Posts from the “Huck” Category

Rania Matar: In Her Image

Posted on November 29, 2017

Wafa’a and Samira, Bourj El Barajneh Refugee Camp, Beirut Lebanon, 2016. Copyright Rania Matar.

Born in Lebanon, Rania Matar left her homeland during the Civil War to study architecture at Cornell University in upstate New York. But it was September 11 that would be the turning point in her life, as she decided to pursue a career in photography as a means to create an empowering and inclusive narrative.

While her work is not overtly political, it bears witness to the nature of girl and womanhood in both the East and the West. Photographing in New York, Boston, Beirut, and Palestinian refugee camps, Matar discovered that no matter what the circumstances, women all have more in common than not.

“The focus on our differences is so artificial,” Matar observes. “I am from Lebanon and the United States, and I am the same person whether I am there or here. Nothing changes in the way I live and act. The label of having to be one thing is very limiting in the sense of identity.”

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Destiny, Dorcester, Massachusetts, 2010. Copyright Rania Matar.

Categories: Art, Exhibitions, Huck, Photography, Women

Park Jongwoo: DMZ – Demilitarized Zone

Posted on November 24, 2017

Photo: Copyright Park Jongwoo, courtesy of Steidl.

Photo: Copyright Park Jongwoo, courtesy of Steidl.

On June 25, 1950, Korea was torn apart by civil war. Though the fighting went on for 37 months, the war never ended, as both sides refused to sign a formal peace agreement. Instead, they constructed the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), a 248 km long, 4 km wide buffer zone – the site of a fully armed Cold War that begins a mere 60 km from downtown Seoul.

Here, forests are filled with landmines and barbed wire fences, patrolled by military armed with the most up-to-date equipment. Civilians are prohibited from entering the DMZ, which unfolds like circles of hell, from the furthest areas of the Civilian Control Zone, all the way to the joint security area, where the two nations stand in a 60-year face off.

In 2010, on the 60th anniversary of the war, the Korean Ministry of National Defense decided to make the first photographic record of the DMZ ever. Photographer Park Jongwoo was tapped for the job, giving him unconditional access to the South Korean Guard Posts (GPs) on the site, the results of which have just been published in DMZ: Demilitarized Zone (Steidl).

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Photo: Copyright Park Jongwoo, courtesy of Steidl.

Categories: 1970s, Art, Books, Huck, Photography

Jill Freedman: Resurrection City, 1968

Posted on November 22, 2017

In April 4, 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech titled “Beyond Vietnam” at Riverside Church in New York City. Turning the focus from civil rights to human rights, he called for an end to the war, and renewed focus on fighting the enemies within the United States borders: poverty, injustice, and insecurity. One year later, to the day, he was assassinated – a crime for which the US government was finally found guilty in a court of law in 1999.

In the final month of his life, Dr. King called for a national demonstration that would “confront the power structure massively.” Following his death, “The Last Crusade” went forward, and 3,000 people came from across the land to set up a camp called “Resurrection City” on the Washington Mall. They lived in wooden shanties that stood for six weeks in 1968.

The Poor People’s Campaign, as it was officially known, was organised to draw attention to the poverty affecting people of all ethnicities in the United States. “They murdered Dr. King and I was furious,” photographer Jill Freedman remembers. “I had to go.”

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Categories: 1960s, Art, Books, Exhibitions, Huck, Photography, Women

Constance Hansen: Brooklyn c. 1969

Posted on November 15, 2017

Photo: Self-portrait, my place in Fort Greene, late 60s. Photography © Constance Hansen / Guzman.

In the wake of riots that began after the United States government ordered the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Daniel Patrick Moynihan, an urban affairs adviser to President Nixon, introduced a policy called “benign neglect” that would change the course of American history. The policy proposed systemic denial of basic government services to African-American and Latinx neighbourhoods across the nation, resulting in a massive collapse that decimated the people for well over a decade. The Clinton Hill section of Brooklyn, home to the Pratt Institute, was one such neighbourhood to fall into disrepair. Yet from the destruction, a new culture was coming to bear.

Constance Hansen, one half the husband-and-wife team of Guzman, has just unearthed photographs of this pivotal era taken while she was a student at the Pratt Institute from 1969- 1971. “There was a whole other thing going on then,” she remembers. “The 60s vibe, the music, the Vietnam War, Civil Rights – everything was exploding. It was anarchistic. You just did your thing. There were a lot of artists, writers, poets, and people creating, very free and they were all deep in their work. I would be floating through and taking pictures.”

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Photo: Police activity, Brooklyn late 60′s. Photography © Constance Hansen / Guzman.

Photo: Crochet girl’s bedroom, late 60′s. Photography © Constance Hansen / Guzman.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, Art, Brooklyn, Huck, Photography

6 Tips for Aspiring Protest Photographers

Posted on November 13, 2017

“Fuck this Shit”, Photo by Michael A.McCoy. Anti Trump Protest, Washington D.C, 2017.

After completing two tours of duty in Iraq in 2008, U.S. Army combat veteran Michael A. McCoy turned to turned to photography as a therapeutic tool to deal with the horrors of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. With a camera in his hands, McCoy could escape from the memories of being inside a war zone as photography enabled him to be full present in the moment, bare witness, and share his story with the world.

The 2014 death of Mike Brown at the hands of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson changed everything. The protests that raged across the city sparked a movement against police brutality and the killing of black men, women, and children at the hands of law enforcement officials. For McCoy, Ferguson was the moment of truth.

“I started photographing protests because I wanted to start documenting history,” he explains. “I realized that I could use my camera as a tool and amplify the issues affecting myself and my community that need to be heard. I could have been Mike Brown, Freddie Gray, Trayvon Martin, or Eric Garner.”

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

‘Untitled’ Photo by Michael A. McCoy. Baltimore Uprising, Baltimore, MD, 2015.

‘Freedom Walk’ Photo by Michael A. McCoy. Black Lives Matter NYC, NYC, 2015

Categories: Art, Huck, Photography

Sean Maung: The Vaqueros of Santa Monica Boulevard

Posted on November 2, 2017

Photo: Copyright Sean Maung

Photo: Copyright Sean Maung

Santa Monica Boulevard is one of Los Angeles’ most fabled thoroughfares, running West from Silver Lake, through Hollywood and Beverly Hills all the way to Ocean Avenue, just off the Pacific.

“There are different areas on Santa Monica that have different flavours,” photographer Sean Maung, an LA native, explains. “When you say ‘Santa Monica Boulevard,’ most people think of West Hollywood, which has a very strong gay and lesbian scene. But I’ve always been really attracted to Santa Monica Boulevard in East Hollywood.”

The random mix of people from local Russian, Thai, and Latino communities appealed to Maung, who has been documenting the street culture of his hometown for over a decade. While photographing transgender prostitutes working the street late at night, Maung saw the words “Club Tempo” on an orange sign in front of a mall and thought to himself, “What’s Club Tempo?And why is it in the back of a strip mall in East Hollywood?’”

He would soon find out.

Read the Full Story at Huck

Photo: Copyright Sean Maung

Photo: Copyright Sean Maung

Categories: Art, Huck, Photography

Meg Hewitt :Tokyo Is Yours

Posted on October 27, 2017

Photo: Meg Hewitt. Johnny, Golden Gai 2015

Photo: Meg Hewitt. Legs – after Daido, 2016

In March 2011, disaster befell Japan as the Great Earthquake, tsunami, and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster hit the nation in record time. Five years later, Japan’s prime minister Naoto Kan revealed that the country came within a “paper-thin margin” of nuclear destruction that would have required the evacuation of 50 million people – a feat he acknowledged was near impossible.

As this science-fiction horror story played out in real time, Australian photographer Meg Hewitt began to imagine the density of Tokyo, the feeling of being trapped as a cloud of nuclear fallout spread, and the disturbing question of whether or not to trust the government and big business. For Hewitt, thinking was not enough: she needed to experience life in Tokyo for herself.

Over a period of two years, Hewitt created a body of photographs inspired by the curious co-existence of darkness and light, trauma and innocence, death and life – which she crafted into the newly released monograph, Tokyo Is Yours. Hewitt combines the raw edge of Anders Petersen with the knowing glance of Daido Moriyama, the haunting glamour of Fritz Lang with the graphic traditions of Manga through a careful edit and sequencing that pairs unlikely moments to sublime effect.

Read the Full Story at Huck

Categories: Art, Books, Huck, Japan, Photography