Tyler Hicks: Kabul, Afghanistan

© Tyler Hicks/New York Times-All Rights Reserved
The New York Times brings us a nicely done (and very well edited, I thought) slideshow narrated by its accomplished photographer, Tyler Hicks.

Tyler Hicks' first trip to Kabul was in 2001, as Northern Alliance soldiers were fighting Taliban gunmen in and around the Afghan capital. There was a power vacuum at that time, and no restrictions on what could and could not be photographed...something which Tyler found to be very liberating.

He has returned every year since, and found Kabul to be a city in transition.

In the print edition of the newspaper, the section Week In Review carries the feature, and I must say that the layout of Tyler's two black & white photographs (one of which is above) that lead the article is superb...overall, an excellent photojournalism layout and a throwback to the days of LIFE. I'm also told that Tyler used a film camera...with B&W film.

Tyler Hicks' The Other Front:Kabul

Alessandro Vincenzi: Mumbai Monsoon

Photograph © Alessandro Vincenzi-All Rights Reserved
Alessandro Vincenzi is an Italian photographer living in Madrid. A trained biologist, he joined Medecins Sans Frontieres and traveled the world with the humanitarian organizatio.

He has added new galleries to his website; one on transgenders and the other on the monsoon in Mumbai. The latter is classic street photography, and many of the gallery's photographs are full of humor, and 'decisive moments'.

Alessandro Vincenzi

Happy Fourth of July

A Happy Fourth of July!

Michael Robinson Chavez: Senegal

© Michael Robinson Chavez/Washington Post-All Rights Reserved
Michael Robinson Chavez's work has often appeared on TTP, and for good reason; he's a consummate professional, and his work is not only consistently excellent, but is also varied...from conflict reportage to religious ritual, Michael has done it, and has done it well. Now that I met him at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop (FPW), it's only natural that his work will be featured here even more frequently.

One thing for certain...Michael's taste in music is eclectic. One of the pieces of music he chose to accompany a slideshow of his photographs at FPW was "Allah Hu", the magnificent qawwali song of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. His most recent photo slideshow in the Washington Post is on Senegal, and one of its chapters has as its audio a song by the superb Senegalese artist Baaba Maal. I don't know for sure if Michael chose it or not, but I wouldn't be surprised if he did.

Here's A Changing Senegal from the Washington Post.

Foto Week DC

FOTOWEEK DC seeks to establish itself as the nation’s premiere photography festival, and to recognize the most talented photographers in the DC, MD and VA area. The achievements of area professional photographers will be recognized by their peers through submissions of work in six categories.

A panel of judges will select images to be awarded on Saturday, November 22 at the FotoWeek DC awards ceremony and gala to be held at the National Geographic Society’s Headquarters.

The sponsors are the National Geographic, PDN, Discovery and the American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) among others.

As always, please read the rules' fine print before submitting your photographs.

I found FOTOWEEK DC's definition of "professional photographers" very interesting...it defines a professional photographer as someone who "publishes photographs in books, magazines, newspapers, or online regularly."

Foundry Photo Workshop: Group Photo

Here's an out-take from a bunch of photographs taken of the instructors at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop (FPW) held in Mexico City. This is of the instructors asked to horse around at AAVI, where all of the panel discussions and presentations were held.

(L to R,back row): Eric Beecroft (FPW's founder), Guy Calaf, Tewfic El-Sawy, David Griffin (National Geographic).

(L to R, middle Row): Rodrigo Cruz,Shaul Schwarz, Stephanie Sinclair, Adriana Zehbrauskas, Benjamin Rusnak, Ben Lowy, Hugo Infante, Stanley Greene, Kael Alford.

(L to R, seated): Eros Hoagland, Andrea Bruce, Paula Bronstein, Michael Robinson Chavez, Renée C. Byer, Scott Mc Kiernan and (horizontally, Kadir van Lohuizen)

Conrad Louis Charles: Brazil

Photograph © Conrad Louis-Charles-All Rights Reserved
I met Conrad Louis-Charles at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in Mexico City, he briefly described his background, but it wasn't until I returned that I discovered his work, and that the adage that still waters run deep is certainly true in his case.

Conrad is an independent photographer and cameraman currently based in Philadelphia and Sao Paulo in Brazil. He worked with various corporate clients, and he specializes in travel, documentary and editorial photography...making him a perfect candidate for the pages of TTP. He's represented by Getty Images.

His website showcases work from mainly Haiti, Dominican Republic, and Brazil. However, I was impressed by his Work-In-Progress gallery, which has a large number of his sensitive photograph of religious rituals and pilgrimages in northern Brazil. I'm not too fond of mixing color and black & white photographs, but Conrad kept the color photographs bunched together on his gallery, so it's not really mixing.

Explore his other galleries as well, and compare his Haiti work to that of the earlier post.