Magnum Foundation

Applied Research Center estimates that there are at least 5,100...

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:33:00 -0400

Applied Research Center estimates that there are at least 5,100 children currently living in foster care whose parents have been either deported or detained.

Do you have questions about how family unity is being incorporated into the immigration bill? Raise your question here.

Pictured: The daughters of garment workers. New York City. 1996. Chien-Chi Chang

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work from the Magnum archive to highlight issues in the immigration debate as part of our LA RUTA project.

Picture Dept: Drama, Manipulation and Truth: Keeping Photojournalism Useful

Tue, 21 May 2013 14:06:54 -0400

Picture Dept: Drama, Manipulation and Truth: Keeping Photojournalism Useful:

picturedept:

Paul Hansen’s photograph that recently won the World Press Photo award as the picture of the year was apparently modified to increase its drama, a technique to make colors more vivid and saturated that seems to be becoming more widespread in photojournalistic circles. As such, it remains…

petepin: From the opening of the community engagement...

Mon, 20 May 2013 17:28:41 -0400

petepin:

From the opening of the community engagement installation at Montefiore, with En Foco, Montefiore’s Art from the Heart, and Mekong NYC. What an incredibly moving experience!

The Collaboration and Responsibility We saw it over and over...

Mon, 20 May 2013 12:23:00 -0400

Pete Pin presents his project, Cambodian Diaspora, at #Photoex.(Photo by Ruth Prieto)

Wendy Levy and Eric Gottesman brainstorm during their workshop session at #photoex. (Photo by Ruth Prieto)

The Collaboration and Responsibility

We saw it over and over again in the projects presented at Photography, Expanded: a laser-like focus on audience and goals.

Whereas traditional social documentary photography imagines the photographer’s role as bringing images from remote areas to a wider audience, many #PhotoEx projects begin and end with a small community, often documenting itself.

Take, for example, Pete Pin’s project on the Cambodian diaspora. He is himself a refugee from the Killing Fields, and one of the early iterations of his project brought together members of his community to talk about their experiences, using photos he’d made as a starting point for conversations. Now he is prompting young Cambodians to ask their elders for artifacts from the old country as a way to create inter-generational dialogue.

Wendy Ewald, who is well-known for her projects educating communities to document themselves, gave cameras to the Innu people of Labrador when she visited decades ago. More recently she has returned with photographer Eric Gottesman, and they are working hand-in-hand with community organizers to create a game that will engage young Innu with the history of their people.

In these ways, photography becomes a means of empowerment, a way to process trauma, a way to educate oneself, or a way to start a dialogue. At the same time, the photographer’s own documentation can take a back seat to their role as a teacher of documentary techniques.

Another hot topic at #PhotoEx was Human Centered Design (a great primer here). One of its foundations is the importance of bringing together and interviewing all stakeholders as early as possible, including community members, NGOs, teachers, policy makers, technology and design. This helps ensure goals and strategies that serve the intended community, but it can also present needs and strategies that are conflict with a photographer’s more purely artistic ambitions. I’m interested to see how photographers (or multi-platform storytellers of any kind) will evolve in their approach to authorship as their role in such projects becomes more of a director or organizer.

Which seems to beg the question, is the photographer even the leader of these projects anymore? Is anyone? Maybe this is the time to employ a truly collaborative model. Something where several people equally “own” a project.

If that’s the case, it’s doubly important to spell out each collaborator’s responsibility. As we also saw during #PhotoEx online projects can have a long tail. Sites are being built that are designed to live for five or ten years after their creation. Who will continue to make the small changes and upgrades necessary for that kind of timeline? Who will be responsible for continuing to pay for servers and services? The earlier these questions can be addressed, the more successful a project is likely to be.

-Miki Johnson, blogging for #PhotoEx

emergencyfund: Pete Pin NPR and EN FOCO Exhibition Pete Pin,...

Mon, 20 May 2013 12:01:43 -0400

emergencyfund:

Pete Pin

NPR and EN FOCO Exhibition

Pete Pin, our first Emergency Fund Fellow in 2011, was featured on the NPR Pictures Show for his project “Cambodian Diaspora.” Read the whole interview here.

“One thing that I learned … is that a lot of people felt really traumatized during their stay in refugee camps,” says Pin. He adds that violence and rape were common.

Pin will also be showing at EN FOCO from April 29-July 19, 2013. The exhibition will take place at Moteflore Family Health Center at 360 E. 193 Street in Bronx NY. For more information visit the EN FOCO site.

Congratulations to Pete for such an exciting month!

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work...

Tue, 14 May 2013 16:59:00 -0400

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work from the Magnum Photos archive to highlight issues in the immigration debate as part of our LA RUTA project.

The New York Times reported in January 2013 that the U.S. is spending $18 billion on border enforcement, which is more than the combined budgets of the FBI, DEA, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals Service, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives.

Join March for Innovation to support reform that supports economic growth. #iMarch

Pictured: Long lines of Mexicans wait in the early morning on the Paseo del Norte bridge to enter El Paso. 2011. Paolo Pellegrin/Magnum Photos.

Pictured: Mexican resentment runs high in the border towns....

Mon, 13 May 2013 14:48:00 -0400

Pictured: Mexican resentment runs high in the border towns. Children walk along the memorial wall, known locally as “the scar”, on their way home from school. Tijuana. 2006, Larry Towell/Magnum Photos.

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work from the Magnum Photos archive to highlight issues in the immigration debate as part of our La Ruta project.

When Larry Towell was in Tijuana in 2006, he was documenting construction of the new U.S. border wall designed to keep out migrants. It was believed then that over 3,000 migrants had died trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. Today, only six years later, ACLU estimates that over 5,000 have perished.

Larry remembers that while he was shooting that day, a child came by carrying a colorful umbrella. She used it to keep her balance on the curb as she walked between on-coming traffic and the memorial wall.

To get involved, sign up for updates from the Border Network for Human Rights or the ACLU.

Fantastic work by 2013 Magnum Foundation Emergency Fund...

Thu, 09 May 2013 14:10:00 -0400

Fantastic work by 2013 Magnum Foundation Emergency Fund Fellow, Ruth Prieto Arenas is featured today on the NYT LENS blog. Ruth’s work is also being exhibited at LA RUTA, a theatrical collaboration and photographic installation currently on view in Snug Harbor.

2012 Magnum Foundation Photogaphy & Human Rights Fellow,...

Wed, 08 May 2013 14:38:00 -0400

2012 Magnum Foundation Photogaphy & Human Rights Fellow, Poulomi Basu’s work on rural women in India’s armed conflict awarded 2nd place in Foto visura grant.

A Final Embrace: The Most Haunting Photograph from...

Wed, 08 May 2013 14:17:00 -0400

A Final Embrace: The Most Haunting Photograph from Bangladesh

Powerful work by Taslima Akhter 2010 HR Fellow, features on Time Magazine Photo. Read the backstory on LightBox today

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work...

Tue, 07 May 2013 15:05:00 -0400

For the month of May, Magnum Foundation will be showcasing work from the Magnum archive to highlight issues in the immigration debate as part of our LA RUTA project.

According to National Immigration Forum study, Homeland Security spends $2 billion annually on the jailing and deportation of undocumented immigrants – a nearly 150% increase from 7 years ago.

Pictured: 8:00 pm holding tank for undocumented male detainees. El Cajon, CA. 1989. Susan Meiselas/Magnum Photos

La Ruta Le Journal de la Photographie La Ruta was featured in Le...

Mon, 06 May 2013 13:22:05 -0400

La Ruta

Le Journal de la Photographie

La Ruta was featured in Le Journal de la Photographie on May 6, 2013.

“It is covered with the names, genders and ages of hundreds of bodies, many unidentified, found on the Mexican border. This is one of the realities of immigration. “

Read more.

LA RUTA THE NATION LA RUTA was featured in The Nation on April...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 17:50:06 -0400

LA RUTA

THE NATION

LA RUTA was featured in The Nation on April 30, 2013.

LA RUTA THE NEW YORK TIMES La Ruta was featured in The New York...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 17:36:00 -0400

LA RUTA

THE NEW YORK TIMES

La Ruta was featured in The New York Times, The Arts section on Saturday, April 27.

According to the Center for American Progress, if undocumented...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:46:00 -0400

According to the Center for American Progress, if undocumented workers were granted citizenship in 2013: The U.S. GDP would grow by $1.4 trillion and the economy would create an estimated 203,000 additional jobs per year over the next 10 years.

To call for a quick and direct path to citizenship for millions of undocumented workers in the U.S. this May Day go to:
http://reformimmigrationforamerica.org/#content-campaigns

Pictured: 3:00pm Arrest alongside Interstate 5, Oceanside, CA. 1989, Susan Meiselas/Magnum Photos

Photography as Entry Point We are eager to keep the...

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 14:36:25 -0400

Photography as Entry Point

We are eager to keep the conversations going that started during Photography, Expanded, a two-day exploration of multi-platform visual storytelling and audience engagement presented by Magnum Foundation and Open Society Foundation’s Documentary Photography Project. Miki Johnson, our #PhotoEx blogger, has put together a few posts that will touch on top themes. We will post them here in the coming weeks; we hope you’ll share your thoughts in the comments.

Of all the revolutionary ideas shared last weekend, I was struck most by one that seemed to go without comment.

Marcus Bleasdale mentioned that for him “photography is just an entry point,” a way for him to gather information about a situation (in this case, the conflicts over precious metals in the Democratic Republic of Congo), to share that information, and to prompt positive change. It seemed like such a logical idea within the context of the weekend, one many presenters echoed, that I almost didn’t catch its deeper implications. In other words…

The photograph is no longer the goal, the apex, the end—it is now merely a means to reach a goal.

Maybe this idea is already passé, already obvious. But if so, the sheer fact of its widespread acceptance is worth noting, considering that, a few short years ago, such a statement would have ruffled the feathers of any “objective observer” documentary photographer.

Marcus’ project for Photography, Expanded might never directly employ one of his images. With the help of Patrick O’Luanaigh, the founder of game-design firm nDreams, and Daniella Steadman, who specializes in multimedia production and audience engagement, he is developing an emotionally engrossing adventure game for tablets, which will subtly educate players about the conflicts perpetuated when they purchase those same tablets.

For the game, Marcus’s photographs are secondary to his contributions as a local resource, a link to people involved in the conflicts, a protector of their stories. Although the game will take cues for visual styling from his photos, and players will be able to browse his images to learn more about the conflict, the game’s most direct impact may be the ability to send emails from within it, urging electronics companies to label products made with conflict-free materials.

Before the conference, I caught up with Teru Kuwayama, who created Lightstalkers and Basetrack, and he put a sharp tip on this point.

“In a world of billions of cameras, I’m not sure what ‘documentary photographer’ really means,” he said. “We live in the most recorded era of human history, so photographers should ask themselves what value they add to a very densely populated ecosystem.”

The project Teru presented, Duristan, will be a multimedia platform for sharing, aggregating, and publishing information about South and Central Asia. Teru’s own photography never enters the equation, and, maybe more striking, photography itself is only a small component of the larger project.

As photography is seen more as a tool, and one of many, to achieve a goal, what new skills must photographers learn and employ? We might look to the former lives of Photography, Expanded photographers for instruction: Marcus worked in finance for years before picking up a camera; Pete Pin abandoned his doctorate in Political Science to pursue documentary photography; Eric Gottesman studies politics and economics before turning to art.

So a broad understanding of politics, economics, and maybe sociology helps. Then there are the various storytelling languages: video, audio, interaction design, code. Thankfully, we no longer expect any one person to master all of these, opting instead for collaboration with specialists. Still, storytellers today must be able to converse intelligently about these languages in order for those collaborations to be successful.

Finally, do we need a whole new name for practitioners of these techniques? Action-oriented storytellers? Socially conscious multi-platform artists? As the Photography, Expanded organizers are well aware, a group without a name—or at least a cohesive philosophy—is harder to find funding for. One of their goals was to help funders understand (and get excited to fund) this new storytelling movement.

It’s up to those of you who are shaping this revolution to do the same. As a storyteller, I encourage you to also add these techniques to your toolbox: asking hard questions, taking creative risks, sharing your experiences, and educating others.

-Miki Johnson, blogging for #PhotoEx

(Image above: Marcus Bleasdale, from project Zero Hour Congo)

wyattgallery: Photo history in the making at Photography...

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 12:36:00 -0400

wyattgallery:

Photo history in the making at Photography Expanded. Star iPhone photojournalist @benlowy holds court with @la_martin8 and Denise Wolff of @aperturenyc and Alison Morley of #ICP (who gave me my first cover for NY Times Travel Mag on #Trinidad) as my past professor at #NYU #tisch and author Fred Ritchin speaks to Anna of @opensociety. I’m proud to say these leading industry professionals are my friends. #humbled #photoex

Perpetual Collaboration and More #PhotoEx

Fri, 19 Apr 2013 15:38:43 -0400

At the Photography, Expanded event this weekend, seven photographers and their teams will share what they’ve learned by taking their documentary work beyond photography into the collaborative, multi-platform, sometimes chaotic future of storytelling.

I caught up with those who could be pinned down long enough for a chat or email, hoping to get a sneak peak of the lessons they learned. Several big ideas emerged, which I’ve highlighted below, and which will hopefully spark more discussion on the Magnum Tumblr following this weekend’s events.

Perpetual Collaboration

Eric Gottesman, who is working with Wendy Ewald on an interactive archive and video game exploring the Innu concept of “Nitassinan,” (“traditional land” or “home”), puts collaboration at the center of his work. The project combines historical images of the Innu with images made by community members and Eric’s images, and asks the community to react to them and decide where and how they should be displayed.

“It’s been important to me, with my photographic practices, to move towards a pluralism, not only of skills but also of vision,” Gottesman says. “‘Plural’ meaning ‘many different kinds of perspectives on different things’; for me that’s what collaboration is really about.”

For Sue Johnson, collaboration is also a way to help stories rise above the constant barrage of information we face. “Everything goes by so fast now—even the most viral video on YouTube has a shelf life of only few weeks” Johnson points out. “I think it is increasingly important to collaborate with people across platforms and mediums, to experiment with new forms of storytelling and publication, in order to give the work a longer life.”

Through Photography, Expanded, Johnson hopes to expand her Iliso Labantu project, which supports South Africans in documenting specific locations, as a way to encourage others to visit and learn about them.

No More “-ographers”

Johnson also points out that, as the appetite for video, and the ability to stream it anywhere, increases, the line between those who tell stories in still versus moving images will blur. “I don’t think that people will identify as being a photographer or filmmaker down the road,” she says.

That seems to play out in the Photography, Expanded projects, which include not only photography and film, but also a video game, educational curriculum, and Teru Kuwayama’s Duristan, a multi-faceted online platform for South and Central Asia, with specific focus on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Kashmir.

As projects grow and move into multiple, often highly technical platforms, they’ll be harder to fund on a personal basis, points out Ian Teh, bringing us once again to collaboration. “A better connection with potential collaborators and a support network will allow this new potential in documentary photography to flourish.”

Teh is working on a data-rich project that explores and charts the changing landscape in China’s Yellow river basin.

The Audience Is King

For Pete Pin, his relationship with the Cambodian diaspora he documents goes beyond collaboration—they are his family and friends. Growing up within a community of Killing Fields survivors, Pin rarely heard stories those those dark days that forced his elders to flee their home. As a largely self-taught photographer, he now uses his images to prompt conversations among his friends and family.

“I’ve been thinking of this work from the beginning as, ‘How do I connect?’ ‘How do I use photography to facilitate a conversation?’” Pin explains.

One of his biggest lessons was to speak in a way his audience would understand—and it turns out photography is not as universal a language as he once thought.

“Older Cambodians have had no interaction with documentary photography, so they were kind of put off by it,” Pin says. “They were expecting formal wedding photos; so now I’m working on portraits, in order to speak to older and younger alike.”

Yue Ren agrees that the audience must now be at the top of a storyteller’s mind—they demand to be heard. Her project uses cell-phone images by Chinese migrant workers to bring visibility to their lives and the challenges they face.

“Documentary photographers should know that they are no longer the “King of Photography,” which means an audience will trust them, follow them without conditions,” she explains. “They may question your report and share their own voice at anytime. It is a challenge for documentary photographers in our time; what I want to do is turn the conflict into cooperation.”

-Miki Johnson, blogging for #PhotoEx

The ruins of Loe Sam, a small village in the Bajaur Agency of...

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 16:59:00 -0400

The ruins of Loe Sam, a small village in the Bajaur Agency of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. December, 2008. Teru Kuwayama.

#PhotoEx—JOIN THE CONVERSATION

“In a world of billions of cameras, I’m not sure what ‘documentary photographer’ really means,” says Teru Kuwayama, who is well known for creating online community platforms including Lightstalkers and Basetrack. “We live in the most recorded era of human history, so photographers should ask themselves what value they add to a very densely populated ecosystem.”

That is one of the big questions presenters will tackle at Photography, Expanded: Interactive and Multiplatform Strategies for Photographers, an intimate conference presented by Magnum Foundation and Open Society Foundations Documentary Photography Project taking place in NYC this weekend.

“We want to inspire documentary photographers to expand their storytelling beyond the still image, to use emerging digital tools to engage audiences across multiple platforms and to mobilize them around important social issues,” explains Emma Raynes, Emergency Fund Program Director for Magnum Foundation.

Although the seats for Saturday’s conference are filled, notes and resources from the event will be available here: http://www.magnumfoundation.org/photoex.html

And since the questions being tackled by Photography, Expanded are hardly small ones, everyone is encouraged to keep track of #PhotoEx on Twitter, for updates from the event, to take part in the discussion, and for resources after this weekend.

-Miki Johnson, blogging for #PhotoEx

Magnum Foundation is proud to announce its collaboration with...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 12:48:00 -0400

Magnum Foundation is proud to announce its collaboration with Working Theater in the presentation of Ed Cardona, Jr.’s world premiere play LA RUTA. This unique collaboration will illuminate and clarify some of the central issues within the current immigration reform debate through a theatrical performance and accompanying photo-based installation. La Ruta, will be staged within a semi-truck and will travel throughout NYC and it’s outer boroughs.

Magnum Foundation is organizing a photo-based installation outside the truck that will focus audiences on the experiences of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. and will feature both award-winning Magnum photographers and young, emerging documentary photographers. Images from the renowned Magnum Photos archive will also be projected within the truck setting to illuminate the interior worlds of the characters.

By using art as a tool for social engagement, Magnum Foundation hopes to engage audiences in the broader socio-political context of the immigration issue. See below for ways to get involved and take action.

Campaigns & Resources

1. BORDER DEATHS AND ENFORCEMENT

a. receive updates from the border network for human rights: www.bnhr.org

b. get involved:
www.nomoredeathsvolunteers.org/werejectracism.htm
www.derechoshumanosaz.net/projects/arizona-recovered-bodies-project/

c. donate to: www.borderangels.org/

d. contact your elected officials to discuss immigration reform that addresses the unintended consequences of increased border enforcement.

2. DETENTION AND DEPORTATION

a. advocate for the elimination of the quota:
http://detentionwatchnetwork.org/

b. support the national prison divestment campaign:
prisondivestment.wordpress.com/author/enlaceintl/

3. DUE PROCESS

a. support the ny immigrant family unity project:
First state-wide universal representation program for detained immigrants facing deportation. nyifup@gmail.com

b. join the dignity not detention campaign to repeal mandatory detention and restore due process to immigration law. visit www.dignitynotdetention.org to read the 15 things you can do to stop mandatory detention.

c. join the campaign for prison phone justice: phonejustice.org

d. get involved with the accompany immigrant program: www.newsanctuarynyc.org/ or first friends visitation group: firstfriends2@juno.com

4. LABOR

a. advocate for raising the minimum wage:
The Center for Economic and Policy Research published an analysis that if the federal minimum wage had kept up with increased rates in worker productivity it would have stood at nearly $22/hr today.

b. contact your elected officials
to discuss co-sponsorship of legislation that will raise the minimum wage and tie it to the rising cost of living.
www.raisetheminimumwage.com/pages/new-york-state
www.raisetheminimumwage.com/pages/fair-minimum-wage-act-of-2013

c. drop the i-word: Take the pledge to not call people ‘illegals.’Colorlines.com/droptheIword

d. support the nyc-based ‘paid sick time act’:
www.timetocareny.org/nyc/

DREAMERS/NEXT GENERATION

a. get active with the ny state youth leadership council:Sign up for their newsletter www.nysylc.org/.
See ‘11 things you can do to help support the NY DREAM Act.’
www.nydreamact.org

b. contact your state elected officials to discuss co-sponsorship of the comprehensive NY DREAM Act, currently slated for June 2013.

c. sign the online ny dream act petition:
http://action.dreamactivist.org/nydreamact/

d. donate to NYS Youth Leadership Fund, The Dream
Activist Network, 67 Sueños, or other immigrant youth-
led organizations advocating for more inclusive reform.
Donate to a scholarship fund for undocumented students.