pictures to prove it™

Walter Astrada won the 2009 $15,000 Alexia Foundation professional grant for his proposal to document violence against women in India. Astrada found that persistence pays. It is the fourth year in a row he has applied for the Alexia grant. (continues here…)

(via alexia foundation)

http://www.timgruber.com/blog/2009/02/24/how-to-procrastinate-like-leonardo-da-vinci/

thanks tim. this is great.

The White House News Photographers Association is currently judging it’s annual contest. the results are slowly being posted. you can see them here.

Charles Ommanney is sweeping the awards with several honestly wonderful images of Obama.

i just stumbled onto this post by Rachel Niesen and i loved it. Rachel is part of an inspiring and incredible crew in Atlanta, GA.

be moved or go home.

Rachel said:

Humans love to create.

We have an uncanny, universal desire to make our mark.

It’s why we photograph and paint. It’s why we build towers and businesses.

One of my favorite shows, MadMen, dedicated a recent scene to the concept of human creativity. The scene lingered in my memory for weeks.

Two characters are discussing a Kodak marketing campaign about memory and legacy. Harry says to Don:

“I’ve always been fascinated by the cave paintings at Lascaux. The bison get all the attention, but there are also these handprints, tiny by today’s standards…It’s like someone is reaching through the stone right to us, saying “I WAS HERE.”

These cave paintings are among the earliest known works of art. They were discovered in 1940 near the village of Montignac in central France when four boys stumbled into a cave. Inside, they found paintings that were nearly 17,000 years old.

Secluded cave walls bear real imprints of humans who created the most beautiful Stone Age art. Something about these ancient human handprints is magical.

I remember when I first saw them. My Art History professor turned off the lights and projected an image of tiny handprints onto the classroom wall. The class was hushed, as if we were hearing a sacred secret.

Why does something so simple impact us so deeply?

I think it’s because we are witnessing a tangible legacy left by fellow humans who responded to their desire to create. They made their mark. They reached through stone to tell us WE WERE HERE.

How will you make your mark?

the winners for world press were announced this week and as always there is a mixed collection of responses to those chosen. j.g. said “photojournalism needs a visual enema.” he is smarter than most of us and i tend to agree with him. much of the work is solid and classic, but it doesn’t feel like anyone really pushed the limits with anything. are we going to have to wait for david burnett to come up with his next direction before we can feel like we are progressing? please, i implore you, send me links to work that you find fresh, exciting or new.
the best thing i’ve seen in ages has been keith loutit’s timelapses. go peep them and be moved. then send me some links to something great. thanks.

© 2008 Jerome Bonnet

im not one of those people.

me as photographed by ben lowy

ben was here for the past couple weeks. he made some pics of me and he put them on his blog. he has just started doing these multiframe portraits. id dig em. peep it.

LMB shares his mind with us all. peep it here.

Chicago photog Brian Ulrich has a really good blog post on his site. He asks why no one is obviously documenting the housing crisis and the economy.

you can read it here.

(via aim from Ben)

As the unit photographer on the “Watchmen” movie set, Clay Enos saw an opportunity to shoot more than just publicity stills. He also shot his first book…

(from PDN)