Archive for category Photography That Matters

End of Labor Town: Dumping Ground of Old Men in Japan

These are not the view of Japan that we normally see. Shiho Fukada shows us how some elderly people in Japan fare. It is not a story unique to Japan.

SEE http://www.socialdocumentary.net/exhibit/shiho_fukada/728

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Pearl Harbor Brownie

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Evgen Bavcar: The Blind Photographer

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Self portrait by Evegen Bavcar

Photography has always been thought about as “another,” way of seeing.

And it is.

But, usually, we think about that as a person looking through the camera, seeing what’s there, and, through the magic of the camera and the film -or digital- capture process, one sees the world in different way.

More advanced photographers and appreciators of photography then allow for the transformative recognition of the quality and angle of light, of the Decisive Moment, of the power of distance to subject or, even, luck or magic.

It is this latter idea that infuses the work of Evgen Bavcar ((“E-oo-gen Ba-oo-char”), the Slovenian photographer is completely blind, completely eccentric and his images are totally wonderful. Read the rest of this entry »

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Dhiraj Singh: Video Biographer

“My name is Dechen.”

Watch this touching video done by Dhiraj Singh.

He did an interesting thing: A Video Biograph.

In a way, all Visual Journalists who do stories on people, are doing “biography,” but with the addition of audio, where the subject can speak for themselves (edited, of course), where the image-maker can animate the images and drive the viewer’s emotions, the subject of the story becomes more “alive,” the depth is ratcheted up, and, potentially, the medium is beginning to resolve the age old struggle of photojournalism: Who’s viewpoint is this about? The subject’s or the photographer’s? Read the rest of this entry »

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Dhiraj Singh: The (New) Eyes Of India

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From “Six Feet Under,” ©2009Dhiraj Singh

For more work by Dhiraj Singh, SEE: http://www.dhirajsingh.com/01.htm

Dhiraj Singh is a Photojournalist who lives in Mumbai, India. His work has been published in numerous international magazines and online journals, including Newsweek, Vanity Fair, msnbc.com, The Wall Street Journal, L’Expresso, and, many others. He has won numerous awards (see his “bio,” on his site, above) and participated in many exhibitions. His pictures of the Mumbai terror attacks in 2008 were part of the prestigious group exhibition titled, ‘Bearing Witness’ held in Mumbai in 2009.

Documentaryshooters is honored to have permission to publish Mr. Singh’s work. We feel he has the insights and skills to show India as it is, depicting its greatness and its struggles, its deep and ancient soul as well as its modern and energetic heart. He, as no other photographer has, since, the great Raghu Rai’s seminal work of the 1970’s, ’80’s and 90’s, not only shows India and the sub continent, he makes us feel it. Read the rest of this entry »

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Alan Berner And The American West

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Harold G. Olson and his goat Buddy,

Stuck, Washington, ©2005

(from a story on annexation in

King County, Washington)

Alan Berner is a staff photographer for the Seattle Times.

He is also one of the most exciting, interesting and undiscovered photography talents on the planet.

His work is lyrical, thoughtful, enjoyable, moving, well constructed and intelligent. Read the rest of this entry »

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Lartigue: The Human Is The Tool

Picture-13For More Photos by JHL: http://photography-now.net/jacques_henry_lartigue/portfolio1.html

In a time when camera phones -and videos- are ubiquitous and that, in many cases, people using them are the only sources of images and information (Iran), the work of Jacques Henri Lartigue is even more relevant than it was in the early 20th Century.

Lartigue, the boy, wasn’t a photographer: he was a kid with a camera. No big deal. Like people with camera phones now.

Look at the images!

Joyous, exuberant, beautiful in composition and moment of capture, they stand as a good document of the times and an excellent expression from that young boy who, obviously, exalted at the possibilities of his life in general and the possibilities of photography in paticular.

So, keep those camera phones snapping (if you have the “snap” sound enabled) and keep posting them on MySpace and Twitter and Flickr and Facebook and keep some of the big hitters (NY Times, etc.) telephone numbers in the other end of that phone, because, once again, we’re reminded, it ain’t the tool, it’s the eye and heart and mind.

Yours (if you use it).

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Vote

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“Vote,” Selma Voting Rights March, 1965

©Bruce Davidson

Sometimes we forget that the “Big Work,” the work that one becomes known for making isn’t all there is.

Bruce Davidson went south, from Chicago, on  instinct.

The world was shaking and he felt the vibe.

The time was now: Civil Rights.

Real change.

Without assignment or specific destination he “nailed it,” and was able to work on the edges of the news, tell the story from a personal and deeply intimate viewpoint.

This image, for me, is one his best. Beautiful composition. Beatiful moment. Beautiful storyline. Iconic and packed with all the elements that make it a novel unto itself,  if this was the only photography that existed from the era it was shot in, it would, I think, be enough to tell the story of the struggle.

One word and one image: sometimes it’s enough: Vote.

For More on Bruce Davidson: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Davidson_(photographer)

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Prostitution: Pain

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©2009 Photograph by Mimi Chakarova

GO TO: http://www.mclight.com/slideshow.html

Editor’s Note

This is one of the most painful documentaries I have ever seen.

Even more amazing is the fact that the work is not the slam and splash type of photojournalism that deals in blood, guts and flames.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Interview With Jonathan Torgovnik

Torgovnik in Rawanda Jonathan TorgovnikJonathan Torgovnik

SEE: http://mediastorm.org/0024.htm

Here is a quintessential insight into the drive to do documentary photography, a chilling portrayal of the challenges of working within difficult environments and of turning horror into hope. Listen to Jonathan Torgovnik talk about rape, murder and redemption in Rawanda.

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Sam Faulkner

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SEE: http://www.samfaulkner.co.uk/

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Displacement In The “Heartland”

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SEE: http://mediastorm.org/0023.htm

A documentary project on Displacement…in the “Heartland!

This photographer shows how “progress,” comes to everywhere and the displacement is not limited to indigenous people either. In the end it is the interests of Capital weighed against the interests of Labor that is the issue of land appropriation and displacement.

Let this documentary speak for itself.

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