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Germán Rodriguez Laverde
Germán Rodriguez Laverde
Germán Rodriguez Laverde

Germán Rodriguez Laverde

Country: Colombia

Colombian cinematographer, thanks to his work he has managed to develop a particular style in his projects, managing to project emotions and feelings by becoming one with the camera. He also works as an assistant director, director, and cinematographer and has had the experience of working for large production houses and projects that have been mentioned worldwide.

Throughout his career, Germán has been the winner twice consecutively in the categories (best photography and best short film) for Canon Colombia. He has also been recognized worldwide by Sony International Photography in the category "moving image", has won several awards as Cannes with an advertising campaign in which he worked; He was a finalist in a Vans USA contest for the best short film.

He studied in Los Angeles California thanks to a stimulus scholarship that he won at the school (Global Cinematography Institute) of the member of the American Film Association (ASC) Yuri Neyman ASC.
 

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More Great Photographers To Discover

Jeff Wall
Canada
1946
Jeff Wall's artistic technique mixes the fundamentals of photography with influences from other art forms such as painting, film, and literature. This synthesis takes place within a complex framework that he refers to as "cinematography." His wide body of work ranges from classical reporting to sophisticated constructions and montages, which are frequently performed on bigger scales typically associated with painting. Wall, who was born in 1946 in Vancouver, Canada, and still lives there, became interested in photography in the 1960s, a time when Conceptual art was popular. By the mid-1970s, he had incorporated the spirit of experimentation inherent in Conceptualism into his own style of pictorial photography. Wall's photos, created as backlit color transparencies, a method more commonly associated with advertising than fine art photography at the time, made a huge effect when displayed in galleries and museums. They had a critical influence in establishing color as an important part of photographic composition. In his early works, Wall explicitly references other artworks, creating linkages to the history of image creation. "The Destroyed Room" (1978) is inspired by Eugène Delacroix's enormous picture "The Death of Sardanapalus" (1827), which explores themes of violence and sensuality. "Picture for Women" (1979) resembles Édouard Manet's "A Bar at the Folies-Bergère" (1882) while contextualizing the painting's implications within late-'70s cultural politics. These works exhibit Wall's concept of "blatant artifice," which emphasizes the theatricality of both the subject and the production. One important part of Wall's body of work is "near documentary," which are pictures that mimic documentary style but are made in conjunction with the people they include. Wall's method of using nonprofessional models, which captures ordinary moments with complex meanings, is reminiscent of the neorealism of Italian cinema in the 1950s and 1960s. Wall explores formal and dramatic possibilities, delving into the meanings and affects of documentary photography by depicting events that were seen but not captured on camera at the time. Since the mid-1990s, Wall has expanded his artistic repertoire, incorporating traditional black-and-white prints and, more recently, inkjet color prints into his evolving body of work.
Zanele Muholi
South Africa
1972
Zanele Muholi was born in Umlazi, Durban, in 1972. She completed an Advanced Photography course at the Market Photo Workshop in Newtown and held her first solo exhibition at the Johannesburg Art Gallery in 2004. She has worked as a community relations officer for the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), a black lesbian organisation based in Gauteng, and as a photographer and reporter for Behind the Mask, an online magazine on lesbian and gay issues in Africa. Her work represents the black female body in a frank yet intimate way that challenges the history of the portrayal of black women's bodies in documentary photography. Her solo exhibition Only half the picture, which showed at Michael Stevenson in March 2006, travelled to the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg and the Afrovibes Festival in Amsterdam. In 2008 she had a solo show at Le Case d'Arte, Milan, and in 2009 she exhibited alongside Lucy Azubuike at the CCA Lagos, Nigeria. She was the recipient of the 2005 Tollman Award for the Visual Arts, the first BHP Billiton/Wits University Visual Arts Fellowship in 2006, and was the 2009 Ida Ely Rubin Artist-in-Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Muholi's photography has been compared to the way W.E.B. DuBois subverted the typical representations of African Americans. Both Muholi and Du Bois have created an archive of photos, working to dismantle dominant, pre-existing perceptions of the subjects they chose to photograph. Muholi views their work as collaborative, referring to the individuals they photograph as "participants" rather than as subjects. Seeking to empower their subjects, Muholi often invites participants to speak at events and exhibitions, adding the participant's voice to the conversation. Through their artistic approach they hope to document the journey of the African queer community as a record for future generations. They try to capture the moment without negativity or focusing on the prevalent violence, portraying the LGBTQI community as individuals and as a whole to encourage unity. Thus, their work can be considered documentative, recording the overall community LGBTI of South Africa and their challenges, and at times, more specifically the struggle of black lesbians. Before 1994, black lesbian voices were excluded from the making of a formal queer movement. Muholi's efforts of creating a more positive visualization of LGBTI Africans combats the homophobic-motivated violence that is prevalent in South Africa today, especially in the case of black lesbians. While black women's bodies appear frequently throughout sexualized pop-culture, black lesbians are viewed (through the lens of the patriarchy and heteronormativity) as undesirable. This negative view of homosexuals in Africa lead to violence, such as murder and rape, and rejection from their families. Muholi's Zukiswa (2010), shows an African lesbian woman making eye contact with the viewer, displaying an unwavering gaze of confidence, self-awareness, and determination. This example encourages awareness, acceptance, and positivity with the queer community as well as South Africa. Although Muholi became known as a photographer who engaged with the then-invisible lives of black lesbians in South Africa, they began to recognize this idea of "gender within gender." In 2003, and their sense of community definitively began to include trans people. Muholi was employed as a photographer and reporter for Behind the Mask, an online magazine on LGBTI issues in Africa. Muholi first received global attention from the art world in 2012 at Documenta, a world-famous exhibition of modern and contemporary art in (Germany), for a series of portraits of lesbians and transgender participants titled: Faces and Phases. The photos were also exhibited at Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.Source: Wikipedia
Annick Donkers
Annick Donkers is a documentary photographer from Antwerp, Belgium. After obtaining a Master’s degree in Psychology, she decided to specialize in photography. She has received a grant from the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was selected to participate in the Seminar on Contemporary Photography at the Centro de la Imagen in Mexico City (2008). Her work has been exhibited and published internationally. She was one of the winners at the Survival International Competition (2015), won an award at the San José Photo Festival in Uruguay (2016), the Sony Awards in UK (2016), the MIFA awards in Russia (2016), the IPA awards in USA (2016), the TIFA awards in Tokyo (2016), received an honorable mention at the Px3 Prix de la Photo in Paris(2016), was selected at Latin American Photography vol.5 (2016), on the cover of Dodho magazine (2016), shortlisted for the Kolga Tbilisi Awards and Athens Photo Festival (2017). She currently lives and works as a freelance photographer in Mexico City.About Lucha Libre Extrema The Lucha Libre Extrema series emerged from a growing interest I had in Mexican professional wrestling. I was soon drawn towards sub-genres of the sport such as Lucha Libre Exótica and Lucha Extrema. This semi-clandestine hardcore genre is currently prohibited in Mexico City because of how dangerous it is, but events still take place outside the capital, notably at a car wash-turned-arena in Tulancingo, the village where El Santo, Mexico’s most famous pro wrestler, was born. The participants receive professional training and are paid a little bit more because of the risks they take. They perform with a variety of weapons: chairs, thumbtacks, wire, and fluorescent lights, turning the ring into a war zone. Yet the community of luchadores “extremos” is closely knit and few outsiders have gained access. Mexico has been a very violent place in recent years. As such, I found it fascinating that people were drawn to the dangerous world of Lucha Libre Extrema and turned my camera to the audience in an attempt to understand their reasons. About Afromexican HealersAt the end of last year my attention was drawn to the coastal region of Guerrero known as Costa Chica, located to the south of Acapulco. This region is home to Mexicans descended from African slaves that identify themselves as being “black”. But outside this region they are little-known and they are currently fighting to be officially recognized by the Mexican State. The Costa Chica is also a place rooted in traditional beliefs that include appearances of trolls, the devil and spirit animals. The legend tells that when a baby is born, a member of the family brings the child to a crossroads up in the mountains where lots of wild animals pass by. The first creature to approach the child will be the child's spirit animal, or tono in Spanish, since there is now a dependency created between child and animal. This means that when the animal is hurt, wounded or dies, the person is too. In the Afromexican communities there are healers that will cure these "animal"-related illnesses, since conventional medicine will not work in these cases. The person is cured with herbs selected by the healers and also according to the needs of the animal. They call these healers curanderos del tono and there are only a small number of them left. I went to the Costa Chica region in an attempt to capture what remains of this Afromexican tradition.
Carol Beckwith
United States
Thirty years of work on the African continent have carried Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher across 270,000 miles and through remote corners of 40 countries in exploration of more than 150 African cultures. In the process, this team of world-renowned photographers has produced fourteen widely acclaimed books and made four films about traditional Africa. They have been granted unprecedented access to African tribal rites and rituals and continue to be honored worldwide for their powerful photographs documenting the traditional ceremonies of cultures thousands of years old. As an intrepid team of explorers, they are committed to preserving sacred tribal ceremonies and African cultural traditions all too vulnerable to the trends of modernity. The Beckwith-Fisher images are the result of a long, enduring and deeply respectful relationship with African tribal peoples. This, combined with their photographic skills, creates an intimate portrayal of ceremonies long held secret that might have never been recorded. Their work preserves and presents the power, complexity and celebration found within the rituals of African tribal life. Their extraordinary photographs are recorded in fourteen best-selling books and in their films. Their new book “Painted Bodies” (2012) follows “Maasai” (1980), “Nomads of Niger” (1983), “Africa Adorned” (1984), “African Ark” (1990), “African Ceremonies” (1999), “Passages” (2000), “Faces of Africa” (2004), “Lamu: Kenya’s Enchanted Island” (2009), and “Dinka” (2010). The special limited-edition books, hand printed in Santiago, Chile, are titled “Surma,” “Karo,” “Maasai,” and “Dinka.” “African Ceremonies,” their defining body of work, is a double volume, pan-African study of rituals and rites of passage from birth to death, covering 93 ceremonies from 26 countries. This book won the United Nations Award for Excellence for “vision and understanding of the role of cultural traditions in the pursuit of world peace.” Honored twice with the Annisfield-Wolf Book Award in race relations for “outstanding contributions to the understanding of cultural diversity and prejudice,” Angela and Carol are also winners of the Royal Geographical Society of London’s Cherry Kearton Medal for their contribution to the photographic recording of African ethnography and ritual. The photographers have made four films about traditional Africa, including Way of the Wodaabe (1986), The Painter and the Fighter, and two programs for the Millennium Series Tribal Wisdom and the Modern World. Numerous exhibitions of their photography and films have been shown in museums and galleries around the world. In 2000 their Passages exhibition opened at the Brooklyn Museum of Art featuring 97 mural photographs, six video films and a selection of African masks, sculpture and jewelry. This exhibition has traveled to seven museums on three continents. Aware that traditional cultures in Africa are fast disappearing, Carol and Angela are working with an urgency to complete the third volume of their ongoing study of African Ceremonies with the goal of covering the remaining traditional ceremonies in the 13 African cultures in which they have not yet worked.Source: carolbeckwith-angelafisher.com
Laurent Delhourme
Laurent Delhourme was born in Bordeaux (France) in 1968. After studying visual media, he became a self-taught photographer. He spent five years as an assistant at ELLE and Daylight studios, as well as for various fashion photographers, before embarking on a career as a portrait photographer in 1998. His work has since appeared in various magazines, corporate projects and advertising campaigns. At the same time, he moved into film in 2001 and made numerous documentaries for France TV / Canal+. He has covered various topics, including the Moudawana law in Morocco for the protection of women, the Madrid train bombings, abandoned street children in Budapest, the Women on Waves pro-choice organisation in Portugal, Carlos Ghosn in Japan and cotton farming in South Africa... He has also worked with the press agency CAPA on reports and corporate videos for Aigle, Total, Renault, Orange, Alcatel and EDF. For almost 20 years, Laurent has roamed the streets of Paris, Leica in hand. He tries to capture the emotions and poetic dimension of people who cross his path. All of his photos are linked to a story, a narrative, a unique moment. Laurent draws inspiration from the work of Elliott Erwitt, Garry Winogrand and Henri Cartier-Bresson, taking his place in a long line of humanist photographers. He photographs people in the street and observes them without bias or judgement. Laurent seeks to capture what is invisible in their daily activities. Far from using a journalistic approach, he aims to document his times. In the press Observer and chronicler of modern life, Laurent Delhourme's approach is part of the lineage of 20th century humanist photography. Lovers of images of Erwitt, Frank, Davidson, Weiss, Franck, Cartier-Bresson, Mark, Ronis, Freed, Evans, Maltête, Winogrand, Meyerowitz ... His universe is inspired by the heritage of all those photographers who knew how to document their time. He photographs the daily life of his contemporaries, of these anonymous people whom he meets over time in the working-class districts of Paris, on the sidewalks of Fifth Avenue or among the effervescence of Piccadilly Circus, the emotion remains always intact, lively. by this tireless and visceral desire to freeze unique moments. Born in Bordeaux (France), he has lived in Paris for over 25 years. At the age of 18, he discovered photography through a friend and it was at the age of 21 that he understood that his passion would make it his profession. People are the key word in his work, recognized for his portraits, he is the author of numerous advertising campaigns, his photos have been published in various French and international magazines. When he's not in the studio he continues to develop his art on the streets. He seeks to capture the invisible in the daily lives of the people he meets. Each of his photos is connected to a story, a story, a unique moment. These photographs concentrate humor, burlesque situations and everyday incongruities. If the photographer takes care of his framing, by choice, he never conceives a staging. He is sure that the behaviors of passers-by are interesting enough to let them express themselves in their entirety. He captures his images on the fly. Immediacy is his motto. In his early days, a book changed his view of the world in a book by Elliott Erwitt (Photographs 1946/1988), I was young and had never seen anything like it. For me it was a revelation! I discovered through Erwitt's work a true philosophy of life that has always fascinated me Laurent confides. This book, which he consults regularly, is still his bible today. Unlike his work as a portrait painter which requires mastering all the parameters of the shooting, for Laurent street photography is a moment of freedom, he lets himself be carried away by the people he meets and the emotions he meets. He feels. He walks instinctively, feels, he likes to be surprised, he captures the mundane in his daily life as discreetly as possible with his Leica M or his Leica Q. Working mainly at 28 and 50 mm he makes sure never to disturb the scene he photographs "I try to make myself transparent so as not to interfere with my environment". Laurent Delhourme has exhibited on numerous occasions, notably at the Paris photo fair (Grand Palais in Paris) and at the art photography festival in Arles (France). He released his first book Macadam Paname in October 2020 at Editions Hemeria, a black and white book on Paris. He is currently in preparation for a second book.
Charles Muir Lovell
United States
1952
Born in Chicago, Charles Muir Lovell lives and works in New Orleans. He holds an MFA in photography from Central Washington University and a BS in photography from East Texas State University. He began photographing as a young man traveling throughout Europe and South America. He continued his photography practice during his over 20 years as a museum director and curator, a career that took him from the Pacific Northwest to the Southwest and Deep South, everywhere finding distinctive cultures and photography subjects. Lovell has long been passionate about photographing people within their cultures. Upon moving to New Orleans in 2008, he began documenting the city's second line parades, social aid and pleasure clubs, and brass bands, capturing and preserving for posterity a unique and vibrant part of Louisiana's rich cultural heritage. An earlier series based on religious processions in Mexico, El Favor de los Santos, was a Rockefeller Foundation–supported international traveling exhibition and resulted in a book published in 1999 by the University of New Mexico Press, Art and Faith in Mexico. Lovell's photographs have been exhibited nationally and internationally, are found in several permanent collections, including the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Historic New Orleans Collection, and can be seen at www.charleslovell.com and on Instagram @charleslovellart. He received the 2020 Michael P. Smith Documentary Photographer of the Year Award from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities. Lovell has also developed a series of photographs called Language of the Streets he began while an artist-in-residence at the Emily Harvey Foundation in Venice, Italy, in 2006–2007. He returned to Venice for a second residency in 2015 and was scheduled to return in 2021 until coronavirus shut everything down. He has continued this series in Naples, Paris, Mexico City, New York and New Orleans. Statement "As a young man, I traveled through Europe and Latin America with my Nikon, living as one of the family with friends in the countries I visited. My travels hugely influenced my work, opening my eyes to how other people lived. As a visual artist, I gravitated toward photographing people within their cultures, trying to capture on film something true about their lives. College and grad school took me to small-town Texas (Commerce) and Washington (Ellensburg), and a long museum career took me to the Pacific Northwest (Tacoma), Southwest (Yuma, Ariz.; Las Cruces and Taos, N.M.) and Deep South (Greenville and Greensboro, N.C., and New Orleans); everywhere I found distinctive cultures and compelling photography subjects. While living in New Mexico, I traveled in Mexico photographing Holy Week religious processions, foreshadowing my current and most significant photographic project: documenting and preserving New Orleans' unique second line parade culture. Upon moving to New Orleans, I became fascinated by the pageantry and celebratory nature of the city's African American cultural tradition of second line parades. I was captivated by their visual richness, their ritual and history, and how they express a vibrant cultural and artistic heritage, intensely alive yet intimately connected to the past. The massive amount of industry that the social aid and pleasure clubs invest in creating their magnificent costumes, decorations, baskets, umbrellas and banners-truly a labor of love-blew me away. Documenting these visually stunning parades quickly became a passion-and a commitment. For more than 10 years, I've followed the weekly parades, taking tens of thousands of color photographs. I've formed friendly relationships with members of the social aid and pleasure clubs that stage the parades, allowing me behind-the-scenes access, resulting in distinctive photographs. My color photographs vividly capture the paraders and brass bands in their elaborate custom-designed, hand-sewn costumes, and the dancing parade followers, revealing the festive mood of these sacred moments of cultural celebration, and preserving them for posterity. I take great care to portray these spirited-and spiritual-ceremonial moments honestly, sensitively and respectfully. In the 20th century other American photographers-notably Ralston Crawford, Lee Friedlander and Michael P. Smith - also documented this cultural tradition, but in black and white. My use of color lets me capture not just the atmosphere of the parades but also their incredible vividness. Formerly I used traditional photographic techniques, but now I embrace new digital methods, bringing to the subject a fresh approach for the 21st century. Taken as a whole, my photographs capture the rich cultural history of second-line parades, a significant artistic and ceremonial tradition deeply rooted in New Orleans' African American culture and unparalleled elsewhere in the United States. I hope that my photographs will increase awareness of the importance of preserving second-line parade culture and contribute to the understanding of Louisiana and its culture, which has sometimes suffered from scholarly neglect and seemingly insurmountable cultural and economic challenges. Another photographic series I have pursued over the years is Language of the Streets, which began taking shape in 2007 during an artist residency at the Emily Harvey Foundation in Venice, Italy. After working in large-format silver gelatin and color photography for over 20 years, I began exploring digital photography using a small-format digital camera. Upon my return to New Mexico, I learned digital printing and exhibited my Venice work at a solo exhibition at the Taos Center for the Arts in 2008. My residency in Venice was extremely influential in the work I began doing after moving to New Orleans in 2008. I began using a medium-format digital camera to make higher-resolution color photographs. Since 2009, I have fully transitioned to a digital practice. I make my own prints on an Epson inkjet printer and work with professional printers on larger works. From the experience of taking street photographs in Venice, I continued my series Language of the Streets in New Orleans, as well as in Naples, the Amalfi Coast, Paris, Mexico City and New York City. In 2015, I was invited back to the Emily Harvey Foundation, where I designed and presented an accordion artist's book, or leporello, featuring the Venice series of photos. Off the Street: New Orleans and Venice, part of the Language of the Streets series, investigates similarities and differences between the two cities, which share a striking mixture of high and low, old and new, closeness to and dependence upon water, a vital tourism sector, a proliferation of graffiti and outdoor art alongside unparalleled historic architecture. My street photographs from the two cities explore back streets not seen by tourists frequenting commercial settings like the French Quarter or Plaza San Marco. I strive to capture the texture of the cities' largely unseen back streets. Both cities also have world-renowned contemporary art competitions: the Venice Biennale and the triennial Prospect New Orleans. Works from my Venice series were exhibited alongside photographs from Mexico City in 2016 at the Contemporary Art Center, New Orleans, in Experiments in Anarchitecture, curated by Andrea Andersson, and in 2017, works from the Venice series were included in Project 387, curated by Berty Skuber at the Archivio Emily Harvey in Venice. " -- Charles Muir Lovell
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