Category: Featured Artist

LAURA EL-TANTAWY : Talk & Slideshow Evening : Friday 30th September

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In the Shadow of the Pyramids is the current project by photographer Laura El-Tantawy.

Laura El-Tantawy , 2011 by Steven Lee

I met Laura briefly at the National Gallery cafe to talk about her fund raising efforts through emphas.is a crowd funding website to enable her to complete the final chapter in her documentation of the popular uprising by the ordinary people of Egypt. These events which centred in Cairo, and particularly Tahrir Square was broadcasted all over the world by mainstream news channels and literally shook the leaders of the Arab world off their feet.

Laura’s photographic style is unique, part journalistic, part documentary and part fine art, raw and powerfully emotive, and totally artistic. Trained as a journalist and worked as a newspaper photographer in the USA, she is passionately absorbed to covering the forthcoming elections in a ‘new’ Egypt in October and November.

[Check out Magnum’s David Alan Harvey’s skype interview with Laura here. DAH’s BURN magazine are Laura’s media partner on this project and they sponsored her in February to cover the revolution in Egypt. Their continued support now is part of their counted effort to see the project through to print as a book.]

Laura will be giving a talk about her latest project, accompanied with a slide projection of photographs taken before and during the uprising in Egypt. This is a fund raising evening (non-obligatory), which is open to anyone who would like to learn a bit more about the events unfolding in Egypt, her style of photography and her first hand experience on the ground. Your support is most appreciated. Watch the video below for her personal address, and help spread the message. Apologies for the rather short notice of this event, but I’m sure it will be a great evening out!

Laura has indicated that the first 20 RSVPs will receive a special ‘memento’ postcard print from her on the evening!

Venue

Green Cardamom Light Gallery, 5a Porchester Place, London W2 2BS

Time : 7:00 to 10:30pm : Free entry

Date : Friday, 30th September 2011

RSVP to : info@explorenation.net or leave a comment below.

(Nearest tube : Marble Arch or Edgware Road)

About Laura

Laura El-Tantawy is an Egyptian photojournalist & artist based in London. She studied journalism & political science at the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia (USA) & started her career as a newspaper photographer with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Sarasota Herald-Tribune (USA). In 2005, she started work on her first book documenting a changing Egypt. As part of the urge to understand the issues, in 2009, she accepted a six-month fellowship at the University of Oxford (UK) to research free speech in Egyptian media.

In 2008 she was nominated and accepted to take part in Reflexions Masterclass, a two-year photography seminar directed by Italian photographer Giorgia Fiorio and French curator Gabriel Bauret. Her work has been published & exhibited in the US, Europe, Asia & the Middle East. She exclusively works on self-initiated projects.

Laura is the founder of www.illdieforyou.com, a project documenting farmer suicides in rural India.
www.lauraeltantawy.com

This event is organised by explorenation.net

CUBA series : Cubanos by Andy Craggs

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At the dancehall, Cienfuegos, Cuba © Andy Craggs, 2011

Andy decided to tint a series of portraits in selenium to create a moody and enigmatic feel for his ‘Cubanos’ subjects to avoid being derivative. He photographed mainly with a 80mm F1.2 Nikkor AI manual lens on his D3 body, providing incredible small depth of field, which is his signature style. These intimate portraits were made on the streets and alleys of Havana, Trinidad, and Cienfuegos.

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Cubanos by Andy Craggs, 2011

I had my portrait taken…by a 111 year old box camera!

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On the last Sunday before our group left Havana, I met Pepe on the steps of Capitolio, the state building in Central Havana. I was intrigued by the contraption of a camera he was fiddling with, basically, a large box, covered by pieces of paper torn from magazines, on a wooden tripod. A quick smile and a “Ola, and we chatted in English. I discovered he was operating his grandfather’s 111 year old camera obscura, or box camera, ..and…he can take a photo with it, and produce a pretty instant print for me in less than 5 minutes..slightly wet print, mind you, but a REAL silver gelatin print and not a Polaroid! He went on to show me how he can process the paper inside the box after he had exposed the paper by opening the ‘shutter’, a plastic bottle cap for 1 second from the cheap scratched lens at the front. You see, there are two small shallow trays inside the box, which processes and washes the print, then he slides open the tray from the back of the camera, and continues to fix it in another tray! Finally he dunks the print (still a negative image) into a bucket of water to rinse it.

Watch the birdie!

That’s not all! Because the first image is a negative print, he then proceeds to re-photograph this print by placing it onto a bracket in front of the lens. Suddenly, his portrait lens converts into a macro-focusing one. Pepe then adds some ‘old trickery’ to the print by sticking a fake Capitolio dome above the portrait, sticks some reversed “Cuba” and “Havana” letters and voila! (He calls this Photoshop) A perfect portrait of me sitting in front of the Capitolio is completed.

Another few minutes pass by, and he is busy processing the final ‘positive’ print inside the camera and hands it to me still wet. All the show for 2 CUCs!

Simply amazing stuff. I got Pepe to do our group photo after that.


CUBA : MALECÓN series no.4

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Photo © Bruno Couck 2011

The fourth instalment in the Malecon series comes from Bruno Couck. Bruno typically photographs architecture and abstracts, and is beginning to enjoy street portraits and close quarter photography in a new light in the streets of Havana.

“Shooting in low light conditions favours blurred images, which in turn give a very good impression of how lively the main Havana sea facing road is on Saturday nights. People running, walking, strolling over from one side to another, from a group of friends to another, from a silent area to one where some music is played…

Malecon, probably the most densely populated place in Havana at the weekend!”  ~ Bruno

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 Night movement on the Malecon © Bruno Couck 2011

CUBA : MALECÓN series no.2

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Photo © Keng Fun Loh 2011

Another take of the Malecon series by Keng Fun Loh sees a totally different and rather voyeuristic approach. Fun simply decided to shoot in available light (which in some parts wasn’t available at all!) composing a shot every 6 paces along, at a fixed distance away from the sea wall, with a 50mm lens, and making full use of the Canon 5DM2’s high ISO capability of 6,400. Focusing was pretty touch and go in complete darkness whilst, some frames were lit by the headlights from passing cars.

These photographs capture the honesty of the moment, candid and unobtrusively depicting the locals hanging out, unperturbed by a sniping visitor.

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Take Six on the Malecon © Keng Fun Loh 2011

CUBA : The MALECÓN series no.1

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Photo © Ivy Tan 2011

The Habaneros love the Malecon, which is an 8km walkway, promenade, esplanade, seawall (call it what you want) on Havana Bay, stretching from Old Havana and its rickety port, along New Havana with its belle-epoque buildings, and 60’s style iconic beach hotels right up to the Vedado area, where souless Russian-style construction is evident. There is no stretch of concrete in Havana, or perhaps, Cuba better than the Malecon, for the young and old of the city to relax, chill, hang out, fish, dive, and make-out. We were fortunate enough to pop along after our last Saturday evening farewell meal at the famous La Guarida (which is another story) to meet and photograph the locals and tourists doing what they do on the Malecon.

Here are a series of images from the group (starting with Ivy Tan) showing how different interpretations of the same shoot can result in equally spectacular photographs.

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The Malecon Divers  © Ivy Tan 2011

Ivy’s approach to photographing the divers was more specific and focused. She only had a limited time to make these pictures on the Saturday, having just returned on a 6 hour bus ride from the the coast, whilst the rest of the group were either exhausted by the 33C heat, or busy buying cigars. Nonetheless, what she achieved was a tight and close-up view of these hunky boy divers doing their thing. Her naturally amicable approach to people is an asset she uses to get real close to her subjects. Shooting with a compact Leica also helps in this case, where the looming silhouette of a typical DSLR-toting tourist is lessened.

CUBA : A NATION IN TRANSITION

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Literally having just got back from a 12-day photography tour to Cuba, I am posting this teaser to what is promised to be, a series of simply amazing and stunning photography posts that will come from our workshop participants over the next few days and weeks. I can sense computers whirring, frantic downloading, editing, and editing,  and final presentation going on right now as I type this. Shooting selectively and editing tightly is the name of the game. Cuba, and especially Havana is a ‘must visit’ city, in a state of transition. The Americans have been, the Russians came and now the Chinese are stepping in to invest heavily. Heck, there’s even a China town, so called. Chinese immigrants have been in Cuba for centuries.

As we met out friendly guide Hoji on board a spanking new Chinese Yutong coach some 12 days ago after landing at the Jose Marti International, little did our group know what was to be presented before us and our trigger-ready cameras.  We met and photographed many leather skinned elderly men and women, kids on the side streets, colourful scantily clad women, danced Salsa with retirees in a small town, ate tons of fresh lobster, downed obscene amounts of rum and mojitos, caught land crabs and tarantulas, watched vultures circle overhead, hustled by pimps and jineteros offering cheap cigars and chicas, listened to the fabulous Buena Vista Social Club, photographed stunning sunsets and sailed the clear blue waters of the Florida sea.

And more.

A visit to Format11 Festival

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Myself, Yumi Goto and Andy

Andy, myself and Jayna, a photographer friend made a day visit up to Derby for the Format International Photography Festival 2011 last weekend. It was a cold and damp day but the train ride was only a short one, and in no time we left St Pancras, we were in Derby station. (Note : Central Midlands train services, even on First Class, do not serve cooked breakfast on weekends, much to our disappointment.) Having arrived and lacking sustenance, we found a greasy-spoon aptly called Acropolis in Central Square, next to The Quad arts centre where Format is mainly happening.

I was there also to meet up with Yumi Goto, who has been invited over from Bangkok to speak at the Festival. Yumi is also one of the judges for KL International Photoawards 2011 and it was certainly a great opportunity to make my first contact with her here in the UK. Our first event at The Quad was to listen to Chris Steele-Perkins speak on his work and approach as a photojournalists for over 30 years. Chris Steele-Perkins is a renown Magnum member whose inspired works covered most of the UK in the 60s and 70s, documenting the British youth in the form of the teddy boys, and also suburban life, Northern Ireland, and later, overseas conflicts in Afghanistan, Lebanon and Africa. He also showed some of his later works from Japan, particularly his Mount Fuji series and Hello, Tokyo, Love series.


There are also other exhibitions going on throughout the town of Derby, in museums and vacant retail units, at the University also. It was certainly a busy day for the organisers, with Portfolio reviews going on throughout the day, talks and seminars, and the odd ‘celebrity’ photographer wafting in and out of the centre. Personally, I thought it was a well funded and run event, with many decent exhibitions, but a few were rather mixed. The theme this year focuses on Street Photography, and for want of a better word, this genre covers so many styles and methodology, including barren landscapes and photojournalism, that I think, it may be better to drop the ‘street’, and called it Urban photography. I thought Bruce Gilden‘s commissioned images of candid Derby townsfolk Head On, shot at close range with a fill-flash, specially for the festival was too simplistic and pointless. The video of him shooting in the street was more informative, but his shots weren’t. I was also excited to see some of Vivian Maier‘s photographs but sadly, only a homemade video was playing, and that did not interest me.

I was happy to see Katrin Koenning and Virgilio Ferreria‘s works displayed at Format11 also. Katrin and Virgilio were both finalists at KL Photoawards 2010. Some works that stood out for me were Jun Abe‘s Citizens, George Georgiou‘s Fault Lines, Turkey East and West, and David Gibson‘s humorous street grabs. It ‘s always great to see notable Magnum photographers works like Alex Webb, Raymond Depardon, and Bruno Barbey up close. I was surprised some of the big names in so -called Street photography weren’t represented, notable the father of the genre, Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank and Winogrand.

LANDSCAPES OF SILENCE by Fernando Perez

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Fernando’s sublime landscape photographs are being exhibited at the flagship National Geographic store on Regent Street, in London’s West End from 18 January to 15 February, 2011. Those that know Fernando personally can attest for his cool, clean and abstract studies of the built environment, as procured by his architectural background. His landscapes series are new to me, and I very much look forward to visiting the exhibition soon. Bravo Fernando!

http://www.nglondonstore.co.uk/exhibits/exhibits_landscapes.html