Photographer Colin Finlay to Host Live Free Discussion 2/4/2010
I recently received information about this event slated for Thursday 2/4/2010 on a LinkedIn Group. I’ve met Colin Finlay on a few occasions over the years, and I interviewed him for an ImagingBuffet.com podcast, which you can find here. I find his documentary work to be outstanding, both in its subject matter as well as its technical and artistic merit. His commercial/advertising work is equally impressive.
Finlay is one of Western Digital’s Creative Masters, and he’ll be hosting a free live discussion for Western Digital’s LinkedIn Storage Group on Thursday, February 4th from 10:00 am to 12 noon PST (1:00pm to 3:00pm EST) .
The following text is from the event announcement:
For more than 17 years, Colin Finlay has documented the human condition with compassion, empathy and dignity. He is a six-time winner of the Pictures of the Year International honors for his coverage of war and conflict, disappearing traditions, the environment in both its glory and its devastation, genocide, famine, religious pilgrimage and global cultures. In pursuit of his passion, he has circled the globe twenty-seven times in search of that one photo that will be a testament to the depth of human will and compassion.
During the live discussion on LinkedIn, Finlay will discuss his career as a documentary photographer, and answer questions from participants. Finlay is scheduled to leave for Haiti on a humanitarian effort with the International Medical Corps as a photojournalist in mid-February. This trip will mark the sixth time he has visited Haiti since 1991 where he witnessed political upheaval, a mumps epidemic killing scores of children, and now the devastation from the recent earthquake.
Photo © Colin Finlay 2010 Photo caption: There was a tiny hamlet, maybe six hours outside Port au Prince, filled with the ghosts of small children. The whole area, not just the village, had been isolated by the Cedras regime, and now three-quarters of the town’s children had died in a mumps epidemic. Their parents had voted for Aristide in the previous election, and those votes — officially registered in Port au Prince — had cost them dearly under the current military dictatorship. Add the U.S. embargo, and the people were virtually cut off from the capitol.
The village leader had lost three children of his own; two in one day, and a third he had carried on his back all the way down a long, treacherous road to a health clinic that had been closed. The military, weeks before, had cleared out all medicine and equipment and taken it back to Port au Prince — more punishment for their Aristide vote. He made the long trek back to his village — with child on his back — where she later died.
Now his son — his last child — was sick. This portrait shows this child clutching the hand of his father. My eyes locked with the village leader for quite some time and knew what he said was very important. I asked my interpreter what he said and his response was, “please tell the world we are the ones who are suffering.”
To join in on the live discussion scheduled for Feb 4th, visit WD’s LinkedIn Storage Group.
While you are there, I also recommend checking out the past live discussion with Sports Illustrated staff photographer Peter Read Miller. He offers a lot of excellent advice, such as techniques for helping sports celebrities and other subjects to relax when shooting an SI cover or other assignment.
