Friday Round Up - Final for 2012

This is the last Friday Round Up for 2012. This week on Friday Round Up my interview with Valeriy Klamm coordinator of the Russian photo blog Birthmark on the Map; Photographer Rob Hornstra and writer Arnold van Bruggen explore Abkhazia on the Black Sea, a country struggling to define its future; and Stefano De Luigi's Photo-Berlin workshop in March.

(C) Sam Harris from Birthmark on the Map

C) Valeriy Klamm from Birthmark on the Map

C) Valeriy Klamm from Birthmark on the Map


(C) Rob Hornstra


C) Stefano De Luigi

Friday Round Up

This week on Friday Round Up my interview with Canadian photographer, Edward Burtynsky; Raghu Rai opens new photography school and Cédric Gerbehaye's workshop in Paris. Please click on the Friday Round Up tab for full details and to view more photographs.

(C) Edward Burtynsky

(C) Edward Burtynsky

(C) Cédric Gerbehaye

Raghu Rai by Rohit Gautam

Max Pam in Interview - Le Journal de la Photographie

My interview with photographer Max Pam is on today's Le Journal de la Photographie.

"As a young boy Max Pam dreamed of traveling to exotic places. At school he’d open the atlas, pick a destination, and let his imagination take him wandering through Thailand, Tibet, or China, countries that were ostensibly light years from the narrow-minded cultural confines of his 1950’s upbringing in Australia.

When Pam was in his late teens he turned his dreams into reality. He traveled the hippie trail to Katmandu and hitchhiked from London to India, a seemingly impossible feat, but Pam managed to do it and live to tell the tale. And along the way he amassed an extraordinary collection of photographs, journals and memories.

In his award-winning book Atlas Monographs Pam shares his journeys through Zanzibar, China, South India, Yemen, Madagascar, Karakoram and the South China Sea. The weighty tome features photographs from his nascent years in the early..." Please click here to read the full article. All images (C) Max Pam.

Friday Round Up

This week on Friday Round Up, emerging photographer Kiana Hayeri's "May god be with you my daughter"; Steve McCurry in Rio and Genova; environmentalist and photographer Dave Walsh's new book The Cold Edge and Sean Gallagher on China. Please click on Friday Round Up tab for all the details.

(C) Kiana Hayeri

(C) Steve McCurry

(C) Dave Walsh

(C) Dave Walsh

Salute to Saluzzo, Italia

I spent a wonderful day in Saluzzo, near Torino, in September this year with my Italian relatives. We wandered through the ancient alleys and bought freshly picked field mushrooms, ripe, warm figs, and purple grapes from an old woman so bent over that you could barely see her face. She told us she had been robbed that morning, her car stolen as she unloaded her goods at the entrance to the old city. It was hard to imagine how she was able to drive, so hunched over was she. We left her behind and made our way up towards the cathedral and then onto the monastery that is now an exclusive albergo.  Here are some of my photos from the day I spent walking around Saluzzo. 

At the entrance to the old town we met an old woman selling vegetables and fruits from the local gardens. She told us of her woes. Despite being robbed earlier in the day, she praised her produce and the mushrooms she had picked herself that morning. We couldn't resist the pungent odor of these prize specimens, nor the labor she had gone to. A tub of mushrooms, a bag of warm figs and bunches of grapes bursting with juice came with us as we made our way up the hillside. We walked on stones worn smooth from years of traffic - human, horse drawn and now small vehicles. As we climbed my cousin told me about the town's history, the scars it wore and its attraction to artists and artisans.

Gelato in the town square before driving home in the dusk to Vigone to prepare for the Corn Harvest Festival. That afternoon the air was heavy with corn dust, the sky a rich mauve daubed with pink clouds. Later we cooked the mushrooms we'd bought from the old woman, tossing them in olive oil and garlic. We ate them with rocket salad and thin spaghetti topped with Regiano and drank dry, effervescent Prosecco from Venezia. We talked about history and I learned more stories to return home with.