During the hot summer days we all need water. Drink it, swim in it and cool yourself down with it. And the hot sun burning down on us is perhaps most frustrating for all the bald men out there. Tim Tadder combined bald men with water in an unusual yet wonderful way. Giving them something that might remind the men of a great set of hair, if only for a very short moment. This series is called Water Wigs.
Tim Tadder’s website: www.timtadder.com
Many photographers will find themselves from time to time defending either analog or digital processing. Which is better? And why? Well for me the answer is easy, both are just fine.
L.A. Times photographer Jay L. Clendenin photographed Olympic athletes before they went off to London. He used both a digital and an analog camera. A Canon 5D Mark IIs and a 4×5 inch field camera with a 100+ year oold Petzval lens. Perhaps he had the same discussion and was planning on showing everyone that both ways can deliver wonderful photos. By placing the end results next to each other, the differences become very clear. It’s a game of depth of field against vivid colors. Take your pick. I love them both. So Old vs New? Nah, Old + New is just fine. Watch the video clip below to see Clendenin in action.
Babies are born every day. According to Wiki; a staggering 255 babies every minute. As a photographer babies and small children can help in generating a steady income. Since there’s an endless flow of the little ones. Anne Geddes became famous with her baby photos. She shows us the sweet and cute side of those tiny human beings.
Jill Greenberg on the other hand is showing us a the opposite side. She shows us a side that has nothing to do with cute or with sweet. But a side of us human beings, that we all know too well. When children are not getting what they want, don’t want to go to bed or travel along on an airplane. Jill Greenberg gave the kids in these photos some candy. And just before she released the shutter she took the candy away. Resulting in a wonderful yet little unsettling portrait series. That side of us we don’t really like to see photographed. That side that we as adults have learned to suppress.
The west and the middle east are driven apart ever since the horrible events that took place at 9/11. What we learn about ‘them’, speaking now from the western point of view, is coming to us through the media. Western media. The news covers every suicide bomber and every attack on a western military base. What we never truly get to see is the people who try to live their normal lives.
Together with journalist Pauline Bakker, photographer Marieke van der Velden traveled to Baghdad Aug/Sept 2011 with a simple question: How are you? The photographs see took shows us the people behind the news stories. Or behind the cover stories, the truth we never get to really know since a propaganda machine is keeping the humanity out of these conflict zones. A very interesting series called Baghdad Today.
Marieke van der Velden’s website: www.mariekevandervelden.com
Pieter Hugo photographed hyenas and their owners. Yes, their owners. In Lagos, Nigeria, men seem to keep an hyena as a pet. Using a chain as a leash, they walk around with their pets like you normally would with your dog. I wonder if this animal is a good and smart substitute for what we normally would call men’s best friend. Does a hyena really looks out for the owners best interests. The muzzles indicates otherwise.
Pieter Hugo found out the true relationship between these men and hyenas. He spent eight days with them. The men are called ‘Gadawan Kura’, roughly translated ‘Hyena handlers/guides’. They are a group of itinerant minstrels, performers who used the animals to entertain crowds and sell traditional medicines. For the complete story please visit Hugo’s website or click here.
Pieter Hugo’s website: www.pieterhugo.com
Earlier on PforPHOTO I posted about a series by Michael Wolf in which he photographed windows and the small cities that exist behind them. A voyeuristic series called Transparent City. His new series, again photographs taken through windows, shows us the commuters of the Tokyo subway system. The many people (2.8 million a day) who rely on this rapid transit system are all packed neatly into small compartments.They all commute cozy together.
The photographs that Michael Wolf has taken gives us a look into the day-to-day lives of Japanese commuters. Damp windows. Emotionless faces. Portraits of people who are compressed together. Portraits of people who pause their lives from the moment they set foot on world’s busiest subway system. All on their way to do what they do. Everyday the same. Everyday together. The series is called Tokyo Compression.
Michael’s website: www.photomichaelwolf.com
Aernout Overbeeke, Dutch photographer, seems to approach a portrait in a similar way as Arnold Newman did. To portray a person he doesn’t just shoot the person up close and personal but includes his surroundings as well. And often takes a few more steps backwards then Newman did. By doing so Newman created an abstraction where Overbeeke creates an amazing depth in his photographs. And the softness he puts into every image is just beautiful.
Whether it’s his portraitures or his commercial work, the softness and the depth is always recognizable. A signature of a photographer that understands light. By using natural light in combination with strobes he never makes it look like a studio shoot. The natural and strobe lighting give a wonderful mix to create the perfect atmosphere.
