Sung Kwan Ma | Hanoi Portraits

Photo © Sung Kwan Ma | All Rights Reserved

It's always a genuine pleasure to view the work of a photographer who shares many of one's own aesthetic, as well as geographic affinities. Through a mutual Facebook contact, I discovered the lovely work of Sung Kwan Ma, a photographer born in Seoul and now based in New York City. He has a number of galleries on his website, that include work from various cities in India, China, Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Viet Nam. His work includes portraits and street photography, as well as wedding photography...both in color and monochrome.

It's his Viet Nam photographs that I loved the most, especially those of his street portrait sessions of Thu Thuy, a Hanoi-based model. He has chosen to photograph her amongst the bustle of the old quarter in Hanoi, known as Pho Co; one of my favorite areas for street photography because of its ambiance and exotic back walls that are often inscribed with mobile telephone numbers as adverts...and where the beauty of the Vietnamese model in her traditional red and white ao dai is amply displayed.

Interestingly, he has also used the widescreen 16:9 aspect ratio in his framing for a selection of his portraiture work, such as in Shanghai and in NYC. He preceded me in that style, as I am preparing to do the same in a forthcoming project with Lise Liu (see my previous post).

As per his website, Sung's extensive spiritual journeys in India and humanitarian activities throughout Asia over the past two decades have been the soul and defining framework of his work. He specifically mentions his affinity to the various cultural diversities of India and the Indian people. His images seek to capture the emotional depth of traditional sentiments and the joys of festivity.

A photographer to follow.

Alessandra Meniconzi | Canon EOS R | Mongolia

Photo © Alessandra Meniconzi | Source: Canon Europe

One of my very favorite travel photographers is Alessandra Meniconzi*, a Switzerland-based Canon Ambassador and a true globetrotter who preceded most of us to the remote corners of the world. I cam to know Alessandra's work through her wonderful book "Hidden China" which she graciously gifted me a few years ago.

"Never behave like the paparazzi, always be polite and respectful. 

The subject has their pride; they are not an object, but a person like you."

Her work has always been focused on the ancient heritage and customs of indigenous people, and she has recently spent a few years documenting the traditions of Mongolia's nomadic people, by establishing connections within their communities, particularly in the Altai Mountains in the far west, where Mongolia meets Kazakhstan. Her work has been published by Canon-Europe to advertise for the EOS R, and can be found here.

Supplementing her remarkable images, Alessandra also shares her shooting philosophy when she's out in the field. 

I found her approach, while not exclusive, to portraiture to be very practical and useful. She chooses to have her subjects posed against a black background in a dark room or, if not possible, she uses her own black fabric to hang behind the subjects as backgrounds. This enhances the Mongolian costumes, and brings out their colors.

* Alessandra's website is password protected.

Vietnam's Ca Trù & The Google Doodle

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy | All Rights Reserved

I'm very pleased that Google Doodle; the special, temporary alteration of the logo on Google's home pages intended to commemorate holidays, events, achievements, and notable historical figures, has featured the ancient art of Ca Trù on February 23, 2020 which coincided with its day in Viet Nam. The 'doodle" is by Xuan Le, an artist in Ho Chi Minh City.

The illustration depicts a typical Ca Trù performance, with a female singer playing the phach (a bamboo bar beaten with small wooden sticks), accompanied by a man playing the dan day, a long-necked, three-string lute used exclusively for this art form. It also features a judge (left) who strikes a drum in praise or disapproval of the singer’s performance, usually done after every passage of the song.

Google tells us that Ca Trù fits somewhere in between the geisha ceremonies of Japan and the dramatic performances of opera. Its unique sound has roots that stretch back to the 11th century. First gaining popularity as entertainment for the aristocracy of Vietnam’s royal palaces, it later made its way into the inns and communal spaces of what is now modern-day Hanoi.

In 2015, I attended a number of these Ca Trù performances in an old house in the center of Hanoi's Old Quarter. I was granted permission to photograph at will from various corners of the 'stage', which resulted in The Ancient Art of Ca-Tru galley.

Ye Hong Qi | The Miao

Photo © Ye Hong Qi | All Rights Reserved

The Miao is an ethnic group belonging to South China, and is recognized by the government of China as one of it 56 official ethnic groups. It is estimated that the Miao population is just over 9.5 million; larger than most minority groups in China. 

The Miao live mainly in southern China's mountains, in the provinces of Guizhou, Yunnan, Hunan, Hubei, Hainan provinces and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture. Some sub-groups of the Miao, most notably the Hmong people, have migrated out of China into Southeast Asia (Burma (Myanmar), northern Vietnam, Laos and Thailand).

I feature the work of Ye Hong Qi, a Shanghai-based photographer, who focused most of his photography on documenting the Miao minority in his native China. Describing himself as an "amateur" photographer, I met Qi at the well-known IG Photography Art Gallery in Shanghai to introduce him to its director. 

He graciously gifted me a copy of his book The Miao Family of China; a lovely monograph of his 70 images selected from more than 100,000. This project was started in 2014 and was completed four years later. All of Qi's images are made using ambient lighting, and no artificial lights were used. The images were made in 5 provinces, and in more than 90 Miao’s villages in China.

Devansh Jhaveri | Fashion-Culture

Photo © Devansh Jhaveri | All Rights Reserved

I've recently described myself as a travel photographer gone "rogue" on account of my recent photographic projects that involve storytelling using Chinese traditional fashion (qi pao/cheongsam) in traditional settings in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei and Kuala Lumpur. 

So it's with considerable pleasure that I noticed the not too different work of Devansh Jhaveri in his gallery titled Fashion. Many of his staged images use traditional locales and backgrounds in India...I believe some could've been made in Old Delhi, and Rajasthani or Gujarati architectural sites.

The juxtaposing of attractive women decked in (probably) expensive traditional saris and tribal-influenced gowns with dilapidated surroundings highlights the traditionality and history of Indian fashion and culture, and provides depth and context to the images.

Devansh's documentary credentials are also in full display with his Maatam gallery which depict Muharram rituals associated with Shia Muslims, and his Kumbh gallery.

Devansh Jhaveri is a freelance photographer based in Ahmedabad, India. He has been published in newspapers across India, and his photographs were used as book covers for books by Penguin Books. He has been widely exhibited by Pix Delhi, at the Delhi Photo Festival, the Chennai Salon, and the Asahi Shimbun in Japan. He has also been part of two personal solo shows named Trespass and Distortions. His latest series "The Red Dress Project" was exhibited at the British Council Delhi and will be traveling to other cities this year.

Alessandro Bergamini | China's Guizhou

Photo © Alessandro Bergamini | All Rights Reserved

As a continuation of my own Sino-centric photographic trajectory, I'm on the lookout for the inspiring work of adventurous travel photographers whose travels have taken them to China's various provinces and regions to add to my blog.

I have found Alessandro Bergamini's China gallery to hit all the right notes in that regard. Most of his images were made in Guizhou; a province located in the southwestern part of the country, and well known for its traditional rural villages, inhabited by minority groups like the Miao and Dong. Other images in the gallery were made in Guangxi , another autonomous region bordering Vietnam, and home to the famous cormorant fishermen of Guilin. I haven't been but I read that even though the water is too polluted now for fishing to be sustainable, these fishermen are catnip for many photographers, and earn their living in that fashion.

Aside from his China gallery, don't miss exploring Alessandro's other images of Ethiopia, Myanmar (Burma) and India.

Alessandro Bergamini tells us that he is an Italian travel photographer from Finale Emilia in Italy. He started his photography with an old camera donated by his father, and traveled to some of the most remote regions of the world, capturing the spirit and visual cultures of his encounters. He perfected his post-production techniques to better reflect the atmosphere of the images he gleaned from his travels. During 2019, he offers travel workshops in the Wakhan Corridor (Afghanistan) and Kashmir.

Rosalynn Tay | Ethiopia

Photo © Rosalynn Tay | All Rights Reserved

I had seen Rosalynn Tay's photographic work on Ethiopia some months ago, and thought that it reminded me of Sebastiao Salagdo's style; black and white, stark and contrasty. 

Her 2014 gallery of images made during a photography trip to the south of the country are devoid of the artifices that are favored by many travel photographer who visit that region. 

In contrast to many photographers who feature images of tribes in south Ethiopia and the Omo Valley, depicting them in elaborate (and contrived) headdress, Ms Tay photographs her subjects in a natural setting...without having recourse to artificial props.

The Lower Omo River in south west Ethiopia is home to eight different tribes whose population is about 200,000 and it is there that they've lived there for many centuries. The tribes such as the Daasanach, Kara (or Karo), and the Mursi live along the Omo river and depend on it for their livelihood. The annual flooding of the Omo River feeds the biodiversity of the region and guarantees the food security of the tribes especially as rainfall is low and erratic.

Rosalynn Tay is a travel and fashion (as well as editorial) photographer based in Singapore, and is a peripatetic traveler whose fondness of travel led her to photograph in countless countries. She travels to Sri Lanka, Japan, Mongolia, Bangladesh, China, Malaysia, Siberia, Morocco and even ventured to North Korea. She is a graduate of Spéos, the internationally recognized photography school in Paris. She's also a committed Leica user, and has exhibited her work (Ethiopia -solo- and LeicaXhibition -group). 

She also has given photo talks in Singapore including Leica Women in Photography; an initiative founded to celebrate and showcase outstanding women who brought their unique perspectives to the field of photography.

Aga Szydlik | Singapore's Street Opera

Photo © Aga Szydlik | All Rights Reserved

Readers of The Travel Photographer blog know of my current long term involvement in documenting Chinese Opera of the diaspora; an involvement that will culminate into the production of a coffee-table book bearing the same title. It is for this reason that the blog has been recently populated with posts with excellent work of Chinese opera by travel and documentary photographers.

Aga Szydlik's Wyang: Singapore's Street Opera work is one of those. Her close-up portraits of the opera actors are striking by their unvarnished look.

The earliest description of wayang in Singapore dates all the way back to the mid-1800s. For more than a century, jiexi (street opera in Mandarin) enthralled more audience than any other form of live entertainment. 

At one point, the flourishing scene supported over a hundred professional troupes that staged thousands of shows each year. Some of them even had their own dedicated venues in the city state's Chinatown.

However, now only about 10 professional street opera troupes are left in Singapore, drawing an ever-smaller audience of elderly people. The decline of street opera in Singapore was caused by its government's policy to replace dialects (such as Hakka, Hokkien et al) with Mandarin, and the slow erosion of its audience. The spread of television, movies and social media platforms exacerbated the disinterest of the younger generation in this ancient art form.

Aga Szydlik is a professional culture photographer and a doctoral candidate based in South Africa. She tells us that her journey with photography started with Muay Thai (the famous Thai fight style) which she documented extensively. Based in Thailand, she able to explore South East Asia, onwards to Indonesia and South Africa. She is enthusiastic about alternative processes, analogue photography, Lomography and salt/albumin prints as well as mixed media.

Frederik Trovatten | The Day of the Dead

The Day of the dead by Frederik Trovatten on Exposure

This member has no public activity yet.

In the 16th century, the Spanish Conquistadores arrived in Mexico, and quickly considered the Dia de Los Muertos to be sacrilegious, and tried their best to ban it. The ritual, dating to the Aztec and Toltec people some three centuries back, was not easily stopped and the Spaniards' efforts only succeeded in strengthening it.

Similar to other indigenous belief systems and rituals, the Dia de los Muertos merged with elements of the imported Christianity, thus achieving a form of syncretism with the invaders' religion. Originally celebrated in the summer, it moved to the first two days of November to coincide with All Saints Day and All Souls Day.

In 2008, the Dia de los Muertos was recognized by UNESCO which added the holiday to its list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. It is an extremely social holiday that spills into streets and public squares at all hours of the day and night.

For the Aztec and Toltec pre-Hispanic cultures, death was a natural phase of life. The dead were still members of the community, kept alive in memory and spirit, and during Día de los Muertos, they temporarily returned to Earth. Nowadays, people flock to cemeteries to be with the souls of the dead, and build private altars with photographs of the dead, and their favorite foods and beverages. The gatherings are often joyous in tone, and the families remember the lives of the departed.

Frederik Trovatten describes himself as a Danish press and street photographer living in Mexico City. He's also an entrepreneur with 10+ years experience in digital marketing and startup, having started his career in Adwords and worked in Analytics, SEO, Email-marketing, Blogging and Social media.

Anthony Gueguen | Phuket Vegetarian Festival

PHUKET VEGETARIAN FESTIVAL by laostreetphotography on Exposure

Although I've photographed Kuala Lumpur's Nine Emperor Gods Festival, I haven't had the stomach (yet) to do the same at its "cousin"; the Phuket Vegetarian Festival in Thailand.

The Phuket Vegetarian Festival (also known as the Nine Emperor Gods Festival or the Kin Jay Festival, is an annual Taoist event celebrated by the Chinese community in Thailand, and its version as the Nine Emperor Gods Festival is celebrated over nine days in Myanmar, Malaysia, and Indonesia by local Chinese communities.

In comparison, the religious self-mutilations performed by the devotees during the Vegetarian Festival in Phuket are considered to be extreme and shocking. The entranced devotees who perform these acts of religious self-mutilation are called mah song. They wear elaborate costumes, enter into trances and ask the gods to enter their bodies. Men or women (they are usually celibate) puncture their faces with hooks, spears and knives amongst other sharp implements.

It is said that the mutilations are done without anesthetic, and are performed either inside or near the temples surrounded by other devotees. The wounds are treated with only iodine and petroleum jelly by attendants wearing surgical gloves as precautionary measures.

Other than his Exposure website Lao Street Photography, information on Anthony Gueguen is unfortunately sparse, however he is a project advisor with a French NGO based in Vientiane called Comite de Cooperation avec le Laos (CCL). His profession enables him to travel within Laos and to other Asian countries.

Zarni Myo Win | Traditional Dance Troupes In Myanmar

Photo © Zarni Myo Win | All Rights Reserved

Due to my involvement in a long term project documenting Chinese opera in the Chinese diaspora, my "radar' is finely tuned to discover similar examples of music, drama and dance in Asia...and I discovered Myanmar's traditional dancing form.

As in many other Asian countries, music, dance and drama in Myanmar are a part of everyday life in the country, performed on makeshift stages by the side of the road rather than in elegant venues, and with an audience of chattering and cheering locals gathered for the occasion. Fairs and festivals are often cultural as much as religious in appeal, with traveling troupes of artists performing pwe, a distinctive Burmese blend of theatre, song and dance, mixing slapstick comedy with stories from the great Buddhist and Hindu epics.

In contrast with Chinese opera, which is struggling to survive in certain regions of Southeast Asia, a large number of Burmese troupes travel around the country's villages and during pagoda festivals, staging performances throughout the countryside during the dry season. They perform on temporary bamboo stages, whilst audiences sit on mats spread in front of the stage. 

Although the traditional dance-drama in Myanmar is said to have originated from Siam (nowadays Thailand) through the conquest of Ayutthaya in 1767, when a Burmese king returned with royal Siamese dancers, the similarities (at least backstage) with Chinese opera are striking.

It is such troupes that Zarni Myo Win documents in his wonderful Behind The Curtain project. 

Photo © Zarni Myo Win | All Rights Reserved

Zarni Myo Win is an award-winning photographer from Yangon (Myanmar), who travels around his country to document its culture, lifestyle and heritage. He is currently working on a long term photography project on Myanmar's traditional dancing troupes. His passion is to document the lives of Myanmar traditional opera performers, real life of Myanmar people, and patterns and lines in landscape.

I met Zarni in Kuala Lumpur in 2017 when he received the Overall Winner Award in the Travel Photographer Society competition. He also won many photography awards such as Third Place Winner, National Awards, Sony World Photography Awards, First Place Winner, Portrait & Travel Category of Mobile Photo Awards (2017), Second Place Winner, Others Category, IPPAwards (2017) and iPhone Photographer of the Year, IPPAwards (2018).

Unassuming but exceptionally talented, Zarni epitomizes the new and young talent that is emerging from Myanmar, and it is with considerable impatience that I'm waiting to see more of his work...and that of his peers.

Ye Hong Qi | The Miao Portraits

Photo © Ye Hong Qi - All Rights Reserved

It's been a few weeks since my last post...but I needed a break to re-energize my blogging appetite, and with my time swallowed up with a forthcoming photo book, and the incessant demands of social media, blogging took a back seat.

However, I chanced on wonderful images by the Chinese photographer Ye Hong Qi whose long term project "The Portraits of Chinese Miao Nationality" (中国苗族人肖像) is just a delight for those who are interested  -not only in portraiture- but in anthropology and ethnic minorities.

Ye Hong Qi tells us that he started his project in 2012, seeking to document the Miao culture through portraits made in situ, eschewing artificial lights and other devices.

The Miao is an ethnic group belonging to South China, and is recognized by the government of China as one of the 55 official minority groups. They live primarily in southern China's mountains, in the provinces of Guizhou, Yunnan, Sichuan, Hubei, Hunan, Guangxi, Guangdong and Hainan. 

Interestingly, the Chinese traditionally classify the Miao according to the most characteristic color of the women's clothes...such as Red Miao, Black Miao, the Big Flowery Miao, White Miao, Green/Blue Miao, and the Small Flowery Miao.

While the Miao people have had their own unique culture, the Confucian ideology had significant influences on this ethnic group. It is expected that men are the dominant figures and breadwinners of the family, and women are, having a subordinate figure, the homemakers.

In his biography, Ye Hong Qi describes himself as an amateur photographer from Shanghai. He started his photography in 2012 and started to record the life and remaining culture of Chinese minorities people. He was awarded a number of recognitions in China and the USA, and was published in PDN and PSA.

POV : William E. Crawford | Hanoi Streets

Photo © William E. Crawford | Courtesy The New York Times

I don't recall writing a blog post about an article that appeared on The New York Times' Lens feature, but I could not let the wonderful photography of William E. Crawford on Hanoi Streets go without giving it its due merit on the pages of this blog.

One of the photographs that I couldn't stop looking at is of this Vietnamese general. I have no idea who he is or what his history may have been...but I've met Vietnamese men (and women) of his age with similar facial expressions, whose astounding gentleness and courtesy to me -as a visitor to their country- are the most rewarding experiences I took away from my travels in Vietnam.

In the Lens article, Mr. Crawford is quoted as saying "despite the embargo and the wounds of the American War there was no obvious anti-American hostility ... the lack of hostility towards Americans, at least in the North, was a relief to me."

This is so true! Everywhere I went in Hanoi and elsewhere in Vietnam, I was received with open arms even though I was seen as an American (the difference between being American-born or naturalized seemed irrelevant to them). Even Vietnamese men who told me were Vietcong during the American War were friendly and extremely cordial...and shared meals and many cups of rice wine (and ribald jokes) with me.

William E. Crawford is a documentary photographer who spent three decades documenting Vietnam, and in particular Hanoi, its people and the surrounding countryside. As one of the very first Western photographers to work in post-war North Vietnam, he was drawn back to the country numerous times at regular intervals between 1985 and 2015 to record this fascinating country's culture, people, and society with beautiful, compelling and intimate photographs, concentrating on colonial and indigenous architecture, urban details, portraits, and landscapes. 

While he used a large format camera an tripod, he -as I did, but not with the same gear- wandered Hanoi’s busy streets returning to the same places, especially in the 36 streets of Hanoi’s Old Quarter.

I could not find Mr Crawford's website, but he is publishing a book Hanoi Streets 1985-2015 which has close to 200 color photographs.

Since I mentioned the wandering in Hanoi's Old Quarter, I thought I'd add a link to my own Hanoi Color: Moments in Hanoi's Pho Co.

Beyond The Frame | Huā | GFX50s

I've been absent from this blog for a while due to 'busy-ness', and working on a new audio-slideshow (aka photo-film) titled "The Legend of Hua"...which turned out to be more time-consuming than I anticipated, due to the various audio tracks that had to mesh with still photographs.

In the meantime, I uploaded a sample of the still images from the soon-to-be released audio slideshow unto my Exposure website, however I chose to post process these differently from those in the slideshow. 

I had read that a photographic technique merging silver printing with charcoal painting was widely popular in the 1920-1930s Shanghai, so I explored various modern digital post processing ways to try and imitate that 'look' as closely as I knew how.

After a number of failed attempts, I chose a process which mixes a combination of my own settings using two imaging softwares; ON1 Photo Raw 2018 and Iridient Developer 4. When I was satisfied with the resultant 'look', I saved the presets for the two programs, and it was more or less a cinch to just apply these to the images I had chosen for the gallery. That said, I still had to tweak a few of them...taking into account the disparity in lighting condition at the time of the shoots, so as to achieve uniformity as much as possible.

Insofar as the hardware is concerned, I used the Fuji GFX50s and its 63mm lens. This 'medium-format' camera is my go-to tool for such photo shoots, and I regret not having the 45mm I acquired after my Shanghai trip, as it would've given me a wider angle to work with.

All the images in this gallery were made in Shanghai and the nearby water town of Xitang. The latter is an idyllic setting and its ancient buildings date back to the Ming and Qing dynasties, which include the teahouse where parts of the famed movie "Lust, Caution" was filmed.

Poy Sang Long | Reuters' Wider Image | Jorge Silva

Photo © Reuters/Jorge Silva - Al Rights Reserved

I was planning to attend the Poy Sang Long celebration in Chiang Mai in early April, but the opportunity of my Shanghai lecture and workshop intervened, and so I had to postpone traveling to northern Thailand till next year.

However, I viewed the recent wonderful photo essay and reportage titled Beloved Princes Become Buddhist Novices by Jorge Silva of the annual event which was featured in Reuters' Wider Image blog, and it definitely reaffirmed my intention to attend the celebration in April 2019.

The essay/reportage is quite thorough in explaining what Poy Sang Long is all about, but here's more information:

The days of April 4-6 are usually the time for the three-day festival of Poy Sang Long when, in the city of Chiang Mai, pre-teen boys are inducted as Buddhist novices. On the first day of the 3-day festival, the youngsters are in the midst of family feasting and gift giving before they are escorted to the temple to have their eyebrows and heads shaved. They are then ritually cleansed and anointed by bathing in sacred water. The parade to the temple is accompanied by the flute music, the beat of drums and the clash of cymbals by local musicians.

On the second day, the boys will parade to the temple to offer gifts to Buddha and the resident monks. The parade will move slowly from Thapae Gate through the road up to Chiang Mai Gate and eventually arrive at Wat Pa Pao.

Early morning on the third day (ordination day), the boys will be transformed into "Princes". Their faces will be covered with powder, rouge and lipstick and they'll be dressed in resplendent costumes, with white turbans on their heads. 

Travel Photographer Society Awards 2018 Announced

Photo © Raed Ammari - Courtesy Travel Photographer Society - All Rights Reserved

The TPS Photo Awards 2018 were recently announced by its founder, Ahsan Qureshi, and the overall winning image is a macro photograph (above) by Raed Ammari. The winning submissions for all the categories were exceedingly difficult to judge due to their quality, as well as for their stylistic diversity. In 2018, there were participants from 92 countries with 2560 entries. 

I was one of the 15 judges; chosen amongst well established photographers in different fields of specialization. This attribute led to there being no ties in any single category; an unusual result for any imaging competition.

It was a singularly tough competition to judge; not only for the sheer number and quality of the submissions, but also because of the number of categories: Street, People, Landscape, Wildlife, Black & White, Architecture, Sports, Fashion, Weddings and Stories.

My favorite category is People, and while I relished scrutinizing each and every submission in that particular category, I was quite partial to the submission by photographer David Nam Lip Lee that earned it a berth amongst its winners.

Photo © David Nam Lip Lee - Courtesy Travel Photographer Society - All Rights Reserved

The Travel Photographer Society has uploaded the Best 60 Entries here.

It also announced, that on April 26th 2018, an award ceremony for winners of the international photo contest will be held to present the winners their awards. 

There will be an exhibition to showcase the Best 60 travel photographs. The event on April 26 will by invitation only, and will be followed by an open to the public event from April 27-29, 2018 at White Box, Publika (Kuala Lumpur).

The full address is: A A4-2-7, Solaris Dutamas, PUBLIKA, No.1, Jalan Dutamas 1, 50480 Kuala lumpur, Malaysia.

Sebastião Salgado | Amazônia

Photo © Sebastião Salgado | Courtesy Folha de S.Paulo

I'm very glad to have stumbled on the latest work by the legendary Sebastião Salgado. It's published as a reportage in the magazine (or blog?) of the Brazilian newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, and while its descriptive text is in Portuguese, I used an online translator tool to feature it here.

The remote tribe known as the Korubos received Sebastião Salgado, in September 2017. He was welcomed with guttural sounds such as "hey hey hey", and stayed in their village in the Javari valley for 20 days to produce his new project, "Amazônia".

The Korubos number about 80, and maintain regular contact with officials of the Brazilian State... but have had little contact with the "white" culture. They are divided into two villages on the banks of the Ituí River, in the Indigenous Land Vale do Javari, in western Amazonas, along the border with Peru, 3,500 km from São Paulo and 1,200 km from Manaus.

This tribe was known in the 20th century for the violence with which it attacked invaders of its territories. Their defensive attacks were followed by reprisals from non-Indians. Nowadays, the Korubos want to talk.

Sebastião Salgado produced a series of photographic reports about the Amazon, with an emphasis on indigenous groups that have had little contact with the "white" culture. "Amazônia" is a continuation of his earlier work, "Genesis". It seeks to portray the autochthonous peoples of Brazil, inhabitants of the world's largest forest, threatened by the destruction caused by an unsustainable exploitation.

For this long term project, Salgado visited several tribes and will conduct other expeditions in 2019, which he hopes will see publications and exhibitions that will form part of the project.

The Travel Photographer's 5 Favorite 2017 Photographers

Photo © Nagi Yoshida-All Rights Reserved

I now feature my favorite 5 photographer for 2017. I do so in no particular order, either alphabetically, nor chronologically nor by preference...just randomly.

Nagi Yoshida: 

My first favorite photographer of 2017 is Nagi Yoshida which was featured on this blog on June 26 with her work on Ethiopia. I liked her imagery of the various tribes in the Omo Valley such as the Mursi, Bume, Hamer and the Afari people. 

The Japanese photographer's love affair with Africa started when as a child, she was fascinated by being African. Some children want to become pilots, some models, but her dream was just to become African. 

Photo © Corentin Fohlen | All Rights Reserved

Corentin Fohlen:

Another favorite is French photographer/photojournalist Corentin Fohlen featured in my post of March 3, with his incredibly colorful and fantastical portraits of Haiti's Karnaval. This festival has been held for over 100 years in different towns of Haiti.

Fohlen began to photograph Haitians by creating a makeshift studio on a city sidewalk near the Karnaval celebrations, where he could create portraits of each unique costume. Since 2012, he has been involved in long term projects in Haïti, and has published two books on this country and its culture.

Photo © Hiroshi Watanabe - All Rights Reserved

As for the next favorite photographer, it's Hirshoshi Watanbe.

He was featured in my post of May 23 for his lovely work on Kabuki performers. This gallery is of square format monochromatic portraits of non-professional kabuki performers in the small town of Nakatsugawa; located midway between Tokyo and Kyoto.

Hiroshi Watanabe was born in Sapporo, Japan and graduated from the Department of Photography of Nihon University in 1975. He moved to Los Angeles working in Japanese television commercials, obtained an MBA from the UCLA Anderson Business School in 1993 and subsequently, started to travel worldwide, extensively photographing and since 2000, has worked full-time at photography.

Photo © Robert van der Hilst | All Rights Reserved

Robert van der Hilst:

I was happy receiving Robert van der Hilst's lovely 'Chinese Interiors' voluminous coffee-table photo book as a gift in Shanghai, and discovered the talents of this Dutch master photographer who was influenced and inspired by Dutch mid-17th century genre painting. Naturally, I wrote of him in my post of November 8.

Robert van der Hilst is certainly an inspiring photographer, and his website's galleries feature his lovely work from Mexico, Fukuoka (Japan), Shanghai and his Cuban Interiors is particularly worth viewing. 

Photo © Leonid Plotkin | All Rights Reserved

Leonid Plotkin:

Closing the list is a long time favorite photographer; Leonid Plotkin whose Men of Heart work was featured on my blog on March 5. 

Men of Heart is about the Bauls who are a group of mystic minstrels from Bengal (Indian State and Bangladesh). The Bauls are members of a syncretic religious sect, and a follow a distinct musical tradition. A very heterogeneous group, with many sects, but their membership mainly consists of Vaishnava Hindus and Sufi Muslims.

Leonid Plotikin is a freelance documentary photographer and writer. His work has appeared in publications such as The Guardian, The Observer, The Economist, Penthouse Magazine, Student Traveler, Budget Travel, Discovery Magazine, MSN.com and others.

The 5 Top Posts On The Travel Photographer In 2017

It's the time of year. Time flies. The most viewed posts of 2017 on The Travel Photographer blog are:

1. POV : Can The X-Pro2 Do The Job Of The GFX 50S? of January 8 in which I share my ambivalence about acquiring this -at the time- new camera, while owning the X-Pro2 and a bevy of lenses...and questioning whether the return on investing in a GFX 50S would be worth it. Would the quality of the GFX 50S surpass that of the X-Pro2 by such a factor that it justifies its $8000 expenditure? It seems many of my blog's followers and other readers were interested in the same question, and that boosted this post to very top of the popularity totem pole....and by a substantial margin.

As readers of this blog know, I did get the Fuji GFX50s and its 63mm lens a few months later, and haven't regretted it in the least. Quite to the contrary, I have fallen for it (as I have for the X-Pro2 before it) especially doing the "fashion-lifestyle-travel" type of photograph that I'm interested in.

2. The Legend of The Purple Hairpin | X-Pro2 of July 26 was the surprising second most viewed post. I call it surprising because I never expected Chinese opera would have much traction among readers of this blog. However, I am guessing that the post went sort of "viral" among the NYC Cantonese community involved in these shows.

The post links to a gallery of images I made at the Chinese Community Center's theater on Mott Street (NYC) of a famous Cantonese opera about a love story that occurs during the Tang Dynasty. To photograph the performance, I used my Fuji X-Pro2 and the Fujinon XF 18-135 F3.5-5.6 OIS WR (the equivalent of a 28-200mm) that gave me the reach I needed.

3. Mercer Street With the X-Pro2 of February 4 was the third most viewed, and the reason why is a little unclear. However, in the post I write of my style of street photography, roaming the cobblestoned streets of SoHo in NYC with my Fuji X-Pro2 and its 18mm f2.0 dangling from my neck and shooting from the hip... so perhaps that is what attracted the eyeballs. It could've also been linked to by one or more of the Fuji aggregators that have a fervent readership base.

4. An Afternoon With The Chinese Opera of May 22 comes in fourth place on the popularity totem pole. This again is very surprising for the reason I mention earlier. 

The post describes my difficulties in getting access to the back stage of the auditorium/theater in NYC's Mott Street. It was my first time there, and had no contacts to help me out....so had to photograph the perfromers from my seat. The X-Pro2 fitted with the 18-135mm Fujinon lens was just perfect to capture the action, and I had no need to stand or move to another location within the room. 

5. Ania Błażejewska | Balinese Idyll of January 12 rounds up the list as the fifth most popular post....and deservedly makes it on this list. 

As I wrote on the post, Ania Błażejewska's Balinese Idyll is of scenes with models to represent life on the island as it was many years ago, before becoming a tourist destination. Her photographs are tasteful and luminescent, and the models chosen for this particular photo shoot are just gorgeous.

I must reiterate my surprise that four of the five most popular posts are of my work. It has been the norm in recent years that the most popular were of other photographers...and deservedly so, as I feature many excellent galleries to The Travel Photographer blog. 

Perhaps a fluke...so let's wait for next year's most popular!

My Best Images Of 2017...And Why | X-Pro 2 & GFX50s

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved
X-Pro2/12mm Zeiss/f2.8

With the end of year closing in, I thought I'd post 10 photographs that I made during 2017 which I deem to be the "best" (always a subjective thing) for a variety of reasons. 

By "best", I mean that these images combine the visual (composition et al), the ambiance and its connection to me as photographer.

The first (not in any particular order) is one of many I took of "Wang"; an aging Hokkien opera performer in Ampang (Kuala Lumpur) during the Nine Emperor Gods festival in October. In fact, I have a complete blog post on Wang, and how I formed a bond of sorts when I dropped on a couple of nights by the stage where he and his troupe would perform. For me, "Wang" epitomizes the gradual decline in popularity of the Chinese Opera. 

In this particular photograph, "Wang" wears heavy-handed make up on his face, with painted eyebrows. I can't decide whether his facial expression is sad, tired or is he being slightly sardonic. His face was very expressive, and I saw him use it during the shows. I deliberately used a wide angle (Zeiss Touit 12mm) to include the messy background, the drying clothes and the open trunk to show the "out-of-a-suitcase" lives of these itinerant opera troupes.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 16-55mm/f3.2

Another favorite image is of four men in the small town of Qi Bao. It was taken in an ancient tea house where storytellers accompanied by Chinese pipas, perform their art.  Qi Bao, a water town 18 kilometers from downtown Shanghai, was built in the Five Dynasties Period (907-979 AD), and it's in such tea houses that one can enjoy a traditional Suzhou pingtan performance of storytelling to music.

Shanghai in September was hot and sultry, and I thought these men were either retired or unemployed. They were totally unconcerned with the storytelling show a few yards away, and were doing their own thing. I thought it was a timeless image, despite the two men fiddling with their mobile phones...with the crooked handwritten posters on the walls, the rickety furniture, the tea cups and the ancient music, I recall feeling as if I had gone back in time....at least 40-50 years.

For more of my Shanghai street photography, see Incongruities in Monochrome gallery.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 18mm/f2.0

This photograph was made in Kyoto, and was shot from the hip...as is my usual way of  shooting when I'm in my street photography mode. I didn't want to disturb the scene so I was very quick. Compositionally, it could have been much improved had I been able to move two steps to the left, but I had no time as I wanted to capture the gestures of the little girl imitating the posture of the kimono-clad woman (who was being photographed by a friend with an iPhone).

Examining it later, I was about the chuck it out from my file of "possibles", but I liked the kimono's (and the bag's) design which contrasts with the plain gray/brown of the wall-fence...and the the striped t-shirts of the two little girls.

Many women of various nationalities (but mostly from East Asian countries) rent kimonos in Kyoto...and are appreciative when photographs are taken of them. The city officials developed programs to retain the traditional industries and artistry in making such garments, and to encourage people to wear them more often, so temples, museums, and restaurants in Kyoto offer discounts to women wearing kimonos. 

For more of my Kyoto's kimonos gallery, see The Kimonos of Kyoto.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 16-55mm/f2.8

Whilst in Kuala Lumpur in 2016 participating in the annual Travel Photographer Society event, I was introduced to The Old China Cafe; an old café-restaurant that serves a combination of Straits Chinese and Malay dishes, and whose untouched pre-war ambiance and large traditional feng shui mirrors gave me the idea of constructing a fantasy story about a beautiful Chinese woman dressed in a clinging red qi pao or cheongsam appearing to an habitual customer and opium-addled Western photographer.

Fast forward to early May 2017, and I found myself once again at the Old China Cafe with Tracy Yee and Stanley Hong shooting for The Red Qi Pao, my fashion-themed story.

I had briefed Tracy as to the general idea of my imaginary story which was supposedly based in 1930 Shanghai, and she enthusiastically performed the role of the love-stricken Mei Li who was being ill-treated by her foreign lover. 

The atmosphere of the Old China Cafe lent itself perfectly to the theme, and while photographing, I had flash-backs of the wonderful movie In The Mood For Love by Wong Kar-wai, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung. For me, the photograph that best exemplifies the movie is the this one...of a pensive Mei-Li leaning against an old Chinese screen. I deliberately shot this frame so it would appear soft...to give it the mood I wanted to recreate in that particular sequence.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 16-55mm/f2.8

In Tokyo...the metropolis of more than 9 million people has the reputation of having many lonely people. It is reported that instead of actually forging relationships, or continuing those they have already, Japanese people are hiring actors to play the roles of loved ones. Many young men have no courtship skills, and are unable to forge lasting relationships with young women as in the West.

At dusk near Shibuya station, this young woman waiting for someone...perhaps her boyfriend, her husband or other girlfriends, struck me as being forlorn and sad. She's clutching her mobile phone, perhaps expecting a call or message with a pensive expression. I saw her as vulnerable, cocooned in a outsized woolen sweater but wearing an unseasonable short dress. 

Deep in her thoughts, she did not notice me...and every time I view this image, I wonder if her friend(s) showed up, or did she go home after a long wait....disappointed at her wasted evening.

For more of my Tokyo street photographs, see Tokyo Noir.

 

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 18-135mm/f6.4

Since earlier this year, I've immersed myself in a new project involving Chinese Opera. While this project is continuously evolving and may now focus on this ancient performance art amongst the Chinese diaspora in South East Asia, I started it in New York City's Chinatown. This still-authentic area of lower Manhattan is home to Cantonese and Fujianese/Hokkien immigrants, and weekly shows are periodically performed.

This is one of my favorite photographs of a "mou sang" (hero) in a Cantonese opera held at the Chinese Community Center's theater on NYC's Mott Street. The performer is "Andrew" who is part owner of the Mandarin Court Restaurant just opposite the Center. His role is that of the mou sang (actor who can play both civil and martial roles)..and he was extremely adept in portraying the play's hero. I particularly liked his expression confronting his nemesis...and that his (inadvertent) reverse V-gesture is a vulgar one in Britain adds to his combativeness.

As I was standing about 20 feet from the stage, I used the X-Pro2 and the 18-135mm OIS lens to give me the range I needed.

For more of my photographs of Cantonese Opera, see this audio-slideshow.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

GFX50s/GF63mm/f2.8

Taking the opportunity of being in Shanghai, I was able to photograph a sequel to my Red Qi Pao audio slideshow in that city itself. I was fortunate to be introduced Ms Yiyi; a professional model and a budding photographer herself, featured her as a red qi pao-clad girl of Nanjing Road; a famous road in the city. Her story "occurs" in the 1930's and involves the foreigner only known as "gweilo".

Along with Eric, a photographer friend, we went to Guilin Park for the 3 hours photo shoot. The park's tea house provided an perfectly suitable backdrop for the photographs. I used my GFX50s along with its 63mm lens, as well as the X-Pro2 and a 16-55mm lens. 

Ms Yiyi was very quick to understand what I sought, and had all the accessories needed to play the part; the opium pipe, the fake fur stole, the yellow fan and the high heels. While Eric was there to interpret whenever needed, I found it extremely easy to direct her as she intuitively knew what to do.

It was one of the most pleasant photo shoots I've had ever done. The tea house was empty at this time of day...perhaps because it was drizzling for most of the time, the park was not at all crowded, and the light was gorgeous. I shoot in ambient light, and I eschew strobes and reflectors. 

Unfortunately Ms Yiyi wasn't able to view the resultant The Girl of Nanjing Road audio-slideshow as Vimeo and YouTube are banned (or censored) in China, but I did manage to send an abbreviated version of it via WeChat.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/12mm Zeiss/f2.8

This is another monochrome "street" photograph made in a small eatery in Nakano, Japan. The elderly man was totally oblivious of my presence at the door of the eatery, and seemed to be lost in a world of his own. Similar to the Shibuya young woman in the previous photograph, he seemed to be lonely and vulnerable, and I felt sorry for him.

Naturally, these feelings are aroused in a matter of seconds, and he may have been quite the opposite...waiting for his wife and family to join him....but feeling sorry for him was my instinctive reaction. 

One cannot help but noticing in Japan that it has a rapidly aging society, where nearly one in four people is over 65, which means that more elderly are living alone every year. I recall returning home and looking at this image more closely...and thinking he must've been a widower or a bachelor, because there was no glint of joy, of expectation in his eyes.

I read somewhere this quote by a Japanese social researcher: 

“An enormous flaw in Japanese society is that we don’t look each other in the eye when we’re walking in the streets. We need to re-think the Japanese fear of interacting with others.”

For more of my Tokyo street photographs, see Tokyo Noir.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 18-135mm/f6.4

Another of my favorite frames of Chinese opera was in Shanghai. Qinqiang is a regional type of this performance art, and the show was at the Yi Fu Theater on Fuzhou Road. The opera's tale was about two women; both brides but with different fates. The opera's title is The Qilin Purse (a red purse bearing the symbol or image of the mythical Chinese 'unicorn', meant to bring luck and good fortune to brides at their weddings).

Quite different from Cantonese or Hokkien operas, Qinqiang is much more sophisticated. It originated in the Yellow River Valley of Shaanxi province in northwest China, and boasts the most ancient, affluent and largest musical system of all Chinese operas, and is reputed to be the forefather of Chinese operas. It's also listed as a national Intangible World Heritage since 2006.

The cast seemed to be very well known to the enthusiastic audience, and while I expected to be asked not to photograph the show, it was quite the contrary with a couple of other photographers setting up tripods in the aisles. I didn't need to as I used the 18-135mm OIS on my X-Pro2 which was perfect for the task.

Due to the lighting and my settings (1/90 sec, f5.6, 75mm, iso 1000 and spot metering), I was able to capture the performers against a dark background rendering it almost black, and seemingly floating on a mirror.

At the end of the performance, there was an encore...and many of the audience went to the front of the stage to take pictures with their mobile phones...I was looking for an opening amongst the crowd, and a man shoved others to make way for me. He brushed my objections to the side, saying because I was a foreigner I had priority!

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy - All Rights Reserved

X-Pro2/Fujinon 16-55mm/f2.8

The tenth photograph (remember...they're not ranked by preference) is of a Hokkien opera performer applying his make-up before appearing on a stage in Sungai Way (Petaling Jaya). In contrast to the cluster of Malaysian photographers who were back stage that evening, I am not too fond of photographing the performers' reflections in mirrors. It's been done too many times, and have become trite....losing their impact because of overuse.

However, I made an exception for this one because I noticed the two reflections in the close-up mirror and the larger one....and because of the angle of view, I also noticed that the position of the performer's right hand with the brush (or applicator) looks different in the two mirrors. Perhaps an optical illusion?

If it wasn't for religious festivals, Chinese opera could well be virtually extinct in Malaysia. Before and during Chinese religious festivals such as the Hungry Ghosts festival and the Nine Emperor Gods festival, Chinese opera troupes live in the back areas of the stages that are specially erected, and perform nightly or even twice daily.

For this frame, I used the 16-55mm at a 24mm setting, iso 640 and center-weighted average.

For more of my Hokkien opera photographs, see Back Stage.