i hear a sad song…i do not understand the words, but i can "feel" it is sad….deep, melancholy, and goes with the mood of the city…dark, mysterious and sometimes full of dread….i wander São Paulo, with not a clue where i am, but i am told that i am now in the heart of Samba….Barra Funda , an "oasis" amid the chaos, the neighborhood where Samba began…originally the "voice" of slaves, now the musical expression of choice for many Brazilians….
just when i am wondering why, and for how long, can any culture endure one of the worlds most quixotic megacities (19 million), with the highest of all crime stats (5,000 murders annually) and traffic stats (1000 added cars each day) , the music picks up a beat…sounds now happier and the people dance and sing….joy washes over everyone….in celebration, we drink cachaça …warm, sweet and straight to the cerebellum….whew (how will i get home?)….made from the very sugar cane which promulgated slavery in the first place…but, i am smiling reeling along with everyone else….clapping, dancing….more cachaça…and more more…
suddenly the music stops… é o fim….abraços goodbye….thank you…muito obrigado …i hope we meet again……….yes, i do…
tossing another log onto the smoldering fire …
it occurred to me last night at a party that good photography is like good comedy … made so much sense then, trying to remember why now ;-)
I think the line of thought was geared to street photography and had something to do with the ability to see the unusual in the everyday, to pick up and key in on what others might miss, and to boil subjects down to their essence … present with a new twist and …
PANOS,
You said you want to see my New York Picture, It’s there : http://www.photosjsbreault.com/target0_en.html
Peace
http://www.photosjsbreault.com/target5_en.html
… amazing… bravo… all that
AGA,
I just looked at your images of women in Istanbul. In particular, the ones selected for the publication are very strong. You are most certainly on to something. I am sure you are aware of the book but you should check the book of Alex Webb on Istanbul (City of hundred names). The first picture of your site reminded me of it. Good luck with your project. Eric
Why is good street photography like good comedy? For the reasons you’ve already mentioned, Tom, which are basically Aristotle’s reasons as well, or at we think they are Aristotle’s reasons as well, as no one has ever found his treatise on comedy in which he allegedly says all of these intelligent things about comedy. It is not, however, so much about finding the unusual in everyday life; the unusual is, by definition, that which is out of the ordinary; street photography freezes the usual and shows just how strange it can be. Consider, for example, the necktie. I wear a necktie five days a week, always making sure before I leave the house that the tie actually matches my shirt and trousers. And why do I wear a necktie? Who the hell knows?! A necktie serves no utilitarian function that I know of, unless sometime during the course of the day I need to apply a tourniquet to a gushing artery, and really, how often does something like that happen in the course of the business day, or as a convenient noose if I feel like killing myself because that dope Franklin down in sales has managed to sell a million and nine Chinese-made widgets to a tribe of mathematically challenged Hottentots who dont really need them. With video, the viewer sees their world basically as they know it; with stills, the viewer sees the frozen moment, the moment that essentially gives the game away. Much of what people do during the course of any given day is pretty ridiculous, when you give the matter any real thought, and by catching those moments photography, like comedy, makes us laugh at ourselves, which always a good thing, I think. That’s also the main difference too; photography catches the usual and freezes it, showing us how silly it really is; comedy takes the usual and stretches it to the point of absurdity. That’s what I do most of the time, although the bit about my brothers trying to reassemble a deer happened more or less the way I describe it whenever I tell that story. Sometimes it’s awful hard to improve on reality.
BEAR…
anyone named Bear deserves some sort of reply!!!
well, i do not think you need any contacts…just show up!! you will find the people of Mexico to be very hospitable…particularly in Oaxaca…just be nice to the first person you meet!! seriously, one thing will lead to another to another..enjoy..
HERVE…
slo-mo?? c’mon Herve , do i not deserve a quiet weekend with my girl??
the rest of you understand, right?
back soonest amigo….
cheers, david
I don’t know David, I think she may be too good for you ;-)
Forgot your girl is in London, David. Now, a week-end seems rather short.
Please, do not follow Panos’s footsteps in metamorphosing, relation-wise, from a greek God to a…Goddamned greek!
:-))))))
Hey David give your girl big hugs from me too!
At least you have got something going still, I just churned through yet another and I thought this one might work too!
Him, a successful muso who also is on tour for 3 to 6 months a year, me, someone who can’t plan and hates to wait, hmmm seemed promising there for a while….
Just guess I am not a person whose meant to have a personal life.
Enjoy London David, we only all have such a short time…
David.. enjoy your time with your love and than come back and write please what you think about beeing neutral :-) Is it good to be neutral when you start the story or is it better to hold one of the sides of conflict?
and everybody… i worked about a week to produce new website, this time it’s my design and i made it by myself with small but very impotant help from two of my friends http://www.agaluczakowska.com Everybody are very welcome to check it :-)
CHEERS!
AGA
your website looks just great!! very nice “FEMALE ISLAMBUL” series.
pozdrawiam
AGA….
when i think of all the great photographers who have photographed “issues”, i think they always “take sides”…how could they not? they may photograph “both sides” in some way, but surely they cannot be totally impartial…i think one must not confuse “integrity” with alleged “impartiality”…
now, Aga, i have not yet looked at all of your new work…and i am totally totally interested, but when i look at work , i really like to take my time and do it right…i have not had this “quality time” to do so…but, surely by tonight or tomorrow morning i will…
TOM…
i cannot argue with you on that one!!!
cheers, david
David.. but don’t you think it’s always better to “meet” with story with open heart not with imagination only from news… and later to decide what side you take…?
and now David.. go, go away from computer :-) When you will be back from romantic weekend you can write here, not before :-) hihi
David
I’m coming to the table very late in the game on this one, but I have to take a break from my over-deadline work to offer up condolences aover the passing of Burt Glinn. I want to assure you that, althought I never met the man, I am very familiar with his work and have long regarded him as one of the true giants of photojournalism. In fact, I knew his work long before I knew his name. Many of his images are ones I grew up with, particularly his work in Japan, Russia, and Cuba, and they were windows onto a world I was only beginning to discover second-hand through the eyes of photographers and writers whose names I barely knew. Many, many years later, when I started to actually study photography and its history and came to always look for the credit on images, I found the name ‘Burt Glinn’ over and over again attached to iconic, timeless photographs that were already stored in my memory bank. So then I deliberately sought out his work. His range and versatility was truly amazing, and sets a high standard for all of us to aspire to and measure ourselves against. I never knew much about his life other than his photo work, and never met him, but it pleases me greatly to hear that he wasn’t only a great photographer but a gentleman and wonderful person as well. As long as I may be granted to live, Burt Glinn’s name will be high on my list of the great photographers.
Sidney
Ana, such a joy looking through your new website! I think the subject is wonderful, pertinent and obviously something you care about … and has such great potential!
So … can you tell us more about your work in Turkey? Did you have preconceptions that you found were “wrong”? Did you find yourself having more of “something to say” as you progressed? Did you struggle with yourself to be open and not judge, while still bringing your values to the table? Did you yourself adopt local cultural traditions to gain access? How did you feel about that?
I can imagine many challenges for you doing this work, as both a cultural “outsider” and a woman in this cultural context … but these may be just misconceptions on my part. I do not wish to offend, only to learn a bit.
Sorry for all the questions but i really appreciate your work and we can all perhaps learn from each other. Please share :))
… and I meant that to be “AGA” of course, sorry!
Akaky, it’s always a delight to read what you have to say. I will read your comment about street photography many more times, I’m sure.
Aga, I meant to follow up on the “neutral” argument. I think it’s a function of the individual itself, not the photographer to take sides, just on the merits of the conflict itself, or not. Then, should the images show “your” side or both sides equally, well, for me it really depends, but in general, I find it more ethical not to “editorialize” one’s images, ie. put a one-sided text next to it that basically tells people what they should think.
In a more contemporary note, it seems to me PJs are less and less political, and one-sided, and things tend to be treated with equal strength, when they simply have not equal stength.
Like the many “essays” on being a US soldier/platoon deployed in Irak vs the story of a country turned upside down with easily 25 times more casualties, civilian at that, than the US army. Access does have something to do with the discrepancy, but ultimately, lack of it is no excuse for a PJ worth his/her PJ-ness.
David, good to hear you had a good time in my city. Tudo de bom! Luiz
… for Herve, me and ALL..
peace
Aga,
site looks great, nice work.
Aga, just looked at your site, I really like the worker’s strike reportage, you clinged tightly to the story, followed it, and that pays huge “dividends” in the end (unfortunately not the type that end up in the bank, but what the heck!).
viva panos. thanks man. viva greece!
…your welcome mr David Ryder….
ALL TIME FAVORITE
AGA….
i just spent about half an hour looking at your new work, mostly reading about and viewing your “Female Islambul” project…this is definitely a subject of great interest for you and for all of us….those first two photographs in particular were very strong and i see that this will be a project where you will be spending more and more of your time…
i am not quite sure whether you are moving to Istanbul or are in the process of moving…are you there now, or are you in Poland??? in any case, it is nice to have you back here and exchanging ideas and pictures with us…i will stay in touch with you here and by private e-mail regarding your work…
your work in Istanbul now leads to my next post about how most of us do work outside of our own “territory”….
cheers, david
Hi Aga, nice, clean website design – lots of strong photos.
To everyone else: I notice in Aga’s website that she has mixed colour and B&W photos in her Singles galleries. What do people think about this? Can colour and B&W be mixed in one gallery effectively or is it distracting? I ask because I’m planning my own website.
David…i am right now in Poland but on saturday i will travel to Turkey, and i am going to stay in Istanbul for two months. There is a lot to do more for my story… i was working on it only about few days (plus there are some photographs from Ashura from 2007)… so i want to continue and also shoot more about secular women. I will be still as a tourist so i don’t have access to some places (like The Koran schools for example)…
Also… i checked photographs from my visit in NY… and i wanted to say thank you one more time! A lot of good things happened when i was in states, and one of them was meeting with you, your students and drinkng a beer on the roof of kibutz!
Nick… i think there is nothing bad in mixing color and black and white photographs in single galleries but i would not do it in story for sure (i had idea once, but it doesn’t work at all)