare le parole.

Nel mio reportage, quando le parole risultarono fallaci nel descrivere la realtà, la pura immagine fotografica divenne per me l’unico mezzo possibile di narrazione del reale.

Testo e fotografie di Elettra Paolinelli.

Londoners over the border, by Elettra Paolinelli

Elettra Paolinelli — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 10:44:50 +0000

A story about Canning Town, London, UK. Reportage realized in August 2012 by Elettra Paolinelli.

An Internaut constantly looking for objects of interest, rather than rummaging through multimedia information acquired on Google, Youtube and Facebook, I searched in the world.

Manovich argues that the world today is an endless and unstructured collection of images, texts and other data sets; and so I found in the world the database for telling my story, a story about Absence, a story about the Vacuum, a story that describe Lack. This is the story of a “Gap”, a story about Alienation.

I lived in London, in Canning Town, East of the City.

Every evening I came home tired and with red eyes, like me throngs of commuters on the subway crowded the claustrophobic space. At Canning Town station almost everyone alighted, and there the overwhelming flow of men and women divided. Many went my way, but no one spoke and all of them continued to walk quickly, as if there was someone following them or if it was beginning to rain, each with his face lowered, many wearing headphones.

Sometimes I intercepted the tired eyes of those people-zombies, and in that fleeting moment I could see a glimpse of their sad soul; someone drank coke standing up, approaching the bus stop; others chatted on the phone or read the evening paper, but no one ever talked to me.

That mass of diverse people dispersed through the narrow streets, entered sweaty homes, and were swallowed up by lifts that seemed hungry snakes, but no one spoke a greeting, no one tried to smile, no one knew each other.

On the way home I breathed the acrid smell of smoke of the nearby, I felt the sizzle of electric cables upon my head, and the sneakers at my feet rhythmically scraped the asphalt, I could see the lit windows and silhouettes of people moving in those rectangles of light, as if they were photographs in motion, but they were all alone, always.

I could see micro-stories, micro-worlds dispersed in a jumble of confusion and desolation, I saw humans beings sad and lonely and not able to create relations, each in his shell, his little “monad”, his own room.

The memory I have of these places and that I tried to narrate through the photographic medium is a coarse memory, crude and cruel, mindful only of what is not in the measure of man, mindful only of the chaos of those quiet nights, of those paradoxical places, places where silence is deafness.

My perception of this district was tied to the concept of sweet violence, quiet anxiety, silent screams.

How could I tell this story? Photography became my only means of telling of an exasperated, desperate reality.

The visual impression that Canning Town gave me of itself, was of a piecemeal and disjointed place, without structures, a homogeneous mash of local singularity, randomly distributed.

In my opinion it was similar to an opaque landfill, impenetrable to the eyes, a place of chaos, where traces were confused, bodies and signs disappeared.

Only Photography could stop the only moments of meaning, in this liquid and magmatic landscape.

During the day I retraced the geography of Canning Town in a wavering manner, which, however, was building an overlay of stories, a layering of lives and events that gradually became legible thanks to a reinterpretation of these, in a photography key .

This “London beyond the borders” had to be first of all perceived, inhaled, lived out, and only in a second moment told through photography pictures.

Only by experiencing these places I could fully understand their soul, their essence, their history, by locking them in “frame” through my photos, as if it was a film that I needed to stop to understand, digest, see, discern.

The story became more and more intimate and more and more intent on seeking the alienating reasons in the daily and well rooted behaviours, in the hidden and unexpected recesses of the human stories.

I wandered around with my camera through streets and flyovers, residential areas and skyscrapers, looking for an impossible homogeneity, and by documenting the crazy city planning, the neglegt of the communal areas, the building of private fortresses.

In this borough, no one was neighbour to anyone, and every house, every person was a single entity, separated from the context; nobody knew anyone, and everyone carefully avoided each other.

Each house showed at least two or three large satellite dishes, as if they were pirate flags waving from rooftops, someone had even bricked up windows on the lower floors. What made them afraid? This dormitory-district during the day turned into a ghost neighbourhood, where rare human appearances marked my slow pilgrimage. People looked at their feet, looked at messages on their Blackberry, but they never looked around. But I, I frequently stopped, I looked at the houses, at the empty streets and I took pictures, I had the impression to be the first to turn my attention on those marginal places.

I felt like an explorer that for the first time samples the virgin jungle and, as such, I was trying to understand the habits of its people, their customs and traditions, so different from mine. But every effort of understanding was vain, each contact abruptly interrupted.

In this optical noise in which relationships disappeared and with them the context dissolved, in this area without memory, in which all phenomena became virtual, I thought that it was pointless to look for meaning, because it would only generate ghost meanings, pure hallucinations, caused by the inertia of perception.

The act of photographing became more and more an act of documentation, and I surrendered, with ever more urgency, to the demonstrative power of Photography, to its innate ability to pinpoint reality, to just say “Hic et Nunc”.

I didn’t want to interpret what I saw, I just wanted to say, “This is what is happening here and now”. I just appealed to the technological unconscious of Vaccari, but my soul being there and engaged it could not be uninfluential on the outcome.

As according to the quantum mechanics principles the observer affects the experiment, so in my shots there was much more of “me” than I wanted.

And yet such a way of intending photography, perhaps the most primeval, which had the illusion to capture the pure and simple truth and instead proposed very personal visions, is perhaps to be considered today the most effective in describing reality, a feeling, an intuition indescribable with words.

In my reportage, when words became fallible in describing what I saw, the pure photographic image became for me the only possible way of narrating reality.

Text and photos by Elettra Paolinelli.

Vancouver, city of contrasts, by Jon Guido Bertelli

Fabiano Busdraghi — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 19:41:46 +0000

Reaching for the Skies
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Text and photos by Jon Guido Bertelli.

Rain and an embrace of gray clouds welcomed me on my first visit to Vancouver, nevertheless I was so enchanted by the city that I decided to move there a few years later.

“RainCouver” as many residents jokingly call Vancouver, is not only the most expensive city in North America but has also one of the highest living standards in the world. An idyllically situated seaport it is the third largest metropolitan area of Canada, with approximately 2.5 million residents.

Alex taking a rest, wearing his always impeccably polished boots (reminiscent of his army days) on Blood Alley, a descriptive name left from the days when the old butcher shops used to pick up their deliveries there.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Vancouver is located on the Burrard Peninsula, between the Burrard inlet to the north and the Fraser River to the south, and is beautifully framed by the Strait of Georgia to the west and the picturesque North Shore Mountains (part of the Pacific Ranges) to the north.

Since that first visit to Vancouver I have been captivated by the magic of the city’s quick and constant changes in lighting: from soft to dramatic knife cutting shadows, bursting with rich contrasts, from vibrant colours to a softer palette of pastel shades and spectacular, monochromatic overcast tones accentuated by strokes of primary colors.

When the curtain of an overcast day lifts, the skyline of Vancouver glitters like a multifaceted prism, reflecting varied and richly coloured images unto the buildings, changing constantly when viewed from different angles with a backdrop of the beautiful North Shore Mountains.

White Tranquility
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Vancouver’s prominent Stanley Park, with its outstanding aquarium is 10% larger than New York City’s Central Park. Its bull’s-eye location gives visitors a 360-degree view of Vancouver when walking, skating or bicycling around the park and all the while enjoying the breathtaking views.

The city’s modern “Glass and Steel” buildings stand hand in hand in absolute harmony besides the older buildings of the city, juxtaposing the puzzle of the past with the new.

The character and soul of Vancouver breathes through everywhere, even in the smallest details of the city.

Dion, “Binning” along one of the many richly ornate Vancouver Downtown Eastside alleys.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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This is a city, which vividly stimulates one’s sense of creativity. People from all over the world have chosen to make it their home, adding to its cosmopolitan character, its culture, and history, bringing a wide variety of international restaurants that put a smile on any food lovers’ face. Vancouver is home to a renowned Art Museum, galleries, an Opera House and a Ballet hosting national and international artists.

Away from the glitzy downtown life, restaurants, clubs and such glamorous stores as Hermés, Louis Vuitton, Cartiér, Gucci, Prada and Burberry, roaring Lamborghinis, Ferraris and Porsches cruising the streets, multi million dollar houses and condominiums blending in with the city’s landscape, sailboats interrupting the straight and peaceful horizon line in the distance. As with so many other large metropolises, Vancouver also has a side in need of help and a facelift: the Downtown Eastside. The poorest area code in Canada, this older section in the historic heart of Vancouver provides a unique dimension to the city’s “glass and steel” character. These aging, often dilapidated buildings are the forgotten facades of a more glorious past.

Reaching for the skies, BC Place Stadium and condominiums, Vancouver.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Downtown Eastside, a city within a city, is the home of a disproportionate number of homeless people facing serious issues regarding drug addiction, mental and physical illnesses, violence, crime, abuse, sex workers and the highest HIV infection rate in North America.

More than thirty percent of the residents are indigenous, a ten times higher rate than any other place in Canada. More than sixty women have disappeared, presumably murdered in the neighborhood during the last decade. Even after the arrest of pig farmer William Pickton, now in prison as the mass murderer of Downtown Eastside, the trend continues, with the addition of vanishing men.

Because of Vancouver’s construction boom and the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, several hotels in the area that served as low-income housing have been demolished to make space for high-scale development projects. Housing activists have been demanding that the government build more social welfare housings and shelters for the homeless. Several organizations reaching out to the homeless are active in the area, among them the Anti-Poverty Committee, the Downtown Eastside Residents Association, the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) and so many others.

Anthony, reflecting on his girlfriend’s suicide and being robbed of his life savings.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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I spent a year walking the streets of Downtown Eastside, at first primarily interested in photographing the buildings surviving from an earlier chapter in the history of Vancouver. I used to have an automatic, preconceived and negative opinion of the homeless that I would encounter on my way, always trying to look busy and not to let our eyes meet, until the day when I met Alex, a bright homeless street veteran in his sixties. He approached me with a dignified “Good evening. How are you Sir?” Alex and I immediately clicked and found ourselves engaged in our first of many to come long discussions, not only about the problems of Downtown Eastside, but also about national and international politics, diet, health, art, botany, survival and so many other interesting topics.

Alex, a lively and friendly Dutchman by birth, with a big, fiery reddish beard contrasting with his deep blue eyes, gave me the opportunity to meet other residents of the Downtown Eastside, to befriend, photograph and interview them, giving me a much better insight into their lives.

Reflection in Flight, downtown Vancouvers.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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He used to work as a photo-camera technician for Polaroid, but was not able to keep up with the recent giant steps in the technology of digital photography and was quickly left without a job or new skills. He had part jobs here and there, but not enough to pay for his living expenses. He lost his home and gradually found himself homeless on the Downtown Eastside. Regardless of what happened in his life, he always tries not to let anything take away from his happiness to be alive and his cheerful voice can often be heard on the Downtown Eastside streets “I’m the luckiest son of a gun in the world”!

Dion, so amazing with numbers that he was not welcome to play at some of the Las Vegas’ casinos, was hit by a drunk driver in Vancouver while crossing the street and nearly died of the injuries. He also lost his home and found himself with an injured neck in a halo brace “binning”, picking up empty bottles and beer cans along the streets and alleys of Vancouver for deposit refunds, or anything else that he could find to make ends meet.

Lorna embracing her aunt in front of the “We can not forget” poster of 2008, in remembrance of the many young lives cut short, including their own kids.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Anthony, a proud Native American of the Cree/Saulteaux First Nations, with long black hair and piercing eyes, left his reservation of Poor Man in Saskatchewan, arriving to Vancouver as a native artist and a musician.

He taught Native American art history at college level and was the Director of one of Vancouver’s Art Galleries. Anthony is a traditional Native American singer, who also plays the flute and the drum. He has performed in Canada, the USA and Mexico. He even added his voice as a traditional singer on one of the multi award winning and Juno award nominated Canadian First Nation singer Sandy Scofield’s CD, Dirty River. Anthony never got over the tragic suicide of his young girlfriend of five years and being robbed later of his life’s savings, two devastating episodes that brought him unfortunately to the Downtown Eastside.

Enteing Downttown Eastside, Hastings Street, Vancouver.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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As he says ”It’s hard, very hard to get back up. To have the incentive or the strength to do anything!

Lorna, of a mixed Native American ancestry, has lived for the most of her life in the Vancouver Downtown Eastside. One of her daughters died of AIDS and another of an overdose in one of the Eastside alleys, reasons that keep her a staunch member in organizations committed to help the homeless, the women at risk and the addicts in her community.

Liza, from Flying Dust, a small Cree reservation in North Saskatchewan, with a population of just over 500 people, moved to Vancouver captivated by the life in the big city, but soon found herself in the Downtown Eastside trying to support her addiction. She is not only beautiful, but a kind and bright young lady who, at the age of 11 took upon herself the responsibility of caring for her siblings after their mother moved to Edmonton. Pregnant for the first time at fourteen, she now has ten children and is already a grandmother at the age of thirty-one.

Liza, a beautiful young lady, not only a mother of ten kids but also a grandmother at the age of thirty-one.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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She warned me not to blindly trust anybody in the area, even telling me once “I don’t cheat, I don’t lie and I don’t steal … that’s the real me. That’s me with a heart, I have a heart! I’ll give you what I have if I see that you need it, but come dark-time in my addiction, I will take everything you have of value”. Lisa was able to leave the Downtown Eastside and was able to kick the habit a couple of times, but sooner or later always found her way back there, as so many others do. With her head in her hands, she told me that the area is not only addictive to drugs, but also to the place itself, life and the people. It just draws you back in; it has a grip on you and doesn’t let go.

Amy, born in Edmonton, Alberta, but brought up in a small town along the Sunshine Coast, British Columbia, moved to Vancouver at eighteen. A “Tom Boy” as a kid, she was always trying to keep up with her three older brothers, drinking, going to bush parties and “doing stupid things” as she says.

Thornton Park Hotel, East Main Street, Vancouver
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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She left home at fourteen, quit school and decided to go prawn fishing, a well-paying job that introduced her to “coke” at fifteen. By the age of twenty-one, she was hooked on heroin. Trying to leave her addictions behind, she and her husband checked themselves into detoxification centers. Finally, both of them succeeded and were clean of drugs. Not only were they later able to buy a house, a truck, a boat, but they even had a son.

As Amy says, however, “My life is like a revolving door. The drugs took over again, even when I tried my hardest. Drugs linger like a bad smell that you can’t escape”. Looking up, her eyes filled with tears of despair, she told me that she had lost everything, including her precious two-year-old son, taken away and put into the care of a foster home.

Amy, who has constantly been fighting her drug addiction, says that drugs linger like a bad smell that you can’t escape.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Violet, a Saulteaux Native from Northern Manitoba, left home and her reservation while barely a teenager, shortly after her mother killed her father. She found herself homeless, an addict wandering around and trying to survive the streets of Canada’s main cities, ending up on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside thirteen years ago, sick, having lost one kidney to cancer, with pulmonary edema (fluids in the lungs) attributed to her bad heart. She is never certain whether she will even wake up the next morning.

Regardless of all her life’s misfortunes, Violet had the strength to defeat and remain free of illicit substances until the shattering death of her husband.

Not wishing young girls to end up in her same situation, she tirelessly tries to frighten and convince as many of them as possible to leave the area, telling them that they will sooner or later end up like her, an addict, sick, in a wheelchair: somebody who has lost everything dear to her, including her four children who were taken away from her.

Joe the pastor, preacher at the Carrall Street Church.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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She is a member of the Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction Society (W.A.H.R.S.), an outreach organization run by aboriginal people, which recognizes that the problems caused by epidemics, alcoholism, rubbing alcohol, Lysol, mouthwash, drugs and many other factors have hit the native population the hardest.

These are only a very few of the many devastating life stories that have found their way to the streets and dark alleys of Downtown Eastside, human dramas that could happen to any of us.

They live month to month on welfare cheques, barely enough to cover the rapidly increasing rents which displace the residents and create more homelessness.

Enteing Downttown Eastside, Hastings Street, Vancouver.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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Some of them are reduced to sleeping in doorways, under plastic sheeting or in cardboard boxes, looking for the comfort of some warmth from hot air-ducts during the winter, or simply finding refuge in a dirty, wet sleeping bag along the streets.

The City of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside (DTES) Local Area Plan is focused on helping its low-income residents, to improve the community, improve their quality of life, work for social justice and meet the many challenges brought by drug use, alcoholism, crime, housing issues, abuse, illnesses and unemployment.

The DTES works in partnership with the DTES Neighborhood Council, the Building Community Society and the Local Area Planning Committee.

Violet, holding up a photograph of herself with the certificate of being clean of drugs.
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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The council is committed to increase affordable housing for all residents and end homelessness by 2015. Vancouver is seeking to build approximately 500 new affordable housing units on city owned sites, as part of its More Homes – More Affordability program.

I have strong hopes that the plans and the optimism for a better future for these often forgotten people in the Vancouver Downtown Eastside will become a reality in 2015, bringing them out from the darkness and back to the light of a more dignified life.

For more information, please visit Jon Guido Bertelli homepage and take a look at these Vancouver Downtown Eastside websites: vandu, dnchome, Building Community Society.

Green & Blue Palette, Olympic Cauldron / Torch, Vancouver
© Jon Guido Bertelli
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All photographs are flukes: the problem with photography competitions

Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela — Wed, 28 Nov 2012 06:18:58 +0000

Text and photos by Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela.

One photograph is a fluke, and the photographer is a purveyor of flukes.

When I first started out in photography, I would think that I was not a real photographer because I felt like each of my images was a ‘fluke’. A fluke that I didn’t feel I knew, fully, how I actually achieved. In terms of lighting, posing, compositing – everything would feel almost arbitrary, especially as I was on both sides of the lens making self-portraits, often composing the shots blind. I would wait for the dawning of each ‘fluke’ feeling frustrated for all the substandard shots in between that gave me the nagging feeling that I wasn’t a real artist.

Sedimental: A picture we shot in 1 minute…
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
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I’ve learnt that this feeling is actually the normal mentality of an artist (whether or not I was a real ‘photographer’ in the most physical professional sense was more down to whether I made money from photography.) But I began to realise that to be an artist, you just have to create art, irrespective of how great or not it might seem to others. From day one of creating art, we are ‘artists’. My thoughts have since evolved to entertain the notion that all photography is somewhat about flukes, about luck and chance, and I refer to all genres of photography. Before this comment is taken as dismissive of skill and talent, I will explain what I mean. Some genres involve more luck than others; for example, shooting the perfect image of a bird of prey is about timing, waiting, being able to capture the bird in the right place in the frame, in position, in focus: and that bit of luck in getting the shot. So whilst luck is only part of the recipe, the only things – the research and the patience – don’t necessary stand alone as the qualification of being a photographer. So the notion of what ‘photography’ actually is comes really down to experience, the constant repetition of a set of skills and traits – and imagination.

The adrenalin: …a picture we set up for 5 hours.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
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In a different photography genre, for example, in tableaux photography that is set up and contrived for camera, the images might bend more in the post-production, to gradually meet the artist’s full vision, at leisure – like a painting. But for every photograph in existence, the sum total of its subject(s), its setting, mood, story are not all down to the photographer’s doing. Nothing really belongs to the photographer or is unique to them, or completely under their control. The person photographed by a street photographer for example, is their own self, styled themselves, choosing their pose of their own accord, within their setting. In fashion photography, there is creative input from stylists, from assistants; the models’ poses from a familiar cultural dictionary of body language copied from images seen before, with the photographer shooting them also with a multitude of iconography in their mind that they have ever visually experienced.

Contemplation: made with a butterfly shot in the Museum d’Histoire Naturelle. I nearly didn’t go to the museum, as I wanted to take a nap instead. So many of my images from this shoot would otherwise have been a different story.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
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Then there are all the unexpected things that happen during a shoot (any type of shoot) that the photographer will recount: when the burst of natural light came, or the model pulled a brilliant expression, a person accidentally entered the frame, and all the bits and pieces that fell into place that went toward the making of one picture. I could think of one unexpected quality for every one of my images. Everyone should be able to think of several random – strong or subtle – inspirations or references that goes into every one of their images. Even though a lot of my work is self-portraiture, featuring myself as the model whom I myself ‘style’, I felt even more than usual a force in action that would power my ‘flukes’ – if anything, I had to rely on flukes more.

Of course, it is the eye and skill of the person capturing and creating that makes the ‘photographer’. Whether the photograph is of a scene that had no interception from the hand of the photographer, or a set-up completely designed by them or another designer, it is the act of observation, angle and timing. It is the chemical reaction, between the subject and the camera, that constitutes the photographer’s mark. Even the photographer training on a workshop shooting a ready-made set-up has the opportunity to be creative. In the time they are given to direct, there emerges a window in which can be identified, even in its barest slither in a context otherwise devised by someone else, the creative input by that photographer.

One good picture does not make a ‘photographer’. All those things we associate with a good photographer: skill, or talent, or eye, can’t be faithfully conveyed in one single picture. It can give an overview, but not a conviction. Being a photographer is about capturing and creating images again, and again, and again; the ongoing functionality of production – both as a ‘photographer’ and as an ‘artist’. The persistence, the repetition, the accumulation of lots of those ‘flukes’ is the photographer’s real accolade. The measure is in their repeated persistence of making images happen: whether they are a wildlife, fashion, art photographer. It is someone who constantly instigates situations to shoot in.

The escape: The images for this were shot reluctantly on large JPEG when we ran out of memory card space after rowing out from our cabin to the other side of the lake.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
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And this is why I’ve always sensed something I didn’t quite like about photography competitions. The idea of being judged for one photograph actually means very little. Of course, some competitions invite small series of images for submission – but generally, it is one concept, epitomised by one image, that they are seeking. And it makes sense – after all, the judges are looking for as straightforward a task as possible, having to sift through possibly thousands of entries.

In rewarding one picture, we are congratulating a photographer on merely one ‘fluke’ they have experienced, on one single effort they may have exerted to produce one image, that is questionable as to how much input was given from other people, and that in itself gives no indication as to whether the person really should be congratulated, esteemed, and rewarded as a ‘photographer’.

Her fleeting imprint: Shot in a heavily-guarded abandoned mental asylum we managed to get into during its last few weeks before being demolished.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
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Humans want it easy. Humans want to simplify. Humans want to compare one thing with another one thing, and make a conclusion about which is better. So in photo competitions, it makes sense that we want to look at one picture, react to one picture, and congratulate that photographer often on the basis of a pigeonhole into which we have placed them. We don’t want to have to look at a person’s numerous bodies of work, to understand their ever-evolving desires, to understand their mind and their intentions – even if we did that, the unique make-up that we discover in each person’s lifetime of work would become too mind-boggling to be able to sit it beside someone else’s work and state who should win a prize.

Storm Door: Shooting this without any idea I would add ships, I was going to close the door, but casually dismissed it.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
Please visit All photographs are flukes: the problem with photography competitions for the full size image.

I am not saying photography competitions are bad or should not exist, or that I have never entered one, or will never enter one again. They can be very valuable experiences on which to hinge and market ourselves, and it is precisely that: being aware of their over-simplification and what they really are about. First, your work must stand a chance of randomly catching the attention of the judge within that one split second when they first flick through all of the entries, and if for whatever arbitrary reason your image does not connect with them in that time, place and split second, your submission was futile. On the other extreme, even if your picture goes on to win the competition, it is not your picture, not the way you contextualised it as part of your series or your body of work – it’s a picture that has been re-appropriated by the judge in their specific time, place and taste – it becomes theirs, it’s their choice of representation of the competition. What/who they pick will always be on their terms. And though the rewards (prizes, awards, exposure) may be great – and worth shunning all of this philosophical drivel I’ve written – deep down, the winning of a competition doesn’t prove anything about your photography, your abilities, the profundity of your work as a whole. It only proves that people enjoy that one ‘fluke’ you orchestrated, and decided to give you something in return, and to accept you into their circle, at least temporarily.

I speak particularly of those competitions that do not ask for anything specific, opening up a whole range of categories for submission, where the criteria is even more blurred. I have opened up photography magazines where a spread of readers’ pictures are displayed, everything from penguins to naked ladies, and wondered what I’m supposed to think as I look from one isolated diverse picture to the next.

Handbreak: The cars and tyre tracks in the Dubai desert were not ideal on first glance, but then became part of a Gulliver-esque narrative.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
Please visit All photographs are flukes: the problem with photography competitions for the full size image.

I think photography becomes a lot more interesting and meaningful when we actually take the time to appreciate an artist’s wider body of work and read about their background and their process, how they manage the unexpected alongside the orchestrated, how they go on to make another picture, another and another (which is exactly why I enjoy Camera Obscura, for the time it devotes to every artist’s piece – and the diversity with which different artists talk about their work). What makes an artist/photographer is their continued strain of creations, the gaps between their pictures as well as the pictures themselves, and their refusal to accept the non-existence of originality by restlessly remixing their inspirations in their own way.

Parasite: Originating from an outtake of me stooping over in a field, along with an outtake of the wood.
© Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela
Please visit All photographs are flukes: the problem with photography competitions for the full size image.

For more photos please visit Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela website and her facebook page.

First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor

Steven Nestor — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 07:52:52 +0000

Detail from Photogram, 2012 c/o Eastman Kodak & Dwayne's Photo.
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

Text and photos by Steven Nestor.

We are now universally used to and expectant of the perfect, pristine world that digital affords. For most consumers it is the only tool for photographing. If even considered, film is largely seen as being cumbersome, limiting and firmly consigned to the past. It was what most people’s early life was recorded on and certainly not part of today’s world of PS, delete or upload. When I asked 16-year-old summer students of mine if they had ever shot film, their faces frowned in puzzlement.

Shot in Trins, Austria, 1993 on Pentax K1000.
© Steven Nestor
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

“You mean that thing like a little tube you used to put in the camera?”

“Yes.”

“No.” A firm answer, but still confused by the oddity of the question. It was as though I had asked them if they still drew their water from a well.

Shot in Regensburg (Koeigswiesen) in May of 1994.
© Steven Nestor
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

Digital is the now, without beginning or end. There is no ‘first’ or ‘last’ image. The file numbers can go unnoticed behind concerns about pixels and megabytes. Moreover, the numbers 0, 12, 24 or 36 are utterly meaningless to most who now photograph.

When starting out in photography I avoided winding the film on to the camera dial’s first setting of frame ‘1’ so as to maximize the number of images I could take on this “little tube”. It was satisfying to squeeze as many as 39 frames out of a single roll of 36 exposures. A small victory for the dilettante. The minor risk of course was that the first frame might not “come out”. At the time, however, I don’t recall checking my negatives to see why. With an envelope of prints in the hand, that first image was either there or not. Sometimes though an overlooked sliver of an image had made it onto the negatives. Even if I did notice something was there, my eye would have skipped over it to the first complete frame.

In the early years of my photography good labs were hard to come by and the results very mixed. Scratches and fingerprints on negatives were more often than not the norm. Similarly, green, red or cyanic prints were easily explained away with the magical words, “It must be the film”. What did they care?

But what happened to those first frames? Sometimes in cocking the shutter I must have wound the film just enough and missed losing the frame. On other occasions the lab may have decided to cut it off from the strip as it was “ruined” anyway. What customer would want a half burned print? The larger commercial labs would even sometimes put a small removable sticker with helpful hints onto prints showing signs of motion blur etc. Then I bought a new Nikon and ditched my old Pentax. No more manual winding. No more half frames. It automatically wound on to ‘1’ and ended at ‘36’. The shot that might not come out was eliminated. A sort of semi pace towards digital was being made in the late analogue age and the reward of getting more frames out of a roll was forgotten. I had moved up a ranking in the amateur world where equipment takes precedence over vision.

Shot in Teramo, Italy, 1999 at friend's wedding.
© Steven Nestor
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

It was not until a few years ago that I was trawling through old negatives looking for images from the early 1990’s that I noticed one particular image that I had never seen before. Half of the subject – a friend in Germany – is lost in unintended exposure of the film to daylight so that the frame would have been automatically discarded in the printing process. The result is a sort of double exposure where daylight has insulted on the negative and burned off half of the frame and subject, never to be retrieved. Unmediated by lens, aperture or speed, light has triumphed destructively and a kind of ‘pyrography’ has emerged.

As a result of this find I starting using a fully manual camera more prolifically again and so automatically reverted back to trying to maximize the number of frames I could get out from a single roll. The first frame, happily compromised again, could now in many ways be the most flawless of the roll. It is also the perfect expression of analogue, of photography, of light and of destruction. And I have continued on and off with this deliberate hit and miss procedure. Either the frame is perfectly compromised or skipped. About a year or so ago I decided to examine all of the “lost”, half burnt frames I had and to see what, if anything, they might collectively say despite the diversity of time and subject matter.

Putting together this body of work I wanted to go a step beyond my fascination with old found photographs with their nostalgic and portal qualities. When working with the archieved image there are the usual questions surrounding it’s provenance, production and the issue of to what degree one restores the image. Here, however, the damage occurred at inception when I unconsciously – later deliberately – created seemingly meaningless partial frames to be later discarded. What attracts me beyond the age and personal connection to these images is the pronounced and profound element of light, which is normally and deliberately shut out for all but the briefest of moments. Whether a glow on the edge of the frame or near total erasure, these scorched images – these brilliant half-worlds – represent a moment that has been taken, that has been recorded: a singed fragment snatched from the destruction of a pyretic light.

Producers of film have always pointed out just how stable the medium is and how pigments will last for well over a century. However, the message on the box reads, ‘load in subdued light’. There is that risk of accidental exposure, of ruining the film. Light – the very basis of photography – is dangerous to the recording material. If uncontrolled, it wipes the film clean in one scorching instant, thus also obliterating what might have been a perfect frame, memory aid etc.

When initially squeezing in those extra frames I was not trying to make any sort of statement. It was when I examined that image of my friend in Germany that I saw a value and new reading of these first (and last) images. Many of these images, such as my first ever one from Austria in 1992, were only given life (or another dimension) through their partial destruction. Later, I could be deliberate with my film loading and imagine a possible reading, should the frame burn as I wanted it to. The first deliberately seared frame to work the way I hoped was that of the main railway station in Turin, taken on Kodachrome 64. I can read it – enjoy it – on a purely superficial level, or, given that it is the last year of Kodachrome, see it as a comment on the end of a specific era as well as reflecting on the fragility of the present.

This semi-erasure also captures the essence of how memory selects and sorts. What did I remember of a day trip to San Marino in 2006? Shafts of light through a non-descript church window. A man with a placard protesting his innocence in front of the palace. This almost completely erased frame of the San Marino landscape perfectly illustrates to me that vague, faded memory of a view I had stopped to photograph, to snap. It is confirmation that memory, in unison with time, is forever falling from our grasp and from what our eyes are projecting inwards. Although by depressing the shutter release we may be pausing time continuum, by also including the moment of destruction these images challenge the delusion of the alleged power of photography to halt time, to preserve memory.

While seemingly bland, even completely pointless, the most recent ‘first frame’ was particularly pleasing to produce and offered far more than I had imagined when standing in front of the subject. Firstly, there was the intrigue of encountering the Safe Surrender Site in the small mountain community of Groveland, California. Here an unwanted baby may be surrendered within three days of being born without fear of prosecution. Obviously there is an official sign indicating the presence of a surrender site, but what did I actually see and remember? What might the mother recall of the site when abandoning her baby? The sign? Or maybe the neatly coiled umbilical like hose at the side of the fire station? This resulting half burned image testifies that I was at the site, framed and recorded it. However, I only remember that hose. That’s what struck in my mind. And that’s what was left in the recording process. That neatly coiled hose descends from a permanent erasure.

Shot on Kodachrome in Turin, Italy, 2009.
© Steven Nestor
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

Going through my 30+ images I was reminded of another facet to this work. As many writers on photography have pointed out, the specter of death is something we experience when reviewing photographs and catching a glimpse of where we are going by seeing were we no longer are. Here, however, that flicker of the end has been at once augmented and usurped. Not only is there that eternally snatched moment from the past, but there is now a new dimension: the eternal moment of destruction of the film and partial erasure of that which has been framed. Although there certainly exists a link between the specter of death and photography, these first (and “last”) images also contain in equal measure both destruction and a curious chanced beauty. The coincidental burning of the frame and the moment tempers life’s moribund condition and animates that spared fragment.

Home. Shot in Dublin, Ireland, 2012.
© Steven Nestor
Please visit First/Last Images, by Steven Nestor for the full size image.

Because, like us, film is physical, delicate and subject to aging (rather than corruption in digital), and because life has only one conclusion, I feel that these compromised moments are the more beautiful for it. The message cannot be said to be exclusively one of demise; rather it is the curiosity of the partially singed frame, the partial recall. The destructive and unregulated element of light animates this otherwise ‘flat death’, sending a spike into the two-dimensional plane. While the chance or deliberate ‘yellow and/or red edging’ can be read as a manifestation of a loss of memory and time, it is also death’s competitor through a beautiful distraction: thus, distraction via destruction. It is now (and for the lifetime of the eternal moment) a new first message, obscuring what is usually reserved for primacy of place.

When digital first arrived I offhandedly rejected it. For me it was cheap and nasty and I became immediately despondent for the seemingly immanent demise of analogue. However, digital’s near complete dominance of the photographic world has conversely injected more life into analogue than analogue itself could ever have done alone. Analogue’s great “nemesis” has pushed the user closer to their preferred medium, prompting a fuller exploration of film as seen for example in the work of Miroslav Tichý or Tacita Dean. Those still choosing film over digital are free to embrace and exploit its physical limits and flaws, whereas in the past such compromised frames as these First/Last Images would more likely than not have been rejected out-of-hand or cropped to exclude the unwanted “damage”.

Please visit Steven Nestor website for more photos and stories.

Fotografie di sogni, di Sara Bugoloni

Fabiano Busdraghi — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:28:30 +0000

Testo di Sara Bugoloni e Virginia Sommadossi, fotografie di Sara Bugoloni.

Una delle cose più difficili da imparare per chi lavora con le immagini è il paradosso di come molte volte la realtà per essere recepita come tale, debba essere snaturata in qualche modo. Di solito si fanno prove su prove per capire quanto forzare la mano per avere il ritorno sperato, sono quasi formule matematiche facilissime da sbagliare.

Un concetto simile potrebbe essere applicato al ricordo. I filtri immaginifici che mettiamo al nostro cervello quando ricordiamo, seppur distanti da dati oggettivi di realtà, danno la vera idea di quello che è stato quel preciso momento. Sono le contingenze, le sensazioni, le emozioni che vanno a lavorare sul dato di realtà riempiendolo del significato reale.

Gli scatti di Sara sembrano attingere proprio ai ricordi. Sono sequenze isolate di una storia complessa ma perfettamente sintetizzata nel minuscolo istante del suo click.

Certe sue finte imperfezioni analogiche, le sfocature, la saturazione nelle sue immagini vanno ben oltre quello che pensiamo solo di “vedere”, fino a farci “sentire” qualcosa di più profondo.

Sara ha un’incredibile capacità di veicolare mondi emotivi: il suo, quando scatta paesaggi che odorano di vita, ma anche quello delle persone che sceglie di fotografare.

Avviene in questo modo una ridefinizione dei campi emozionali ed estetici dove l’immagine non sembra più lavorata dagli strumenti fotografici ma da quelli della mente.

Non è un caso che i soggetti delle foto siano ragazze che con lei hanno condiviso pezzi di vita, e non modelle scelte attraverso criteri di fisicità.

In qualche modo il tema della realtà, dell’amicizia, del cammino da percorrere e dei luoghi dove stare, del passaggio dall’adolescenza all’essere donna sono impliciti in ogni suo scatto.

In alcuni di essi è facile immaginare una specie di simbiosi tra fotografa e soggetto che si ritrovano ad avere quasi sempre la medesima età, in altre sembra che da un momento all’altro quei visi abbiano voglia di raccontarti o mostrarti le loro vite, i pensieri più profondi, le necessità, le voglie.

Che ritragga volti o paesaggi non ha importanza, l’intensità delle storie che vi sono dietro sembrano essere un filo organico e potente legato anche ad ognuno di noi tanto da farci cadere, così come accade al cinema o a teatro, in un processo di immedesimazione naturale, da farci credere che quelle foto appartengano anche ai nostri più intimi ricordi.

di Virginia Sommadossi

Faccio molto spesso dei sogni. E li ricordo, a differenza di molte persone.

Non sono quasi mai bei sogni, non sono quasi mai tranquilli. Vengo condizionata dagli eventi, dalle persone, dalle sensazioni. A fine giornata metto tutto nel frullatore, condisco con una bella dose di subconscio e lascio che la mente annebbiata dal sonno faccia il resto.

Al mio risveglio annoto il mio sogno: annoto le impressioni, annoto le sensazioni o solo un frammento, un’immagine, una frase.

Ho sognato Eni, la ragazza con cappotto e capelli blu: l’ho sognata nella sala da pranzo di una bellissima casa. Solo che non l’ho sognata a tavola. Lei si era nascosta dietro una grande tenda bianca e tutti l’avevano scambiata per un fantasma. Eni ama l’acqua, ama il mare. Eni cambia colore di capelli a seconda dei periodi della sua vita.

Le ho chiesto se c’era un posto che secondo lei era particolare. Lei mi ha portato in un antico cimitero, vicino ad un’alta chiesa. Prima di iniziare abbiamo fumato una sigaretta, immaginando le storie della gente sepolta là sotto. Ho fatto allontanare Eni per farle una foto, e quando è tornata mi ha detto: ” Mentre ero laggiù si sono mossi dei fiori.. Se ci pensi stiamo camminando su un sacco di corpi”.

Ci siamo spostate in piscina, il riflesso verdino della luce attraverso l’acqua, l’odore di cloro e il vapore che saliva leggero.

Il costume rosso, il rumore di un corpo che infrange la superficie lisca dell’acqua, il trucco sbavato e i capelli bagnati, in una mattinata nuvolosa d’ottobre.

Le mie foto sono impregnate di questi odori, colori, rumori; sensazioni che vorrei fare uscire e colpire chi le vede, rievocando le medesime emozioni.

Leggo molto. Leggo dei libri e immagino nella mia testa delle scene, immagino i personaggi, il colore dei capelli del protagonista e il sapore del tè che sta bevendo.

Alcune frasi del libro si imprimono nella mia testa, alcuni passaggi diventano scene della mia vita, alcuni modi di fare diventano miei.

Adoro i dettagli, potrei vivere di dettagli, li colleziono. La trama di una sciarpa, la cicatrice sul dorso di una mano, le lentiggini di un naso e il colore di una foglia.

Sono quei dettagli che rendono tutto reale, vivo, tangibile.

Vivo di quei dettagli che caratterizzano la mia vita, la mia gioventù.

La giovinezza è un periodo bellissimo e terribile allo stesso tempo.

Siamo degli ossimori, siamo contrari accostati, costantemente divisi tra due elementi, tra sensazioni, tra stati mentali, oscilliamo attirati da poli opposti e spesso sbagliati. Siamo consapevolmente incoscienti, condizionabili ma sicuri, mutevoli ad ogni sguardo e paurosamente unici.

Pensiamo di essere consapevoli di ciò che stiamo attraversando ma in realtà non lo capiremo finché non sarà finito.

Funziona sempre così: si fa fatica ad apprezzare il valore delle cose finché non le si può più avere.

Ho il bruttissimo vizio di proiettarmi in avanti nel tempo, di pensare a “dopo”, a “domani”. Faccio fatica ad essere presente hic et nunc, se non in rare occasioni.

Le fotografie servono ad ancorarmi al presente, ad avere la parvenza di aver catturato e fermato qualcosa per sempre. Come il soffio di vento tra i capelli di una persona, quel vento che non soffierà mai più nello stesso modo tra quei capelli, perché il momento è così effimero da non ritornare mai più.

Le immagini sono la prova di esserci stata, in quel momento, in quel posto, con quelle persone e quello sguardo e quel sentimento nell’anima. Quella prova che nessuno, nemmeno io, potrà dimenticare.

Parlare delle mie foto è come parlare di me, perché ognuna di esse racchiude una parte di me stessa.

di Sara Bugoloni

Small Town Inertia, an interview with Jim A Mortram

Fabiano Busdraghi — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 10:47:17 +0000

Gonzalo Bénard: Small Town Inertia: do you want to explain the title or the story behind it?

Jim A Mortram: Small Town Inertia is a long form documentary and environmental portraiture series that I have been working upon for the last 3 years. It concerns itself with the real life stories of several people within a 3 miles radius within my local community in Dereham, East Anglia in the UK. The title stems from the notion that many people end up and stay here even though they desire to leave.

  I entered into the series with the notion that everyone has a story and with a desire to afford a voice to those that often have no platform to communicate their story. Themes have varied from person and situation. I’ve reported about isolation, poverty, drug abuse, homelessness, self harm, mental illness, juvenile crime, epilepsy though for myself the over riding experience has been one of endurance in spite of the impossible walls life often presents to us. Wall’s that box us in, wall’s that separate us, wall’s to climb to be set free.

  Small Town Inertia reports from within these documented lives. Lives lived in the now. Lives lived within times of much change. As the cultural, political and economic landscape changes these stories depict the final destination for the results of many of those high up and far away decisions and influences. These photographs and supporting stories depict the full stop of the Welfare State cuts, Housing Benefit cuts, Health cuts, loopholes and failures of systems and what happens when the heart of a community is slowly eroded. They also depict the lives of those hanging on, bowed yet not broken, of lives where a fight to survive is very real. Fighting apathy, addiction, fighting loneliness, illness all the while clinging to self-respect, adrift in the community, in life, but not yet lost.

Gonzalo Bénard: Everybody can see the tremendous quality of your photography, even on internet where sometimes we can’t see it properly, so let’s not talk about it and let’s go beyond the technical stuff. Since I know your work you’ve been always focused on what it is to be human, bringing naked-fragile minds through your portraits. What’s the relation that you have with them all to achieve such deepness and honesty when doing a portrait?

Jim A Mortram: I always treat people, as I myself like to be treated. You can never feign nor fake interest in a person. I’ve never singled out people with an eye that they might make a good story for example; it’s a very organic evolvement. Though every person I’ve photographed I’ve met as a stranger over time bonds form, trust very much has to be earned. People are very giving and that humbles me greatly, my greatest debt is always to the person the other side of the lens. It’s such a great honor to be accepted and brought into another person’s life and given the access to document it. I’m sure I could work in a faster fashion but for me long form documentary is where my heart is. Often I’ll visit people and not even take an image, just talk and more importantly listen, and I listen more than I shoot. I have an equation that I always bear in mind Talk more than you shoot and listen more than you talk and it serves me well. I break shoots up into periods of straight documentary and periods so shoot portraits, make interviews and shoot video.   

The most wonderful outcome of the series is seeing the positive effects that it has upon the people featured within the series, our very real bonds and the sense of community, both with the people I photograph and from the wider photographic community itself whom have been of outstanding support.

Gonzalo Bénard: I know that your main job is to be a carer, but your hobby became a continuity of that. Do you feel a carer when you’re photographing them?

Jim A Mortram: That’s a really interesting question and something I’ve often mused on. My conclusion is that being a Carer, especially for a loved one, a member of the family has influenced me as a person and those experiences evidently trickle down and appear in my personality now so are present when I shoot. It’s a high stress situation working as a Carer and you need to develop many skills you’d never use in everyday life, elements such as thinking really fast in serious situation, life threatening ones from time to time, acute patience and knowing when to shut up and listen, to understand what a person needs when they can’t always communicate. All these have had a real impact on the way I communicate and especially listen during shoots but I have never felt like a Carer, everyone I shoot is just like me, were all human being regardless of what we might be experiencing, I always take that into every situation I go to document.

Gonzalo Bénard: Do you feel that for them is important you to be there and in some way leaving a register in your photographs? Do you feel this ex-change when you’re with them, being important for you to photograph and for them for being photographed?

Jim A Mortram: Yes. Very much show and for many reasons. Initially it’s to have an opportunity, ANY opportunity to share their experiences and to be heard. It’s, I feel a really empowering step for the people I work with on these long form series to make the decision to get involved, stay involved. It’s a way for many people to take a positive step, to maybe take some control where there might be a huge absence of any control in their lives. It’s also a mirror for many people, it might be the first time that they have paused for thought as every day is just surviving, enduring and when you live just to make it through one day to the next it’s often hard to distance yourself from that experience and take a moment for reflection.

Gonzalo Bénard: Do you want to share a special moment with any of the people you shoot towards your photography or you being photographer?

Jim A Mortram: I’d first encountered Shaunny totally by chance as I’d taken a street shot of him taking his shirt off outside a pub in Market Town. Subsequently that shot went on to place 3rd in the Photo Radar POTY (Documentary) and I wanted to find out who it was I’d made this random street image of.   

Market town is a small place and it did not take too long to find someone that knew someone that could put me in touch with Shaunny. I got an email and arranged a meeting at his home. At this time I was still borrowing a camera and lenses so I’d picked them up the morning of the shoot along with for the first time a 50mm.

  My sessions always work the same. There is a lot of talking. I’ll always set out what the project is about, where images will be shown etc and then we really get into exploring life. Many times the people I shoot have no significant opportunity to talk, open up or be listened to. I like to ask a question then let things roll, to let the person reveal as much as they are want to share and interject with further questions throughout the conversation making fresh junctions together, seeing where it takes us.  

I’d started with a 28mm, a f2.8 and the light was very dark that day and the D200 I was using was not the best camera for an interior, little light and so I was pretty much forced into putting the 50mm f1.8 to the body to give myself a little more room to play with.   This first shoot with Shaunny was one of the first that I’d really explored intense 1 on 1′s. Walking into a total strangers house was quite something but my own fears were suppressed by the desire to do justice to what was happening within the room. Shaunny was opening up more than I had expected. Within 15 minutes of arriving he was opening his soul to me, every pain, loss, regret began to flow forth, at first just a trickle but soon becoming a river that was to burst it’s banks.  

“I never talk to anyone about this stuff” Shaunny said as we talked through the loss of failed relationships, finding his Mother passed away at 15, the death of his young children, his battle with chronic back pain due to an accident, his self medication with alcohol.   

“Do you want to stop? I can put the camera down at any time” I told him, we were very close, the 50mm forces you to use your legs as a zoom so I was maybe 1 foot away from Shaunny, both of us standing parallel to the single window in his flat. Winter skies outside, I remember someone revving their car, redlining it, testing the engine outside a monotone drone that seemed to amplify the words, the stories Shaunny was sharing. There was no longer a camera between us. I often look over the viewfinder so actual eyes can lock, I shoot manual so that was spot metered and taken care of, shooting wide open at f1.8 hand held is tricky at the best of time and as Shaunny’s first tears started to come I fought to keep my own hands from shaking.  

“Do you want to stop mate, I don’t have to photograph this” I asked again “No, I want you to, this is the first time I think I’ve ever opened up about these things, I want people to know I have regrets, that I am sorry, that I’m not who they think I am, I want people to see that I hurt too”.

  Shaunny saying that was a revelation for me. I could easily have put the camera down had he not said that. In that moment I knew that to not do my best in this situation would be a dereliction of duty. Here I was, in another mans home, toe to toe with him baring his soul and tears, very old, bitter, painful and real tears spilling from his eyes and I felt for the first time the burden of a very wanted responsibility. I could feel myself totally engaged in this moment, this shared moment and also aware of controlling the camera, probably nervously as I’d never used a f1.8 50mm before so I was as nervous as all hell of getting it wrong but everything was happening so fast I just had to let the fear go, rely on instinct and carry on.  

I shot a lot in 10 minutes, maybe 40 images and most all with Shaunny looking right into the camera, right into me, right into the audience. These were intense shots. Being so close to another human being in pain, sobbing their heart out. As Shaunny reached the climax of his very personal cathartic out pouring I took one last shot placed the camera to one side “Mate, that was amazing. Have you any idea how much that touched me. I’m almost in tears too! How do you feel?” I asked. Shaunny drying his tears looked up and at me and said, “Fucking brilliant mate, I feel fucking brilliant. Like a weights gone. Thank you.”

  This really choked me. Thank me? I’d done nothing. Pressing a shutter is no big mystery to me. I’d not expected this day to unfold anywhere close to where its destination eventually was. It was becoming a moment of very real clarity for me too. These moments were teaching me why I had to pursue the Small Town Inertia series, that every person has their story, tales of loss, tales of joy, endurance regrets and hopes of redemption. Instead of 15 minutes of banal transient fame they deserve, instead of being the focus of an imposed ego destined to be art on a wall we all deserve to be listened to at the very least within our lives.

 I put my arms around Shaunny and gave him a hug “You don’t have to thank me mate, thank yourself, you found it in you to face all these things, to get them out. You feel the regrets you do, they affect you. You’ve shown that in extraordinary circumstances today. I’m proud of you… be proud of you too. “  

I packed my gear away and as I left I told Shaunny that I’d sit on the images for a while and visit again with a print, if he wanted them public we’d go from there. When I got home I was relieved the shots had come out at all. Whilst editing them I found the shots with open eyes a little too obvious and they somehow through all their evident pain lost some intensity and they did not really reflect the most poignant moment of that morning. The very last shot however did. When Shaunny paused for that final moment, tears upon his face with eyes closed finally reflecting upon the life, his life and all it’s pain and all his regrets that he had just fought into and excised and shared for me epitomized the pain, struggle, endurance, reflection and acceptance of that cold morning shared in a flat with a stranger. A few weeks later I returned with a print. I was weary, would Shaunny be pleased, would he not want to share the image at all. My fears were allayed instantly. Shaunny loved the image, was proud of the day. We’ve gone on to share many other moments together as I’ve documented his life and the portrait we made together hangs on his wall still.

Gonzalo Bénard: You’re creating a relation with them, only that way you can also have the honesty in your work that is so important, and I guess that this is not a short time project but a longer one. Do you want to show the evolution of being alive in such register?

Jim A Mortram: Absolutely. I could not see myself working in any other way than long form. Without the time invested I think I would document in a much shallower, ephemeral way so taking months, years to constantly document and share it gives the series context, there is a evolution within the lives, to tell any story you have to do more than read chapter one you have to read from the front to the back cover.

Gonzalo Bénard: Which is the evolution you noticed more since you started this social photographic work till this latest one you’re still developing?

Jim A Mortram: I firmly believe that you never reach a destination; I’m constantly moving forwards in terms of the way I do things mostly as I believe we never stop learning. The largest constraints to the work are financial; it’s hard to self-finance travel, film, equipment, bills etc when you pay for everything from Carers Allownce Benefits and that’s frustrating but not enough of an obstacle to stop my work on these series.

Gonzalo Bénard: Apart from the exposure you’re getting with your photography that can and should bring more awareness to our society, is there a immediate and practical help you’re getting or can get doing this work with/for them?

Jim A Mortram: I’ve had a wonderful reaction from so many photographic peers, curators and editors, something that began slowly and led to a point where I have a wonderful network of friends that help out in many ways which is something I value so dearly. RE the project I get no financial help outside the occasional donation, no Arts grants etc. One company that has helped me has been the UK Office of Hahnemuehle papers that were just fantastic in supporting my last exhibition, without their help the show could never have taken place at all.

Gonzalo Bénard: Of course that there’s always people who think that you’re taking advantage of them, and I’m saying this by some comments I read on an article about your project on BBC news, maybe from people who never did anything useful nor are aware of your real work. Is there anything you want to share to our readers who don’t know you?

Jim A Mortram: It’s easy for people to make a snap decision when looking at a series or a single image, I can understand that and honestly many of the situations people I work on stories are in, I’ve experienced myself so I have a real and true empathy, a connection with them and that’s mutual. I’ve always made sure everyone I’ve ever worked with fully understands the project, consent is always the first element discussed and I’ve never had a complaint from anyone that’s been a part of a series in fact it’s just the contrary as my phone often rings with people wanting to do it, to be involved. What people maybe don’t understand is the depth of commitment between all the people in the series and myself, it’s long term and very real.

Gonzalo Bénard: How can someone take part on this project or how can someone help you/them on this Small Town Inertia?

Jim A Mortram: The most important thing I would always say is to view the images in context with the interviews and testimony upon the Small Town Inertia site or the Aletheia Photos site of which I’m a member. If anyone would like to help the project there is a donate link upon the Small Town Inertia site.

Portraits from Jaffa, by Bar Am-David

Bar Am-David — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 06:21:46 +0000

Photos by Bar Am-David, text by Bar Am-David and Eli Am-David.

Tel Aviv is divided into nine districts that grew up during the city’s short history. The most notable of these is Jaffa, the ancient port city out of which Tel Aviv grew. This area is traditionally made up of a greater percentage of Arabs but recent gentrification is attracting a young, professional population and Israelis.

The rational for visual Jaffa voyage lies in the social political background use of the photographs containing the cultural practices that emerge from the use of these images. Furthermore at the photographic journey I created a conceptual substructure for people to be involved and to take action upon the forgotten back yard of the main metropolitan in Israel.

The late modern history of Jaffa starts with the Ottoman conquest. Only in 1654 the “Latin hostel” was established by the order of the Franciscans, who were responsible for the affairs of the Christians in the Holy Land a few years earlier by 1642, an attempt was made to build a similar hostel entrance “cave” used to store the pilgrims until the arrival of officials from Ramle or Gaza. On a later stage they were established the Armenian monastery and the convent Greek – Orthodox who also served as hostels. Construction of these buildings was used as a lever to the reestablishment of a permanent settlement in Jaffa.

Beginning of the permanent settlement in Jaffa built friendly relations between the Ottoman Empire and France which influenced the increase in traffic of goods at the port. Thus we find in Jaffa in the settlement a variety of Muslims, Christians, European and few Jews.

General Napoleon Bonaparte who arrived in Jaffa on the third of March 1799 found a fortified city with a large garrison. Napoleon was able to capture the city on the seventh of March 1799, so he went north to Acre. He left in Jaffa the injured soldiers in the hospital that was set up in the Armenian monastery. He returned to Jaffa at the end of May 1799 when he retreated from Acre.

After the conquest of Jaffa there was a beginning of process of re-construction and production by the local ruler Mohammed Abu sprout and with the help of the British army led by General Sidney Smith. In 1820 Jaffa Khaled estate was founded by a Jewish Rabbi Isaiah Ag’imn Istanbul that marks the beginning of renewed Jewish community in Jaffa.

In 1831, the army of Muhammad Ali conquered Jaffa as the rest of the Land of Israel. Ten-year reign in Jaffa established around the city’s neighborhoods with Egyptian characteristics. In 1840, Jaffa returns to Ottoman rule and the city and the port continue to evolve and grow. Outside Jaffa’s neighborhoods were created. First of all, the Americans built the “Church of the messiah” (1866) that was sold to the Germans by leaving Jaffa to the Templers who continue to use the American colony in homes they themselves built.

In the years to come the City of Jaffa continues to grow in all directions. The inhabitants make the port a main orange marketing export centre under the brand “Jaffa oranges”. New Jewish neighborhoods such as Neve Tzedek (1887), Neve Shalom (1890) were established. A new paved railroad track to Jerusalem was inaugurated in 1892.

In 1900 was laid the cornerstone of the famous clock tower of Jaffa marking 25 years to the rise to power of Sultan Abdul Hamid II. In 1909 at the northern part of Jaffa was founded the first Jewish independent neighborhood called Achuzat Bayit which eventually becomes the first quarter of the first Jewish city named Tel Aviv. As a result of the 1948 independence war the two cities of Jaffa and Tel Aviv were united to one of the two main metropolitan cities, including Jerusalem, in Israel.

As to my personal response in which these images increasingly rivals the normative world and in which these photographs should be instrumental in shaping our collective and individual conceptions of reality. The Voyage to Jaffa means to inspire and motivate the public and support any opinion that will emphasize actual aspects within the social and the political conflict that surround Jaffa as a micro cosmos of the Middle East regional conflict. The collection of Jaffa photographs aim to present the diversity, the complexity of the different societies and its inhabitants by showcasing some mainstream and some alternative images.

In my opinion, the cultural landscape of Jaffa must engage the viewers emotions on multiply levels, and the viewer should be a real partner in a holistic outlook of the several photographs. The photographic art as shown partly in this voyage has the ability to put through a visual complex throughout time and different lifestyles.

In my mind’s eye, it seems to be required to create multiply visual modes that sometimes are not acceptable by the mainstream of society. It also enables us to show a wide spectrum of emotions and mental states. Jaffa is a typical micro cosmos of this spectrum. I know from a personal experience that a subjective view of photographic art is unavoidable.

However I tried to convey to the viewer a complete portfolio of images and hidden messages to produce identity and involvement. Furthermore by offering materials reflecting visual culture in human geography as well as cultural memory and visual activism I hope to evoke a deep and honest public awareness.

This special photography experience serves as a basic media tool and as a language of art in an ongoing social dialog. It also enables us to show a wide spectrum of emotions and mental states in an immigration oriented and multicultural country. The photographic journey through Jaffa highlights the power of symbols skillfully and wisely.

Such photographic works can encourage directly or indirectly a social public discourse and shedding light on potential actual solutions.

Jaffa is the most celebrated place in Israel, where Israelis and Arabs live in peace together despite the conflict. My purpose was to examine the lifestyle of this particular place and to look at how ordinary people survive in their extraordinary circumstances. These photographs do not pose solutions but serve as a reminder of enduring spirit through the most challenging adversity.

For more information and photos, please visit Bar Am-David website.