2A Duty of Care: Using Photography to Battle Anxiety and Depression
Meet Jim Mortram, a photographer with a past that involved battling anxiety and depression. Now he uses photography to interact with his community and draw attention to those who are “struggling to get by.” In this 3-minute video by Wex Photo Video, find out what Mortram thinks about the power of photography.
The video is part of Wex Photo Video‘s “More Than an Image” series, which features a number of photographers who have faced personal challenges.“There was a period of almost a year where I didn’t really speak out loud,” says Mortram of his difficult past. “I was loaned a camera… It helped me reintegrate myself back into a community and meet people.”
3Access all areas: rock photography by Neal Preston – in pictures
Elton John, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin – Neal Preston has shot the greatest names in rock. His new book, Exhausted and Exhilarated, contains photographs and recollections of life on the road from a career spanning almost 50 years
Shooting Michael Jackson for a People Magazine cover in 1987 in Tokyo, I found a perfect spot where I could have all the beautiful neon lights of the Ginza in the background. I arrived and set up early, nobody bothered me or asked what I was doing, then all hell broke loose. Michael showed up, and the second he got out of his car about 1,000 fans appeared out of nowhere, making it impossible for me to get the shot I needed. The deluge of fans killed my session and the magazine ended up going with a live shot for the cover.
I was fortunate to have my street photography career when I did, I think. I photographed the streets of New York City (and Montreal) between 2010 and 2017. In 2017 I decided to call it quits and “retire”. Now, granted, this was not the era of Garry Winogrand or Joel Meyerowitz (although I did run into Meyerowitz in Whole Foods, he had no camera … seems he’s given up the streets too). Yet, this was a “second wave” era of sorts. Street photography was very hot during these years, but it was also before the “craze” of everyone shooting the streets and everyone being “afraid” of people with cameras. It was a good moment in contemporary street photography.
5The Photographer Martin Parr Has a New Foundation—and He’s Using It to Make Chris Killip Famous
The Magnum photographer, curator, and prolific photobook collector Martin Parr has opened his foundation in Bristol to the public and researchers. Parr is now an archivist too—not just of his own work, but also of a lifetime’s work by fellow documentary photographer Chris Killip.
“In Britain, people think I’m dead,” Killip said at the launch conference on Saturday, October 21. But the Isle of Man-born Harvard professor of visual studies is working between four to 12 hours a day in the darkroom where he is printing, sometimes for the first time, images from his vast archive.
6A First Look At Documentary ‘Cinema Through The Eye Of Magnum,’ Now Available on FilmStruck
Last week, we told you about the new documentary Cinema Through the Eye of Magnum, which airs exclusively on the cinema lovers’ favorite streaming service FilmStruck. The movie spotlights the photo service’s incredible on-set photography, which includes now famous images of icons like Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, and Elizabeth Taylor. Film reporter Alicia Malone narrates this overview of Magnum’s essential place in the history of photography and film.
In the art world, William Eggleston is a revered photographer. In the music world, he’s virtually unknown. But now the 78-year-old Memphis native, celebrated for legitimizing color photography in the 1970s, has just released his very first album, simply titled Musik.
The German spelling is an homage to J.S. Bach, one of Eggleston’s heros. And while the new album sounds very little like Bach, Eggleston often makes his 1990s-era Korg synthesizer sound like one of the master’s mighty church organs.
You can get a taste for the album in the short and sweet film by Rick Alverson, which follows Eggleston around his Memphis apartment while his music plays. The artist pads from bedroom to dining room where, hunched over a table laden with oscilloscopes and tube amplifiers, he noodles with his keyboard, creating a retro sound somewhere between Tomita and Tangerine Dream.
