Photos: Cecil and Carl, In Sickness and In Health

This is a perfect example of story telling with pictures, could be taken from the pages of Life Magazine in the 50′s; on The Denver Post Blog

Cecil and Carl toast with a friend to celebrate Carl’s 72nd birthday at My Brother’s Bar in Denver. The couple agrees they met in a bar in 1969, but differ on the location. “There was a dispute we’ve never settled about where we met. I say it was in Mary’s Bar and Carl says it was the Backdoor,” Cecil said. “He came up and asked me a silly question. We got to talking and we spent the night together. We decided to see each other again.” (Photo By Craig F. Walker/The Denver Post)

Over a year ago, Cecil Bethea, 84, watched nursing home attendants hold back his longtime partner, Carl Shepherd, 72, as Cecil turned to go home, where the couple lived together for nearly 39 years.

The two talked about getting married three decades ago, but as gay marriage wasn’t an option, they concluded they were content to continue living together. Cecil said, “signing that lease was our marriage certificate I suppose… Then when we bought the house, we both signed on for that and a house does bring you close together, stretching out into the future.”

Carl, a Blackfoot Native American from Helena, Montana, and Cecil, a southern gentleman from Birmingham, Alabama, met in a Denver bar 44 years ago. “There is a dispute we’ve never settled about where we met. I say it was in Mary’s Bar and Carl says it was the Backdoor,” Cecil recalled. “He came up and asked me a silly question. We got to talking, and we spent the night together. We decided to see each other again.”

Now, Cecil bathes and shaves Carl’s face every other day when he visits him at Juniper Village – The Spearly Center, a nursing home specializing in caring for people with mental illness, brain injuries and neurological disorders. Carl suffers from dementia.

“You see, he’s not Carl anymore,” Cecil said. “As I remember in the old time wedding vows, there was a phrase in there; ‘in sickness and in health,’” Cecil continued. “Well this is certainly sickness. And if I didn’t do it, who would?”

Cecil helps prepare Carl for one of their Denver outings at The Spearly Center in Denver, Colo. Cecil said the two never understood stereotypes, especially those of gay men. “This goes back to the olden days,” Cecil said. “When men paired off they would ask the question; ‘Who’s the husband and who’s the wife?’ Well, Carl crocheted and did car repairs and I did the cooking and the bookkeeping, so we didn’t fit any kind of stereotype. For some reason, we did not like the word ‘lovers’ – that’s a bit pretentious – so we just decided we were partners.” (Photo By Craig F. Walker/The Denver Post)

Carl sits with his partner, Cecil, at My Brother’s Bar in Denver. “Carl is the smartest person I’ve ever met,” Cecil said. “I never figured out why on earth he picked me. Carl could do anything, so he had to have patience with me. Oh I can cook okay, and that’s about it as far as practical skills.” (Photo By Craig F. Walker/The Denver Post)

Cecil sits quietly with Carl as they wait for their lunch at My Brother’s Bar. Though marriage was never an option for the couple, Cecil said he believes others should have the right. He compared being gay and gay marriage to being black during the Civil Rights movement. “It’s sort of like the blacks in the south in the 60’s and the sit-ins at the Five & Dime,” Cecil said. “I don’t think they wanted to eat there – they wanted the right to eat there, and I think that’s the way so many gays feel. They aren’t particularly interested in marriage, but they want the right to be married.” (Photo by Craig F. Walker/ The Denver Post)

See the rest of the images from this photo essay here

Photographers to launch digital light meter

From Olivier Laurent at The BJP

A group of photographers and developers has created a new digital light meter that plugs into an iPhone and uses the device to give accurate light measurements

Lumu Labs has created what it calls the “light meter for the 21st Century” – the Lumu, a device that plugs into an iPhone’s headphone jack to give accurate light readings with the help of a dedicated application.

“We were just a bunch of photographers, totally annoyed by the current selection of light meters on the market,” says Luka Mali of Lumu Labs. “You know the feeling: walking home, rain is pouring and that lame excuse called an umbrella that should supposedly keep you dry. And it’s the same with light meters: they’re huge, unpractical, archaic and cost way too much. We decided to change that – by connecting our beautiful digital light sensor without batteries to your iPhone. And using its brain and connectivity to bring some features never seen in light meters before.”
Read more: http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of-photography/news/2275493/photographers-hope-to-launch-digital-light-meter#ixzz2Wf4Qwrwp
Subscribe to BJP and save money. Click here to save 29% today.

Life Breath of Half the World

Reblogged from Steve McCurry's Blog:

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 India

Monsoon rains have covered the entire country a month ahead of schedule,
brightening the prospects for a
bumper output of summer-sown crops such as rice, oilseeds and
cotton in one of the world's leading producers.

Mumbai, India

India

During the year I spent following the monsoon in a dozen countries, I learned to see it as a critically important event, 

Read more… 291 more words

Photographer Collection: Eman Mohammed in the Gaza Strip

“Female photojournalists can’t be found in Gaza. It’s a war zone and the nature of news is mostly violence,” says Eman Mohammed, a 25-year-old Palestinian journalist, wife and mother who lives in the Gaza Strip and knows all to well about the struggles women face in the Israeli-occupied territory.

At the age of 19, Mohammed worked multiple jobs to save enough money to buy her own photography equipment while studying journalism at a local university. But when she landed a job as a staff photographer her colleagues were not exactly welcoming. “I was harassed, threatened and abused by my colleagues, now I’m more independent in my work style and don’t mind the staring or the looks. I proved them wrong when I was nine months pregnant covering the second war on Gaza.”

Eman says it was her own mother’s encouragement that pushed her to pursue her dream, “My mom, a pharmacist and single mother in a very conservative community, never worked as a journalist but managed to encourage the photography passion in me, teaching me the importance of capturing special moments and pushing me to go against all odds.”

While Mohammed may have overcome many of the obstacles of being a female photojournalist in Gaza, the region still presents other challenges. “Photographing the bodies of people I worked with a couple of days ago during the war was the hardest, I was shooting all blurry at first. Then you have the kids and their mothers, and that can never be an easy thing to shoot. Nothing about war is pleasant or easy. Honestly I don’t think any photojournalist, male of female, is safe in such a place. You don’t hear a warning siren and your vest with a “PRESS” tag on it won’t protect you, not fully.”

Eman Mohammed currently works as a freelance photographer

and reporter in Gaza. Her work has been published in the Washington Post, Mother Jones, the Guardian, Le Monde, and Geo International.  - Katie Wood, denverpost.com

A Palestinian security officer watching hundred of thousands of Hamas supporters while they are celebrating the 21 anniversary of establishing the Islamic movement of resistance (Hamas) in Gaza city,14th of  Dec.2008  photo by Eman Mohammed

GAZA CITY, GAZA STRIP – JULY 09: A general view of Gaza’s beach on a busy Friday’s afternoon. (photo by Eman Mohammed /Getty Images for WHAT’S NEXT)

 eight palestinian children from same family look out while a funeral ( not seen) passes by, as laundry spreads along their window.

Palestinian fishermen collect fish from the nets that they set early in the morning at the Gaza City beach, 26 March 2009. Palestinian fishermen are still denied from going deeper than one mile in the Gaza sea, as the Israeli Navy rarely allows them to leave the shallow waters.

Palestenian girl recites Qura’an verses in a mosque at Gaza City, Gaza Strip, on 24 June 2009. Hamas launched summer camps dedicated to the study of the Qura’an, drawing a broad participation from Gazans photo by Eman Mohammed

SEE MORE of these superb images on the Denver Post Blog Site here

 

Photos: 60 Years of Climbing Mount Everest

From The Denver Post

Nepal celebrated the 60th anniversary of the conquest of Mount Everest on Wednesday by honoring climbers who followed in the footsteps of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay. Nepalese officials offered flower garlands and scarfs to the climbers who took part in the ceremony. They were taken around Katmandu on horse-drawn carriages followed by hundreds of people who marched holding banners to mark the anniversary. Hillary and Norgay reached the summit of Everest on May 29, 1953. Since then thousands of people have reached the 8,850-meter (29,035-foot) peak. Tenzing Norgay died in Darjeeling, India, in 1986 at age 71. Hillary, who died of heart failure in 2008 at the age of 88, attended the golden jubilee celebration of the conquest in 2003.

Sherpa Tenzing Norgay stands on the summit of Mount Everest May 29, 1953 after he and climbing partner Edmund Hillary became the first people to reach the highest point on Earth. (AP Photo/Edmund Hillary, Royal Geographical Society)

British mountaineers George Mallory and Andrew Irvine, both members of the Mount Everest expeditions in 1922 and 1924, are seen at base camp in Nepal. The pair was preparing to climb the peak of Mount Everest in June of 1924. It is the last image of the men before they disappeared on the mountain. (AP Photo/Str)

Explorers Sardar Tenzing Norgay of Nepal, left, and Sir Edmund Hillary of New Zealand drink tea outside a tent at camp. The pair conquered Mount Everest in 1953. Hillary and Norgay were part of the ninth British Expedition to Everest. (AP Photo/NZPA,Penguin Books, HO)

A photo taken on September 30, 2010 shows Mount Everest (C) from the window of a Druk Air aircraft during a flight from Bangkok to Paro. Everest is the world’s highest mountain above sea level at 8,848 meters (29,029 feet) high. (Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images)

See more than 40 pictures from this gallery featuring the history of climbing Everest here

Our Man In Damascus is now Our Man in Istanbul – John Wreford

Our good friend and celebrated photographer John Wreford has extricated himself from Damascus for the time being, no doubt he will return, but for the moment he is now officially our man in Istanbul. You can see his most recent images here

©All Images John Wreford

Photography Exhibitions Summer 2013

Daniel Blau announces winners of 5 Under 30 competition

The five winning photographers will exhibit work at the Daniel Blau gallery in Hoxton in July, Daniel Blau has announced the names of the winning photographers in 5 Under 30, its inaugural photography competition for young photographers.The photographers include 27-year-old Marianne Bjørnmyr, 29-year-old Madoka Furuhashi, 26-year-old Andi Schmied, 22-year-old Tereza Cervenova, and 25-year-old Lara Morrell.

For more visit www.danielblau.com

The Photographers Gallery

Deutsche Börse Photography Prize 2013 winners are Broomberg & Chanarin for War Primer 2  19 Apr – 30 Jun 2013

Plate 26, George Bush serves a Thanksgiving turkey to US troops stationed in Baghdad in 2003, 2011

CHRIS KILLIP British born Killip has been taking photographs for nearly five decades.What Happened – Great Britain comprises black and white images of working people in the north of England, taken by Killip in the 1970s and 1980s. After spending months immersed in several communities, Killip documented the disintegration of the industrial past with a poetic and highly personal point of view.

18 Apr – 30 Jun 2013

©Chris Killip

Cristina De Middel (b.1975, Spain) is nominated for her publicationThe Afronauts (self-published, 2011). Until June 30th

In her first book, The Afronauts, De Middel engages with myths and truths, reality and fiction. In 1964, after gaining independence, Zambia started a space programme in order to send the first African astronaut to the moon.

©Cristina de Middel

Sebastião Salgado Genesis

Natural History Museum

11 April – 8 September 2013
Waterhouse Gallery

Sebastião Salgado’s Genesis is the culmination of 8 years work exploring 32 countries. It is Salgado’s 3rd long-term photographic exploration of global issues, following his previously acclaimed collections, Workers and Migrations.

About 216 of Sebastião Salgado’s black-and-white documentary photographs are on show in Genesis. They capture some of the furthest and wildest corners of our world, portraying indigenous communities that continue to live in accordance with their ancestral traditions, and showing rare insights into their lands.

During the 8 years in which Salgado travelled around the world to produce this collection of images, he often stayed with the people he photographed.

Salgado reflects: ‘Many of us live in cities, cut off completely from the planet. My wish was to experience living with people with real links to nature… For me to go back to nature was a huge pleasure. I wished to present the planet in my language, photography. And so came Genesis.’

The exhibition’s design follows the 5 themes in Genesis: Sanctuaries, Planet South, Africa, Northern Spaces, and Amazonia and Pantanal.

Sebastião and Lelia Salgado © Richard Beliel

Many of the places represented in Salgado’s images are important research areas particularly for studying the variety of species biodiversity.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year

This is now on tour and can be found at various locations

Basingstoke
18 May 2013 to 27 July 2013
Willis Museum
Market Place, Basingstoke, RG21 7QD
0845 603 5635

Bedford
22 June 2013 to 15 September 2013
The Higgens Art Gallery and Museum
Castle Lane, Bedford, MK40 3XD
01234 718618

 

EXPOSURES

Julia Martinez: Nude Photography

13th – 29th  June 2013

The photographer, The artist, formerly a photographic model, moves behind the lens

Art Jericho, 6 King Street, Oxford OX2 6DF, Opening hours vary, but are often Wed-Sat 11am – 5pm (or by appointment) and Sun 1-5pm.

ROCK PORTRAITS 90/94 Dean Ryan

4th July – 3rd August 2013

Live music photography at the Jericho Tavern

A first viewing of photographs of The Verve, Pulp and many more at the celebrated Oxford venue.

Art Jericho, 6 King Street, Oxford OX2 6DF, Opening hours vary, but are often Wed-Sat 11am – 5pm (or by appointment) and Sun 1-5pm.

 

 

Creative Industries Qualification

We received information about a course that the Royal Photographic Society (RPS) runs that might be of interest to those wishing to study photography with an aim of achieving a qualification.

The Royal Photographic Society’s Imaging for the Creative Industries qualification provides a structure leading to professional qualifications with particular relevance for those in the media including picture editors, art directors, curators, and designers as well as those within elements of education…..This could provide a qualification for educators, offering a focused opportunity for the academic community. Within this umbrella, the relevant academic disciplines from the fine arts to design as well as their applications can be interpreted widely. Specifically it will include areas of photography and imaging that embraces both those who make and those who use the medium(s).

 I have no idea what that means so   READ here for further details  here is a picture from Wildlife Photographer of the Year to cheer you up

 

To Light a Fire

Reblogged from Steve McCurry's Blog:

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To learn to read is to light a fire;
every syllable that is spelled out is a spark.
- Victor Hugo

Burma

    Umbria, Italy

At one magical instant  the page of a book –
that string of confused, alien ciphers–shivered into meaning. 
Words spoke to you, gave up their secrets; at that moment,
whole universes opened. 
You became, irrevocably, a reader.

Read more… 360 more words

S is for Simplicity: How Simplicity Will Improve Your Photography

The truly excellent  tom dinning writes on Lightstalking about the need to improve your photography by simplifying your images

In a complex world of action and vision it’s often difficult to separate the trees from the forest. In the early days of photography there was a tendency for photographers to emulate the painters or to use the photograph to assist the artist with his composition. The photograph was a means of recording the complexity of the world with all its detail. It was ‘real’. As photographers experimented with their new tool, they discovered that the photograph was also a way of simplifying the sometimes chaotic view before them. They could choose what would be ‘in the frame’ or not, eliminating the unnecessary and focusing on the important detail. 

The photographers were finding another language; the language of photography.

But often there were no words to describe what they had achieved, so they drew on existing words to define their pictorial vocabulary.

‘Simplicity’ is one such term. It was used to give a sense of ‘oneness’ in which the image could stand on its own and tell the story, that the contents contained nothing more in detail than was required by the photographer to achieve his purpose. READ ALL OF THIS ARTICLE HERE

 

©Jane Buekett

My great friend and superb photographer Jane Buekett understands simplicity, have a look at all her pictures here but as a taste a few..

all images ©Jane Buekett
Click Here: S is for Simplicity: How Simplicity Will Improve Your Photography