Growing up in South Carolina in a Greek household was an experience that, in retrospect, had a definite influence on how I viewed the U.S. as I began photographing it later in life. From the beginning I felt that I was an outsider looking through a window at the society around me. That window later became the viewfinder of my Leica camera. As I grew up and attended school in the segregated South, I became more and more upset about the treatment of black people.
Daufuskie Island, South Carolina. 1952. Men praying in church. Constantine Manos/Magnum Photos
In college in my hometown, where all my schooling took place, I wrote the first anti-segregation editorials in the college newspaper - which led to telephoned threats to our house. While still in my teens, I photographed the Klu Klux Klan burning crosses in the countryside and went to Montgomery, Alabama to photograph the bus-boycott and the young Martin Luther King Jr. This was the beginning of my fascination with America and things American. As I saw more and more of the U. S. it became more exotic to me; I had no desire to go to India...
A three inch tall James Dean rests on the black work top. And another one, and yet another. After some hands-on dodge and burn adjustments with a Dennis Stock image, three small cut outs of the trench coat-clad film icon - hands in pockets, cigarette in mouth - litter the work surfaces of the darkroom at Magnum Photos' New York office. The man with the scissors, the Ilford 500H multi grade enlargers and access to innumerable priceless negatives, is Pablo Inirio. He has claimed the small cubic space as his own since 1992, often working up to 90 hours a week.
Two weeks before Christmas, one of the monthly photographers' meetings has just wrapped up, meaning frequent visits to the darkroom. "Just a minute," comes the reply as Hiroji Kubota taps gently on the light gray door. Later, once it is open, Chien-Chi Chang silently runs back and forth over the threshold asking questions. Many of the photographers place large orders at this time of year, the reason for which Inirio hasn't pondered, probably hasn't had the time to ponder as he deals with the work flow calmly, not a word of complaint, not a single stress-induced, cross word.
The Aftermath Project, which recently awarded Magnum photographer Jim Goldberg a grant for his project ‘The New Europeans,’ is a young organization whose two co-founders are as dedicated to story telling as to the artistry of photojournalism. They spoke to Ann Tornkvist about why war is only half the story.
Athens, Greece. 2003. The New Europeans. The different communities of immigrants living and working around Athens. Jim Goldberg/Magnum Photos
Treaties are signed, armies retreat and borders are redrawn. Weapons, if not abandoned, are indefinitely put aside. For many spectators of war, an end is reached. Yet the ramifications of conflict are not easy to erase. Limbs do not regrow, nor do buildings spontaneously rebuild themselves. Traces of distrust and fear linger. For curator Kirsten Rian and photographer Sara Terry, dissatisfaction with the short attention span of mainstream media inspired their organization The Aftermath Project which awards grants to support post-conflict photography.
Magnum Photos is delighted to introduce the Magnum Blog, an online forum for discussing photography and photojournalism. The blog is a new medium for us to illuminate the stories behind the images, to explore the motivations behind the projects, to discuss the systematic issues that affect all photographers, and to explore the industrial and societal changes that inform our expectations of photography.
Continue reading 'Finding exoticism at home'
