#5 Thomas Hoepker

Thomas Hoepker was born in Munich in 1936. His early studies were in archaeology and art history. As a photographer, he was most influential with Geo and Stern. He became a full member of the Magnum Agency in 1989, presiding over the institution from 2003 to 2007. Hoepker lives in New York and Berlin.

< Muhammad ALI, 1966 >

Ali's pictures are his early works. I realized that I'd seen a similar picture of Ali when I first saw his picture.

< Muhammad Ali, 1968 took by Bob Gomel >

I guess Ali likes this pose. Comparing two photographers' work, Thomas Hoepker focused Ali's fist, but the other focused on Ali's face.

< Andy WARHOL in his "Factory" at Union Square, 1981>

Even he thinks himself as a reporter or image maker rather than an artist, but he conveys the fact dramatic way.

This is a one of controversial photography about 9/11. Young people relax along the East River while a huge plume of smoke rises from Manhattan after the attack on the World Trade Center.This is a one of controversial photography about 9/11. This picture wasn't uncased it for years because he thought it's not a good work. After publishing in 2006, there is a big debate arose.

<Brooklym, New York, September 11, 2001>

“If a picture smells, then it is interesting.”

#4 Rick Smolan

Rick Smolan (1949 - ) is a former Time, Life and National Geographic photographer. He is a CEO of company, Against Odds Productions, specializes in the design and execution of large-scale global projects that combine compelling storytelling with state-of-the-art technology. Many of Smolan's books have been New York Times best-sellers and have been featured on the covers of Time, Newsweek, Fortune and U.S. News and World Report.

Smolan has long been a force for exploring culture through photography. The "Day in the Life" photography series that he founded - best-selling photo books that captured life in America, Japan, Australia, the Soviet Union - was an '80s cultural phenomenon. He ambitiously gathered photographers from all parts of the world to chosen country like Japan and captured images of the country. Likewise, he created a project America 24/7 in order to make a photography book which depicts life of Americans from every U.S. State. More than 25,000 photographers responded in this project.

His book, The Obama Time Capsule offered readers a unique feature which designed to showcase one of the most important presidential races in U.S. history through the eyes of more than 140 of the world's top photographers. Unlike any book ever produced, this one offers readers different ways to personalize the book by adding their own content, including listing each buyer on the cover and title page as "co-author" and photographs of the customers appearing on the back cover of the book.

He is also a photographer who has many interesting stories. In 1977, he recorded Robyn Davidson's 1,700 mile trek from Alice Springs to the Indian Ocean on foot with four camels and a dog as her companions. After the journey, National Geographic published her journey.

Their story was dramatized by movie starts: Tracks in the last year.

reference: Rick Smolan’s Trek with TRACKS, from Australian Outback to Silver Screen
The story of a girl (TED talks)

James Welling

James Welling was born in 1951. In the 1960s he studied drawing and worked a lot with painting, primarily watercolor. His photographic work was first recognized and exhibited in the 1970s. In his early work Welling experimented a lot with exposure. To intensify colors, he heated the prints during processing. He also taught himself the basics of dark room photography. Throughout his career Welling has experimented with different photographic mediums, such as polaroids, gelatin silver prints, photograms, and digital prints. I really like Welling's early series "Polaroid Photographs" because I admire his play with color. Welling has also done series of abstract work. Overall, I enjoy Welling's willingness to experiment and his variety of work.

http://jameswelling.net/

Post #5 - Sarah Jarad

Carel Balth

Carel Balth is a Dutch photographer who gained recognition in the 1960s. He describes his work as controlling light in a "poetical and fundamental way." Every 4 to 5 years he begins a new series of work, each exploring light, space, time, and movement. I enjoy Balth's images because they give a new perspective to everyday items. I think his experimentation with shapes and light redefines what a photograph can be.

http://www.carelbalth.nl/

Post #4-Sarah Jarad

#3 Brandon Sherrod - James Van Der Zee

James Van Der Zee (June 29, 1886 - May 15, 1983) was an African-American photographer best known for his portraits of black New Yorkers. He was a leading figure in the Harlem Renaissance. Aside from the artistic merits of his work, Van Der Zee produced the most comprehensive documentation of the period. Among his most famous subjects during this time were Marcus Garvey, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Countee Cullen.

The Harlem Renaissance was in full swing during the 1920s and '30s, and for decades, Van Der Zee would photograph Harlemites of all backgrounds and occupations, though his work is particularly noted for its pioneering depiction of middle-class African-American life. He took thousands of pictures, mostly indoor portraits, and labeled each of his photos with a signature and date, which would prove to be important for future documentation.

#2 Brandon Sherrod - Myra Greene

Myra Greene was born in New York City and received her B.F.A. from Washington University in St. Louis and her M.F.A. in photography from the University of New Mexico. She currently resides in Chicago Il, where she is an Associate Professor of Photography at Columbia College Chicago. She received an Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Photography (2009) and has completed residencies at Light Work in Syracuse New York (2004) and the Center for Photography at Woodstock.

character recognition

2004 - 2007 

Confronted with an up swell of bigotry both personal and public, I was forced to ask myself, what do people see when they look at me. Am I nothing but black? Is that skin tone enough to describe my nature and expectation in life? Do my strong teeth make me a strong worker? Does my character resonate louder than my skin tone? Using a photographic process linked to the times of ethnographic classification, I repeatedly explore my ethnic features in Character Recognition. The lessons learned are haunting and frightening in these modern times.

#1 Brandon Sherrod - Dawoud Bey

Born David Edward Smikle in New York City's Jamaica, Queens neighborhood, he changed his name to Dawoud Bey in the early 1970s. He studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York from 1977–78, graduated with a BFA in Photography from Empire State College in 1990, and received his MFA from Yale University School of Art in 1993. Over the course of his career, Bey has participated in more than 20 artist residencies, which have allowed him to work directly with the adolescent subjects of his most recent work.

Bey’s work is the result of an effort to get away from the act of taking pictures, with all its implications of theft. With Class Pictures, it may be more appropriate to speak of his making or receiving a picture. Even though the subjects get to have their say, they, like all of us, fail to express themselves fully or finally, in writing or in pose. The construction of the self is an ongoing process, and these portraits inevitably remain mere fragments. Their fragmentary nature is precisely what makes them so credible. Bey quietly presents his photographic subjects with empathy and without reducing their complexity—something rarely achieved with images of teenagers, who are so often both looked at and overlooked."