On Nov. 9, 1989, the fall of the Berlin Wall was international news. It signified the reuniting of a city and the beginning collapse of the Iron Curtain that had hidden Eastern Europe from the rest of the world for decades. On the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the Wall, Berlin and other cities around the world are celebrating and remembering.



People used umbrellas as protection from the rain as they view the individually painted dominos along the former route of the wall in Berlin on Nov. 9. The display is part of the celebrations marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Some 1,000 giant dominos, many of them decorated by schoolchildren, will be toppled during the official ceremony in Berlin to commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the fall of the wall. (Michael Gottschalk, AFP / Getty Images)

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Curator and photographer Maya Joseph Goteiner recently sent out this great announcement:

We will celebrate the opening of 2,191 Days and Counting at Powerhouse Arena in Dumbo, Brooklyn on March 7th. I have been working with Chere Krakovsky to organize and curate this exhibition which will benefit the Iraq Veterans Against the War. All proceeds will be donated to IVAW's Winter Soldier Project to collect soldiers' firsthand accounts of the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan regardless of their politics, regardless of whether the soldiers are pro or anti war, while providing them with much needed legal and mental health support.

Please join us on March 7th, from 6-10pm: 6-8pm is the reception and 8-10pm is the performance. You can find more details and a list of participating artists and performers at: www.2191daysandcounting.com

Please rsvp through the following link: http://www.mobaganda.com/2191daysandcountingopening

I attended a fantastic presentation of images from Magnum photographer David Alan Harvey's workshop "At Home with David Alan Harvey". Harvey held classes in his Brooklyn based studio and invited guest speakers such as David Griffin, Director of Photography at National Geographic, and Mary Anne Golon, past editor of Time Magazine, to present during the last workshop. The images were diverse, but the body of work was solid, considering the one-week time frame students were permitted. One of my favorites was a dreamscape series shot by photographer Kyunghee Lee, who traveled all the way from Korea to attend the workshop.

Jennifer MacFarlane's Images from Cambodia

Jennifer MacFarlane, of pixcetera blog fame for her images of Manu Chao, had an opening last week at (Eco)Compassion featuring images shot for Glamour Magazine of the sex slave industry in Cambodia. MacFarlane traveled with reporter Marianne Pearl to shoot the story. The images are striking portraits of precocious children, forced into the industry at age seven. I previously interviewed Jenn about he project, and that piece can be found here.

I haven't blogged in quite a while, but I'm proud to have a comeback tour featuring the site Women in Photography..

I went to Aperture on Monday for the kickoff of a new series of educational lectures curated by Laurel Ptak of I Heart Photograph. This particular event featured the creators Amy Elkins and Cara Phillips of the female-centric online gallery, Women in Photography, and two of the featured artists on the site, Elinor Carucci and Robin Schwartz.

After an introduction explaining the reasons behind WIP's conception, Elinor Carruci discussed her personal work while flipping through never seen images. If you're familiar with Elinor's style, the work is painstakingly intimate, revealing beautiful yet embarrassingly tender moments.. The portfolio transitioned into images of her children enraged and delicate; the vulnerability once unraveled in herself tenfold within her children.

Robin also touched on the odd vulnerability of her child, Amelia. Her series, Amelia's World, is a surreal portfolio of her crystalline-eyed child interacting with animals. The scenes aren't hesitant dog pettings in the park, but are of feeding deer sandwiches, or sitting alongside a wild elk in the woods. One of the first things often seen in a portrait is the portrait taker... but within the images of Amelia, the quiet and intricate relationship between mother and daughter struck me even more so than Amelia's complete acceptance of her animal kingdom.

Many women photograph familiar relationships, and are subtly criticized by the greater world as being 'complacent' in their role as a woman photographer. Amy Elkins presented a myriad of statistics showing the small percentage of female photographers within museums and galleries, regardless of the percentage of females within the field. There are undercurrents defining niche subjects as traditionally female verse male, and these unfair delineations have perpetuated a severe sexism within photography. Women in Photography is devoted to undercutting these designations by showing that quality work by women, is quality work regardless.

The hullabaloo of fashion week has dissipated leaving a lovely collection of delights.

Stylelist.com hired V. Nina Westervelt to shoot backstage and front row during the Spring 2009 presentations, and she came back with quite an impressive portfolio of portraits. Nina's shots, caught on a medium format camera using a spotlight flash, leave the celebrities unpolished. It's as you found snapshots of your best friend's high-school party...with some familiar faces standing next to the keg... There is a disassociation from the perceived reality of Fashion Week, and a candidness usually not attributed to the likes of Kanye West, Nicole Richie, or pretty models...

Click here to see the works.

From one massive entertainment event to another...

Photographer Jennifer Macfarlane recently arrived home to New York from her travels with the band, Manu Chao. Manu, which can be described as a poly-lingual stoner version of U2, recently played shows in Mexico and Tijuana, and Jenn caught every moment of the dirty moshes and onstage frenzies. Although not well-known outside of eclectic music circles, the band is well-loved worldwide...

Despite ominous storm warnings, Saturday night proved to be a win for SlideLuck Potshow....

I know it's old news, but just in case you haven't heard...

The Emmy Awards nominations, released on July 15th, have chosen some fierce projects in the New Approaches to News and Documentary Programming categories. I won't question the wording choice (new approaches? I mean I get it, but...) but rather highlight some of the nominees: MediaStorm was nominated for two awards for work on Crisis Guide: Darfur and The Marlboro Marine, produced for the Council on Foreign Relations and latimes.com, respectively. Washingtonpost.com received four nominations (one of which was the very lovable onBeing), freep.com (Detroit Free Press) two nods, and current.com, two as well -- including TV Free Burning Man, which is an overstimulating homage to the bizarrely fantastic festival.

Congrats to the nominees! The winners will be announced September 22nd NOT via a new approach.

(Penelope Umbrico)


Can I just say that all of this recent news concerning Getty and Flickr reminds me of question that I didn't ask during the NYC Photo Festival.

During the festival, as I watched the uncomfortable curatorial panel unfold among Tim Barber, Jen Bekman and Laurel Ptak, I kept thinking, can we PLEASE mention Leslie Martin's exhibition? All of the questions circulating around curatorial choices and marketing strategies didn't touch upon what, I think, is the most valid contemporary concept-- ownership. Of course appropriation has been bubbling since Duchamp's single misnomered urinal, but with Umbrico's mosaic of sunsets in Martin's exhibition, thousands of original photographers were not attributed. Perhaps because they were ubiquitous images of a daily event they didn't need notation? If so, why wasn't anyone asking the question, why should ubiquitous images not require a byline?

Granted, when Umbrico and Martin spoke in discussion during the New York Photo Festival about the work, I jetted out before the Q and A. Although Umbrico articulately described her reasoning behind the solar pieces (the juxtaposition between a symbol of eternity and spirituality and its digital manifestation) she never talked about the legalities involved to use these images (please please correct me if I'm wrong, and in the QandA she addressed this issue).

If you type the word 'stolen' into the Flickr help forum, 784 topics pop-up speaking to the confusion of randomly finding ones images without citation. I fully realize the concept of exclusivity is slightly archaic, but an issue arises when attribution is dismissed. This conflict has come to head in debates such as the Richard Prince cowboy series (Prince rephotographed Sam Abell's cowboy images from the original Marlboro ads, and sold his images for millions). One of the main arguments in Prince's favor was the intended use-- since the appropriation was for artistic purposes, not advertising purposes, it was therefore perfectly legal. But when art becomes such a highly valuable commodity, should we then take umbrage?


The Getty partnership is a statement that Flickr is a valuable commodity. With billions of photos available publicly, it comes as no surprise that Getty is trying to capitalize on their potential worth for editorial/advertising opportunities. But what about art projects? Was it the ubiquitous nature of the sunset pictures that made it OK for Umbrico to take them... or was it assumed artistic appropriation that caused my original hesitation to ask the question in the first place?

I would love to hear thoughts.

PhotoShelter recently announced Shoot! The Day, which will be a single-day event ideally flipping the stock world upside down. On July 20th, PS is hosting shooting events, seminars and on-site lectures concerning all things stock. In conjunction with the announcement of Shoot! The Day, PS also released the site School of Stock, containing tutorials and no-nos in terms of creating quality stock images.

I just think this whole idea is brilliant. The DIY aspect of PhotoShelter is exactly what the stock industry needs right now. As a photo editor, I am consistently bombarded with stale stock-- these posed and saccharinated images no longer have precedence online or in magazines, but why are they still around? Because there is so little of SOMETHING ELSE. PS writes, "We asked our buyers how they felt about the following statement: "When it comes to the images I search for most often, I think I've seen all of the content available within the major stock houses." 55% agreed with that statement. I agree too. There is very little diversity across the stock market, houses are buying up the same collections and re-posting the photographs. The same image of a women wiping her sweaty brow in pink high-waisty spandex has been representing "hot, exercise, woman" since 1997.

Through gathering buyers, editors, photographers and lighting experts (the Strobist is making an appearance during the event) PS hopes to rejuvenate the market by actually looking at visual trends and then translating that into a literal product. All I can say is THANK YOU. It's about time.

Time Magazine's DOP of photography, MaryAnne Golon has stepped down from her position. Golon began at Time as an intern in 1982, and just over a year ago was appointed DOP after the retirement of Michele Stephenson. Golon's Deputy, Alice Gabriner will take her place as chief picture editor. Golon stated,

"It's all good. It's amicable. There's no rancor. I wish I had a good story for you," she said. "The headline is, I'm happy and the magazine is happy."

Read more from PDN here.

(The Rochester Baby Guide)

I cant figure out if BlueToad.com is for publishers begrudgingly accepting that the Internet exists, or hip publishers trying to retroize the web.

This website offers a full magazine viewing experience complete with swooshy page sounds and a zoom functionality. Offering titles such as A Year in Homeland Security South Fla Modern Babies and Children, and Textile Insight, would convince me that its for the begrudged, but the possibilities of photo sizes seem so post-flickr!

Corbis, one of the top editorial and photographic agencies in the world, hosted an event honoring a collaboration with Albert Maysles. Maysles, the director behind What's Happening? The Beatles in the USA, Grey Gardens, and cult classic Gimme Shelter with the Rolling Stones, defined what we know as documentary film-making.

After the deliciousness of duck buns and white wine, Maysles screened some never-seen footage from Salesman, Grey Gardens, and his new autobiographical film. Albert's preambles to the clips were quaint novellas; he described his projects with eloquent grace and candor fifty years after their production.

"The most pivotal moment in my life?" rhetorically answered Maysles to an audience member's question, "was after the first screening of Salesman. Everyone had left the theater except for one person who had stayed behind. She walked up to my brother and I after everyone had gone, and I could see that she was crying and was also absolutely beautiful. I told my brother 'this one is for me!' and that's how I met my wife." The incorporation of a deeply personal story with his public work is indicative of his career-- he wasn't producing disjointed work, he was extending a narrative based on his world conception.

And then I won the poster!



I rarely prance and I NEVER win lotteries and I NEVER hug famous filmmakers and I NEVER acquire amazing original posters from the mid-70's containing a deranged woman the size of my torso. I gladly accepted the poster of Grey Gardens, (Maysles pivotal film about Mrs. Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter Edie, the aunt and first cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis) and pranced. I spent my sweet 15 minutes with duck buns and extreme talent, and walked out with big green and a date with the video store.