David Alan Harvey: Havana

Image Copyright David Alan Harvey/Magnum
David Alan Harvey is a legend among photojournalists. Here's what Dirck Halstead, of the Digital Journalist says about him: "David is a photojournalist's photojournalist. His work is in the tradition of Henri Cartier-Bresson and W. Eugene Smith. He never uses a press card or long lens. He never stands behind ropes at a "photo op." He tends to use a single Leica body with either a 35mm or 50mm lens. He has the eye of painter and the soul of a poet. He is the kind of photographer I would like to be."

For the past 15 years, David has assembled an incredible body of work on Hispanic culture. Sponsored by his agency, Magnum Photos, and National Geographic, he has documented the Mayan culture, the trail of the conquistadors, Chile, Honduras, Belize and Spain. He developed a love affair with Cuba. In his words, it was "a love mixed with frustration, fear, passion, and paranoia...I was drawn to the ballet of street photography. I hung out with Cubans, listened to their music, drank with them, danced and ate with them. I visited schools and science labs. I rode buses, lived with the families, went to church, and in general, soaked it all up. I lived it, felt it, and photographed it."

His images are full of life and vivacity...and the gallery has Real Audio snippets with David's commentary. By the way, his 17th image on the gallery is of Adelaide and Wilki...these two photogenic Cubans were fixtures in Old Havana, dancing exuberantly for tourists and photographers. I met them in Havana in 2000 and have photographs of them...one of which is on my Havana gallery (a gallery which is in dire need of being reworked on).

David Alan Harvey's gallery on Cuba, and above excerpts come courtesy of the Digital Journalist. It's been a while that this gallery has been published...and it shows. I would freshen it up by converting it into a Flash slideshow, perhaps adding a pulsating Ibrahim Ferrer track to the Havana images, and traditional son with the rest. Along with David's narrative, it'd be wonderful. Notwithstanding, the images are timeless.

David Alan Harvey's Cuban Soul

I haven't met David, but through his recently published blog, I can tell that he's indeed one of a kind. His desire to help young emerging photographers and his generosity stand out in an industry that is frequently selfish and egoistical. My hat's off to David Alan Harvey.

David Alan Harvey's Blog

The NGS Cell Phone

The National Geographic Society will attempt market its new Talk Abroad™ Travel Phone this month. The unlocked Quad band GSM cell phone is said to be reliable and affordable. Calls can be made in over 100 countries around the world (including the US and Canada) while maintaining one personal cellular number. Since this is a prepaid solution, there are no contracts to sign or monthly bills.

I am no expert of cellular telephony, but I comfortably predict this phone will provide no competition to the Blackberries, Nokias and iPhones, in spite of the NGS logo.

Talk Abroad Travel Phone

Katherine Kiviat: Parwana

Image Copyright Katherine Kiviat
Katherine Kiviat has been working as an international documentary photographer and photojournalist for the past 7 years. International assignments have taken her to Afghanistan, India, Israel, Oman, Europe, and the United States. 

For the last two years she was based in Kabul where she photographed the first democratic elections and focused on Afghan women and their changing role in Afghanistan. In June 2005, she published "Parwana" with journalist Scott Heidler. The book is a collection of portraits and interviews of Afghan women across the country who are agents of change.

Presently based in Jerusalem, she has photographed a number of Palestinian-Israeli co-existence programs around the region as well as covering feature stories outside Gaza and the West Bank.

Her website has a number of galleries to choose from, but I suggest you visit her solid work on Afghan women, which she titled "Parwana". I hope her book does very well.

Her photographs can be seen here

India: Holi Festival Redux

Further to my earlier post a few days ago, the Washington Post just published a gallery of photographs of the Indian festival of Holi, which was celebrated on March 3.

Here's the link: Holi

POV: Cult of the Famous

If this doesn't enhance my reputation as opinionated, I don't know what will. A recent ad/post on a photo forum attracted my attention. It involved a request for photography assistants to help out a photographer over short duration gigs. The ad was written in such a way as to impart that the assisting opportunities were exciting since the photographer is famous. The cities in question are domestic and international. The duration of the gigs is between 2-3 days each.

Here's the ad/post:

"Digital assistants good day rate plus expenses!!!!!

Requirements: 1.They need to own a laptop 2. Need to know how to use digital cameras inside & out; download raw and jpg, burn DVD’s 3. They need to own or be able to drive a car and know each city well 4. They need to pick up/drop off photographer from airport/hotel depending upon cities."

Let's examine the job requirements: knowledgeable in computers and presumably photo-editing, ownership of a mac laptop, profound knowledgeable of digital cameras, ownership of a car to drive the photographer around, and shuttling to and from the airport with waiting time, etc. In other words, what's needed is a photographer's assistant, a fixer, an interpreter, a guide, a driver and -if necessary- a 'pinata' if anything goes wrong.

Then let's tally costs of a driver, car, translator/interpreter, guide, digital photography expert, etc and see if the photographer's "good day rate" is remotely comparable. I'm willing to bet the ranch that it will be a fraction of that. Yes, I know, all this is speculation and that the photographer may prove me wrong by paying the assistant a decent wage, mileage, gas, food, etc. along with some mentoring perhaps...I hope so. By the way, the US industry standard is about $150-200 a day for 10 hours work by an assistant with some experience.

But as I see it, the intangible benefits to the assistants over these 2-3 days are negligible...it's too tight a time frame. Working with a photographer in such gigs cannot provide a learning experience someone would get from say a month's internship, or even a week, where they'd be exposed to many facets of the photographer's business.

I wouldn't feel exercised about this if the ad/post hadn't been written to convey it as an opportunity to work for a famous photographer and gain attendant benefits. It subsequently was clarified by the ad poster that job seekers should not expect anything more than a day's wages from the experience. So why headline the post/ad with the name of this famous photographer? We all know the answer to that.

Some in the professional industry agreed with me, while others didn't and said so in the strongest of terms. Hackles were raised by my using the word 'exploitative' and it was claimed that there was nothing wrong for assistants to do the legwork and the heavy lifting for photographers. Maybe in an industry as competitive as photography, a job that pays any kind of wage is welcome.

A rather theatrically petulant post from a photographer on the forum, who describes himself rather bizzarely on his profile webpage as a 'feral photographer' (yes, i know what you're thinking...not much going on in this guy's attic) claimed that my questioning the ad's requirements would lead to assignments being no longer posted on the forum, and implying that I was snatching bread from the mouth of his dependents.

A number of posters knocked themselves out in clamoring that they would work for free to assist a famous photographer. These are the same people who are hysterical and up in arms when an amateur photographer's work is shown for free on Yahoo or CNN or any other website. Sublime hypocrisy or just stupidity? Is it because there isn't enough work of that kind to go around? Or is it just a puerile reaction to accept scraps from the famous and powerful? Is it just being enthralled by celebrity photographers, hoping that their success will rub onto them during a 2-3 days period? Is it to ingratiate themselves to the ad poster?

Once again, I am not disputing the value of assisting any photographer for a period of time...nor disputing the value of internships...not at all. What I'm disputing is the intrinsic (if the wage is based on industry standard, so be it) value of these very short term gofer gigs, and the obvious attempt by the ad poster to make it sound better than it is, capitalizing on the photographer's fame.