Umbra Sumus
Very saddened to read that the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula is now the most violent place on Earth as reported in today’s Guardian.
I remember shooting a small story there about young people trying to leave the gangs in 2001.
Here are a couple of the images that I made …
Following yesterday’s entry with the tearsheet from the Monocle assignment, I thought I’d show some images that I was pleased with but didn’t make the final edit.
Funnily enough, I’d just shot and written another piece about French involvement in India… hundreds of miles away – a strange coïncidence. More on that when it’s published later in the year…
Here’s a spread from this month’s Monocle Magazine of a story I shot for them a few weeks ago in Pondicherry, the former French territory in southern India. I’ll post a couple of my favourite images from the set in a day or two.
Last week I was on assignment for a magazine in Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu photographing the French influence on the place.
As you can see, my presence didn’t go unnoticed… The local newspaper decided that me laying on the floor to get a better angle on a military band was front page news… as was the arrest of the poor chap who, slightly worse for wear on the local hooch, chose that moment to have a little dance in front of me and then squared up to the band leader – presumably for not playing his favourite tune…
In any case, I made a frame and clearly gave the local newsroom a laugh.
Here’s a recent tearsheet for the German Magazine, Effilee of an article that I wrote and photographed about a particular response to non-native invasive (alien) species – Muntjac Deer, Grey Squirrel and American Crayfish… the German headline has it best – something like, “Who is a stranger here is eaten”. Less sensationally, the piece explores the environmental fallout of introduced species and a discussion about both ‘speciesism’ and, the realization that we now live in an age that may come to be known as the Anthrocene.
Many thanks to the very excellent Crayfish Bob, Fergus Drennan (aka Fergus the Forager) and Mike Robinson
Appropriately on Valentine’s Day, the New York Times carries a piece today about the changing landscape of romance and especially kissing in Indian society. During my project about documenting Delhi’s green spaces, I photographed many couples seeking intimacy in public places unable to do so at home. Here are a couple of images from the series Public Spaces, Private Lives. A fuller set ran on the Camera Obscura blog in 2009 with a little interview about the work.
Happy Valentine’s Day.
