I learned long ago that it’s best to approach your heroes with trepidation, because they rarely live up to expectations. So when I met Elliott Erwitt in Perpignan, France, years ago, when we both had shows for Visa Pour l’Image, I was reluctant to talk to him. Imagine my surprise when he asked to trade prints. I upped the ante and asked whether if I bought his book, “Personal Best,” he would sign it for me.“Don’t buy my book,” he said. “It’s much too heavy to carry on the plane.”
When I was a teen-age amateur photographer, I snapped a picture of a large group of Philadelphia police officers loitering in a rail terminal. Within moments, an officer came over and wanted me to open the back of the camera to expose the film. Decades later, film is obsolete — but the fundamental issue raised that day is not.
via Police often wrongly claim that photography equals obstruction or their duties | UTSanDiego.com.
In her 1977 collection of essays, “On Photography,” Susan Sontag identified a feeling of helpless voyeurism that comes over us as we look at photographs of people in the midst of conflict. She also wrote about how repeatedly seeing such images could anesthetize the vision and deaden the conscience. Sontag understood photographs of conflict to be making a utilitarian argument — that they could bring us into a state of productive shock — and showed that they seldom did what they claimed, or hoped, to do.
Idaho resident John Cassinelli lost his digital camera when he went fishing on the Salt River two years ago. It was recently found by a couple who posted its images on Facebook.
via Lost Camera Survives Two Years Submerged In Wyoming’s Salt River : NPR.
In the same week that the City of Paris launched the Parisian Pact on Fighting Social Exclusion, a new photography exhibition featuring images taken by Paris’ homeless and most vulnerable citizens was inaugurated by Deputy Mayors Bruno Julliard and Dominique Versini this week. The photos are on display on the railings surrounding Paris City Hall.
via A new exhibition shows Paris through the eyes of the homeless – Paris.fr.
LOS ANGELES – The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors yesterday approved a settlement with the ACLU Foundation of Southern California ACLU SoCal and three photographers who were detained by L.A. County Sheriff’s Department LASD deputies while shooting photos in public places.