former fixer for stanley greene, andrei mironov, killed in ukraine

Russian interpreter Andrei Mironov and photojournalist Andrea Rocchelli were killed in eastern Ukraine by a mortar attack in rebel-held Slavyansk on Saturday. Andrei Mironov was a fixer for many journalists in Chechnya, including NOOR's Stanley Greene.

Andrei Mironov was a former Russian dissident and political prisoner during the Soviet era. Stanley took his portrait, above, in Moscow in 2006.

"He was  a close friend, and someone I had spent time with over the years," wrote Stanley in an update to the NOOR office. "The irony is that it happened in the exact spot I was in the day before, trying to do the same picture of a destroyed train."

Andrea Rocchelli was the founder of Cesura agency. He is the first journalist to die in Ukraine since the crisis began.

"This place really drinks blood. Today I photographed ballots being burned by pro-Russian forces," wrote Stanley.

"The only way to honour Andy Rocchelli is to go back on the road, and keep on covering Ukraine," wrote journalist and Stanley's colleague Francesca Borri on her Twitter.

slavery uncovered in chicago

Slavery Uncovered is a new visual advocacy campaign addressing human trafficking and forced labor in the Chicagoland area. NOOR's Nina Berman and Jon Lowenstein participated in a workshop and public presentation at the campaign's opening last night, May 21 at the Art Works Studio at 625 N. Kingsbury, Chicago.

The exhibition included work by Jon and Nina as well as artist Mike Genovese. The workshop and presentation also included filmmaker Nina Alvarez and writer Anne Ream.

Jon and Nina also took part in an insightful radio interview about the project. Give it a listen here. 

Jon's work on victims of modern day slavery was also published on CNN Photos. Take a look here.

See NOOR's Modern Day Slavery group project on our website.

five convicted in murder of journalist anna politkovskaya

"From time to time, God causes people to be born—and she was one of them—who had a lust to go abroad at the risk of her life and discover news. Today it may be far-off things, tomorrow of some hidden mountain, and the next day of some nearby men who have done a foolishness against the state. These souls are very few, and of these few, not more than ten are of the best. Anna Politkovskaya was so blessed to be one." - Stanley Greene

Yesterday, a Moscow court convicted five men of murdering investigative journalist and Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskaya. She was known for her opposition to the Chechen conflict and Russian president Vladimir Putin. NOOR's Stanley Greene took this photo before she was assassinated in the elevator of her apartment building on October 7, 2006, Vladimir Putin's birthday.

Stanley is currently in Ukraine covering the ongoing crisis.

francesco zizola photographs jesus for vrij nederland

Just in time for Easter, NOOR's Francesco Zizola has photographed Jesus! Ted Neely, star of the long-running rock musical Jesus Christ Superstar, is still playing J.C. at 70 years old. Francesco was able to catch him on assignment for Vrij Nederland at a rehearsal for the musical in Rome.

See Francesco's work in Vrij Nederland below.

world press photo pop-up group exhibition

All of NOOR's photographers have a strong connection to World Press Photo, as award winners, Joop Swart Masterclass participants and educators, jury members, or supervisory board members. To celebrate this fact, and with the World Press Photo Awards Days fast approaching, NOOR presents a small pop-up exhibition in an informal setting, featuring relevant work by all our photographers.

NOOR's pop-up exhibition is currently hanging at the Cafe de Engelbewaarder, which is situated just over the canal from Het Compagnie Theater, the location of this year's World Press Photo Awards Days. The exhibition runs until May 12th.

Address Engelbewaarder: Kloveniersburgwal 59, 1011 JZ Amsterdam.

This exhibition is supported by Nikon Europe.

All printing by FotolabKieKie.

Exhibition photos by Jen Tse.

andrea bruce's damascus work in national geographic

Andrea Bruce's work from Damascus, Syria was published in the March issue of National Geographic.

National Geographic also featured Andrea in an interview about her experience working in Damascus, showing a rare glimpse of life under the regime.

"A city I’ve always loved has become a tense bubble surrounded by encroaching chaos and violence," she said. "Followed by government-approved escorts, I was only allowed to leave my hotel at specific times; searching for the real Damascus under their wary and watchful eyes. Nevertheless, what I eventually found were people, living in the shadows of an over-crowded city, who largely didn’t take sides and whose loyalty was largely undefined. As in most of the world, people simply want to live their lives."

Her tearsheet in the print edition of National Geographic is below. 
 

outdoor installation in za'atari refugee camp

NOOR photographers Nina Berman, Alixandra Fazzina, Andrea Bruce, and Stanley Greene worked on a collaborative photography project at the Za'atari refugee camp for Syrian refugees in northern Jordan. The photographers documented life in the camp and set up a photo portrait booth. They made several thousand images, nearly 100 of which were turned into large scale prints, blown up to 3 meters wide, and pasted on the camp's concrete security walls.

“We tried to strike a balance with images showing daily life without sugar coating the reality and at the same time not make the experience of looking at the wall depressing,” wrote Nina Berman on her Instagram, adding that certain questions would never be concerns when photographing for publications, but presenting photographs in public where the subjects are also the audience becomes an entirely different conversation.

To learn more about the  NOOR Foundation/Za'atari project, contact the NOOR office.
 

 

yuri kozyrev's work on international uprisings in internazionale

NOOR's Yuri Kozyrev's work documenting uprisings in Egypt, Ukraine, Yemen, Libya, Greece, and Iraq has been published in Internazionale magazine, March 28th issue, with an article entitled "Once Upon a Time, Democracy".

on community, transparency, and integrity

As part of the NOOR-Nikon Masterclass for Documentary Photography, Jon Lowenstein gave a public presentation at SALT Galata on Wednesday night. About 70 people from the wider photography community in Istanbul attended. Jon showed and talked about his long-term ongoing project on Chicago's South Side, including his short film "A Violent Thread". He touched upon how local communities and their problems are representative of bigger social issues on a larger scale. Jon also expanded how he uses photography to engage with the community and how he collaborates with the people from his own neighbourhood.

The next morning, Kursat Bayhan, one of the participants from Turkey, presented a project that his newspaper Zaman initiated, called "Time in Turkey”. This gave the group a good example of how a newspaper in the region understands the importance of photo features.

 

The group continued with a long debate about ethics in photojournalism, led by Benedicte Kurzen. She stressed that in every step that we are taking as photojournalists, from getting ideas to having your images published, mistakes can be made. The group discussed issues to do with setting up, preserving the identity of the people that you photograph and work with, privacy laws, the importance of caption writing, post-production, altering content and misuse of images by clients when they are taken out of context. Integrity, being transparent, being able to stand for what you are doing as a photographer, and taking responsibility are key in this process.

 

“It is good that we are bringing up these examples of ethical misbehavior, since it is happening all the time in this industry and it jeopardizes our credibility," said Stanley Greene. "We need to be responsible because the public trusts us and we have to make them trust us.”

Images by Frank Zuidweg.

kadir van lohuizen's sea level work in the new york times

NOOR's Kadir van Lohuizen has worked extensively around the world to produce broad, compelling work on global rising sea levels. This work has just been published as a substantial piece in the New York Times, online and in print.

"Rising Seas" includes a collection of slideshows and detailed information about some of the areas most vulnerable to rising seas around the globe, showing the magnitude and scope of the problem through individual area profiles. A related article, entitled Borrowed Time on Disappearing Land, focuses on how Bangladesh is confronting the problem as one of the world's most vulnerable nations, although it has contributed minimally to carbon emissions. The work in Bangladesh also includes three videos that further illustrate the situation through glimpses of everyday life and a map visualization of the effect of rising water on Bangladesh.

We invite you to see this important and informative work online or in the print edition of the New York Times.