Saturday, November 21, 2020 / Labels: Magnum Foundation, photography fellowship
Open Call: 2021 Photography and Social Justice Fellowship
November 21, 2020 /Photography News/ Magnum Foundation’s Photography and Social Justice Program builds capacity through critical explorations of photography and social change.
Each year, the program supports a diverse, international group of Photography and Social Justice Fellows who are passionate about challenging injustice, pursuing social equality, and advancing human rights through photography. The program provides space for interdisciplinary experimentation, mentored project development, and cross-cultural, critical discourse for developing new approaches to socially engaged documentary practice. With intensive mentorship, artist- and expert-led workshops, peer-to-peer learning, and production funds, this program prepares fellows to make effective creative projects and become leaders who inspire social movements, pose difficult questions, and stimulate debate and awareness about pressing social issues.
Magnum Foundation covers the cost of participation, including all educational and programmatic activities. Fellows also receive a modest stipend to support the production of their projects. The program is produced in partnership with the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism.
Photography and Social Justice Fellows
Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellows are early- to mid-career photographers or individuals in aligned disciplines who are motivated to deepen their engagement with photography and social justice.
This program especially aims to support people of color, women, gender non-conforming individuals, LGBTQ individuals, individuals who are part of racial, ethnic, or religious minority groups, and others whose authorship is unevenly represented within the field of documentary photography.
Program Overview and Timeline
The Photography and Social Justice Program takes place during May through October 2021 and includes a core seminar course, workshops, mentored project development, and mentored production. Due to COVID-19, the 2021 program will be held remotely and meetings will occur with consideration of participants' timezones.
Photography and Social Justice Seminar with Fred Ritchin (April - June)
Participants will attend a discussion-based seminar course that begins with three informal gatherings in April and May and meets biweekly in June. Through discussion and experimental exercises the seminar will explore ethics and creative strategies for advancing social justice.
Workshops (March - June)
Workshop topics include photography and activism, research methods, multimedia production, human rights law, preparedness and selfcare, bookmaking, writing, curatorial practice, public speaking, digital security and others.
Mentored Project Development (March - June)
Meeting regularly with mentors and colleagues, participants will develop their projects and begin producing work.
Mentored Project Production (July - October)
With support from mentors, participants will produce their projects, implement distribution strategies, and deliver final works to Magnum Foundation.
Applicant Criteria
- Applicants can be documentary photographers, artists, and photojournalists, activists who use photography in their change-making practice, or scholars who incorporate images and image-making in their research and scholarship
- We encourage applications from self-taught photographers who have not had access to formal training.
- Applicants must be proficient in spoken and written English. English is the primary shared language that will be used for discussion among participants during seminars, workshops, and mentor sessions.
- Applicants should be open minded, willing to experiment, and motivated to participate in critical discussion with colleagues.
Application and Selection Process
Photography and Social Justice Fellows are selected through an open, international call for applications. Candidates will be notified about their status of their application in early February 2021. Shortlisted applicants will be interviewed and final decisions will be made by the end of February 2021.
The deadline for applications is December 1, 2020, 11:59 EST.
Magnum Foundation
Magnum Foundation expands creativity and diversity in documentary photography, activating new audiences and ideas through the innovative use of images. Through grantmaking, mentoring, and creative collaborations, we partner with socially engaged imagemakers experimenting with new models for storytelling.
The City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism
The Photography and Social Justice Program is produced in partnership with The City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate School of Journalism. The CUNY Graduate School of Journalism prepares students from a broad range of economic, racial, and ethnic backgrounds to produce high-quality journalism at a time of rapid change.
For more information / to apply: https://www.magnumfoundation.org/news/2020/10/26/open-call-photography-and-social-justice-fellowship
Wednesday, March 25, 2020 / Labels: free online photography course, MOOC, PPA
Over 1,000 online photography courses are now available for free

Saturday, February 8, 2020 / Labels: history of photography, pigeon camera
Remembering Julius Neubronner, inventor of pigeon camera
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Julius Neubronner with pigeon and camera, 1914 |




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Julius Neubronner's patented Pigeon camera with two lenses, with cuirass and harness |
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Sectional view and pneumatic system of Julius Neubronner's patented pigeon camera with two lenses |
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Detailed sketches of breast-mounted carrier pigeon camera with two lenses |
Wednesday, October 3, 2018 / Labels: history of photography, Thomas Easterly
In Photos: Remembering 19th-Century Daguerreotypist Thomas Easterly
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Ruins of the Great St. Louis Fire, 17-18 May 1849. Daguerreotype by Thomas M. Easterly, 1849. Source: Missouri History Museum Photographs and Prints Collections |
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No-Che-Ninga-An, Chief of the Iowas, 1845 |
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Lynch's Slave Market, 104 Locust Street, 1852, by Thomas Martin Easterly. According to the National Parks Service, "there were constant reminders of the horrors of slavery in antebellum St. Louis. One of the worst involved the open sales of slaves at various places along the city’s busiest streets, which was an accepted community practice. Regular slave auctions and sales were held in several places, most notably at the slave market run by Bernard M. Lynch on Locust Street between Fourth and Fifth. This market was moved in 1859 to Broadway and Clark Streets. Lynch’s “slave pens” were former private residences with bars placed on all the windows to secure them like prisons. Slaves were herded off steamboats and up the street to the slave houses, then sold to persons, especially after 1840, from outside St. Louis, mostly from the western counties in Missouri or further down the river. Families were broken up, with children taken from mothers, fathers sold down the river, husbands and wives separated. And all of this was done in full view of crowds wishing to buy and passersby going about their daily business." Source: Missouri History Museum. |
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Daguerreotype portrait of Enoch Long, circa 1855, Thomas Easterly. Source: Missouri Historical Society |
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Daguerreotype Gallery of Thomas Martin Easterly, St. Louis, Missouri, 1851. Author: unattributed. Source: Missouri History Museum |
Monday, September 24, 2018 / Labels: early cinema, Vim Comedy Company, vintage photos
Early 20th century movie stills: Vim Comedy Company
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Motion picture scene, 1916. This image was collected by filmmaker William "Billy" Bletcher (1894-1979) while working for the Vim Comedy Company between 1915 and 1917. The small film studio was based in Jacksonville and New York. The company produced hundreds of two-reel comedies (over 156 comedies in 1916 alone). Before going out of business in 1917, it employed such stars as Oliver Hardy, Ethel Burton, Walter Stull, Arvid Gillstrom, and Kate Price. Ethel Burton (Palmer) was a popular comedic actress who made her debut with Vitagraph Pictures in 1915. She co-starred in several Billy West comedies (a popular Charlie Chaplin imitator), and was married to director Arvid Gillstrom, a Swedish-born filmmaker who directed many of the West comedies. Burton did little acting after the 1910s. Most of the films she made in Florida were with the Vim Comedy Company. Tallahassee pennant in the background. L-R: Ethel Burton Palmer, Bobby Burns, and Walter Stull. |
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Motion picture scene, 1916. Harry Naughton, Ethel Burton, and unidentified actors. Unable to tell which individual is which. |
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Motion picture scene, 1916. L-R: Bobbie Burns, Ethel Burton, (?), and Walter Stull. |
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Motion picture scene, 1916. L-R: Rosemary Thebe and Harry Myers. |
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Motion picture scene, 1916. Ethel Burton Palmer is to the left and an unknown actor to the right. Ethel Burton (Palmer) was a popular comedic actress who made her debut with Vitagraph Pictures in 1915. She co-starred in several Billy West comedies (a popular Charlie Chaplin imitator), and was married to director Arvid Gillstrom, a Swedish-born filmmaker who directed many of the West comedies. Burton did little acting after the 1910s. Most of the films she made in Florida were with the Vim Comedy Company. |
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Motion picture scene, 1916. L-R: Walter Stull(?), Harry Meyers, and Rosemary Thebe. |
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Motion picture scene from Strangled Harmony, 1916. L-R: Bobby Burns, (?), Ethel Burton Palmer, (?), Walter Stull. |
Sunday, September 16, 2018 / Labels: General Motors, Oldsmobile photos
In photos: Four decades of Oldsmobiles (1897 -1938)
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Our First Oldsmobile - 1897 |
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1900 - Oldsmobile, curved dashed ru[n]about, 1 cylinder |
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1901 - Oldsmobile, curved dashed runabout, 1 cylinder |
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1903 - Oldsmobile PIRATE special 1 cylinder racer, holder of 1 mile straight record.. 1903 |
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1904 - Oldsmobile , curved dashed runabout model 6, 1 cylinder.. 1904 |
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1909 . Oldsmobile Model D, 4 cylinders |
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1910 - Oldsmobile Model 23-24, limited, 6 cylinders |
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1913 - Oldsmobile Model 40, 4 cylinders |
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1915 - Oldsmobile Model 43, 4 cylinders |
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1926 - Oldsmobile Model 30-D, 6 cylinder, Landau Sedan |
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1935 - Oldsmobile Model F-35, 6 cylinder |
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1936 - Oldsmobile Model F-36, Touring Sedan, 6 cylinder |
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1937 - Oldsmobile Six Convertible Coupe - Family outing |
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1937 - Santa Claus writes O.K. on a new Oldsmobile Six |
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1938 - Lady with the fox terrier trying to shift gears in a new Oldsmobile eight cylinder convertible coupe |
Thursday, September 13, 2018 / Labels: Kevin Carter, photojournalism ethics, Pulitzer
Remembering Kevin Carter and the photo that made the world weep
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Kevin Carter's Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph |
"I am depressed ... without phone ... money for rent ... money for child support ... money for debts ... money!!! ... I am haunted by the vivid memories of killings and corpses and anger and pain ... of starving or wounded children, of trigger-happy madmen, often police, of killer executioners ... I have gone to join Ken if I am that lucky."
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Friday, September 7, 2018 / Labels: DIY, paper camera, paper crafts, paper lens
DIY: 3 photography related paper crafts anyone can make




Saturday, September 1, 2018 / Labels: history in photos, Photography News, WWII photos
In photos: Life during World War II
The Second World War (1939-1945) is generally accepted to have begun 79 years ago today, on 1 September 1939, with the invasion of Poland by Germany, and subsequent declarations of war on Germany by France, Britain and most of the countries of the British Empire and Commonwealth.
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Farewell, n.d., between 1940-1945, by Sam Hood. From the collection of the State Library of New South Wales |
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6th Division arrives at the wharves, 9-10 January 1940, by Sam Hood. Note: Sydney - Berlin was the aim, but High Command had other ideas. The 6th Division was largely responsible for the defeat of Italy in the Middle East, then moved on to Greece and New Guinea. This photo is from a collection depicting the wartime departure of the 6th Division for the Middle East, 9-10 January 1940. From the collection of the State Library of New South Wales. |
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Second World War. German soldier in a tank. [possibly a Renault UE, a French made "Armored Tractor" or "Infantry Supply Vehicle"; designed for utility work, used and modified by the Germans]. German soldiers are helping the French farmers plough their fields. France, 1941. From the collection of the Nationaal Archief of the Netherlands. |
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This photo is from a collection depicting the wartime departure of the 6th Division for the Middle East, from Sidney, 9-10 January 1940. From the collection of the State Library of New South Wales. |
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Soldier's goodbye and Bobbie the cat, between 1939-1945, by Sam Hood. From the collection of the State Library of New South Wales. |
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Wounded and invalids. German wounded return their empty coffee cups to Red Cross nurses just prior to departure. Location unknown. 1941. From the collection of the Nationaal Archief of the Netherlands. |
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War loans displays, State Theatre, Sidney, October 20, 1943, by Sam Hood. From the collection of the State Library of New South Wales. |
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April 11, 1945, Deventer, the Netherlands. From the collection of the Nationaal Archief of the Netherlands. |
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Liberation of the concentration camp Amersfoort. Three Dutch army officers behind barbed wire. From the collection of the Nationaal Archief of the Netherlands. |
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Starved prisoners, nearly dead from hunger, pose in concentration camp in Ebensee, Austria. The camp was reputedly used for "scientific" experiments. It was liberated by the 80th Division. 7 May 1945. Author: Samuelson, Lt. A. E. |
Thursday, August 30, 2018 / Labels: Gustave Le Gray, history of photography, inovation
In photos: Remembering Gustave Le Gray, one of the most important French photographers of the 19th century
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The Beech Tree, by Gustave Le Gray (circa 1856). In October 1999, Sotheby's sold a Le Gray albumen print "Beech Tree, Fontainebleau" for £419,500, which -at that time- was a world record for the most expensive single photograph ever sold at auction to an anonymous buyer. Later that day -at the same auction- an albumen print of "Grande Vague, Sète" ("The Big Wave at Sète," "The Great Wave, Sète") also by Le Gray was sold for a new world record price of £507,500 or $840,370 to the same anonymous buyer who was later revealed to be Sheik Saud Al-Thani of Qatar. The record stood until May 2003 when Al-Thani purchased a daguerreotype by Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey for £565,250 or $922,488. August 30, 2018 /Photography News/ Born 198 years ago today, on 30 August 1820, in Villiers-le-Bel, Val-d'Oise, Jean-Baptiste Gustave Le Gray has been called by the J. Paul Getty Museum "the most important French photographer of the nineteenth century" because of his technical innovations in the still new medium of photography, his role as the teacher of other noted photographers, and "the extraordinary imagination he brought to picture making". |
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Gustave Le Gray, Self-portrait (late 1850s) |
Le Gray was originally trained as a painter, studying under Fran?ois-édouard Picot and Paul Delaroche. Later, he crossed over to photography in the early years of its development.
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Photographic portrait of Louis-Napoléon / Napoleon III (1852) by Gustave Le Gray |
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Alexandre Dumas (father), 1860, by Gustave Le Gray |
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Camel transporting artillery, Egypt (1866), by Gustave Le Gray |
- Improvements on paper negatives, specifically waxing them before exposure making the paper more receptive to fine detail.
- A collodion process published in 1850 but which was theoretical at best. The invention of the wet collodion method to produce a negative on a glass plate is now credited to Frederick Scott Archer who published his process in 1851.
- Combination printing, creating seascapes by using one negative for the water and one negative for the sky at a time where it was impossible to have at the same time the sky and the sea on a picture due to the too extreme luminosity range.