burn magazine

João Castellano

Sou Farofa

One of the biggest issues in Brazil is the heavy social inequality and all the prejudice that comes along with it, a bad heritage we have incorporated from the colonization period. Middle and upper class Brazilians frequently use a depreciative term to refer to the lower income beachgoers: “farofeiros”. This term comes from the word “farofa”, a typical food made of toasted manioc flour and other ingredients that may include bacon, onion, parsley, eggs, bananas or vegetables. It may be considered trivial for some, but as tasty and well-known as any other Brazilian gourmet dish for others. In order to have fun without spending much, people usually bring to the beach food from home: “farofa” and fried chicken. Most of the time, these “farofeiros” are not hanging out in the same areas of the beach as the rich people. Brazilians have a way of defining people based on their status and clothing, so if you don’t belong to the high end of the social pyramid, you are smaller and treated with prejudice. The main idea of this project is to take us, viewers, to a place we don’t wan’t to go, to show us a reality we don’t want to see, and then make us start questioning our own prejudice.


Bio

João Castellano was born as João Paulo in the early 80s. João didn’t come from a family of artists. He never aimed being a professional photographer, his childhood dream was to become a professional soccer player. After giving up that goal, he decided to be a soccer photographer. But he realized that in order to become a soccer photographer, he would need to become a photographer first. Since 2010 João has been working as a staff photographer at Istoé, one of the largest news magazines in Brazil. Nowadays, João splits his time between personal projects and assignments for the magazine. João has collaborated with some international publications such as Reuter and El Pais.

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João Castellano

Felipe Jacome

Lord of the Mangrove

The northwestern corner of Ecuador is home to the tallest mangrove trees in the world. Amidst the trees´ towering, almost fantastical, roots, people of nearby Afro-Ecuadorian communities gather black shells as their form of livelihood. In local parlance shell pickers are known as concheros. Concheros start young. Children as young as 10 years old are expected to pick shells to contribute to their families’ income. Children make good shell-pickers because they are agile and light, allowing them to navigate around the infinite spider web of mangrove roots. Picking shells is a tremendously arduous task. Everyday concheros trudge through the knee-deep mud and endure the inclement environment of the forest to discover small crevasses within the buried roots. When they are lucky, they find shells. When they are unlucky, they might be stung by the poisonous toadfish or bitten by a watersnake. Yet the concheros endure because the black shells are considered a culinary delicacy in Ecuador. Even so, a conchero will be lucky to get 8 cents per shell. On average, a good conchero can find between 50 and 100 shells in a day’s work.  Although community leaders do their best to encourage children to go to school, a large percentage drops out at an early age to become concheros. These environmental portraits explore the relationship between childhood, manual labor, and this unique ecosystem.

Children climb aboard a boat after a day of picking shells in the mud of the Cayapas Mataje Mangrove Reserve, 2009.

Even though black shells are a culinary delicacy in Ecuador, shell pickers are only paid 8 cents of a dollar per shell. On average, pickers will find between 50 and 100 shells in a day´s work. San Lorenzo, Ecuador. 2010.

Jenny Quiñones has 5 brothers and sisters, 3 of which pick cockles in the mangrove. Children as young as 9 years old pick shells in the Cayapas Mataje Mangrove Reserve to contribute to their families´ economy. Although local authorities have made important improvements keeping kids in school, their performance usually takes a toll as they are too tired to do homework or pay attention in class after 5 or 6 hours searching for shells in the arduous conditions of the mangrove. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador.

Alex Ocampo walks through a water inlet in the mangrove reserve. Shell pickers are used to work and walk waist deep in the mangrove. Most outsiders will invariably get stuck in the mud and have to get pulled out. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Jefferson Muñoz blows into a torch made out of coconut husks. The torches blow smoke for hours repelling the vicious mosquitoes and black flies of the mangrove. Insect repellent only repels insects for a few minutes after application. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Shell pickers have traditionally worked barefoot. In the past years, however, most people use rubber boots and gloves to protect themselves from toadfish and water snakes living in the mud of the mangroves. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

A group of kids come back from picking shells a couple of hours before the adults in order to make it to school in the afternoon. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014

The children that live in the Reserve are extremely agile. They effortlessly climb from branch to branch and navigate through the infinite spider web of roots. Their spryness makes them very efficient shell pickers. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Children splash around the water of the mangrove before boarding the boat to go back to the community. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014

Cesar Castro and Olger Grueso goof around in the mangrove while taking a rest from picking shells.

Even though black shells are a culinary delicacy in Ecuador, shell pickers are only paid 8 cents of a dollar per shell. On average, pickers will find between 50 and 100 shells in a day´s work.

Children climb on the roots of the mangrove in the Cayapas Mataje Reserve. They are the tallest mangroves in the world. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2013.

Julio Banguera has 4 brothers and sisters, 1 of which picks shells.

A group of girls play on top of a capsized boat on dry land. According to local health authorities, children make up to 70% of the population in the Mangrove Reserve. Tambillo, Ecuador. 2014

Alejandra Bones has 3 brothers and sisters. She is the only one of her siblings that picks shells to contribute to the family´s income. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Paula Grueso struggles to walk across a patch of soft mud. Cayapas Mataje Mangrove Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Elisa Castillo takes a break from picking shells in the Cayapas Mataje Mangrove Reserve. 2013.

Elisa Castillo takes a break from picking shells in the Cayapas Mataje Mangrove Reserve. 2010.

The mangroves of the Cayapas Mataje Reserve in northwestern Ecuador are the tallest in the world. Their shapes and size are breathtaking. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2014.

Cesar Castro has 7 brothers and sisters. He is the only one of his siblings to pick shells to contribute to his family´s income. Cayapas Mataje Reserve, Ecuador. 2013.

Bio

Felipe Jácome is a documentary photographer born in Ecuador. After finishing his studies at the Johns Hopkins University and the London School of Economics, his work has focused on issues of human mobility and human rights. In 2010 he won the Young Reporter Competition of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Jacome’s photos have appeared in publications such as National Geographic, The Washington Post, Foreign Policy Magazine, The Guardian, Vice Magazine, and CNN.

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Felipe Jacome

Gaia Squarci

Broken Screen

When you’re losing sight, the world starts to appear fragmented, like through a broken screen. Then you stop understanding where light comes from.” Dale Layne

The blind live in a sighted world. They function in a system constructed on the rules of seeing. Many of them could once see, but after going blind they were forced to reinvent themselves, and their quality of life became deeply affected by disability law, support in the private sphere, and the level of awareness in the society around them. I asked them to guide me into their lives. I’m interested in the disconnect between the concept of blindness as a metaphor and its reality. Stripped of its mysterious aura, the blindness of daily life, the one that’s not heard of in the words of a song, often turns out to be disquieting, and kept at a distance.This project has become a way for me to explore our universal needs. I imagine myself in the position of someone who turned blind, forced to reinvent my relationship to the world after years of a sighted life. When filtered through blindness, the core questions of identity, love and independence feel to me even more resonant.

“Broken Screen” is currently displayed at STILL gallery in Milan, Italy, till January 28, 2016.

Harold, who doesn’t want his last name to be public, is pictured sitting in his living room. New York, NY. July 3, 2013

18_Verbal Description and Touch Tour of the Whitney Biennial 2012, where the blind and visually impaired can experience art pieces without seeing them. The tours are organized every two months and have to be booked. New York. Apr 27, 2012

Michael Faillace, a blind lawyer, swims daily in Asphalt Green, a swimming-pool in the Upper East Side. He says the contact with the water helps drain the stress of his job. New York, NY. October 19, 2012

Blind poet and publisher Steve Cannon is pictured in his office at The Gathering of the Tribes, art gallery and poetry space Cannon founded in 1991, that quickly became a landmark of the New York East Village. New York, NY April 16, 2014

Collin Watts, visually impaired, sitting at a bar in Penn Station, where he transits every time he goes from his home in Jamaica, Queens, to Manhattan. New York, July 29, 2012

Gloria Turnblo, blind since 2010, poses during a class of photography for the blind at Visions center for the blind. The class is taught by Mark Andres, a sighted photographer. Students compose the frame and decide the position of the subject with the help of visual memory. They’re offered descriptive feedback by Andres or a teacher assistant. Their book “Shooting Blind” was published by Aperture in 2005. New York, NY. December 13, 2011

Alexandra Hobbes, blind since the age of four because of domestic violence, listens to the television in the apartment where she lives with her husband Elijah Hobbes, albino and visually impaired. The blind listen to television and hope for a device that more fully describes scenes so they can enjoy the programs on the same level as the hearing impaired. New York, NY. April 16, 2012

Robert Brown, Dale Layne and Cynda Bellamy at the movie theater before the beginning of Cloud Atlas. Robert recently became visually impaired, Dale , (on the phone) is completely blind, and Cynda, sighted, is the recreational specialist at World Services for the Blind. Although few movie theaters are equipped with bluetooth devices providing a description of the scenes for the blind, most of them are not, and they rely on the audio input from the movie and hints from the ones who are sitting with them. Action movies can be especially frustrating, for the presence of long action scenes with no dialogue and a powerful music, that necessarily require visual preception for spectators to follow the thread. Little Rock, Arkansas, January 5, 2013

Flowers can be hit and fall very easily; in some houses they’re kept under transparent plastic bells. Apartment of Dale Layne, Brooklyn, NY. March 8, 2012

Students are pictured during a class of photography at Visions center for the blind. The class is taught by Mark Andres, sighted photographer; the students, either blind or visually impaired, make decisions about the frame, subject, background and colors f the picture using their visual memory. They’re given feedback through the description of the photos by Mark or his assistants. The students formed a collective and their book, “Shooting blind”, was published by Aperture in 2005. New York, NY. December 13, 2011

On a TV screen, two people look at each other. Apartment of Dale Layne. March 8, 2012

“When you’re first losing sight for glaucoma, the world starts to appear fragmented, like through a broken screen. You can see only in some directions. Then you get to the point when you see light but you don’t quite understand where does it come from”. Dale Layne. New York, Apr 2, 2012

Destiny Hobbes, daughter of Elijah and Alexandra Hobbes, respectively visually impaired and blind, is stroked by her mother. Destiny’s eyes are healthy. New York, NY, March 17, 2013

Blind poet and publisher Steve Cannon, 79, is passed the phone by writer George Jay Wienbarg at The Gathering of the Tribes, art gallery and poetry space Cannon founded in 1991, that quickly became a landmark of the New York East Village. New York, NY April 13, 2014

Kitchen of the restaurant Dans le Noir, where blind waiters serve in the pitch black dining room. They’re the only ones able to find orientation in the dark, guide and serve clients. The aim of the restaurant is to let people experience the sensation of eating without seeing the food, or anything else around them. New York. Mar 11, 2012

In the hall of the Whitney museum for the Verbal Description and Touch Tour of the Biennial 2012, where the blind and visually impaired can experience art pieces using other senses but sight. Tours for the blind are organized in many museums in New York, but there’s a request for a more developed concept of universal design, which would make them more autonomous and let the institutions save a lot of money on the long run. Devices would include audiotour radios that they can use without having to push the numbers and more contrasty and bigger wall texts placed at eye-level, easier to read for someone who has a sight deficit New York, Apr 27, 2012

Collin Watt on the beach in Coney Island, working out. On his back, the scars left by the skin peeling off because of Tegretol when he was 12. He was given Tegretol in Queens General Hospital. Tegretol is a medicine used to cure epilepsy and it can cause strong side effects; when Collin took the medicine his skin peeled off and it took it two months hospitalized to grow again. He still carries the scars of this process. His eyes suffered a stroke of blood pressure, going blind except for a limited capability to see from the right eye. He can see colors and guess shapes in presence of a strong contrast. New York. May 13, 2012

Blind poet and publisher Steve Cannon’s hands. New York, NY. April 16, 2014

A bass-relief globe is pictured at the World Services for the Blind (WSB). The WSB is a rehabilitation center for the blind and visually impaired which offers life skills and career training programs designed to help students achieve sustainable independence. Little Rock, AR. January 5, 2013

Collin Watt, visually impaired, looks from a very short distance at a photo shot by Tim Hetherington, at the retrospective at the photographer at Yossi Milo Gallery. Before his death in April 2011, Tim Hetherington had been working on a project with the Milton Margai School for the Blind, Sierra Leone. New York, NY. April 16, 2012

Danielle Corley plays in her room in East New York. Danielle is a sighted child growing up with blind parents. Dominique, her mother, was blinded at the age of 26 in a car crash. She says that “Danielle is still too young to understand blindness fully, but she knows that mom and dad can’t see. Sometimes she waves her hand in front of my face to play. I know that because I can feel the air moving. Generally the problem is that she can say ‘NO’ more than children with sighted parents, but overall I feel I’m doing a pretty good job”. Brooklyn, NY. February 21, 2012

John and Paradise, who had not met before, dance at a birthday party. Brooklyn, NY. November 09, 2014

Bio

Raised in Milan, Italy, she studied Art History at University of Bologna and photojournalism at International Center of Photography (ICP). In 2014 she attended the Eddie Adams Workshop and was nominated for the Joop Swart masterclass in the same year. In 2015 her work has been selected for the exhibition reGeneration3 about new approaches to photography at Musée de l’Elysée in Lausanne.

Her clients include the New York Times, the New Yorker, Time Magazine, Vogue, the Wall Street Journal, MSNBC, VICE, The Guardian, Newsweek and L’Oeil de le Photographie. Her work has been exhibited in the United States, Italy, France, Switzerland, Mexico, Ireland and China. 

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Gaia Squarci

Sarah Pabst

Reclusive

“And in the end, we were all just humans… drunk on the idea that love, only love, could heal our brokenness.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald

When we met we were immediately drawn to each other, but we didn’t have an easy start. There was love and passion, but also addiction and pain. Out of an inner need I turned the camera to what was close to me, to have something to hold on to if things threatened to fall apart. So I started photographing us, him, me and what surrounds us — intuitive moments I felt the need to capture. I tried to find out who he is and who I am. We are afraid of the darkness in us, but, “in love the dark confirms that we are together“ (John Berger).

Sexuality becomes an affirmation of life itself. In nature I find my way back to my childhood self — to memories mixed with happiness and doubt. Upon these memories, 12000 km away from my native country, I try to build the future. Nature turns into a gleam of hope, a happy outcome of troubled times. This imagery is my journey, my intimate diary as I search for the answers to the vertigo of everyday life and the torments of my heart and soul. It’s about my life, my feelings, about us.

Because, in the end, we are all just full of hope to put back together those broken pieces.

Bio

Sarah Pabst is a German-born (1984) documentary photographer and painter and lives since 2013 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Besides her personal intimate work she mainly focusses on women and identity topics. Her work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally. She was awarded with the 3. Prize in the ‘Women in Society’ Category of the Picture of the Year (POY) LATAM 2015, the Canon Profifoto Förderpreis (Grant) in 2014 and her work was published in Vice, Lensculture, Le Monde Diplomatique, Profifoto, Burndiary, Zeit Online, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Revista Pecado, Brigitte Young Miss, Deutsche Welle and the Max Planck Journal, among others. She’s a featured Instagram photographer since 2015. From 2012-2015 she worked as an adjunct lecturer for photography at the Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Germany, where she also writes her doctoral thesis on Documentary Photography in Argentina. After university she continued her education in workshops and courses with Antoine d’Agata, Leo Liberman, Mariana Maggio, Christian Rodriguez, Nicolas Janowski and Carlos Bosch. She is currently working on her first self-published book and took workshops on photobooks with Gonzalo Golpe, Julieta Escardó and recently with Veronica Fieras of Riot Books and Martin Bollati. Sarah studied Spanish, Painting and Photography in Germany at the Universities of Köln and Wuppertal and graduated in 2011. In 2005 she travelled to Latin America for the first time which was a turning point in her life. She went back to the continent many times and started photographing social issues in 2006.

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Sarah Pabst

2016

Just about the time I got used to 2015 it was over. The year ripped right on by before giving me a chance to digest it. I am sure most feel the same.

BURN now rocks right into it’s 8th year. Many photographers who got their start right here on BURN and BurnDiary in the last 7 years have gone on to publish books, have exhibitions, get assignments from major magazines, join agencies, get grants, and generally end up with a presence they did not have before. Sure the Emerging Photographer Fund winners might be the obvious who perhaps benefit most, yet all the things I just mentioned have been done by photographers who have simply had essays published here.

Coming up in 2016 the power of BURN to discover new talent will only increase. Soon BURN will be a part of Apple News an app built into every iPhone. Right now Apple News is only available in the U.S., the U.K. and Australia. This will change since Apple is still rolling this new app out. This puts BURN photographers seriously in touch with a large audience and alongside all the top international magazines. For a small boutique blog site this is a big jump.

Just to keep things in perspective, when BURN started in 2008 the iPhone, or any smartphone, just did not play the role they play now. There was no Instagram. What? A world without Instagram? Who can remember that far back?

Now the smart phone is indispensable for most of us. People get their news, their pictures, their purchases, their banking, and find their way home with the GPS on their phones just to name a few necessities. We are married to our phones. Can’t live without them, and the primary way we see most pictures and take most pictures most of the time. Actually at this point the phone is the way we communicate with most people most of the time. Ironically no more phone calls. Texting rules.

So no surprise, technology rules our times. Yet not really. The reason BURN will be on Apple News is not because we have any special technology. Ha ha. We are operating on a cobbled together website that is in great need of repair or remodeling . Nope, Apple wants us for only one reason. Content. Our stories, our pictures.

The machines alone are sterile. They need content to be of any practical use. So technology will roll ahead as usual and great storytellers will rule. Authorship will be prized more than ever. Authored personalized content will be the only content seriously regarded by editors and curators and yes by the so called mass audience as well. The “mass audience” is really at this point small audiences garnered by authors. Photographic authors among them.

Is this you? Do you have something to say? Or do you just want to sit back, relax, and watch what comes in? Either way is fine.

Happy New Year to all of this BURN audience. Some of you have been here since the beginning. Some of you only see us on FaceBook or Instagram. No matter. We will try to give you a good ride in 2016. Stay tuned.

-dah-

Cushion stall, Donetsk, February 2014

Christopher Nunn

Ukraine 2013-2015

This on-going series began in February 2013 when I travelled to Ukraine following a thread of family history to the sleeper town of Kalush, the birthplace of my then-ailing grandmother. She left at 14 before arriving in England as a displaced person after World War II. Never intending to document my own family history, I simply used this geographical starting point, together with its inherent themes of histories, shifting borders, displacement and memory as a framework in which to explore Ukraine. Over time my journey shifted from west to east Ukraine, where I found my self by chance in early 2014 during the early stages of unrest, and where I continued to work as the region plummeted into all-out conflict. The majority of my work over the following 15 months was made within the conflict zone but took a more measured approach to the mass media reporting and focused on the periphery of Ukraine’s crisis in a wider sense. This project became a naturally evolving piece of work and a deeply personal journey that was shaped by the people I met whilst traveling, and ultimately by the country’s decent into chaos.

Boris, Odessa, September 2014

Ayla, Kalsuh, Ivano-Frankivsk region, November 2013

Revolver, Kalush, November 2013

Jewish Cemetary, Kalush, Ivano-Frankivsk region, February 2014

Posyolok district, Kalush, Ivank-Frankivsk region, February 2014

Elena, Donbass, October 2014

Valeria, Druzhkovka, Donetsk region, October 2014

Kalush, February 2014

Danylevskoho Street, Donetsk, May 2014

Belitskoe, Donetsk region, September 2014

Proletarsky district, Donetsk, May 2014

Checkpoint on the outskirts of Artemivsk, on the road to Horlivka, October 2014

A burning Security Service of Ukraine vehicle, Kalush, February 2014

Pro-Russian protest, Donetsk, March 2014

Donetsk, January 2014

Valik, Kalush, Ivank-Frankivsk region, February 2013

Bio

Christopher Nunn is a Yorkshire based photographer who divides his time between England and Ukraine. He graduated from Bradford College in 2004 with a degree in photography. Chris’ photographs have been exhibited throughout the UK and internationally, and recent press includes It’s Nice That, Business Insider, CNN Photos and Esquire Russia.

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Christopher Nunn

Mariano Silletti

Ludovicu

Ludovicu’s disappearance. Ludovicu arrived in Montescaglioso (Italy), with his family, from Romania. Ludovicu was 57 years old and he was suffering from Alzheimer. One day in December 2013, he went out from his home and never came back. Veronica, his wife, waited for him for hours. She then finally came to our police station. Ludovicu’s story has touched my heart. I am a police officer, I have a passion for photography and I did not want this story to be forgotten. In wintertime it becomes dark very early. Ludovicu’s home is located in the town center. Everything there was silently screaming poverty. The walls were damped with peeling paint. Veronica was very heartbroken and tired. We needed her husband’s clothes: she slowly gave us his trousers and some of his underwear. The dogs had to sniff them so as to find a trace of the man. We would like to give some hope to Veronica. We would like to fight the evil premonitions and try to find her husband. We tried to find him in the countryside, we entered the abandoned cottages. Where we found other stories, we came across other women and men’s lives. It was such a melancholic winter. While we were trying to find him, we stumble in so many different lifestyles. We came across other emigrants, the shepherds, the peasants and the citizens from our town. I looked at them with different eyes. Our search was persistent, my goals were out of focus. I had come across a mystery and suddenly I realized it. I saw fear and pain. A man suddenly disappears without any trace. I was surrounded by shadows and I wanted them to vanish. After winter, spring came. I wanted to find some encouragement even in these obscure months. Until now, no traces have been found of Ludovicu’s disappearance. 


Bio

Mariano Silletti was born in Pisticci in 1972 and currently lives in Matera (Italy). He joined the Carabinieri Forces at a young age, in 1991. In 1997 he studied and attended a photography course in Bari. His photography captures scenes of ordinary life, stories of men and women he has come across during his duty as a Carabiniere. His photography is emotive, full of feelings and strength.

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Mariano Silletti

David Alan Harvey

Tell It Like It Is

[ Published by BurnBooks ]

I went a little bit crazy publishing this book. Just like I did the first time. In 1967, Bryan was six months old and I was spending the last $400 of the family money to go buy film. This time around isn’t any different. I am all in on the publication of Tell It Like It Is.

I say this proudly, yet not boastfully.

My pride is based on giving a percentage of profits to the Liggins family and to set up a scholarship for a minority photographer.

We take the self-publishing idea very seriously around here. I spare no expense in the manufacturing of my work. I just want it right. This makes my books a little more expensive, yet if you look closely you will clearly see the value of a well thought out, well designed, well assembled photo book. We do our best to make each of our books a piece of art.

None of this is possible without my colleagues Anton Kusters and Diego Orlando on design and production; Kaya Lee Berne all around producer, darkroom assistant, and make me get shit done woman, Michael Courvoisier for scanning the original negatives, Michelle Madden Smith for creating our new BurnStore, and my son Bryan for making the book video (and Michelle for editing it) and my other son Erin for helping me find the Liggins family and doing video of the reunion. 

2015 Edition

Collector’s Edition Box Set

Tell It Like It Is is also a 25 print show, big 60”x40” silver gelatin prints at LOOK3, along with Haenyeo: Angels of the Sea (which is also a new book), along with NO FILTER, prints of some of my Brazil work. So I’ve got my hands full.

In short, we’ll be shipping as fast as we can, but cannot promise your package will go out until after June 15. 

But do come see me at LOOK3. It’s the best U.S. photo fest hang. Down home style. 

I put my heart into Tell It Like It Is in 1967, and I’ve put my heart into it now as well.

– david alan harvey

David Alan Harvey and assistant Kaya Lee Berne in his Outer Banks darkroom, printing silver-gelatin prints for the Collector’s Edition.
(Photo by Frank Overton Brown III)