Jay and Missy, Prospect Park, 2018 Photograph © Bruce Polin
Allie, Prospect Park, 2017 Photograph © Bruce Polin
Photographer Bruce Polin with "Aubrey, Prospect Park, 2017"
"What's the opposite of a Cellphone Picture?" is the title of the New York Times Lens Blog article about Photographer Bruce Polin! "Walking around Prospect Park with a 100 pounds of gear, including a boxy 8 by 10 camera, Bruce Polin collaborated with strangers to make idyllic portraits.... read more here
Bruce Polin
lives and works in Brooklyn, New York…."Prospect Park is really the
optimal microcosm of New York's profound diversity. My use of its
natural assets as the backdrop somehow imparts additional political
resonance, given that our public lands and environmental protections
seem to be eroding by the minute, and climate change denial is now,
incredibly, a governing principle. The park, designed in 1867 by
Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert B. Vaux, is a vast organism, fertile,
with secret winding paths, and infinite textures and sounds. There are
many unique 'neighborhoods' within it. The park has become my studio in a
way -- one in which I don't have much control, an aspect that can be
frustrating but often liberating…." read more brucepolin.com
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Anna Maria Gallegos de Houser and Bonneville Salt Flats, 2017, diptych
Photograph © Tomas van Houtryve
Tomas van Houtryve holding
Bernadette Therese Ortiz Pena and Carter Lake, 2017, diptych
Tomas van Houtryve is a conceptual artist, photographer and author whose major works interweave investigative journalism, philosophy and metaphor. Van Houtryve makes images using a wide range of processes, ranging from 19th century wet plate collodion to thermal imaging and Augmented Reality.
Lines and Lineage: The boundary between Mexico and the United States used to be 1100 kilometers farther north, following what is now the state line between Oregon and California and running east to Wyoming before zagging southeast to Louisiana. Originally home to the indigenous peoples of the region, much of this land was Spanish and then Mexican territory for centuries before becoming what we now think of as the American West….Using glass plates and a nineteenth-century camera to photograph landscapes along the original border and create portraits of descendants of early inhabitants, this project imagines what that history might look like. It questions the role that photographs—both present and missing—have played in shaping the identity of the West.
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from the series “One Day in History”
Survivor of the July 22, 2011 terror attack on Utøya, Norway
Photograph © Andrea Gjestvang
"Seven years ago, Cecilie Herlovsen and her best friend Andrine were hiding together at the sea shore of Utoya. Andrine was killed. Cecilie was shot in her arm, should and in the chin. Her arm had to be amputated. Today, Cecilie is still disabled to work or study. She has lost her sickness benefits compensation and feels that she never received the help she needed to fully recover."
Andrea Gjestvang with new work taken in the Faroe Islands
Norweigen born photographer, Andrea Gjestvang is living and working in Oslo, where she takes on assignments and pursues long term personal documentary projects....With an intimate photographic approach, she explores political and social issues often connected to the lives of adolescents. Her project “One Day in History”, portraits of the young survivors of the 22nd of July 2011 terror attack on Utøya, Norway, gained international recognition, exhibitions and awards, including the prestigious L’Iris d’Or/Sony World Photography Awards Photographer of the Year 2013.
Currently Gjestvang’s fascination and interest in remote and inaccessible environments in the North, brought her to Greenland and the Faroe Islands, where she explores the intimate lives and persistence of people in vulnerable communities. see more: andreagjestvang.com
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"A student of Ugwa Secondary School in Obodougwa community, demonstrates how frustrating and difficult paying attention in class can be, due to the cracking noise from a gas flaring site in her community." – Tales of The Oil Rich South. Photograph: CODE/KC Nwakalor
Black soot. "The city has been plagued with the presence of black soot in their atmospheric air believed to be due to unregulated refinery activities." – Tales of The Oil Rich South. Photograph: CODE/KC Nwakalor
Photographer KC Nwakalor
"A lady in her late 30’s lost her younger brother a year ago to cancer, she believes his illness and death might be linked to the environmental pollution."– Tales of The Oil Rich South
KC Nwakalor is an International documentary photojournalist based in Abuja, Nigeria. He is driven by the need to visually humanize real issues in Africa. His works centers around Socioeconomic, Health and Environmental issues in Africa. His scrupulous attention to detail, determination for a better Africa has led him to produce work for notable organisations like The New York Times, Bloomberg, USAID, OXFAM, Amnesty International, Marie Stopes International, Jeune Afrique, Options UK, Ipas, and Connected Development (CODE).
Tales of The Oil Rich South: For the past 2 years, Port Harcourt City (the heart of the oil rich Rivers state, in the Niger Delta Region of Nigeria) have been plagued with the presence of black soot in their atmospheric air. This is believed largely to be due to unregulated refinery activities and destruction of seized crude oil products. This environmental pollution poses a lot of health hazards, from bronchitis to chronic cough to cancer etc. While little has been done by the government to fix this issue, thousands of lives risk developing health issues as a result of their long term exposure to such contaminated air. see more: kcnwakalor.com
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Photograph © Charmaine Poh
Jean Goh and Xener Gill pose for a portrait, with Xener’s parents’ wedding portrait projected onto the backdrop. Jean met her first few partners through church. While she still believes in God, she decided to step back from serving in the church she attended, partially because the institution disapproved of homosexuality. Jean identifies as gender queer. It is Xener’s first relationship with a woman.
Charmaine Poh is a Chinese-Singaporean artist, photographer, and writer based between Singapore and Berlin. Her practice combines photography with research, text, video, and installation, focusing on issues of memory, gender, youth, and solitude in the Asian context. Often working with the form of narrative portraiture, she considers the performance of self and the layers of identity we build. She works with communities in a collaborative process that holds space for introspection, intimacy, and sharing. She is interested in the stories that make us who we are. A series about queer love is forth coming. charmainepoh.com
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It’s All In My Head Photomontage © Etinosa Yvonne
It’s All In My Head Photomontage © Etinosa Yvonne
Etinosa Yvonne
Etinosa Yvonne is a self-taught documentary photographer from Nigeria. Her work focuses on under-reported societal issues as it affects the everyday Nigerian and society at large. In 2018, she got a grant from Women Photograph to fund her ongoing project, It’s All In My Head. Later that year, she emerged as the overall winner of the National Geographic/Lagos Photo Portfolio Review. Etinosa leverages on the immediate impact of photographs to shed light on various issues that affect marginalized members of her society. read more: etinosayvonne.me
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from the series, The Aesthetics of Disappearance, 2019
from the series, The Aesthetics of Disappearance, 2019
Tristan Cai received his B.F.A(hon) from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and his M.F.A from San Francisco Art Institute, he has also pursued non-degree studies at TaiK ( The Helsinki School). He has studied under and been influenced by Henry Wessel, Linda Connor, Meridel Rubenstein, Stephanie Syujuco and Jryki Parentainen.
Cai’s multi-disciplinary art practice utilizes research-based ethnographic approaches to understand the human condition. Employing counter-strategies, he produces oblique visual narratives consisting of archival materials, composited photographs, objects and videos to examine the veracities of our histories. He is also constantly reflecting on the possibilities, limits and failures that the medium of photography offers.
Tristan Cai's new series, The Aesthetics of Disappearance, 2019, shown at The New York Portfolio Review, is based on Singapore's colonial era and the idea of slavery. Even as the British abolished slavery in 1833, slavery and indentured servitude continued to exist in Singapore for more than a 100 years until the 1950's. Watch for more on this project in the future. tristancai.com
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Plies Photograph © Jabari Jacobs
Miss Cameroon Photograph © Jabari Jacobs
Jabari Jacobs Photographer + Director
Jabari Jacobs is a highly sought after Fashion and Music Photographer + Director. Originally from Prince George's County, Maryland, he now works worldwide, though primarily in Los Angeles and New York, shooting campaigns for Nike, Universal Music Group, Adidas, Hypebeast, Reebok, Puma, Warner Music Group, Sony Music, Roc Nation, Conde Nast, Disney, BET, and many more! His work covers the spectrum from the most contemporary urban rap, aka Trap Music, to my own Era's, Earth, Wind and Fire. see more jabarijacobs.com
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Metal Wings, 2012 Photograph © Mariya Kozhanova
Russian Photographer Mariya Kozhanova
Finding Identity Through Cosplay in Russia is the title of the New York Times Lens Blog article about Russian Photographer Mariya Kozhanova. Born in Kaliningrad, Russia, of a generation around the time the Soviet Union fell in 1991, her series “Declared Detachment”represents a generation of Russians born when well organized society and established identity fell apart. All myths and believes that was the driving force for generations before were destroyed.
Now a lack of base and missing of foundation in society opened them to a life which they could not trust. Forces for creating their own identity from the beginning were missing. In this moment, their society could not offer them any deserved faith, ideals or any other meaning. This Young Generation of Russians started to borrow it from totally different cultures.
Some of them declared their way through Japanese mass-culture of “cosplay” where in a simple, catchy, bright, spectacular, superficial world of anime heroes with attractive idols and colorful looks you could become any of those figures yourself. This generation escaped into a different ideology and tried to build their illusive world on the ruins of the past. read more mariyakozhanova.com
Her next project:
Mariya is photographing Eastern Orthodox nuns in a small monastery
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Photograph AP Photo/Ivan Valencia
“Es una mujer indígena Embera Katío de la comunidad de la Puria. La Puria es una comunidad que está a 3 horas caminando por las selvas chocoanas. Es una comunidad donde solo viven mujeres y niños. Los hombres y jefes de la comunidad, fueron asesinados o reclutados por grupos armados ilegales. Debido a esto, las mujeres tuvieron que tomar control de la comunidad como verdaderas líderes.” Foto de @aivanvalencia fotógrafo profesional y #CanonFellow
“This is an Embera Katío indigenous woman from the Puria community. La Puria is a community that is 3 hours walking through the Chocoan jungles. It is a community where only women and children live. The men and heads of the community were killed or recruited by illegal armed groups. Because of this, women had to take control of the community as true leaders. “ Photo by Ivan Valencia, a Columbian Professional Photographer and #CanonFellow see more ivanvalencia.org and on Instagram @aivanvalencia/
Ivan Valencia, a Freelance Photographer born in San Andres Island, Colombia
A man covers his face with a cap as he walks past a fire during a protest at the border between Brazil and Venezuela, Saturday, Feb.23, 2019. Tensions are running high in the Brazilian border city of Pacaraima. Thousands remained at the city's international border crossing with Venezuela to demand the entry of food and medicine. Photograph: AP Photo/Ivan Valencia
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Photograph © Lisa Kahane
Lisa Kahane lisakahane.com
The Bronx had almost stopped burning by 1979. The intensity and extent of the devastation permeated the landscape. It was an awesome mess, not just another neighborhood, but another realm, visible but incomprehensible. The Bronx came undone in a confluence of unfortunate circumstances: the life cycle of community, rampant city planning, economic change, racism, poverty, failed hopes, drugs, crime, abandonment, counterproductive government response. It was destroyed for profit. The entire story has yet to be told.
A friend suggested to photographer Lisa Kahane that she record it for a time when it would be a memory, which was then impossible to imagine.The result, Do No Give Way to Evil: Photographs of the South Bronx, 1979–1987, is an extraordinary document of devastation and rejuvenation, as Kahane records the first seeds of rebuilding.
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Maya Touam with her Flemish-inspired series Ready Made
Born in France of two Algerian parents, Maya-Ines Touam has always stretched her eyes and curiosity on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea. It is natural that his artistic career has embraced the influences of these two continents...Thus, through multiple media, the young artist undertakes a work that is both anthropological and dreamlike. She plunges her hands into the roots of her origins to shoot striking images. We discover with it the history and the beauty of a thousand-year-old culture, but also the practical and geographical aspects of a fabric or objects too often caricatured. A work on the borders of two worlds, that the elegance and the weight of the words makes conversation serenely. – Clement Belet
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I'm honored to have once again been invited as a Reviewer for this year's 7th Annual New York Portfolio Review, sponsored by The New York Times LENS blog and the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. Much thanks and praise goes out to James Estrin and David Gonzalez, Co-Editors of The New York Times LENS Blog; Andrew L. Mendelson, Associate Dean, at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY; Producer Laura Roumanos, Executive Director of United Photo Industries; and their team, for creating this enormously important and free event for the benefit of photographers, documentarians and photojournalists.
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