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© Caroll Taveras, 2009
I think America has too many guns. It is not something that fits really with Prison Photography so I stay away from the topic.
But I came across Caroll Taveras‘ photographs of a quick draw competition for children in Colorado, and was compelled to post.
© Olivia Wyatt
Recently, I panned the Magnum: In Motion piece on Haiti. Afterward, I went back to put a name to the disaster. Olivia Wyatt.
Then I felt guilty. I meant to attack Magnum, not an individual … who has a name … which is stated clearly at the end of the piece.
To allay may guilt, I feverishly went in search of other stuff to support the notion that Wyatt was piss-poor at what she did. I was sorely disappointed.
QUALITY
Olivia Wyatt has her lens and mic up in some good projects. As well as producing Jonas Bendiksen’s Nepal Maoists and the Magnum group’s Merry Christmas (with choice tunes from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra) she was also the producer on Christopher Anderson’s Capitolio Magnum: In Motion piece that played its part in getting everyone hot and bothered last summer.
Silicon Forest, the other Anderson piece Wyatt worked on fizzes and pops with the same disjointed eye that Anderson lent to Akademgorodok (Academic City), Siberia.
© Olivia Wyatt
THERE’S MORE
Then after unearthing some classy collage works, I came across Wyatt’s unexpected polaroids from Ethiopia (pages 46-54).
After all this, her Vimeo channel walks me straight into another dimension where Eraserhead meets Jesus Camp meets Point Break.
Seeking the Spirit is about Pastor Richard Philips and the congregation of the Celestial Church in Christ meeting at the Beach 96th Street, Rockaway, New York to observe an all night ceremony of prayer and cleansing.
Screen grab. Seeking the Spirit, by Olivia Wyatt
All great work. I am chastened.
Last month, spurred by Michael David Murphy‘s summary opinion piece I started writing about photographers rights.
I have talked before (and here and here) about the diminished freedoms for photographers in the UK. While the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) led many of the actions, it is the support of the whole photographic community that has driven the issue.
The half-penned piece was rendered redundant by last weekend’s “I’m A Photographer, Not a Terrorist” demonstration in Trafalgar Square, London last weekend. The event looked like a hoot (see here, here, here and here)! Nevertheless, I want to throw down a few thoughts and some links.
ONGOING CONFUSIONS
In November 2009, the UK police issued a memorandum retracting some of the misguidance it had issued; bobbies on the beat were reminded that it wasn’t illegal to take photos. Seemingly, this was more a PR exercise or simply the rank and file didn’t get the memo. Harassment continued.
This situation has totally degraded. The level of trust between the photographic community and police authorities is at an all time low (more here and here). Granted, the Guardian is my sole source here, but it covers the issue so well.
Outside of Britain, incidents have occurred in Los Angeles and elsewhere in the US. Some might say there is a certain amount of baiting employed by some journalists’ tactics (Paul Lewis outside the Gherkin in London springs to mind), but they are merely testing the communication and enforceability of new directives immediately after they’ve been announced by police authorities (in Lewis’ case, directives from New Scotland Yard).
In 2010, I hope to see less harassment of photographers. But, if hassle does continue I hope (and expect) to see its continued reporting to keep the pressure on police chiefs and politicians … particularly in the UK.
And with that I have a site recommendation. Photography is Not a Crime is a good one-stop shop for the unfortunate new genre of photog/authority face-off stories.
The watchdog is compiled by Carlos Miller a Miami multimedia journalist arrested by Miami police after photographing them against their wishes. He goes into his case at length and I still don’t think it is resolved.
Regardless of his motives, Miller’s coverage is comprehensive. As a silo for moments of confrontation and antagonism, the Photography is Not a Crime blog can be a repeated depressing look at abuses of authority.
More than the individual stories – which warrant extended consideration in themselves – it is the cumulative weight and significance of collected incidents that makes Miller’s site a cultural mirror.
Photography is Not a Crime is a must-read for photographers and other media journalists.
There are SEVEN cameras in this image.
What an intriguing image. It’s got a foolish mixture of activity that confuses the viewer: slapping; parrying; a sizable unperturbed bunch of by-passers who display amusement, disappointment, indifference and camera-induced detachment.
One lady has a baby under one arm as she strikes with the other. The lady in defensive mode raises an elbow so as to not inconvenience the cameras she holds in each hand nor the pacifier on her middle finger.
The lady on the right has just been evicted by Israeli settlers. The situation is obviously tense, but who’d bet against me that without the cameras this confrontation would not have occurred?
Photograph by Ahmad Gharabli / Agence France Presse / Getty Images (Source)
© Daniel Morel / Corbis
Amidst the all the coverage of Haiti, I have found the interviews and words of photojournalists (eg. Damon Winter; Melissa Lyttle) FAR more interesting and informing than the images.
What an essential privilege to hear Haitian photographer Daniel Morel speak about not only his placement during the earthquake, but also the behaviour of the media, the complaints of Haitians toward said media and where he and Haiti go from here.
If I am going to put weight on any opinion it is Morel‘s.
PART ONE OF A SERIES OF POSTS DISCUSSING PHOTOGRAPHERS’ ACTIONS AND RESPONSES TO THE KILLING OF FABIENNE CHERISMA IN PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI ON THE 19TH JANUARY 2010.
“The question is not whether Fabienne will be remembered as a victim of the earthquake but whether, outside her family, she will be remembered at all.”
Rory Carroll, The Guardian, January 26th, 2010
15-year-old Fabienne Cherisma lies dead after being shot in the head in Port-au-Prince. Photograph: Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters.
Fifteen year-old Fabienne Cherisma was shot dead by police at approximately 4pm, January 19th, 2010.
On the 26th of January, the Guardian published an account of Fabienne’s life – her schooling, her sales acumen and her aspirations to be a nurse. The piece is not long, but it needn’t be. It is a modest effort – hopefully the first of a few – to remind us that Fabienne was a daughter, a sister, a source of love and pride for her family and, in the end, an innocent victim.
THE IMAGE THAT REMAINS, THE SYMBOL THAT EMERGES
There is a chance that Fabienne Cherisma could become a symbol of the Haitian earthquake and the problematic aftermath; that she become a tragic silhouette extending meaning far beyond the facts of her abrupt and unjust death.
This notion can be at once offensive and inevitable. If the visual rhetoric is going to play out as such, then if it is not Fabienne, it will be another victim.
What purpose could the emergence of a such a symbol serve?
Thus far Fabienne’s death is a story that has caught wide attention. It came without warning, it was unexpected. Her death – resulting not from nature’s violence but from human action – stands out from other deaths as a particular injustice; Fabienne’s killing is salt in the wounds. While tens of thousands lay obscured beneath rubble, she lay limp and exposed on a bare roof-top. The image itself is an affront.
If one believes that images fuel public awareness, thus securing donations and aid, and thus helping Haiti’s immediate future, then certain images and stories will carry that awareness and emotion.
All the accusations of media exploitation in Haiti do not discredit the positive effects a single image can – without any manipulation – have in the minds of millions. I wouldn’t call this the magic or the power of photography, I’d call it the mysterious perversion of photography. I don’t, and can’t, explain it. I merely observe it.
THE RESPONSIBLE USES OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Fears amongst those who care about media and its conduct hope that the focus can remain on Haiti and its long-term recovery. If the media deserts Haiti after a few short weeks then all accusations of disaster pornography will be upheld.
Photo-editors are now searching for the images that will maintain the humanitarian momentum on Hispanola. These images will be from committed photojournalists who stick around once press photographers have left.
It would be worthwhile to see and hear journalists’ reporting that follows up on the experiences of victims who may or may not have already appeared in coverage. I actually expect journos will follow up on the stories of the child born amid the rubble, the elderly woman rescued after 10 days and the man rescued after search and rescue was called off.
The Haitian recovery must be reported more than the initial chaos.
In the scenario of mass reproduction and circulation, the image of Fabienne’s dead body needn’t be one of mere exploitation. Nothing is so one-dimensional. Of course, this is very sensitive territory and above all the wishes of her family should prevail … in an ideal world.
That said, the history of photojournalism is replete with globally-recognised subjects whose visage was appropriated without their knowledge and/or consent. There’s no model release form in war and disaster.
Fabienne may become a symbol for the innocent victims of this disaster as Kim Phúc did for those in Vietnam. The politics of the two crises are a planet apart, but our modes of consumption are not.
Images are highly manipulable; Errol Morris asserts a caption will turn can turn the reading of a photograph 180 degrees.
The inconvenience of captions often results in the creation of symbol.
I don’t think it will be long before a symbol, a brand for Haitian plight, will rest upon a single image. Western thought demands a visual book-end to the visual dialogue.
Pureevilbunny has already documented a graphic (in both senses of the word) stencil rendering of of Fabiennie’s corpse (artist not stated). The incongruous pink clothing, argyle sweater, flowers and blood are elements that shock.
THE PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCES AVAILABLE
I do not want to prescribe a means of viewing images of Fabienne’s death. I am interested in informing the public about the photographers who witnessed and recorded the event.
The most widely circulated image is that atop this article by Carlos Garcia Rawlins and distributed by Reuters. It was used in the Daily Mail among others and in the Guardian’s original reporting of the killing:
Jan Grarup of Noor images was also present. Grarup’s dispatch for the 19th and 20th January contains 136 images, nine of which include Fabienne.
© Jan Grarup / Noor Images
© Jan Grarup / Noor Images
© Jan Grarup / Noor Images
© Jan Grarup / Noor Images
Fabienne’s body is in a distinctly different position between the photographs of Garcia-Rawlins and Grarup:
© Carlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters.
© Jan Grarup / Noor Images
Grarup was present at the scene before Garcia-Rawlins. Between their photographings, the framed pictures slid, Fabienne’s hips turned and her body rolled.
How much time was there between Fabienne’s slaying and the two photographers at the side of her body? How much time was there between the two of them photographing Fabienne? Were Grarup and Garcia-Rawlins on the roof at the same time? Did they see each other work?
Both photographers were obviously present before Osam, Fabienne’s father, carried her body away.
In the immediate aftermath, Grarup documented with a few frames a distraught Osam and family.
Olivier Laban Mattei continued documenting events. Laban Mattei’s dispatch of 28 images, is in fact only five images repeated.
Osam Cherisma carries the body of his daughter Fabienne killed by a policeman during lootings in the Marthely Seiee street January 19, 2010 in Port-au-Prince. © Olivier Laban Mattei/AFP/Getty Images.
Armante Cherisma cries in front of the body of her daughter, Fabienne, 15 years old, killed by a policeman during lootings in the Marthely Seiee street January 19, 2010 in Port-au-Prince. © Olivier Laban Mattei/AFP/Getty Images.
Despite the amateurish piecing together of evidences, presented here is a basic timeline to Fabienne’s death. These images placed in sequence describe more fully her tragic death and take Fabienne’s memory beyond that (Garcia-Rawlins’) single image.
Fabienne was an innocent. Whether misdirected warning shots or deliberate targeting, her shooting was needless.
If Fabienne’s death does come to symbolise something larger, I hope it does so to benefit the survivors in Haiti; that the injustice brought upon her will only distill our resolve to avoid injustices to others.
If the shocking form of her body, face down in the broken frame, becomes symbolic it cannot be for reductive consumption, disaster cliche or political gain.
AFTER THE PHOTOGRAPHS
‘With morgues overflowing, and earthquake fatalities being bulldozed into mass graves, the Cherismas took their daughter’s body out of the city. With a borrowed $70 they rented a private bus, and drove for four hours to relatives in Zorange. They buried her in a Catholic ceremony and placed a white cross over the grave.’ (Source)
– – –
ALSO IN THE ‘PHOTOGRAPHING FABIENNE’ SERIES
Part Two: More on Fabienne Cherisma (Carlos Garcia Rawlins)
Part Three: Furthermore on Fabienne Cherisma (Michael Mullady)
Part Four: Yet more on Fabienne Cherisma (Linsmier, Nathan Weber)
Part Five: Interview with Edward Linsmier
Part Six: Interview with Jan Grarup
Part Seven: Interview with Paul Hansen
Part Eight: Interview with Michael Winiarski
Part Nine: Interview with Nathan Weber
Part Ten: Interview with James Oatway
Part Eleven: Interview with Nick Kozak
Part Twelve: Two Months On (Winiarski/Hansen)
Reporter Rory Carroll Clarifies Some Details
Part Fourteen: Interview with Alon Skuy
Part Fifteen: Conclusions
Matt and Scott at Dvafoto have made some important observations on the behaviour of the press in Haiti.
Dvafoto just got a redesign too, bringing all their commentaries of the past up to the surface again. Well worth swimming about in the visual archive for a while.
I’ve never quite had a holiday like that before; the snowfall you always thought your parents were making up as they described the days when “real winters” hit.
Yesterday, Manchester airport availed itself and I got out. Arrived back in Seattle last night.
So I am back on the horse and I’ve got stuff to say (so does the horse).
Prison Photography 