Andrea Pistolesi: The Rohingya Refugees

Photo © Andrea Pistolesi-All Rights Reserved
Andrea Pistolesi is a pro in the full meaning of the word...a my kind of guy...a photographer who fuses travel and editorial imagery, and who's candid enough to say that professional travel photography as it existed is now extinct, and that travel publications and ancillary glossies are a dying breed. He espouses the view -like I do- that interesting visual stories are all around us, but that we need to broaden our scope by creating new ways of distribution (think of the new VII Magazine, as an example).

Andrea was born and lives in Florence, and studied geography at the local university, evolving in a travel photographer specializing in geographic and global social reportage. He published books on exotic destinations (Indonesia, New Zealand, Morocco, South Africa, The Land of Buddha, Hinduism, Eastern Christianity), and amongst others, has recently published a book on prayers of major religions.

He was widely published in CN Traveller (Italy), Delta Sky, Departures, Elle, l'Espresso, Figaro Mag, Gente Viaggi, Geo, Gulliver, Hemispheres, Islands, LATimes Mag, National Geographic, NYT Sophisticated Traveler, Photo, Rutas del Mundo, Smithsonian Mag, Time, Travel & Leisure, and many others.

Andrea's website is a cornucopia of travel and editorial photography, which is bound to give viewers hours of enjoyment, and provide photographers immense inspiration and ideas.

I spent a while on his website, trying to decide which of his galleries to feature on this blog. It was difficult, and I changed my mind often. Finally, I chose the brilliant reportage of the Rohingya refugees in southern Bangladesh.

As Andrea describes them, the Rohingya are the unwanted of southwestern Asia. An ethnic Muslim minority, they have no rights in Burma and try to flee across the borders with Bangladesh where only a few earn a refugee status. For others, it's a life of squalid illegal camps, an unending odyssey falling prey to human traffickers, to organ traffickers, to sex rings and to pedophiles.

Also read Andrea's blog post Requiem For Travel Photography. And don't miss his work on the Nats (spirits of Mynamar) and on the Bugis Seafarers.

Highly recommended as a photographer to follow.

David Lazar: Myanmar (Burma)

Photo © David Lazar -All Rights Reserved
Here's an introduction to David Lazar, a photographer and musician hailing all the way from Brisbane, Australia. With a long roster of awards under his belt, David was the Overall Winner in the 2009 Intrepid Photography Competition, won the Best Wildlife 2008 category and the Best Culture and Portrait 2007 category in the Peregrine Photography of the World Competition. He also won the Best Landscape 2007 category in the Intrepid Adventure Photo Competition, and was published in JPGMag, Intrepid Travel Magazines, Digital Camera, and Digital Photo of the UK.

He recently traveled to Burma, and returned with lovely images of this wonderful country and of its people. These images are grouped under a gallery he titled "Myanmar, Say A Little Prayer". Also explore David's other galleries of the Middle East and India.

David tells us that he was drawn to the designs of the Thanaka paste on the women and children’s faces. This is the traditional Burmese paste made the bark of trees and applied to the skin each day to keep it moisturized and protected from the sun. Thanaka has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years.

Books: Claudia Wiens: Burma

Claudia Wiens was based in Cairo, and is now in Istanbul working as a freelance photographer, and is represented by Getty Images. She has now published a book of her photographs of Burma and titled "Of Dung-Beetle Messengers And Infamous Crickets" which, although I haven't seen yet, does provide Claudia's interesting visual narrative of this lovely country and its people. Have a good look at the section involving Nats.

I'm glad that Claudia chose this blurry image for her book's cover since, as regular readers of this blog know, I'm enormously partial to motion blurred images myself. Good choice, Claudia! For further images of Burma and other galleries, visit Claudia's website.

I met Claudia at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop (FPW) in Mexico City, where she worked on a project involving female Lucha Libre wrestlers.

A previous post of Claudia Wiens on TTP is here.

Felice Willat: The Spirit of Burma

©Felice Willat-All Rights Reserved
Felice Willat is founder and president of Tools With Heart, a company that develops products to enhance personal discovery and well being. A successful entrepreneur, and with a strong background in network television production, Felice is also an accomplished photographer, as evidenced by the recent publication of her photographs of Burma on the pages of Matador, an online international travel magazine, in a feature titled In Focus: The Spirit of Burma.

From Felice's many lovely photographs, I chose the one above of evening traffic over the famed U-Bein bridge in Amarapura.

Her photographs are on display in an exhibit titled ALMS - "Offerings" at the Topanga Canyon Gallery (Los Angeles) from April 7th - May 3rd, 2009. Further details on the venue are here. The photographs also inspired her new book, "The Quiet Between - Song Of Burma".

Felice is one of the photographers joining my Gnawa Photo~Expedition due to start on June 19, and I look forward to see her work from this Moroccan extravaganza!

Her website with more photographs is here.