March 31, 2017

Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - 31st March, 2017

This week on Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - a truly wonderful photo essay from Ukrainian photographer Viktoria Sorochinski and Siberia's amazing frozen Baikal Lake, the deepest, and cleanest on earth. Plus the winners of the Australia and New Zealand Photobook of the Year Awards. 

Photo Essay:
Viktoria Sorochinski - Lands of No Return



Ukrainian photographer Viktoria Sorochinski has been working on this photo essay for close to a decade. These beautiful, poignant and at times hauntingly sorrowful portraits capture a society that has been bypassed by progress, its elderly residents impoverished and alone. This work is incredibly mature and insightful and rings with authenticity. 

Viktoria says as a child she visited her grandparents in this small village near Kiev, a time that she recalls as "filled with light and happiness." Years later she visited the village again and this time "was astonished at how lifeless and miserable it looked. There were almost exclusively elderly people in the village. They are living out their last days: neglected by the government and often abandoned by their families. Along with their traditions and their homes, they are slowly disappearing…Even though this project started as a personal journey, the more I worked on it, the more I realized that capturing and commemorating these people and places has a greater value. They are the last remaining evidence of the once-magical and vibrant culture that will soon be known only in history books”.










(C) All images Viktoria Sorochinski

Photo Essay: 
Kristina Kakeeva - Siberia's Frozen Baikal Lake

Russian photographer Kristina Kakeeva is also an engineer. She spent several days on the lake to produce these wonderful photographs. She also tells the story of how the lake came to be, which I love.

"The only river in the world that flows from the lake is Angara, all other rivers flow into the lake. There is a legend that the Father Baikal had 336 rivers—335 sons and one daughter, Angara. All of the sons flowed into Baikal to restock the water, but the daughter fell in love with Yenisei (another river in Russia) and started to take her father’s water to her lover. In response, Father Baikal threw a huge rock into his daughter and cursed her. This rock is called Shaman-Stone; it is situated in the spring head of Angara, and is considered to be the river’s beginning."





(C) All images Kristina Kakeeva

Photobook Awards:
Australian and New Zealand Photobook Awards - Winners 


Katrin Koenning and Sarker Protick are the winners of the 2016 Australian Photobook of the Year for their publication Astres Noir published by Chose Commune (France). This win adds to a list of impressive accolades including being shortlisted for Paris Photo-Aperture Foundation Photobook Awards (First Book) and the Prix Nadar. 


Over the ditch the New Zealand Photobook of the Year was shared by Simon Devitt for Rannoch and Evangeline Davis for Touchy



To find out more: Australia and New Zealand. These awards are sponsored by Momento Pro (Geoff and Libby) who deserve a shout-out because they really do put their heart and soul into making photobooks. 

March 24, 2017

Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - 24th March, 2017

This week on Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - group shows for Sydney and Melbourne and the winner of the 2017 BJP International Photography Award, Daniel Castro Garcia's exhibition Foreigner: Migration into Europe 2015-2016 is on at TJ Boulting Gallery, London.

Exhibition: Sydney
HOME - Group Show

This group show featuring Brian Cassey, Daniel Grendon, Godelieve Mols, Isabelle Baumann Ivana Jovanovic, Lola Alexander, Michael Jalaru Torres, Nick Pont, Samantha Mackie and Zorica Purlija explores the theme of 'home'. As you can see from these images, it's a theme that means a whole lot of different things for the individual. And it's one of my favourite themes because of the unique perspectives it evokes.


“Fragility Of Home" © Brian Cassey

“Fragility Of Home" © Brian Cassey

"My Place" © Brian Cassey 


© Isabelle Baumann


© Ivana Jovanovic


© Lola Alexander


"Making Sense of The Vast" © Samantha Mackie


© Nick Pont


Bending Light © Michael Jalaru Torres


Watching © Godelieve Mols


© Zorica Purlija


© Daniel Grendon

Until 2 April
Contact Sheet Gallery
60 Atchison Street
St Leonards, Sydney


Exhibition: Melbourne
An Inconsistent Look - Group Show

(C) Felipe Devoto

This group exhibition examines how people often see the same things differently; how what one person notices another will overlook. Once again, it’s all about perspectives. 

"An Inconsistent Look" takes the viewer to the streets of Melbourne and Argentina in black and white, and in colour. Italian-born photographer Carlos Oggioni captures the daily commute in Melbourne; Scottish-born photographer Barry C. Douglas steps back to look in; and Felipe Devoto presents an abstract view of his native Argentina.


(C) Barry Douglas


(C) Barry Douglas


(C) Barry Douglas


(C) Felipe Devoto


(C) Felipe Devoto


(C) Carlos Oggioni


(C) Carlos Oggioni


(C) Carlos Oggioni

6-27 April
Magnet Galleries
Level 2
640 Bourke Street
Melbourne

Exhibition: London
Daniel Castro Garcia - Foreigner: Migration into Europe 2015-2016



Daniel Castro Garcia was this year's winner of the British Journal of Photography’s International Photography Award for his series depicting migrants caught up in the European refugee crisis.

Castro Garcia spent weeks with his subjects, interviewing almost everyone before he photographed them. He says this engagement is “the backbone of the work. Going up to people and speaking to them, discussing their situation before even mentioning photography. I really have a strong belief that it’s a collaboration. Without engaging with the individuals and conveying what you’re trying to do with them, it’s worthless.”





(C) All images Daniel Castro Garcia

"Foreigner: Migration into Europe 2015-2016" is also a self-published book.


Until 8 April
TJ Boulting Gallery
59 Riding House Street
London W1W7EG

March 17, 2017

Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - 17 March, 2017


This week on Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - a preview of FORMAT 17, the UK's largest photography festival which opens next week in Derby. Also Melbourne's Kristian Laemmle-Ruff showcases MIND THE GAP at fortyfivedownstairs. Plus Glenna Gordon's wonderful Diagram of the Heart.


Preview:
FORMAT17


(C) Dara McGrath

Next week Derby hosts the latest iteration of the UK's largest photography festival, FORMAT17, which first appeared on the international calendar in 2004. With a festival theme of HABITAT, this year FORMAT17 will showcase work from more than 200 international artists and photographers who explore what this theme means to them. 

In a program that sees 30 exhibitions in which emerging and established artists reside side by side, FORMAT17 will feature works on subjects as diverse as landscapes, digital worlds, migration, displacement and regeneration, all of which reflect HABITAT. 

These are some of the artists in the Open Call exhibition:

(C) Sheng-Wen Lo, Nanjing Underwater World, China (2015)

(C) Poulomi Basu - the Ritual of Exile (winner of the 2017 FotoEvidence Book Award)

(C) Lee Deigaard, Buckshot

(C) Edgar Martins

(C) CJ Clarke

(C) Matej Povse, Balkan Trails

Additionally, the FORMAT17 program also includes a photo book market, workshops, portfolio reviews and more. Check out the program here.   

From one of the feature exhibitions:
AHEAD STILL LIES OUR FUTURE

(C) Sadie Wechsler-Takeoff

(C) Lisa Barnard

Curated by Hester Keijser and Louise Clements

FORMAT 17
Opens March 23

Exhibition: Melbourne
Kristian Laemmle-Ruff - MIND THE GAP



Since I first saw his work back in 2014 in the beautiful book, In the Folds of Hills, I've been a fan of this young Melbourne photographer, who keeps pushing the bar. Last year I featured some of the images from this exhibition on Photojournalism Now, which at the time was showing in Perth. 

Now Mind the Gap is making its Melbourne debut next week at fortyfivedownstairs in the CBD. 




Combining photography, sound, text, documentary and installations, Mind the Gap is an intriguing exhibition as each of its components come together to create a powerful, complex narrative that when stripped bare, is essentially about our connection to the Earth, about our humanity. 

Put Mind the Gap on your "don't miss" list.

21 March - 01 April
fortyfivedownstairs
45 Flinders Lane
Melbourne

Monograph:
Diagram of the Heart - Glenna Gordon



American photographer Glenna Gordon drew inspiration from romance novels written by Muslim women in Northern Nigeria to create her monograph Diagram of the Heart, which was published last year by Red Hook Editions. 

These female novelists don’t only write about love. Some address controversial issues such as child marriage and human trafficking. Others pen dreams of escape and rescue. 

The penning of romance novels seem an unlikely pursuit in a country that is usually associated with misery, conflict and death. These images tell a different story.









All images (C) Glenna Gordon