Brenda Ann Kenneally: Upstate Girls

by heartbeat

Kenneally's photo essay «Upstate Girls: What became of Collar City» documents the coming of age of a group of young women in Troy, New York. It is a honest view of poverty, dysfunction and teen pregnancy, but also the search for love and survival in lower working class America. Kenneally was born here, and the story she documents could have been her own.

- Growing up as a young girl in this surrounding, I think it is important to have a healthy amount of «fuck-you-ism». A certain arrogance without being disrespectful. Some people come to this world with the knowledge that there will always be a free seat for them. It was not my case. I always felt I had to struggle to deserve that seat, Kenneally said when visiting Oslo in February.

- But all humans are equal, why be afraid of shaking hands with other people? If you have the basic experience of equality, I guess you don't need that «fuck-you-ism», she adds.

Kenneally fled the Troy neighbourhood at 16, and settled in Florida where she found photography. Through her intimate long-term projects, Kenneally forces the viewer into a reality most people don't want to see. Social issues that intersect where the personal becomes political.

- I don't believe in the American Dream, but I am definitively a dreamer, Kenneally says.

Brenda Ann Kenneally has received numerous prestigeous awards for her work, including a Canon Female Photojournalist Award, a Getty Images Grant for Editorial Photography and a first prize for «Upstate Girls» in World Press Photo.

Her book and web publication MONEY, POWER, RESPECT; Pictures of My Neighbourhood also won numerous awards.

Through Kenneally's web publication The Raw File and Upstate Girls, you can see more of her great and important work, both pictures and movies.

Andrea wins 1 prize for her Greenland story

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Andrea was awarded a 1st prize in the Norwegian Picture of the Year in category «International reportage» with her long term project in Greenland.

The widows of Murmansk

by Marte Vike Arnesen

The life expectancy rate for the average male in Murmansk, a city situated in the north west of Russia, is 58 years, for female it is 72. The average female therefore lives 15 years longer than the average male. In a series of portraits I have met some of the women that remained after their husband died. With no work, and no help from the government they are left to themselves, or as often is the case, left to live with their children.

Greenland exhibition in Milan

by Andrea Gjestvang

My long term project «Greenland - disappearing Ice Age» is exhibited at Galleria OpenMind in Milan.
Opening tonight, February 2nd, at 7 pm. The exhibition lasts until March 21st.

Galleria Openmind
Via Dante, 12 - 20121 Milano (Italy)

The project is also published in the new Italian photo magazine RearViewMirror #2.
To see more pictures please visit my homepage www.andreagjestvang.com

Anne-Stine Johnsbråten: The Norwegian Roma people

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The Roma population in Norway consists of 500 members, who first settled during the late 1800s. In 1934 they were refused re-entrance to the country after an extended trip in Europe, despite the fact that they had Norwegian passports. As a result almost the entire Norwegian Roma population died in consentration camps during World War II. The remaining family members illegally returned to Norway in the mid-fifties, though they were officially denied access. 

Today they are accepted as Norwegian citizens, with a majority living around Oslo during the winter months. In summer, they travel and live at campsites around Scandinavia and Europe. Since many are members of the Pentecostal Church, religious meetings are important to socialize and keep their own culture, language and identity without becoming «too Norwegian». Many Romas are illiterate due to low education, and do not participate in working life. Discrimination and exclusion often happens in restaurants and campsites or in the society in general. For this reason, they rarely travel in Norway anymore.

Anne-Stine Johnsbråten (b.1983) has a BA in photojournalism from Oslo Univeristy College in addition to education at Norwegian Photo School in Trondheim. She divides her time between freelancing for different newspapers and magazines, working on long-term projects and studying social antropology. She has received a grant from Freedom of Expression Foundation in Oslo for the project about the Roma population. The pictures have been exhibited at the group show «Norwegian Documentary Photography» at Henie Onstad in Oslo, and published in the photo book with the same title. Anne-Stine's Roma-project is work in progress.

Taryn Simon: Secret sites

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Nuclear Waste Encapsulation and Storage Facility 

Cherenkov RadiationHanford Site, 

U.S. Department of Energy

Southeastern Washington State

Have a look at her TED-talk!

Filter#04

by Marie Sjøvold 

The latest issue of FILTER is focusing on disappearances. In this issue you can see the work of photographer Kyungwoo Chun (KR), artist Sophie Calle (FR), the artists Daniel & Geo Fuchs (TY), photographer Torben Eskerod (GB), photographer Manfred Beier (TY), photographer Jeff Wall (CAN), photographer Mads Gamdrup (DK), photographer Marie Sjøvold (NO), writer Nicole Krauss (U.S.), poet Niels Frank (DK), and photo researchers Lars Kiel Bertelsen (DK) and Mette Sandbye (GB).