2Venezuelan photographer Ronaldo Schemidt wins World Press Photo of the Year Award
The World Press Photo of the Year The World Press Photo of the Year honors the photographer whose visual creativity and skills made a picture that captures or represents an event or issue of great journalistic importance in the last year.
The jury, chaired by Magdalena Herrera, awards the prize to Ronaldo Schemidt’s picture entitled ‘Venezuela Crisis’–which also won first prize in the Spot News Single category. The image shows how José Víctor Salazar Balza (28) on fire amid violent clashes with riot police during a protest against President Nicolás Maduro, in Caracas, Venezuela. Salazar was set alight when the gas tank of a motorbike exploded. He survived the incident with first- and second-degree burns. Schemidt (b. 1971) is a staff photographer for Agence France-Presse, based in Mexico.
Magdalena Herrera, director of photography Geo France and chair of the jury, said about selecting the World Press Photo of the Year:
“The photo of the year has to tell an event, that is important enough, it also has to bring questions…it has to engage and has to show a point of view on what happened in the world this year.”
She describes the winning photograph:
“It’s a classical photo, but it has an instantaneous energy and dynamic. The colours, the movement, and it’s very well composed, it has strength. I got an instantaneous emotion…”
4Photographer Lynn Johnson on outrage and the power of photography
For more than 40 years, photographer Lynn Johnson has turned her lens on hidden and at-risk communities all over the world. In this video she explains how a grant from Sony helped her to complete a long-term project with non-profit Ripple Effect Images in Cambodia, focusing on the effects of drug-resistant TB.
Lynn spent time with two healthcare workers, working in remote Cambodian villages
Somewhere in the world, it is estimated that someone dies of TB every 20 seconds. During the course of the project, Lynn spent time with two healthcare workers in remote Cambodian villages. The resulting collection of photographs has been made available to other non-profits working on behalf of women and children around the world.
5In Marrakech, African Photography on Its Own Terms
The life and work of Leila Alaoui, the celebrated Moroccan documentary photographer, looms large over Marrakech’s newest art institution. Alaoui, who at age thirty-three was shot and killed during an al-Qaeda attack in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, was a close friend of Othman Lazraq, the photography-enthused president of the Museum of African Contemporary Art Al Maaden (MACAAL), a privately owned art foundation on the southeastern outskirts of this walled city at the foothills of the Atlas Mountains. MACAAL’s inaugural photography exhibition, Africa Is No Island, bears the subtle imprint of Alaoui’s influence.
Speaking during a weekend of festivities in late February that included a boutique edition of the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair to mark the international launch of MACAAL, Lazraq cited his friendship with Paris-born Alaoui, an accomplished editorial photographer and portraitist who grew up in Marrakech, for sparking his interest in photography. The two met in New York, where Alaoui studied photography, and quickly struck up a friendship. Lazraq’s first photography purchase was a work by Alaoui, who also guided him on his early acquisitions—Lazraq’s home in Casablanca includes works by Araki, Peter Beard, Malick Sidibé, and the emerging South African Phumzile Khanyile.
6A Three-Part Formula For Better Street Photography
To the misinformed or unacquainted, street photography is easy. Everyone else knows this isn’t true. Even those who are so good at street photography that they make it look easy will tell you there’s a lot that goes into the craft. They would probably say you can’t simply show up at an interesting location with your camera and expect to magically make incredible photos. They would probably say you need to you need to forget about trying to follow trends and, instead, strive for something timeless.
Obviously, I’m taking on the precarious venture of speaking on behalf of others — I don’t know for a fact that great street photographers would say any of what I’ve just attributed to them, but I’m confident I haven’t missed the mark by much, if at all. Naturally, the question that follows will be, “So, how does one go about creating interesting, timeless street photography?”
