We’ve mentioned photographer Rob Hornstra and his unorthodox and perhaps revolutionary ideas on funding his book projects before. He is currently working on a project about Sochi, Russia and the run-up to the next Winter Olympics, funding the trips via crowd-sourced donations (see link for more info). He discusses his ideas and methods about funding his own project on the New York Photo Festival’s website, and its a nice thing to hear. Inspiring.

There is also a small slideshow of posters he put up around Rome during an exhibition there, which is a cool thing to see and harkens to my old post Bringing Photos Back to the Street.

I’ve written before about Carolyn Drake and her work about water issues in Central Asia, but Pete Brook on his auxiliary blog Photography Prison just pointed me to a new narrated slideshow Drake has done for Orion Magazine. Have a look at “Return to the Center of the World: Following two storied rivers through Central Asia”

In America’s mass consciousness, Central Asia has transformed from being part of a powerful communist Cold War enemy into a place where the threat of Islamic extremism is imminent—all within the short span of my adult lifetime. Amid the clutter of preformed judgments that surface during the course of this work, it is always a comfort to return to the rivers. No matter how many different names they have been given, or empires have ruled them, or canals have been made from them, I can still see the rivers. Traveling along them offers the closest thing to truth that I can find.

The global media portrays Detroit as a post apocalyptic environment, showing picture after picture of modern ruins, buildings that were once the pride of our city. What’s absent from these images are the people. What we see instead are soulless photographs portraying Detroit as an abandoned city with little regard for the more than 850,000 people who still call it home. Decay is compelling and easy to document – and first time visitors are often fascinated by these exotic ruins. Nevertheless, Detroit’s fall from grace and its current state is not the last or only chapter in the story of this great city. “Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus”, Latin for “We Hope For Better Things; It Shall Rise From the Ashes”, is the motto written on Detroit’s seal. (introduction)

Romain Blanquart and Brian Widdis recently wrote us about their joint project Can’t Forget the Motor City. We want to share a small selection from the project and Blanquart and Widdis’ answers to some of Scott’s questions about their work.

dvafoto: Why photograph a project together? How do you balance both of your styles and approaches against and with one another? Why approach the project the way you have (one focus on people, the other focus on landscape/surfaces)?

Brian Widdis (photographed landscapes in black and white): When I first started thinking about the project, it seemed too ambitious to tackle alone. Romain and I had the same frustrations about Detroit’s portrayal in the media, so the partnership made sense. I was aware of other two person collaborations, so I started thinking about how we could make it work. For many of us, life as a photographer is a solitary existence – it’s been nice to step beyond that with Romain.
In the beginning, I was concerned with establishing our individual voices. Our styles are not overly similar, but we were interested in telling a similar story about Detroit. So if there were no parameters about what to shoot, we would surely duplicate the same scene. Structuring the way we have was also a kind of ego insurance. If we were to photograph the same things, I was afraid he’d outshoot me all the time and would have all the good photos in the project. By varying our areas of emphasis, I guaranteed myself half of the photos.

Romain Blanquart (photographed people in color): This project started about a year and a half ago over a telephone conversation. We both had just seen more images of Detroit in a publication I can’ t remember now, the Independent newspaper I think. Decay, desolation, abandoned buildings, more of the same, not a person in sight; important but so misrepresentative of our city. It pissed me off. Not so much the photography itself but the way it was used, a superficial and misleading representation of Detroit that is constantly drilled into people’s heads. I think that there is a place for photographs of Detroit’s destruction but it has to be put into context and these same images cannot be solely or prominently used by the media when talking about the history, the present or future of Motown.
My background is photojournalism working at American newspapers for the past ten years. Our life, I mean the world, is about people first. And it does not mean that photographs need to be of people. This is what I think brought Brian and I to work together. His photography tends to shy away from people but IS about people. Quiet and subtle moments where the human imprint can be felt. Perfect combination with my way of photographing that tends to be of people in a pretty straightforward way. We have the desire to tell a similar story. We always photograph together for this project to experience the same spaces, moments, people… We do not think or overanalyze our styles and what we photograph. We photograph what and who we are naturally attracted to.

dvafoto: What sort of response have you gotten from editors? I imagine you’ve had some difficulty because the piece challenges contemporary visual expectations of Detroit so much. Is that true?

BW: People in general understand where we’re coming from, but in some respects, a vision of Detroit that is not the same old thing is a hard sell, especially in a general news sense. We’re not doing a documentary project, so in the end, that’s not really our concern. Our project is different in that it’s a documentary style project that is a reflection of our two perspectives. Not a definitive look at Detroit, but different than what most people have come to expect.

RB: The feedback so far as been very positive. You can only listen to the same story told the same way so many times, unless it’s your favorite story! Our challenge is to challenge visual expectations of Detroit. I also want to say that this project does not intend to be an ultimate, statistically correct portrayal of a city. It is more the representation of what someone would experience and see if they spent the time to crisscross this city for a few months with, I would like to think, an open mind.

dvafoto: Many photographers separate portrait-style photo essays from landscape essays from documentary essays, etc. You’ve mixed styles together in the presentation. What does that juxtaposition accomplish? Same question, but for color vs. black-and-white.

BW: Since we knew that the scale of this project would be large, it made sense to have these limitations – only people in color and only surfaces in black and white. It’s a way of focusing the energy, while playing to our individual strengths. Our goal is to create a rhythm using the back and forth of the two individual visions to create a combined third vision. We have been experimenting with ways of establishing that rhythm and the specific medium will play a large part in how that comes together – the book may look different than the website, and the prints on the wall etc.

RB: The mix of portraits and landscapes is simply due to the fact that this is what each one of us is primarily attracted to. So we made it the rule of this game, stick with what you are best at for now! Similar for the color and black-and-white. What attracts me about working this way is that you can look at the project and see two voices conversing using a different vocabulary that once combined generates a third and I believe more powerful voice. And lets face it, the more the merrier.
Working together has many more advantages. It’s a great way to have twice as many ideas and I like the conversation we can have about Detroit and photography. It is also safer.

dvafoto: How are the people of Detroit responding to your presence when you are out working on this? Are your subjects appreciative or apprehensive? Do many of the subjects bring up issues about Detroit’s usual portrayal in the media?

BW: People in general and Detroiters specifically understand exactly where we’re coming from when we describe the project. Most folks have seen the same stories and have the same reaction that we have. Detroit definitely has an image problem – and it’s understandable – the city is a mess. We aren’t trying to fix that image or describe Detroit in its entirety. Our goal is to show that there is a complexity in Detroit that’s not usually seen.

RB: The people we photograph have always been happy about the fact that we want to show something else than decay. Many of them are sick and tired of the way their city is often portrayed.

dvafoto: What’s the eventual plan for the project? Have you finished the photography? Where do you see it ending up?

BW: The photography is about half way done, I think. Our ultimate goal is to publish a book. Romain and I believe strongly in the photobook. We would also like to show the work in Detroit and elsewhere.

RB: The first phase of the project was photographed by walking around the city making random encounters. Now we are looking to get more intimate in the space and people we photograph. We are starting to explore Detroiters in their personal space, their home. The final presentation of this story will be in book form. We also want to share the work through exhibits in Detroit and other cities.

dvafoto: What photography/journalism/art/etc. is getting you excited right now?

BW: I have been really enjoying Mark Steinmetz’s three books South Central, South East and Greater Atlanta . He’s an outsider in the communities he photographs, and his encounters with his subjects are random and brief, but there is still a remarkable sensitivity that he gets to. I’m also really interested in how photographers navigate their personal space and relationships. Two books that I have been enjoying are Doug DuBois’ All the Days and Nights and Nigel Shafran’s Edited Photographs: 1992-2004. Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost is a collection of essays about being lost and the unknown.

RB: Photography books that I have been liking lately are South Central by Mark Steinmetz, There Is Something In The Air by Cuny Janssen, I Am – Paradox Identity by Ilse French. I used to look at a lot of photography online; there are so many great photographers in this world but I realized that I should be doing my own work instead so I now avoid looking at photo blogs as much as possible! I also feel inspired by my friends from the photography department with whom I work at the Detroit Free Press.

You can learn more about Can’t Forget The Motor City, and stay in the loop for updates, on facebook and Tumblr.

I first met Jeremy M. Lange at a lecture we were both attending at ICP in 2006. We’d corresponded by email before, and he somehow recognized me in the crowd. I left New York later that year, and shared my last meal in the city with him. He continued freelancing in the city for a while before moving to North Carolina, producing along the way a strong and varied body of work, ranging from (legal) kidnappers for hire to Mexican presidential politics to barbershops to religious faith. His recent project, “The War At Home” is a wide-ranging piece covering the Iraq and Afghanistan wars from the perspective of those in the US. Do yourself a favor, and spend some time on his site. I asked Lange if he’d be willing to share his perspective on “The War at Home” over email. The discussion is below:

dvafoto: First, for our readers who might not be familiar with your work, where are you based and what publication do you work for? What sort of time on the job do you have to work on personal projects? How open is your publication to your story pitches?

Jeremy M. Lange: I am based in Durham, North Carolina, my hometown, which I returned to in 2007 after 3 years of school, 6 months in Mexico, and 3.5 years in New York City. I have a slightly odd arrangement in that I am a staff, or contract photographer, for the Independent Weekly, an alt weekly that covers the Research Triangle area of NC. I work 6 months a year guaranteed for them, one month on, one month off, and freelance the other 6, but I am able to take freelance jobs for all 12 months of the year, provided that I have all my responsibilities taken care of for the paper on the months I am on. The Indy is great in many ways, but especially in that me and the other photographer have almost complete artistic freedom in how we shoot the stories we are assigned and we get a little more time to invest in denser stories because it is a weekly. Deadlines do build up, but we have the ability to work our schedules out as we please as long as everything is done on time. Also, we can pitch stories at will and with a good argument, they tend to run them, as long as the story fits into the general guidelines of the paper, news, social justice, culture, it is pretty broad. Personal projects are much more easily blended into the paper than in others I have heard of. It can still be hard to find the time, and money, for personal projects, but that is always the case it seems. I think it falls more on you to make that time than anything else.

As a freelancer, I work a lot for the New York Times, who I have been working with since I lived in NYC and ran around for the Metro section, RIP, several days a week. They were the first real paper I worked for and have been great to me over the last few years. Thanks.

Other than that, I fill out my schedule with other editorial jobs, band shoots, portraits, whatever comes down the pipe. I think in smaller markets we are all forced to generalize a bit, but it is fun in that I learn new things from shooting different types of stories all the time. My background is in news and documentary, but I really enjoy shooting just about anything, with a few exceptions. Challenges keep you on your toes and I like the idea of photographing James Taylor one day and Christmas tree farms the next.

What got you started on “War at Home”? When did you know you were on to a bigger story with so many different threads to follow?

I met a soldier named Kristian Hofeller when I lived in Bushwick, Brooklyn in 2006. A package was misdelivered to my apartment and I rode up the street to drop it off at the right house and while speaking to the lady who answered the door, she mentioned that her son had just gotten back from Iraq. I asked if he might want to talk to me about it and take some photos, and I gave her my number and he called me couple of days later. We met at his house and drank some coffee and talked a little but he seemed sort of uncomfortable in his mom’s house so we went out to his truck and he basically broke down the last 5 years of his life to me. 1st responder to the WTC, off to Afghanistan, got in some trouble there, back home, marital problems, divorce, back to Iraq, back home… it blew my mind. He must have talked for over an hour with me just sitting in his truck listening and saying nothing really, I mean what the hell did I know about that? He got in some legal trouble while back in the US and therefore could not get a job, or at least a decent one, so he was considering going back to the military fulltime, he was on Reserve, or with a private contractor. They, the contractors, were offering him big money, he came from a blue collar family, but he did not really want to go. He had lost his wife and friends because of the war, but he really had no other options. We smoked and sat in the truck and he talked and then I went home, saying we would get together soon and shoot some photos. I had no idea what to do with what he told me, so I wrote down as much as I could remember, this is why an art degree can be a disadvantage, I should have taken notes, but I got it down for the most part, I like to listen.

We met again a couple of weeks later and went all the way out in Long Island to shoot some guns with an Army buddy and an older guy from his neighborhood. He would not really let me make any photos of him, but I got a shot of an Osama bin Laden target in a sand pit that has stuck around through all the edits, as well as one of his truck with a backwards “American Hero” emblem in the windshield. So I shot some really cool guns and we talked a lot, Kristian, me and his Army buddy, and then they took me home. We never talked again, he did not return my calls after that, not sure why, but I heard he went back to Iraq not long after. It stuck with me but I was trying to hustle in NYC and that was it for a while.

Not long after I got back to NC I shot a NYT story about a private contractor killed in Iraq, Brent Gray. We went to the grave with his wife and sister and some friends and then to a bar where we met some other guys who had served with him. I was so interested in what they were talking about and how little I knew about it. This is 5 or 6 years after we invaded Afghanistan and 3 after Iraq and I knew next to nothing about what people here were going through. I am not from a military family, but I have always been interested in it, the guns, the adventure and was about one stamp away from Marine basic training after high school. So I started looking around to find stories related to returning soldiers and other aspects of the war’s affects on the country and realized I had a huge pile of ideas.

Your “War at Home” project is pretty far-reaching. What ties it all together? What’s it about?
Read on »

Incredibly last minute announcement but I will be in New York City next week, December 21st through 23rd, for a quick visit with publications, editors and friends and to continue my project I See A Darkness. I will have new work and portfolios to share, including an under-wraps book project that will begin immediately upon my return to Serbia in January. (Did I even mention that I’m back in Seattle for the holidays? It’s been busy.)

If you are in the City and feel like meeting up to see work, see an exhibition (I’ve got Ballen, Frank, and Mosse on my schedule right now) or grab a beer, be in touch! It’ll be a crazy quick visit but it might be my only one this year.

A couple of months ago my friend Darko Stanimirović in Belgrade mentioned that he was hoping to organize some of his friends in town to create a Serbian street photography collective of sorts. Over the following weeks the groundwork for Belgrade Raw was developed through memorable nights full of Montenegrin wine and impassioned debates. I’m proud to present my friends’ efforts here and invite you to see some awesome work by six Belgrade photographers. I invited Darko to answer a few questions about the project:

What is Raw all about, who is involved, how do you know each other?
Well, one day I realized there are a couple of really good freelance street photographers in Belgrade. I especially admired how they capture those ordinary-extraordinary moments of Belgrade life. And they didn’t really care about using old films or front flash. I liked that rawness, it was way more honest and interesting than any boring touristic picture we can see all around. Not just in tourist guides, but basically everywhere – night-life/news magazines, websites, photo galleries etc. We’re all either Belgrade-born or we’ve been living here for long enough to know it shows nothing about Belgrade, but it’s all anyone can really get. So we’re here to try to change it, to show all those small & big things no one wants to publish, but things that really make this city.

We know each other mostly over some Internet forums and Flickr pools. One night in a park, drinking cheap but fine wine, I proposed this idea of a website that would showcase portfolios of some interesting Belgrade-based street photographers to Luka-Strika, one of our photographers. Over next few nights I designed simple layout and coded it in Wordpress. In some three weeks the whole crew was gathered and voila! It’s cool how everything was brought to life really quickly.

Why does the city and photo community need this group?
It’s not just that we as photographers “see” other side of our city. There is a whole community of people who’d love to see something really different and “honest”, without that ugly touristic taste in it. And I’m talking about both people living in Belgrade/Serbia and foreigners. You can learn much more about a city by looking at works of it’s street photographers, than looking at tourist guides or surfing the promo websites. And for the photographers themselves, Belgrade Raw is important because it gives them a context in which to work. It’s always easier to “fill-in” when you have that framework.

What is it about Belgrade that you are focusing on?
It’s hard to tell exactly what we focus on. In a joke, we usually say “that’s something for newspapers, not for Belgrade Raw.” That means we also publish photos which probably wouldn’t be published in traditional sensationalistic media. We like normal, ordinary people, personal stories and interpretations. Someone would think the city is too small for such a “focused” project, but it’s not. In fact, it’s incredible how many big and little stories are still waiting to be covered, while there are so many local newspapers, magazines, TV stations, websites…

Why street photography? Why this manner of photographing Belgrade?
Street photography is a concept that perfectly matches our idea of showing our own, honest view of Belgrade, because it involves photographers who “wander” all around, by day or night, covering everything that seems interesting or important. It’s the opposite of “beautiful sunny day panorama of Belgrade, commissioned by…” Also, street photographers are often freelancers, so you kinda get that true personal view. Speaking of Raw, we don’t care if a photograph was created using a cellphone camera, compact, film or digital. Prime or plastic lens. All we care about is strong personal storytelling. And if you look at the whole “industry” of documentary photography, that’s more or less the direction it takes.

What is next?
We’ve only just begun, but we do have plenty of ideas. Right now, it’s important for us to continue photographing our city, there’s so much more to show. But in the same time, we make plans for print too. We would also love to make some kind of cooperation with other photo-collectives, especially with those in the neighboring countries. There are also plans for guest photographers, so we’re not being limited to “Belgrade-born” or “Serbian” or such. (ed: check out the recap of a workshop with Donald Weber in Belgrade that members of Raw attended, and helped support, for an example of where this project might continue to grow).

And how does this reflect Belgrade/Serbia/Serbs?
For starters, we’re avoiding traditional cliches. But not the other extreme either (“we’re all beautiful, peaceful, awesome people”), so we’re trying to find the right balance. No, we’re not trying actually. We don’t even think about it much, I guess it just comes naturally. But about some other, deeper sync with Serbia/Serbs in general, we’ll have to wait.

The site is still developing and new projects are uploaded every week. One of my personal favorite series, and which sums up the Raw project so well, is “Wind” by Nemanja Knežević. A fresh, personal view of the city that is completely honest, and confounding to much of Serbia’s reputation. Great to see photographers, under their own motivation, creating their own work under their own voice, and finding ways to get it seen on their terms. I’m looking forward to spending more time with this crew when I’m back in Belgrade and maybe producing my own street work from town.
You can, and should, also follow these guys via Belgrade Raw’s Blog, their Flickr Feed, Twitter or become the 521st fan of theirs on Facebook.

DIY film production

When I first started playing with color photography, I shot Kodachrome as often as I could. I couldn’t resist the red and yellow canisters and the beautiful colors of the final product. Earlier this year Kodak announced the end of its 74-year production of the film, and Dwayne’s Photo, the last developer of the film in the world, announced it would stop developing Kodachrome in December 2010. Now, some photos on flickr, with precious few details, show a homemade Kodachrome manufacturing unit. In goes plastic and some chemicals, out comes a fresh spool of Kodachrome film. It reminds me of the effort to recreate Polaroid film. Amazing!

(via boingboing)

Q: Why broadsheet?
A: We think that the best chance for newspapers’ survival is to do what the internet can’t: namely, use and explore the large-paper format as thoroughly as possible. To that end, we opted for a huge and luxurious broadsheet–15″ x 22″. Then we unleashed artists and designers to show exactly how much the format can do.” -McSweeney’s FAQ on the one-shot San Francisco Panorama project

McSweeney’s, whose lists you should know, is producing a one-time-only 380-page newspaper to be distributed in San Francisco, to McSweeney’s subscribers, and in bookstores across the US. The teaser pages of the San Francisco Panorama are beautiful, and the list of contributors reads as a who’s who of contemporary American writing, design, illustration. The photography is top notch, too. Can’t wait to see one of these in the flesh.

Magnum’s Georgian Spring is an incredibly interesting project, and possibly a turning point in photojournalism and agency work. This book, print, web and ‘multimedia’ project is a collaboration with the Georgian state itself, funded by the Ministry of Culture and arranged by photographer Thomas Dworzak with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, and independently curated by publisher Chris Boot.
As Scott mentioned when this project first went live, 10 Magnum photographers are involved and are a very interesting cross section of what is being done in photojournalism today. Jörg Colberg, of Conscientious and photojournalism criticism fame, agrees in his review of the book. To quote him, “So there are ten photographic voices, all from the same photojournalistic agency – how could there be a crisis in photojournalism when there is such variety? Or asked in a different way: What kind of crisis?”

I see Georgian Spring as the latest in a series of interesting photographer and agency-driven productions where people are “doing it themselves” with alternative funding methods. I think of two other Magnum projects directly that I’ve always respected: Euro Visions, about the ten new EU states in 2004 in collaboration with Centre Pompidou and Magnum Off-Broadway (a project that deserves a post in itself, definitely coming soon).
Beyond being a necessary development to continue doing the work we’re out in the world to do, these agency and photographer-led projects almost invariably produce more interesting and personal work. (But maybe this is because I’m a photographer? Wonder if there is a breakdown between publication-designed and producer-designed projects with the public?).
There has been some hubbub around VII’s recent efforts (especially on the public relations front) to get ahead of new funding opportunities, such as working directly with NGOs and then maneuvering to have the work published. In an era where the number of assignments is shrinking and our archives are our pensions, finding any way to photograph important stories prior to selling them is intelligent. So likewise getting countries to pay for portrayals of themselves is an interesting idea that just brings this idea to a new level, and shows impressive lateral thinking. The multifaceted distribution is terrific too, from podcasts to an impressive book (so says Colberg, I haven’t seen it in person yet), to an exhibition and interactive website (with maps and breakdown by region in Georgia, which is nice to see). All around, from ideas to photographs to presentation, extremely well done and I think (at this early moment, juries will tell in time) a new landmark in photojournalism.

Thomas Dworzak has a long personal history of working in Georgia, having been (or continuing to be, as the website suggests) based in Tblisi. And maybe because of his close relationship with the country, and the president, his photographs in this project are the most contentious to me. Dworzak presents a love letter to Saakashvili, which is a curious choice given the mix of other work by his colleagues and the nature of the project itself. By all means I’ll defend his right to publish what he feels like but in such a project it is so strange to see this photo-profile of the president traveling the world, wooing its leaders and his domestic successes. The video presentation is especially strange, with lighthearted music, rapid pictures of the smiling president and running tourism-board commentary by Saakashvili himself. As PDN brought up in its piece Magnum on Georgia, For Georgia a “photojournalistic” project about a State funded by that State on the surface is begging for careful scrutiny of its objectivity. There seems to be ample distance between the creative and journalistic freedom of the photographers and their curator Chris Boot from the state itself, and many of the essays and their subject matter probably would not be picked up in tourist literature by Georgia.
Also enlivening from the PDN article is this quote:

According to Dworzak, the project set off some debate within Magnum. “It’s nothing extraordinary, Magnum has done it and other agencies have done it for many other countries, it’s just usually done in a very shitty way,” Dworzak says. That the Georgian government agreed to a completely hands-off approach “made it really easy to accept,” Dworzak relates.

On the other hand, I was blown away by many of the other projects. In some sense this was a narrow assignment, to bring photographers into one country and have them all cover it in their own way, perhaps putting photographers in positions they are not suited for in an obvious time crunch (the book was published roughly a year after the conflict with Russia). But just the opposite has happened, it opened each to do what they do best and it really compounds the impression of contemporary Georgia. As I said above, this project brings together ten unique voices and gives them freedom to search out their own stories and it is a treat to see it come together. I haven’t had a chance to watch through all ten ‘Magnum in Motion’ video presentations but two really have stuck with me, perhaps for obvious reasons.

Alex Majoli has long been an important photographer for me but his work in Georgia, both here and in the recent war, has taken my respect for him to a new level. Please have a look at his piece for this project on Magnum in Motion. From two stark black and white title cards that tie his personal experience (and relationship to music, which is dear to my heart) to his early photography and then straight to the emotions and people he was photographing in Georgia. The soundtrack, from Italian punk band CCCP, provides stark cohesion with the best of movie scores. The images are raw, beautiful and confounding.

Russian photographer Gueorgui Pinkhassov provides a similarly personal dispatch from Georgia, with terrific commentary (I believe his words, read by another person). Most of this piece is short video clips, fitting for a man who began his career as a cinematographer and working with Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky. And they are ridiculously beautiful, absolutely in Pinkhassov’s ’style’ but in motion. Indeed some of the videos are from scenes that became final photographs for his contribution to the book, such as the one posted alongside here. It is a moving and unique vision, and I can’t recommend strongly enough seeing his work on Magnum in Motion.

And have a look at the Jonas Bendiksen video, you just might spot him having a drink with the people at the party (in another short video clip, again used nicely). Glad to see the photographers getting involved personally!

Another question, which I admit not giving much thought to yet, is the new “Hollywood” film about the war tentatively titled “Georgia”. Wired’s terrific Danger Room blog riffs on an AP story in a post titled One Year Later, Hollywood Re-Fights Georgia-Russia War. What does this other project Georgia-supported project mean for this Magnum work? The film isn’t funded by Georgia it seems but it has gotten state support, and Wired is framing it as pro-Georgia. Does this paint the Magnum Georgia a different hue?

In the end, I think it is a wonderful thing to have such a portrait about a nation in an interesting point of its history, and I of course want to see more projects of this sort of subject matter as well as innovative funding strategies like this. But the final product of Georgian Spring does still leave me with some caution, particularly with Dworzak’s piece included. Maybe it is the newness of this idea, having the subject fund the project themselves, or having potential conflicts of interest so close to the surface (that’s a good thing, but still something new to deal with), but I’m a touch uneasy still. A bold approach, ingenious in many regards, and its bound to ruffle feathers, and I’m happy that it has affected me that way too. Can’t wait to see what is next, and I’m inspired to think about all of these issues anew.

Over the last week or so three really interesting projects came to me through the excellent lenscratch blog. I’ll just link one image back to her posts, where I encourage you to read about the pieces, see more photographs and click through to the photographers’ websites. Enjoy.

Corinne Vionnet:

Phillip Toledano:

Manuel Capurso: