The Magnum Digest: December 18, 2020
Gregory Halpern photographs pandemic-stricken New York for Le Monde, Matt Black’s images of crises in California in The Guardian, Antoine d’Agata’s portrait of Frederick Wiseman for The New York Times, plus more this week
Gregory Halpern photographs pandemic-stricken New York for Le Monde
M, the magazine supplement of Le Monde, has commissioned Gregory Halpern to shoot images on near-empty streets in New York City. The pandemic’s impact led to the magazine describing an experience in the city as visit to “year zero”. The images appear in a feature online, here, and in the magazine’s print edition this week.
Matt Black depicts crises in California for The Guardian
The Guardian has shared work by Matt Black made in the Central, Eastern Coachella, and Imperial valleys of California. These agricultural regions have suffered from environmental devastation that has exacerbated the impacts of the pandemic, unemployment, and political tensions. See the newspaper’s chronological retelling of Black’s journey through the state here. Read about the photographer’s 6-year project, American Geography, which depicts the scale of marginalization of communities across the United States on Magnum, here.
Antoine d’Agata photographs Frederick Wiseman
The New York Times commissioned Antoine d’Agata to make a portrait of the writer Frederick Wiseman in a feature this week about Wiseman’s body of film works. Read the profile and see d’Agata’s photograph here.
Carolyn Drake’s new book Knit Club profiled in De Standaard
Flemish daily De Standard’s magazine supplement, DS Weekblad, featured a portfolio of work from Carolyn Drake’s newly released book, Knit Club, this week. The book, ‘a foreboding meditation in the vein of Southern Gothic literature’ is the result of Drake’s collaboration with an enigmatic group of women known as the ‘Knit Club’, and is loosely influenced in structure by Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying. You can see the DS Weekblad feature in this week’s print issue, and pre-order the book from TBW here. Read more on the project here, on Magnum.
Enri Canaj’s images sum up Medecins Sans Frontieres’ Year in Pictures
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) recently shared a summary of the year 2020, told through 53 images taken around the world. Work by Magnum photographer Enri Canaj made on assignment for the NGO — as well as independently — represented some of the images within that selection. See the piece here.
Eli Reed’s Black in America on Ransom Center Magazine
The blog for the research center and heritage institution, the Harry Ransom Center, has shared a piece reflecting on Eli Reed’s life and his 1997 publication, Black in America. The book features reportage Reed made in the United States on black life and pivotal moments of antiracist resistance in the 1980s and ‘90s. Read the Center’s article here.
Thomas Dworzak’s virtual photography features on Royal College of Music
Thomas Dworzak has photographed an oboe lesson held online by the Royal College of Music. These images, part of his ongoing exploration of adaptations to how social gatherings are taking place in the face of Covid-19 as they play out virtually, now feature in the college’s online magazine, Upbeat. See the images and read an interview with Dworzak here.
Paolo Pellegrin’s documentation of Australian bushfires on Patagonia’s site
The blog for outdoor brand Patagonia this week featured a story looking at Paolo Pellgrin’s photographs of the aftermath of bushfires in Australia in 2019. In his captions, Pellegrin reflects on the loss of animal and plant life, the loss to humans, regeneration, and the concepts that inspired him to make the images. The brand shares the work as part of its platform documenting stories on activism, outdoor sports and culture. See the work on their website here.
Alec Soth’s latest book features in The New Yorker
The new book featuring the correspondence between Alec Soth and Minnesota prisoner C. Fausto Cabrera has featured in a piece in The New Yorker magazine. “At the heart of Soth and Cabrera’s connection is art,” says the magazine, “art as a container of meaning, a honing steel for the sensibilities, a lodestar for living.” Read their review online here, and find an extract of the book on Magnum here.
Alex Majoli named Photographer of the Year at Photo Annual Awards 2020
The Photo Annual Awards has recognized Alex Majoli as its Photographer of the Year and winner in the category of Photojournalism. Held annually, the event was launched in 2012 by the magazine Photo District News. See more on all of the winners and their prizes on the website, here.
