destruction

Zoriah: Pakistan Earthquake and What the Eye Sees

admin — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 19:45:30 -0400

Zoriah has updated a series he did on the Northern Pakistan Earthquake, also known as the Kashmir Earthquake. I have posted them below with his earlier write-up. Other previous series by Zoriah concerning AIDS, the tsunami that hit Thiland in 2004 and life in Gaza can be viewed here, here, and here.

From Zoriah:

People often ask me to compare disasters and I find myself struggling to provide them with an answer that feels truthful. In all honesty, after five years of focusing on disasters and humanitarian crisis, I find that everything begins to look the same. Faces, no matter which country or continent they hail from, closely resemble each other when they are framed in rubble and surrounded by smoke. Buildings and trees and landscapes look about the same when they are flattened on the ground, whether the cause was a hijacked airplane, a massive wave or powerful tremor. It is often far too easy for me see a disaster zone as nothing more than a familiar scene, another day of work.
Whenever I get this feeling that I am back in the mundane, I try to look in the eyes of the people I photograph. I try to remember that although this has become a common site for me, this is the extraordinary for those that it affects. I think that the western world , armchair observes of disaster and strife, need to dig deep inside themselves and try to realize that even though the news is their entertainment, it is also quite real. They need to open their eyes to the fact that beyond the now familiar pictures presented to them on their morning paper and on the evening news, there are people struggling with a situation that has turned their lives upside down. I believe that as photographers we need to focus more on documenting emotion in our photos and that editors must make sure that these images, no matter how graphic and painful, reach the eyes of the people that can actually make a difference. In actuality, it is our job to open peoples eyes. To create works of art that touch peoples hearts and open their minds, showing them not only what someone else’s life looks like, but what it feels like.

Technorati Tags: aftermath, earthquake, kashmir, pakistan, zoriah

I Am Not a War Photographer screening in Brooklyn, NY

admin — Thu, 25 May 2006 11:54:14 -0400

Wanted to alert everyone to this screening and talk by artist Lynne Sachs: I AM NOT A WAR PHOTOGRAPHER is a cinematic presentation and talk exploring my decade-long artistic rather than physical immersion in war. From Vietnam to Bosnia to WWII Occupied Rome to the Middle East today, my experimental documentary films push the borders between genres, discourses, radicalized identities, psychic states and nations through the intertwining of abstract and reality based imagery. In my talk, I will introduce precise visual strategies I have discovered in working with these fraught and divisive themes. Often opting for a painterly rather than a photographic articulation of conflict, I struggle with each new project to find a precise language of images and sounds with which to discuss these volatile moments in history, exposing what I see as the limits of a conventional, documentary representation of both the past and the present. Infusions of colored “brush strokes

ZORIAH: AIDS in Asia

admin — Mon, 08 May 2006 10:12:53 -0400

The following words and photographs are from Zoriah:
    During my work documenting the AIDS crisis in Asia, I had the opportunity to meet some truly incredible human beings, some of whom are still alive, most though have already died in the short period of time since the completion of this project. From the groups of urban prostitutes living and working in the slums of Phnom Penh Cambodia, teaching each other safety, survival and financial planning while setting up clinics on the average aid agencies paperclip budget, to the quiet suffering of mothers who have unknowingly passed on a disease to their children via their fathers indiscretion, these stories and these faces linger in my mind.
    While aid organizations give total infection rates of about one percent, caregivers, hospice staff and the people on the ground speak of certain regions reaching up to twenty five percent HIV infection rates. With a new heroin epidemic hitting urban slums and a dramatic increase in both hetero and homosexual sex tourism, the problem is expected to reach epic proportions over the next few years.
    Numbers and statistics are just that, nothing more than markings on paper or words on a news program, the human side however is truly disturbing. Patients wait to die alone, coated in flies and nursed by family members. Understaffed hospitals are in such disrepair that they have been deemed biohazard and HAZMAT threats and workers refuse to even enter the premises, much less make necessary repairs and provide care to patients.
    In several well known hospitals I found myself literally wading through ankle deep piles of disposed needles, catheter bags and soiled linens, as patents navigated hallways with potholes that dropped through to the floors below. The human suffering is quite unreal and the faces of teenage girls, mothers, fathers and small babies wasting away in discomfort still appear vivid in my mind.
    This photo story is dedicated to my new friends who sit quietly and wait to die, those who choose not to sit quietly but fight for the lives and the health of their friends, family, and complete strangers. This photo story should also serve as an attack on the organizations, governments, corporations and pharmaceutical giants who quite simply are doing too little.

Technorati Tags: aids, cambodia, death, illness, prostitution, sex workers, zoriah

Lee Ridley: Sudan Dispatch

admin — Mon, 27 Mar 2006 14:24:19 -0500

Tues 14th March - I was fortunate to be introduced to Betty Bigombe, the Museveni/LRA Peace Talks Mediator, yesterday. She told me that she was sad that the talks were not proving to be successful, but that she will remain in contact with the rebels as long as there is hope. I travelled from Gulu to Lira in the evening, just after nightfall. Not the wisest of moves, especially considering that now the rains have started, the vegetation is growing, which always initiates renewed rebel attacks. There have been a number of attacks in the last couple of weeks, always following the same pattern - Vehicle shot at until it stops; driver killed instantly; others robbed of shoes, clothes and possession and then shot. Driving these roads at night requires nerves of steel and a heavy foot on the accelerator.

Wed 15th March - Left Lira this morning after a flying visit to the Rachele Rehabilitation Centre, set up three years ago by Els De Temmerman, a Belgian Journalist.

Timothy Floyd: Army Surgical Team in Iraq

admin — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 12:30:12 -0500

From Timothy Floyd: I had the privilege of serving during the initial phases of Operation Iraqi Freedom as an orthopedic surgeon in U. S. Army's 934th Forward Surgical Team. We traveled at the front with various brigades treating, not only wounded coalition forces, but Iraqi civilians, soldiers, Republican and Special Republican Guard, as well as Fedayeen terrorists. Initially, we treated the wounded in our canvas surgical tent. As the war progressed, we made unescorted humanitarian missions to homes, villages, hospitals, and camps, including a "black mission" to treat wounded Iranian MEK soldiers. My photographs tell the story of what I saw and felt, and the uncommon empathy, courage and humanity I witnessed. My experience was much different that what is usually portrayed in the American media, but is consistent with most accounts of men and women who have been to Iraq or who are there now. The Iraqi people are just like anyone else worldwide; most of them only want a peaceful life and the freedom to work, study, play and raise a family. (More of Dr. Floyd's photographs can be found here.)

CPT. Bryan Moore attends a post-op wounded Iraqi woman.

A boy wounded near Baghdad by a grenade his brother set off.

CPT Charlotte Lee attends a wounded Iraqi Republican Guard soldier.

An Iraqi man brings a sick child to an American Army doctor near Balad

Bill Putnam: Operation Swarmer

admin — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 21:31:45 -0500

Zuma Press photographer Bill Putnam has filed new photos in his gallery from Operation Swarmer, a combined US/Iraqi military sweep in the Sunni-dominated areas north of Baghdad. Recent news stories can be found here, here and here. From Putnam: "The operation -- billed as the largest air assault since the March 2003 invasion -- lifted 1,500 Americans and Iraqi soldiers in to extremes of barren desert and lush farm lands. Whatever the terrain, they looked for weapons caches and insurgents. Sometimes, they found them. More often than not, they didn't. While this operation was a sign of the (almost glacially) slow growth of the Iraqi army, it was also a sign the insurgency is still active and will take some time to crack."

Technorati Tags: iraq, iraq army, putnam, swarmer

Reinterpretation: Thailand Tsunami Then and Now Gallery (Zoriah)

admin — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 10:22:52 -0500

New Tsunami Images: Zoriah has uploaded a new interpretation of his series dealing with the tsunami that hit Thailand in 2004. Some are re-cut from the previous series, others are new. Interesting what a new crop or a new frame can do. I have posted it in its entirety below along with the original text from the previous series.

Reposted Text: Also, here is a link to a photographic book on the devestation produced by VII. To see some other great series, follow this link, or this one. Go here for a list of more books by great conflict photographers.This backgrounder is provided by the photographer: As an ex disaster specialist I still have many friends working in the field all over the world and in the year following the Asian Tsunami I kept in close contact with them. Just as I expected I soon began to hear stories of how western money coupled with the tourism industry was rebuilding Thailand in record speed while Sri Lanka was still struggling and Banda Aceh was left only with resources for making baby steps. Slightly ahead of the one year anniversary of the Tsunami I decided to return to Thailand and shoot every image taken the year before from the exact same angle. Although I covered the Tsunami from both Thailand and Sri Lanka I was not able to get the funding necessary to return to Sri Lanka to re-capture those images one year later. I think that this is interesting in itself, as I literally had a long list of clients and agencies waiting for the Thailand project. However, a few weeks later John Stanmeyer from VII was able to return to Banda Aceh and shoot a project very similar to mine and it is viewable on the VII website. I find the two projects an interesting visual study in how two countries with very different economic structures recover from a major natural disaster. [Editor's note: Zoriah is currently searching for funding or grants to return to Pakistan and Kashmir at the end of this year to complete an Earthquake Then and Now project. Please contact Zoriah through his website if you are interested or have information.]

Technorati Tags: banda ache, disaster, john stanmeyer, thialand, tsunami, vii, zoriah

fyi:Photographer Alfred Yaghobzadeh Released In Gaza

admin — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 14:14:49 -0500

PDN reporting that Yaghobzadeh, French journalist Caroline Laurent, and Korean television journalist Young Yong have been released today, 22 hours after being kidnapped by a Palestinian faction in Gaza. Here's the link.

Technorati Tags: news, pdn, gaza, sipa, update, yaghobzadeh

Haiti: Violence and Courage

admin — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 09:26:22 -0500

Sipa photographer Asim Rafiqui produced this series on Haiti in 2005. The images and his words follow. Anyone who wants to see more of his work can also go here, here, here or here.

From Rafiqui: In February 7th 2006 the Haitians elected a new President. On February 17th 2006 the results of their choice was finally announced; René Preval, a close friend of Jean-Bertrad Aristide’s and former President of Haiti from 1996-2001, had won. The Haitians had believed that they had handed Preval a landslide, but in fact it was officially announced that he had only won by a small margin, hence avoiding a run off election, but forcing him to negotiate a government with his opponents. What transpired during that 10 days between voting and results remains anyone’s guess. But Brian Concannon, of the Institute of Justice and Democracy in Haiti, concluded that “...for the fourth time since 1990 [Haitians] handed their chosen candidate a landslide victory. And for the fourth time Haitian elites, with support from the International Community, ...undercut the victory, seeking at the negotiation table what they could not win at the voting boot.” This should not have come as a surprise to anyone who had been following the situation in Haiti since the removal of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004. Those who had wrested power from the elected leaders were not simply going to hand it back because of another election. I had been working in Haiti in 2005 documenting the ‘interim’ government’s violent campaign against the pro-Aristide and still hugely popular Lavalas movement. This campaign of assassinations and intimidation continued throughout 2005 and even during the elections itself.
These images help us understand the atmosphere of fear and intimidation in which the recent elections were finally carried out. The also provide testimony to the courage of the Haitian people who despite violent coercion remain determined to choose their own future. When this work was exhibited at Visa Pour L’image in 2005 I included a short introduction to Haiti’s political situation. This original introduction is included below the series.

    Haiti today is a land shrouded in social and political myths. These myths plague the analysis and reporting about the country and mislead us about what is taking place there. Frequently repeated by the media and politicians, these myths tell us that Haiti is a country of unending cycles of senseless violence; that President Jean-Bertrand Aristide fled the country in the face of a ‘popular’ uprising; that the ‘international community’ intervened to help bring ‘democracy’ to Haiti; that the occupation forces continue with their good work of building schools, bridges, clinics and roads. And the most persistent myth; that pro-Aristide ‘gangsters’ remain the principal source of violence and instability in the country.
    In 2005 I traveled to Haiti and found a reality that did not reflect what I had been led to believe. I witnessed an ongoing campaign of violence and repression by Haiti’s current leaders, installed by the USA and France, to eliminate the still vastly popular Lavalas (pro-Aristide) movement and its supporters. Hundreds of Lavalas activists lie without charge in jail while hundreds of others have been killed while protesting in the streets or during Haitian National Police (HNP) raids into strongly pro-Aristide neighborhoods₁. Entire communities suspected of pro-Aristide leanings have been surrounded by UN (MINUSTAH) and HNP checkpoints and the residents denied services like water and electricity₂.
    And yet both the USA and France have stood firmly behind the ‘interim’ government. Recently the USA decided to restart economic and military aid to this government. This is in sharp contrast to its attitude towards the democratically elected President Aristide whom it placed under economic sanctions in 1995 and then worked tirelessly to topple by funding and courting his opponents. The sanctions withheld nearly $500 million from one of the poorest nations of in the Western Hemisphere and caused severe social and economic devastation in the country. At the same time the US government provided financial and political support to Aristide’s opponents and even arranged conferences in neighboring Dominican Republic for Aristide's opponents to meet those from Washington who shared similar political views. As Amy Wilentz, a journalist with extensive experience in Haiti, wrote “In a country...where the military has been disbanded for nearly a decade, soldiers don't simply emerge... they have to be reorganized, retrained and resupplied... and someone has to organize [them].₃

1 “Haiti Human Rights Investigation” University of Miami School of Law 2004 2 “Keeping the Peace in Haiti?” Harvard Law School, Clinical Advocacy Group 2005
3 Amy Wilentz, The Nation, March 4th & April 9th 2004

Technorati Tags: aristide, death squads, democracy, elections, haiti, minustah, conconnon, lavalas, puppy, rafiqui, sipa, united nations, United States

The War in Iraq: Year 4 - Day 1 Photo Opening (NYC)

admin — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 18:59:48 -0500

fyi: The Photographic Gallery in New York will be hosting a show by four unembedded photojournalists: Kael Alford, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, Thorne Anderson and Rita Leistner. The show opens March 18th and will continue through April 30, 2006. The four are also part of an interesting book that looks at Iraq through the eyes of those not embedded with the U.S. forces there. The book link is below. The “Unembedded” website can be found here.