ok, please, no more phone calls or e-mails to Karen Mullarkey!!! the woman is overwhelmed…Karen says her e-mail is on total overload…her computer is smoking!!! she cannot handle any more portfolios or inquiries from us at this point…
from now on , if we get a request like this, i think i will have to select a few of you to submit…an "open call" will just create chaos…. this should now lead to a discussion on how to approach an editor, how many pictures to show, etc etc….actually, i know Karen’s frustration….most of you have websites with just way way too much to view…maybe this is terrific for your friends etc., but busy editors trying to see what a photographer can do, just is not going to "edit" for you…
there should be a big difference between your web presentation and your archive…two totally different animals….many fail to see the difference…..
rather than really seeing the good pictures you do have, many editors will just exit in frustration over just too too much miscellaneous material…they do not want to go on a treasure hunt…they want to see the really best work …fast, concise, clear…period…
this will lead me now to interview two or three professional editors for you, so you can hear it directly from them…
this is a topic that comes up from time to time…or maybe even all the time…EDITING, PRESENTATION….
do most of you feel that editing/presenting is your most formidable task???
david,
i agree with what you put and i could not agree more with it. it is important to define who you are as a artist and as a person and as you have said before as a photographer early on. this will define you not only through one body of work but will show this throughout.
i know a few photographers who are in it to make money and that is it. sell stock images of flowers and pay rent for a year with it. this is all fine and good but when it comes down to it i could not nor ever could i live that life without ever having a deep personal connection not only with my photographs but as well my subjects also.
“its never to late to be the man you could have been”
very well put.
“the best way to predict the future is to create it”
DAVID
Damn… I worked all day with my old 6×6 pentacon six, but with first frame something wrong happen with this f..ing camera. I hear that shutter mechanism work wrong. Now I have to wait until tuesday to see that I could or could not work with this camera. meadium format should be a half of my work…. bloody camera. fm2 not working well also. It could be I will work only on M6 and one 35 lens againe. I had different idea. Shit!
tomorrow is “black march” in Kamienna Gora. Some drunk young mother with her partner have beaten to death 3 years old child. People organize march against it. I will talk with police about young people and about violance. This is not safe town beacuse youth are bored. I will also talk about my work because “guy with camera” is not what many young bored people want on their streets.
But all going well.
peace.
God Bless Cornell Capa !!!! A true Concerned Photographer !!++
Photo-sites. It’s a good point, David. The fact that I never put my Pbase link here, attests to what you are saying. As well as that nobody i know has established his/herself thru a public site.
On the other hand, I have made some good friends from these sites, so the sharing, away from “being viewed” and “career” intent, is really wonderful.
Will it stifle how profession people “view” me? Gee, I’d have to be seen first… From where i stand, yes it will come, in another re-incarnation, let alone re-inventing! :-)))
For some reason, saying all this, this poem comes to mind (better in french though):
Jacques Prévert – The Dunce
He says no with his head
but he says yes with his heart
he says yes to what he loves
he says no to the teacher
he stands
he is questioned
and all the problems are posed
sudden laughter seizes him
and he erases all
the words and figures
names and dates
sentences and snares
and despite the teacher’s threats
to the jeers of infant prodigies
with chalk of every colour
on the blackboard of misfortune
he draws the face of happiness.
” the truth is the best picture, the best propaganda. ” ” the pictures are just there, and you take them.” Capa
“The idea that any photography can’t be personal is madness!… I see something: it goes throuht my eye, brain, heart, guts; I choose the subject. What could be more than that?”
Great quote great man great life great photos
david,
guido again. I wanted to add something because i read your 11.59 post again and, i may be wrong, but you sounded a little pissed off as if by saying you magnum photographers “can afford”, i meant you’re are where you are not because of your talent, hard work and strong vision but because of luck or whtaever.
On the contrary, i have maximum respect and admiration for you,
Alex Majoli (by the way, give my countryman my “saluti”, aren’t you living in the same building?) and many others, and i think i know what the story is like.
I know sometimes i have difficulties to express my thoughts in English so i’m not sure I managed to communicate what i really wanted to.
To clarify my thought what i really meant was: you established photogs probably dont even need to have a portfolio, your work is in every bookshops, but even more in editors’ and people who deal with photography’s memory. That’s why i said you “can afford”. No film director is asking george clooney to show how good he is before hiring him after all…
cheers
David
just going back to editing down to a really strong set of 20-40 images.
just wondering how you presented your portfolio in the early days.
I remember when I lived in San Diego, I was next door to a major ad agency, almost ten years ago. just out of college, and bursting with confidence. so I was trying to dig up a job with this company, became freindly with the art dept there and was shown some portfolios. I was handed a beautiful clothbound coffee table book with slipcase, gorgeous print quality and a lot of pages. here I was standing with a photopaper box and a bunch of b/w’s that I had printed in school. that was some sorry shit. this was an ad agency, and not a magazine environment, (although they liked an editorial approach).
however, today with so many people holding cameras, I mean do you think that 20-40 images is enough.
if you have 70-90 really fine images, why not self publish and show them all. seems like most photobooks are 90-120 pages for established shooters.
Patricia
just going back to your comment. have you ever seen a conde naste contract? you’d be dreaming about your rights after signing one of those. plus you will need an army of lawyers to decipher.
whats the word on that David, with all the heavy editorial pieces, and the major national and international mags. do they want to own at Nat Geo. and if so how does that make you feel.
how about that Patricia, conde naste wants you to shoot a story for them, but they retain all rights, you are just vessel for their images, what do you do then, sign away your soul or shine the job.
thoughts going out to your editor freind. she got tossed to the lions and torn appart.
photographers, what a bunch of self important cooks. I am the best, no me, look at this, they suck I am better, blah blah blah.
poor fucking editors. its got to be a ruff job
DAVID,
I love the quote you shared with us today:
“be whoever you are going to be in the future,TODAY !!!!!”
This is what I love about you David, this desire for high standards, integrity and always pushing us to not project us into the future but act NOW!!!! I was joking about this “NOW” before….as I was trying to find a photo assignment for LATER….I know can add the concept of “TODAY” to “NOW”….
Thanks always for pushing us David! This is the sort of “kick in the butt” that inpires me not just for photography but for life in general, trying to be the very best person you can be NOW, to love your family children father, mother NOW…to tell them TODAY…. I am getting the NOW/TODAY concept better and better but, as we so often forget about it, there is indeed nothing more refreshing to see those frequent reminders from you….
Cheers,
ERIC
NOW!
@DAH: I think the sub-communities on Flickr are great places to make contacts. It’s not good for selling your work or for getting known, but for sure my small network of photographers whose work I appreciate and with whom I collaborate is (or was) based around the site. I would never use it as a showcase of work… more of a storage site, a place to learn or a place to share. Maybe to show sketches of things you work on. Some of my friends pulled out of it, and nowadays they update every so often a small sketch in it. Maybe a dozen pictures. Then all of them are deleted a week after and a new showcase appears. Not that bad an idea for promotion and still being part of it.
And, *good news*! I got confirmed yesterday for a slideshow in Rencontres d’Arles (thanks to Tango Photo collective for inviting me). They will be showing a few of the night shots during the night of the year of the festival. If I have time I’ll try to make it to Arles… it’s in July…
be whoever you are going to be in the future,TODAY !!!!!
———————–
I did that all my life, David, and now we see the result….Not pretty!
:-)))))
DAVID,
I was actually intrigued by your comment that to get nominated into Magnum, Alex Majoli was nominated with 25 photographs…. Presumably, you and other Magnum members knew of Alex and his work before he ever applied to Magnum or did you all “discover” him when he submitted his portfolio…Reason I ask is that, somehow, I would have thought that, if many of you knew of the photographer beforehand, were already familiar with his vision and point of view, than maybe just 25 pictures are plenty enough…but does this happen that you guys nominate someone who you never knew beforehand and actually discovered for the first time when seeing an “entry” portfolio ???? Would be great if this happens as I would have thought members may not want to take a gamble on someone they never heard of before…..
Eric
Eric,
I’ll bet dollars to donuts that a photographer unknown to all members has ever been nominated into Magnum based on portfolio alone….
just discussing this with a freind, how could you really understand what a photogs really capable of based on 25-40 shots, I would think you would want to see a lot of material, including the fuck-ups. I mean if it was a really important job would’nt you want to know exactly what you are dealing with, as an editor. maybe to get in the door, 25 shots will get you to reception.
my freind eric kroll, who was formarly the editor at taschen, here in LA, on sunset, when he first came over and was looking at my work he insisted on looking at my contacts. he wanted to see it all.
I would think it important to see what kind of percentages a photographer has, of hits and misses.
DAVID,
Just saw on the MAGNUM site that Cornell Capa passed away early on the morning of May 23rd at home in New York. I presume that it is another sad day for you all at MAGNUM. I do not know if he was your friend or not but wanted to share my condolences to you, his family and close friends. The past few months have been rather tragic with several of the legendary photographers of Magnum having gone away… Hope you all get a break for a while….
ERIC
Rencontres d’Arles, Joni?
Holy cow, great news for you!
Cornell Capa was not a big star, even his name was co-opted for fame by his brother. yet I must say I do relate a lot more to his photography than his kin. I remember our little quips about “peace photography” a while ago, and there it is, along with his “portfolio” page on the Magnum, him saying just that. That there was a war photographer in the family already, and he stuck photography of peace.
That kind of message is harder to pass these days. Everyone seems to be convincd that to a be a photo-journalist worth its mettle, you need blood, conflict, pain and unrest. It’s a trend very difficult to escape. Panos, in Venice, you can show us that side, not just that it’s a dying world. Evrything changes, after all.
DAVID!
I know you are swallowing the “glistening sea”…and this day, has been an extraordinary intense one…….but also today, i learned that my brother’s boat (he’s a fisherman) sank and, so all has been intense….so, after spending hours with marina and dima talking, i thought i would share this with you….maybe this is about this subject (editing/photgraphy), maybe it is not…who the fuck cares….
I am sending this to you and your son…this is part of my essay/assignment about bones/family….today, i leave this here for you in part to thank you for understanding….
this will be the only time i leave something else here about the essay/photo story ‘bones of time’ until you publish it….
but tonight, with marina and dima, i send this to you in NC and for your son…a prelude…but, maybe also about “editing” and all that shit that plaques the world….
for your david and your son….
hugs
bob
============================================
from the work in progress “bones of time”
We fall into earth long before we begin our step into flight and we are transfigured. If we understand anything, anything at all, it might be this simple truth: we migrate, continually, inside and out. We are tempered and transposed and tampered with by land and sky and sea. It shifts and shapes and sifts inside us, sitting until it (the trees, the water, the dusty earth) becomes us: the metamorphosis. Though is it really us who are transformed or have we been, all along, the transformer. Maybe it is we who bewitch and beguile the land and sea and sky. Maybe we ensorcel that which is around us, shape and hex it so that it resembles us, is defined by us, elliptically wakes inside us because it, place, is of us. We stain the land. We scent it with our hopes and fears and memories; we carve out from this migratory and shifting path, something else. We mark place with our scent, bend light upon its slippery back until it alights. A sky is dampened with yellow because we dream it to life. A sea opens wide its hilly mouth, small dots of cyan and amber teeth, because we have instrumented its awaking. Do we sense this?
This place about which we all speak, the yawing yawn of the sky, the tin earth, the coppery river, the tick and tour of our passing lives, is the country into which we move and mark and make. Water everywhere, inside and out, tiding with our internal tide. Is it not our mass which lens the shift and shape of the spate, the wax and wane of the river’s tongue, the lapping of the sea born of our own tongued-tied movement: we the shaper of tide and flux, not the moon. We are the bodies of water; we the effluvium; we the patterned, oxygenated blood upon which the earth travels. We the highway and the world the wearied and still fighting traveler. Can you hear the tock and spin of earth’s compass inside you?
It is, migrating, is it not?
If we carry, like small thimbles of cinnamon, the pollen dust of the land through which we have journeyed, what have we left behind: sprinkled shells of memory planted into the armor of trees like shelled cicadas, wet tin cans of voice tossed into the ocean at night, sweaters of our sweating selves torn slightly and untended along the caverns and valleys and underpasses of cities, clipped away parts of our salted our skin, songs and sights, later picked up by others. Yes, it is the landscape, the rural hills and shadows, the urban alleys and knobs, which are transfigured for we have in our passing entered them and begun to unravel.
There, the metamorphosis: the small dry snap, not twig, not stone, not mineral, but bone. Can you hear it, in your passing?
…….
just to clarify…my brother’s boat (his business, his love) sank…but he is ok….no case for hysterical worries. ;)))
b
There is a specific SPECIAL time in Venice… GOLDEN LIGHTS…
It lasts about 25-40 minutes…
Then the dark comes … The creatures of the NIGHT…
… GOLDEN LIGHT… 13 photos…. VENICE INSIDERS PHOTOS…
milking, enjoying, drinking that GOLDEN LIGHT…
please , click:
http://web.mac.com/innerspacecowpanos/%22MOVIES%22/VENICE_GOLDEN_LIGHT.html
peace
p.s….
MAGNUM?….that really important?…
i knew John vink and his work before I knew he was Magnum….I saw David’s book before i knew he was magnum…I fucking went wild on Jacob’s work (seen here in toronto) before 1/2 the world knew his name (before he was magnum)…
make the life and sing it…all that matters….
hugs
b
STEVEN THE CON ARTIST…
THE GUY THAT PUNISHED ME OR TOUGHT ME A LESSON…
on the phone… with his “guilty” look in his eyes…
http://web.mac.com/innerspacecowpanos/%22MOVIES%22/STEVEN_THE_CON…_THE_GUY_THAT_KICKED_MY_ASS.html
peace…
Man….40 portfolios in a couple of hours. Maybe it’s easier for Karen because she’s editing other people’s work, but looking through that many portfolios makes me think of Sisyphus. It’s hard for photographers to get noticed among the hordes, but I bet it’s just as hard for the editors to keep their heads from spinning.
Editing my own work is so difficult; I wish I could blame it on my digital camera, but even with film I shoot a ton. Shoot first, and edit (read: ask questions (of myself)) later. Part of the difficulty, as mentioned above, is that one falls in love with ones own pictures and the circumstances in which they were taken, but another aspect, which I think is different, is familiarity. By the time I’m editing, I’ve taken the picture, looked at the picture, dreamed about the picture, written a caption, applied some IPTC keywords (necessary for later finding), looked some more, tried it out in a layout, etc. Doesn’t matter whether I love the picture or not, and in fact this familiarity often breeds contempt as they say, but in the process it gets so I can’t see the forest through the endless, endless trees.
An aside to David: I wish your website worked in China; so difficult to keep up and join in on the conversation when I have to get around the censors to do so…I think it has to do with typepad being blocked.
Hi David.
I haven’t commented on anything here for a couple of weeks because am in East Timor at the moment. The internet has been patchy over the last week….
I have put a rough edit up of a cock fighting essay on my Lightstalkers site. I’m interested in any thoughts etc.
I was attempting to document the event, but not show any fighting. I have put up 12 images, but will whittle them down further.
The project on Sister Guilhermina’s work with the IDPs turned to custard as she had to fly out to Australia, so I have spent the time in other the IDP camps here.
I am attempting a project that mostly focuses on the women and children, those who seem most affeted by the troubles here.
I will put the images up when I return to NZ.
So i’m sitting here trying to edit a 10 photo slideshow for Look3 for youDavid and Im paralyzed…I had Joni’s input as well as Herve’s and they were like night and day..totally different…so now Im trying to decide how to go about this edit…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jinju/sets/72157605200281736/
this is btw what I have so far…14 photos some of which repeat each other a bit so Im going to see how I feel about it tomorrow and which will go….Im leaning more to some than others….
GUIDO…ALL
this is often a great way to communicate, but often not..i was not in the slightest “pissed off” at you or your comment…and i did not at all think that you were inferring that “luck” was somehow a factor in the success of Magnum photographers or any other agency photographers…
sometimes when i am writing very fast, as i often do here, i leave out certain statements or thoughts that might make everything more clear..i go straight to my point and this can lead to confusion, as in this case…my apologies for any mis-statement or confusion coming from my rapid fire words…
my only point was that i think it is a mistake to think that somehow photographers who have achieved some iconic ranking are able to do certain things because of this ranking or after they achieved this ranking…my only point was that in order to make this “mark” they had to be doing whatever they were doing BEFORE they had been bestowed with some sort of “iconic rank”…you cannot put the proverbial “cart before the horse”…
it is true that for some editors who know us well that perhaps we do not have to show our “porfolios” every time as in your George Clooney example…but we show our portfolios all the time for grants, curators, book publishers, advertising agents, print buyers etc…and i think that George Clooney did in fact do a reading for the Cohen brothers for the movie “Oh Brother Where Art Thou”…every picture “buyer” wants to see the work of a photographer, including the so called “iconic” photographers….
i will say this…that the one thing that did change my professional career more than any other thing, was publishing a book….from that point forward i only showed my book instead of a traditional portfolio…and that is why i write the way i do for my audience here and try to push all of you to think BOOK…
rest assured Guido, that my only intent here is to help all of you as much i can… mentoring has been in my blood since my early twenties….
if sometimes i seem critical or am very “straightforward” it is because i am just trying to keep photographers from “making excuses” of any kind for their work…
i do believe in “tough love” for my students and photographers i mentor and care about…why??? because it works!!
i am a “results” person..and i know that perhaps i may frustrate an emerging photographer at some point, but then when i see this very same photographer go out the door and then come back with some brilliant work and the look on her/his face when this happens, then i know that honesty in critique is always the best policy…
i clearly see that there is always a tendency for all of us to come up with some “reason” (and there are many) for not doing this or that…we must all “sail our own boat”…
one last point….i do not think that you or anyone should determine your “sense of self” based on any picture “buyer”…i would rather work at McDonalds to earn my living and have my own “portfolio” than to change or alter my work for any client…yes, i do have editors who have “bought ” my work…and yes, of course, i want them to be happy and yes i do keep them happy so that i may work again…so this belief in my own work is not arrogance…it is just simple belief….and only i have to believe it….
it is this fine balance between doing “your own thing” and still surviving as a professional or serious art photographer that is the very reason why i spend my time writing to all of you here….
i always welcome comments from my audience here whether the writer agrees with me or not…healthy discourse is an art in itself….and, by the way, your English is perfect!!!!
un abbraccio grande, david
Book…
well I think thats everyone’s dream…Ive been thinking a lot recently on how I would like the layout of a book to be….dreams, eh?
JONI….
wow, great!! a showing at ARLES!!! you should be very proud…
let’s go back to Flickr for a second…i think Flickr and the other photo sharing sites are at times a terrific resource , have changed how people look at photography, and may do more to change the agency business than any other modern factor…i go to Flickr all the time, but mostly as a “location resource”… i just do not think that at this point in “history” that it should be the place where you establish yourself outside of the mass mainstream…but quien sabe?? the face of photography online is moving so quickly, changing so fast, that i do not think anyone can predict where it will all go….still, i like boutique shops rather than malls….i like handcrafted objects rather than assembly line products…but, i did catch myself buying a shirt at KMart the other day when i was desperate..not a bad shirt….shhhhhhhhh!!
cheers et al, david
ERIC…
only two or three people at Magnum knew Alex Majoli and most of us had never heard of him or seen a single picture or had ever laid eyes on him …what difference does it make?? his work was terrific…period
this is not so unusual…iconic “famous” photographers apply to Magnum all the time…rarely do they make it…unlike most other agencies, at Magnum we like to discover someone…let them build and grow inside the agency…provide them with room to expand and evolve…
Cristina Garcia Rodero ,Bruce Gilden and yours truly were exceptions in that we all had well established careers prior to Magnum…
do not confuse well established careers with being serious photographers with “authorship”
but, some of you may not know how it works…being “nominated” does not mean you become a member of Magnum…you become a “nominee” for 2-3 years and then submit another portfolio based on the recent work at which point the photog is voted “out” or “in”…”in” the photog becomes an “associate member”, still not a Magnum member…THEN the photog must create even another portfolio based based on the next 2-3 years of work…75% of the members must vote to have you become a full member..yes, yes a grueling process that can take 4-10 years…some photogs are held in their nominee or associate status for some time and must re-apply…
we are not trying to make photogs suffer, but all who try for Magnum do indeed suffer in the process…but Magnum has survived for 60 yrs. practicing exactly the “tough love” approach i take in my mentoring…again, it works!!!!
cheers, david
ALL:
about MAGNUM “UNKNOWNS” ;))…as i wrote last night drunkenly…let me offer another example of one of my fav. photographers who now happens to be in Magnum:
Jacob Aue Sobol….
2 (or was it 3) years ago, there was an “exhibition” of pictures from Jacob’s book SABINE at a bookstore (fucking bookstore of all places) during CONTACT…i went, fucking got my heart all pulped out and up….that night I wrote about Jacob at Lightstalkers, in a fever…no one new that young cowboy, fucking no one…got a letter of thanks from Jacob’s friend David H (at LS)…and swallowed everything he would show after taht (tokyo, c. america, etc)…
last year, when he got in MAGNUM, I was silent for 2 days (no dah, no ls, no nothing)…’cause I met David after i had first started coming here last february (from a tip by belgian photographer) and then at LS wrote that “I DO NOT WANT TO JOIN MAGNUM” ;))…after, david (at LS) wrote me a long, thoughtful response and I wrote back, and our “love affair” ;))..was born…
when Jacob got it, i started to re-think magnum…even though lots of young photographers whom i admire terribly for the originality of their vision (antoine, jonas, christina, soth, majoli, paolo etc) are there, somehow Jacob’s inclusion (coming after antoine) started to make sense to me…
I still totally do not understand why so many photographers worry more about things like this (to be a magnum photographer, or be with a great gallery, or win an award, all that shit), but i have slowly (through my friendship with david and john vink, and knowing chris a) begun to understand, that the value of magnum is that is offers a family for a person working in a field that can often be incredibly lonely and frustrating…
marina and dima are my magnum…but i understand more and more why i might change my mind about belonging to a place like Magnum: cause it still is the home of some big-soul people…
hugs
running
b
Bob B, I read your words out loud to myself so as to hear, taste, touch, see, feel them with my entire being. You, my friend, are what we call an Old Soul, a Seer, a Knower, a Wise One. Yes, your words are like music washing over me, but they are so much more than that. They are written on my heart. You say things I already knew but didn’t know I knew until I hear you say them. Do not let ANYTHING keep you from your work. You are essential to the Whole. Thank you.
I must say this has been a really interesting read, so much so I was inspired to go back to my carbonmade account and create two edits of my 2 main projects. I think I will be leaving it as the link under my name from now on.
this has been a very powerful list of posts indeed.
i think bob hit the nail on the head when he speak of magnum not only being about photography but about being a community as well. sure photography is the main goal but community is hard to come by. especially when only so many people understand you as a person. it can be a quiet life not having anyone to share, bounce and or reflect certain ideas and passions with. having community i find certainly helps to recharge the batteries.
community is precious.
hey Folks,
been away for sometime, and just in the last couple of days, i have finally been able to catch up on the posts. lots of great stuff in here. congrats to those selected for this months assingments, best of luck!!
editing…yes…something that has to be done, but like with so many of us, is dreaded…i find it so, especially, when i only photograph for myself, and then have nothing to do with them, apart from storing them on my hard drive. but when i do the edits, i like to get help from someone, who seems to “understand” photography, story telling, and myself. occasionally, i update my web page, but less and less. was in paris just before xmas, and was happy with the shots i made, and prob maybe should add some images up there…have started the editing process slowly…but at the same time, i really need to get myself a “proper” web page, with my own design.
anyway, seems like i will be changing countries soon…will head back to the motherland, as i have been offered a freelance job with a friend; fashion/commercial photographer, in oslo, which i really look forward to. miss being in the milieu…but for staying in the milieu, this blog is great :-)
and through, this, will make a portfolio, of not too many images ;) and then submit to magazines and news papers, and hopefully get some freelance work.
anyway, wanted to add a couple of links here, which is kinda interesting, how something of the same, can be presented in two unique ways…enjoy.
peace n’ love,
jarle
PATRICIA….
i am not sure you were here when i told Bob that i would not do this forum without him…what you write proves the point exactly…
thank you…
cheers, david
BOB….
please let me point out that Magnum is a photographer’s coop, very important to me, a professional “family”, but not anywhere near as important as my immediate family and the friends i love….
i do not put Magnum, or my photography itself, above my personal relationships…Bob, i think you know me well enough by now to know this is the case…
you may also notice that i am never the one even to bring up Magnum on this forum…
it is always one of you who mentions it, and then i merely answer the question asked…Magnum does indeed work for me, but were i not in Magnum i would be doing the same work…i went through 30 yrs of my professional career without Magnum and could have done 30 more…
i do not try at all to “sell” Magnum to anyone…i do try however to make emerging photogs aware of the “Magnum concept” of authorship, photographers rights, personal projects, photographer agency ownership etc etc….
joining any coop agency is nothing like getting a grant or receiving an award…those are “one time” sponsorships…joining an agency is more like getting married!! …long build up, long term commitment…
coveting anything is never a good thing…you have your head in the right place as usual….
abrazos, david
CATHY…
i think you may have mentioned once before that you had been a “surfing photographer”…cool…there are no waves today, but usually down here at Cape Hatteras we have either good waves or good wind for kite boarding…come on down!!!
i am assuming your house building is going ok, although every time i am around someone building a house they seem to have a slightly insane look in their eye and not much good to say about their contractors!!!
peace, david
PANOS….
my oh my man, you seem to be working harder than anyone on your assignment..rockin’…great….you are really creating some very provocative images..
i mean, you are making some photographs way way above the level you were working just a few weeks ago…
you surely must must feel good about this!!! i do!!
all i can say to you is, keep it up..do not stop!!!….accelerate……
yes, yes you will need to edit down tight by the end, but do not even think about that right now..
live it, breathe it…
peace, david
First off, as someone who does not stand a snowball’s chance in hell of ever getting into Magnum, Gamma, or the YMCA, I’d just like to let all the 45 year old photographers here who have compromised their vision with houses, cars, boats, and big bank accounts and who’ve decided that they must change their lives around that I will gladly take all of these crass materialistic obstacles to the successful realignment of your photographic vision off your hands at no charge to you. If the wife’s nice looking, I’ll take her too. The kids are optional, but hey, you can never tell; BobB turned out very well for someone who was supposed wind up as kielbasa. Now that I’m thinking about this, I must also remind myself not to make offal puns regarding opera and cold cuts here; I was expecting at least a groan, but no, nary a peep out of any of you. Ah well.
BOB….
i missed your “Bones of Time” text the first time around….classic Bob Black….
i thought you were going to delay your project…?????????
anyway, it seems as if you are “on” and i cannot wait to see the images to go with this….
what a great book title….can’t we work on your book sometime soon????
hugs, david
that (FlickR) should be the place where you establish yourself outside of the mass mainstream…
———————
That reminds me of my last “contact” on FlickR. A young adult trying to make a career and establsih himself, but probably from the way he chose to be “viewed”, signing on FlickR, this is why he is still struggling, and has to work even harder to convince. His name is …Barack Obama, maybe some you at FlickR know this young man.
:-))))))) (sorry, david, I could not resist, you served it to me on a silver plate. Your violin is well tuned this morning!)
About Magnum, it’s the conventional wisdom it’s a community, but having read that little monography on the agency (1999, by Russell Miller), it just seems anything but…. Brothers and sisters, yes, but feuding ones. That was a real surprise to me. That feeling of divas and prima donnas with a few cool heads, usually the oldest members.
I sense that Magnum has maybe matured since then, the photographers within too, and that egos, rivalries NY/Paris feuds and tutti quanti may be a thing of the past, or at least, sideshows. Or is it becsause the lawyers and financiers, non-photographers, are part of the decision-making?
AKAKY….
i just sold my only house, have no car, big bank account or boat and, judging from my first look at my contact sheets from my current project, my vision ain’t so great either!!!
however, my two sons seem to have “learned” from their father and have all of the above and have produced some pretty decent films to boot…so materialism and creativity do not have to be mutually exclusive…
by the way, i am still stinging from being rejected by the Washington D.C. YMCA back when i lived in our Federal Village…and i was kicked out of the Boy Scouts when i made an illegal (though not immoral) foray into the Girl Scout summer camp…
so, you can see , i only tell part of my story here…selective storytelling…the whole “truth” would not be a pretty picture!!
can i come hang out with you???
cheers, david
DAVID :))
I totally understand you 100%! :)) My comments weren’t directed at you (about Magnum) but at others posting here…and the great band of lurkers :))…..I know you dont sell magnum or ng, but illuminate your life for others (what i dig about u and why i think we get along so well)…my comments were about others who think about Magnum in “sterotypic” ways, both good and ill…my original reaction to magnum was more my frustration with lots of folk (who i meet in real life at photography gatherings) whose priorities seem odd: the goal above all, instead of what lay inside the act, for each of us, of being photographers, or rather, (fuck the “being photographers) the joy and sorrow and ecstatic act of shooting and connecting :))…i see magnum as no different than any “professional” family that does the best it can to promote its members and to embrace protect and inspire: that’s what i love about the group, much more than it’s iconic history or accomplishments……oh yea, there are great photographers there too ;))))…but that’s true with vii, and vu and noor and iris and eve and blackstar (ok, was true ;) ) and collectionne and BlackFamily agency :)))…
.increasingly, i totally get Magnum as a professional “family” :))..believe you me, i know where David Alan Harvey’s priorities lay! :)))))..i was trying to point out to others here that unlike many comments or ideas people have about Magnum, that my experience has been that photographers, like Jacob for example, make magnum ’cause they are brilliant and substantial and THEY WERE UNKNOWN! :))…shit, I didnt even know you or john vink were Magnum photographers until reading this blog for more than 1 month i read your “bio”…same with vink, i was looking at his Quest for Land series for almost 2 months (discovered through LS 3 years ago) and i read his bio, and i thought: jesus, am i stupid! ;)))….i get tired easily (not with you) photographers obsessing over things like Magnum or awards or galleries (all all disappears, like my brothers boat/business), instead of talking about or focusing on the reason why they were bitten by the photo (any craft/art) bug: a feverish desire to contact, make contact with people, tell and share stories, etc…:)))…above all, stubborn Bob black, has even re-thought about the idea of being a member of a group like Magnum (i dont mean i will apply, or that my work would ever merit that kind of acceptance or value, i just mean, your example and john’s example and now jonas, antoine and jacob have convinced me that my reaction has always been wrong…just as my hero P. Jones Griffith was wrong about the genius and substantial brilliance/accomplishments of Martin Parr!! :))…we grow :)))
as for the assignment: it’s still what we talked about privately…delayed!…but only for publication (replace with lisa or katarina or cathy…im working on Marina to do something too for you!), yes delay for here, BUT, as i said, that doesnt mean i am not working on it! :)))))….that would kill me..just now, putting off to give others a chance and to spend some necessary family R&R! :))))…but I havent stopped at all!!…not publishing immediately never means im not working ;))…same with Marina :))))…
lastly, i sent u 2 emails (including a pic of my brothers sunk vessel) and i received them returned: seems your private email has crashed…i guess your account is now on overload like Karen’s! ;)))))))))….
internet is such a shitting way to talk ;)))…
the part of the essay above is also for ur son….
hugs :)
b
p.s. a book…let’s watch the ocean or ny skyline with marina first together :))
running to the lake with mrs. black1
Akaky :)))
yea, that’s the key: think Keilbasa and you end up a poor artist: but, im still alive ;))))…and i also do not have:
1) house (nope, only dream of that)
2) car (nope, and im happy without one, we rent when we need)
3) big bank account (in 10 mintues we do our family weekly budget, and i have exactly $200 until my next paycheck)
4) fame (well, my son things im cool and my wife likes my art and i love her art too)
5) retirement: fuck…..
But i do have:
1) family i love and who loves me
2) friends: used to have more than i needed (according to dima), but now keep it real and simple and concerned
3) apartment near water (10 minutes to walk to Lake Ontario)
4) dreams
5) hunger for life
6) 2 fathers: Robert Anthony Black II and Mr. Akaky
7) being alive….
i’ll hang with you akaky, i really want to too! :))
running, family budget
hugs
b
HERVE….
Russell Miller was obviously trying to sell books…his job…but, if Magnum was in the turmoil that Russell describes, then i doubt we would be around at all…admittedly, he wrote that book, or at least interviewed for that book, before my time and surely there have been some “colorful” confrontations over the years, but i doubt that many photogs would be trying to get “in” if the Milleresque depiction was the “whole truth”..being the discerning man that you are, i am sure you pretty much figured that out already….
peace, david
David,
Not sure if you saw my post for the first portrait (or if I just got the sound of crickets) but I did hope to get an opinion. Aside from just dropping by a sale to shoot, I have 3 or 4 stories like this lined up. More will follow.
http://humanfiles.com/garagesale/gs02.htm
“the “Creatures of the Night” or Venice Vampires43
“THE CREATURES OF THE NIGHT”
Venice has it’s VAMPIRES…( Nothing really new here, but… still !!! )…
It needs time to meet all of them…. they are very needy… unpredictable…
but generally speaking good warm souls… just like yours…
The “Creatures of the night” calling me…
It’s hard for someone like me to resist… They can harm you, if they want… to defend…
but they won’t attack… they have their own rules… trust me, not much different than yours…
All they demand is respect… and maybe booze or drugs… or love… ( maybe ), just like you…
8 VAMPIRE PHOTOS…
http://web.mac.com/innerspacecowpanos/%22MOVIES%22/the_Creatures_of_the_Night_or_Venice_Vampires43.html
ok… now im going BACK….
I have some new “INSIDERS” TO VISIT…
everyone is going nuts here as a cold memorial weekend…
a very “promising” weekend… so much ENERGY… positive and NEGATIVE … I can feel it… smell it… smoke it…
I’m taking a deep breath for couple of days…
BUT IM NOT GOING HUNTING THIS TIME…NO, NOT ME…
I’m going to “fit” in, “blend” in… I will be the “INSIDER” myself…
I will “defend” them this time… not “expose” them…
I also found this as a safer idea…in general..
soonest
AMY DE WIT..
i looked at your website…do you want a critique here or in private???
cheers, david