Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up - 1st September, 2017

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Special Feature:

29th Edition of Visa Pour L'Image

The International Festival of Photojournalism, Visa Pour L'Image starts in Perpignan, France tomorrow and runs until the 17th September. All exhibitions are free and there is once again an amazing diversity in the works on show. 

Here is a curated selection of what’s on offer. Congratulations to Jean-François Leroy and his team for another amazing festival program. But most importantly, thank you to the extraordinary, dedicated photojournalists who bring us these stories often at great personal cost.

Lu Guang
Development and Pollution

Today China is the world’s second largest economy. Its rapid growth has come with a high environmental toll, China’s seven great rivers poisoned by industrial waste, pastureland destroyed by open-pit mines, and villages turned into death traps. Curated by Jean Loh, this exhibition features images from Guang's 12-year study.

Men at work in the dust. Energy-intensive, polluting industry has been transferred from the east to the central and western regions. Wuhai, Inner Mongolia, 2006. © Lu Guang / Contact Press Images


The main industries in and around the city of Holingol are coal, power and chemicals, causing pollution rendering nearby grassland unfit for grazing. Local authorities have replaced the livestock with sculptures. Inner Mongolia, 2012. © Lu Guang / Contact Press Images


Farmer Li Mingzhu has a cornfield near Tengda lead and zinc smelters. The soil has high concentrations of heavy metals and last year’s crop produced no grain. Jinjiling village, Jiahe County, Hunan Province. March 2010. © Lu Guang / Contact Press Images

Daniel Berehulak
They Are Slaughtering Us Like Animals

Australian photojournalist Daniel Berehulak’s latest Pulitzer Prize winning work saw him spend five weeks in Manila covering the aftermath of President Duterte’s murderous drug crackdown. Working with a local reporter, Berehulak covered 41 crime scenes, and 57 fatalities, his documentation going beyond the crimes to uncover the innocents and the families, revealing the other side to the official story. 

Jimji (6), in anguish screaming “Papa!” before the funeral of Jimboy Bolasa (25). His body, showing signs of torture as well as gunshot wounds, was found under a bridge. The police said he was a drug dealer, but according to his family, Bolasa had surrendered earlier, answering President Duterte's call to follow what was supposed to be a drug-treatment program. Manila, October 10, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times


Relatives overcome with grief seeing the bodies of Frederick Mafe and Arjay Lumbago sprawled in the street. Manila, October 3, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times


Michael Araja (29) was one of a number of people gunned down at a “sari-sari” street kiosk. Neighbors said he had gone to buy cigarettes and a drink for his wife when he was shot dead by two men on a motorcycle, a “riding in tandem killing” which is a common modus operandi. Officers from SOCO (Scene Of the Crime Operations) are gathering evidence. Manila, October 2, 2016. © Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

Stanley Greene
Homage

Last time I was in Perpignan, in 2013, I had the honour of meeting Stanley Greene. He graciously signed my copy of Trolleyology - “To Alison, be safe in the life!” - this might have been his standard line, but he was generous with his time and interested to hear what this Australian thought of Visa. We talked about his eWaste project, and how he had fallen ill shooting in the toxic environs. In this homage, there is work that spans his career, from the early days of fashion photography through to his profound images of the conflict in Chechnya.


The old souk in the Old City of Aleppo, a UNESCO World Heritage site: once the most charming 4,000 square meters in the Middle East, the most famous postcard in Syria, a vertigo of voices, of tales and colors, overflowing with life. Now all that remains is rubble. April 2, 2013 © Stanley Greene / NOOR


Grozny, Chechnya, January 1995. “Death in Grozny.” Outline of a body in the snow, after a Russian rocket attack: black ash, dark snow, shattered glass, trees now ragged stumps, their branches snapped off by the blasts. The streets of Grozny were a no man's land. © Stanley Greene / NOOR


Downtown Grozny, Chechnya, April 2001. Since the death of her child Zelina often stares into the distance, her eyes seeking something far away, so elusive. She says she is already dead, and if only time would hurry up. © Stanley Greene / NOOR

Meridith Kohut
The Collapse of Venezuela

This distressing, but important body of work from this year’s winner of the Chris Honduras Fund, shows the ravages of the economic collapse of Venezuela on its population. Struggling to survive on meagre rations, Kohut captures a country on the brink of devastation. Her intimate images are raw with emotion, the insights and depth of her storytelling the result of her immersion in the culture; she has lived in Venezuela since 2008.


Omar Mendoza suffers from schizophrenia, and also from severe malnutrition: he weighs only 35 kilos [77 pounds]. The state psychiatric hospital where he is has been crippled by acute shortages of food and medicine. August 25, 2016. © Meridith Kohut for The New York Times

Leidy Cordova (37) with four of her five children: Abran (1), Deliannys (3), Eliannys (6), and Milianny (8). The family had not eaten since lunch the day before, and that was “soup” made by boiling chicken skin and fat. The refrigerator is not working, and contains the only food in the house: half a bag of flour and a bottle of vinegar. June 16, 2016. © Meridith Kohut for The New York Times


Family and friends mourn at a group funeral for four young men who were tortured and killed by members of the Venezuelan armed forces. Capaya November 29, 2016. © Meridith Kohut for The New York Times


Zohra Bensemra
Lives on a Wire

Algerian photojournalist Zohra Bensemra focuses her gaze on those whose lives have been shattered by war. She says her objective is simple: to show that all human beings, no matter their religion or nationality, are the same. 

After fleeing a village controlled by Islamic State fighters, a boy and his family are in a bus that will take them to the refugee camp in Hammam al-Alil, south of Mosul, Iraq. February 22, 2017. © Zohra Bensemra / Reuters


The mother at the funeral of Mohammed Ali Khan (15) who was killed in the massacre when the Army Public School he attended was attacked by Taliban gunmen who took hundreds of students and teachers hostage. Peshawar, Pakistan, December 16, 2014. © Zohra Bensemra / Reuters


Voting in the country’s first democratic elections for almost a quarter of a century. Al-Fashir, Northern Darfur, Sudan, April 11, 2010. © Zohra Bensemra / Reuters


Ed Kashi
CKDu - In the Hot Zone

American photojournalist Ed Kashi reveals a deadly epidemic sweeping the Middle East, Asia, South Asia and Central America. CKDu, Chronic Kidney Disease of unknown origin, affects mainly farm workers and their families, the poor and the young. Travelling to Nicaragua, El Salvador, India and Sri Lanka, Kashi has documented the ravages of this fatal disease and its multi-generational impact. 

Jorge Martin Bonilla (29), the youngest of six brothers, three of whom are also suffering from CKDu [Chronic Kidney Disease of unknown origin], worked on sugarcane plantations for five years before contracting CKDu in 2004. He died this morning. Chichigalpa, Nicaragua, April 30, 2014. © Ed Kashi / VII


At Narayana Medical College, Nellore, Andhra Pradesh, India. January, 2016. © Ed Kashi / VII

Mass screening is conducted by a local CKDu organization, with support from the government. Here, in this CKDu-affected town, 342 secondary school students are lining up for blood tests. Rajanganaya, North Central Province, Sri Lanka, June, 2016. © Ed Kashi / VII

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