In recent weeks we have been working behind the scenes on new interactive channels for the Magnum Photos website. One of the main focuses is building stronger community portals and creating a more engaging experience with our website. The greatest asset of Magnum is the high standards of quality in regards to our content, and showcasing this work on the blog can be very limiting, so as an online destination we want to offer more to our audience and build a strong community portal. We would like to bring you better ways to view new work and engage with it on a regular basis so we will be reformatting the blog and building coherent photographer channels to integrate the community with activities beyond blogging and we are looking forward to a more productive and mutually beneficial discourse. While we do this we ask for your patience and understanding. Soon there will be so much more for you to enjoy on our website.

We will be leaving our blog archive online but for now you won't see any updates until we launch the new platform. For up to date news on Magnum and Magnum events follow us on Twitter or subscribe to our newsletters.

After our live interviews with Bruce Gilden, Larry Towell and Peter van Agtmael on Twitter we have another exciting Twitterview coming up this Thursday.

Paul Fusco will take your questions for an hour. Check out his Portfolio page, his moving Magnum In Motion essay "Chernobyl Legacy", "Bitter Fruit" or any of his major features and prepare some questions. Make sure to use #fusco somewhere in your Twitter message as this is the only way for us to see your questions.

Where: Magnum's Twitter Page
When: June 4, 2009
Time: 10:30am EDT
Hashtag: #fusco

After our first two live interviews with Bruce Gilden and Larry Towell on Twitter we have yet another exciting Twitterview coming up on Monday. Peter van Agtmael agreed to stop by the Magnum New York office on Monday to chat with you and answer your questions. The time for the Question & Answer session is 12pm EDT.

This time around we introduce a fancy new feature to these live chats with our photographers. You'll be able to ask your questions via Twitter and receive your answers via Twitter. Business as usual... But what about people who do not use Twitter? Are they left out? Not any longer!

The Twitterview will be broadcasted live and direct on the Magnum Blog too. As soon as the live session starts questions and answers from Twitter will show up in a special chat window on the blog in real time. Blog users can ask their questions by typing them into a text field and Peter will reply to them directly as well. Start preparing your questions! You can see the chat area that we prepared after clicking the continue reading link.

I have to apologize, when posting the announcement about our live Question & Answer session with Larry Towell on Twitter I actually posted the wrong date. The Twitterview was yesterday and not today. I'll make sure to announce the right date the next time around. In the meantime here is the transcript of the conversation with Larry.

For those of you who are not familiar with Twitter: Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send and read other users' updates (otherwise known as tweets) which are text-based post of up to 140 characters.
Basically it's a communication tool that gets more and more popular. Live Question & Answers with Magnum photographers on Twitter allow you to ask precise and short questions and get answers right away. The @ sign signals a reply to that user.

@magnumphotos Hi Larry - is there anything about being associated with Magnum that you feel negatively about?
@michaelbel In life in general it's hard to be in cooperative where everyone has equal say and share, it's a creative tension.

@magnumphotos Hi! you always take field recordings when you travel-how important do you think it is for photographers to embrace multimedia?
@thefrook In this day and age it's critical if you want to participate in the issues of our day online, I also find it liberating

@magnumphotos what inpired you to become a photographer and which have been the influences in your life?
@AdrianArias The subjects have been my influences , what inspired me was first person experience in Central America in the '80s

@magnumphotos what is documentary photography for you?
@AdrianArias It's my own engagement with the people and places I place myself as a freelancer

Make sure to check out Larry's photographs on his portfolio page, his major features and his Magnum In Motion essays. By the way... Did you know that Larry Towell is a musician as well? So think about your questions, if you are not mean they'll get answered for sure.

Where: Magnum's Twitter Page
When: March 13, 2009
Time: 12pm EST

Related Links
» Larry Towell's Magnum Portfolio
» Larry Towell's latest Magnum In Motion essay "Train of Thought"
» Larry Towell's Music (On iTunes)
» Larry Towell's Books (Signed from the Magnum Store)

As you might have noticed Magnum is on Twitter and our staff is twittering away at the moment. After yesterday's first and live Twitter Q&A with Bruce Gilden we are about to have our first Twitter contest up in a few minutes!

You can win a signed book by Erich Lessing with photographs of Herbert Von Karajan and 2 music CDs.
We will tweet 5 obscure questions about Erich Lessing, the first person to answer all of them correctly will win the signed book. Go there now!

Update:
The contest is over and the winner of the book and the CD's is "pics_by_mac". Congratulations!

The winner of our recent Surfing the archive contest is Kas. His submission (Entry #13) comparing the Joseph Mallord William Turner painting Snowstorm to Paolo Pellegrin's photo of Château d'IF was chosen by the Magnum Photos New York staff. He will receive a box set of Art Appreciation signed by Elliott Erwitt. Congratulations Kas, and thank you to everyone that participated.

Today I’m in San Francisco giving a lecture to the Society for Photographic Education. After presenting my pictures and the story of how I became a photographer, I’ll likely be asked if I have any advice for young photographers. Instead of giving just my two cents, I thought it would be cool if I could also offer some advice from my fellow photographers at Magnum. I emailed my colleagues and received 35 different responses.

Download and print the full article as a PDF.

Entry 1:

© Caspar David Friedrich

© Antoine D'Agata

An example:
One of the reasons I'm excited to participate in this blog is because it provides an excuse to rummage through the archive. But where to begin? Whether I'm looking for pictures with a computer or a camera, I like to have something specific to look for before the surfing can really start.

Tyler Green at Modern Art Notes recently spent a couple of weeks talking about contemporary art and the American flag. One of the images he mentions is Gordon Park's legendary take on American Gothic. This got me searching the Magnum archive for flag pictures.

One of the flag images that taps some sort of primal American iconography is the Henri Cartier-Bresson classic of an old woman in Cape Cod. "I felt in her a touch of the strength and robustness of the early American pioneers," he said.

In a New York Times article on his American pictures, William Zimmer writes that Cartier-Bresson "is one not to miss a strong, terse symbol." Speaking of the 'skeletal old woman draped in the American Flag,' Zimmer compares her to the allegorical figure in Delacroix's painting, 'Liberty Leading the People.'"

In an essay about her new fashion work, Quentin Bajac discusses Sarfati's reluctance to participate in 'fashion': "To give it a name would mean circumscribing a practice in advance - locking in it. That's how it's always been with Lise Sarfati. She seems reluctant to put what she does into words, except in negative terms: this isn't fashion photography, she explains. So what is it?"

I'd argue that this is more or less the case with all of the photographers who've previously participated in Magnum's Fashion Magazine (Martin Parr, Bruce Gilden and myself). While each photographer uses clothes and stylists, one senses a fear of being swallowed up in the fashion machine.

All of this makes me wonder about the perception of this work out in the world. Do fashionistas like it? Does Magnum's audience like it? What do you think about an organization grounded in documentary principals dipping its toes in the fashion ocean?

Before you answer, have a look at this.

Links
» Lise Sarfati's Magnum Portfolio
» Lise Sarfati's Fashion Magazine slideshow
» Lise Sarfati's books from the Magnum Store

Last September, Republicans from around the US marched into my backyard - St. Paul, Minnesota. I managed to get access to the Republican Convention with press credentials loaned from someone I met at a demonstration (don't ask). Within five minutes of working my way through the various security measures, I found myself walking down the same hallway as Karl Rove. In a flash I saw my future before me. With one stoke of my carbon-fiber tripod, I could take this menace out. My photography career might be over, but I'd at least I'd make my mark on history.

Needless to say, I chickened out. So now I'm back to looking for more modest marks to make. After a lot of soul searching, my new goal is to breath some life into this blog.

Don't get me wrong; Martin Fuchs has done an excellent job as blog administrator. He sends out emails to the photographers and pesters us for content. And there has been plenty of fantastic content. But something is missing. I see the body, but I don't hear the voice.

In analyzing Magnum's blog, I noticed the post that generated the greatest reader response was one of the Photos of the Week by Christopher Anderson (read the post here). As is often the case, one reader offered some pointed criticism. But what made the post come to life was that Chris took the time to respond. I probably learned more from that dialogue than from a dozen essays on photojournalism.

What makes blogs work isn't fancy prose. It is all about content and conversation. So in trying to whip this blog to life, these are my goals:

1) More content. In 2007 we averaged 6.5 posts per month. In 2008 we are averaging 3.5. I want to pump more stuff through the system.

2) More conversation. Most photographers are busy shooting and traveling. They also tend to be a bit blog-shy. But I'm going to do my best to get them in here. I might be too scared to jump Karl Rove, but I'm willing to do my best with Martin Parr.

So let me start the conversation by asking what you want. If you ran this blog, how would you make it better?

English photographer Olivia Arthur (28) and American-Dutch photographer Peter van Agtmael (27) are the new nominees for 2008.

I briefly e-mailed with them to find out about their motivation to join Magnum and how it felt to be notified of their acceptance. Please post your comments or questions and we will try to find responses and answers to them by our nominees.

Olivia Arthur

© Olivia Arthur/Magnum Photos

For the past two years I have been working on a long-term project about women and the east-west cultural divide. This has been mainly funded though scholarships and grants and I have done relatively little commissioned work.

The motivation for the project is very personal and because of the way I have been working on it, I have had very few guidelines and conditions to follow. This freedom has been amazing for me because it has meant that I have been able to get right into it and let the work unfold as it goes along. It also means that it doesn't necessarily fit into the regular format of photojournalistic stories, and it has not always been easy for me to get it seen.

I see Magnum as a place that thrives on the kind of personal approach and subtle story that I am trying to achieve. I felt that the agency has made a big move in recent years to encourage younger, lesser-known photographers, who have a strong idea of what they want to show, and that really appealed to me. I am still growing and finding my way with my photography and the idea that I can do that under the guidance of an agency like Magnum and its photographers is very special.

Of course I was also encouraged by the fact that I won the Inge Morath Award last year. That gave me the confidence that the photographers liked my work and I was keen to show them what I had done with the grant over the year since they gave it to me. It also meant that I had been in contact with a few of the photographers and was perhaps less intimidated by it than I would have been a few years ago.

The day that they had the meeting in Paris I was at home working. Thomas Dwozak sent me an sms to say congratulations and I was quite stunned, then Paolo Pellegrin called me and it eventually seemed more real. I called my boyfriend and my parents - all of whom knew what this really meant to me - and then I went out to celebrate.

» Olivia Arthur's Website
» Olivia Arthur on the World Press Photo Site
» Olivia Arthur on Photobetty

Peter van Agtmael

© Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos

I felt compelled to pick up a camera because of Magnum, and that discovery has brought great meaning and purpose to my life. I love a huge range of photography, but because of that early and continuing influence, I have always wanted to be a part of the agency. I studied history in college, and Magnum is a historical archive of incredible meaning. I feel honored to have the opportunity to begin contributing my own testimony of our troubled species. As for applying, I'm not really sure why I decided to submit at this particular moment. I felt a really strong impulse, and figured I had nothing to lose. It's hard to describe what I felt when I got the news, it was like a surge of hundreds of feelings at once, but my first articulate feeling was an understanding that my life was entering a really important new phase.

I was with my family at my aunt Marie-Louise's house in Holland when Thomas Dworzak messaged me with the news. She had died the previous week after a long battle with breast cancer, and her funeral had been the previous day. I got the news as I was photographing her son sleeping on her living room couch, while in the background my dad and uncle went through the details of her life, silhouetted by the sharp light of the setting sun. Marie-Louise was really important to me. She had been married to a very active war cameraman, and thus was intimately familiar with the toll that going to war can take on family and oneself.

She was there the day I first told my parents I was going to Iraq, a decision that has changed my life dramatically. A few hours after I broke the news, the two of us went grocery shopping. As we walked and talked, she listened to my reasons intensely, and offered short and loaded answers. She had always really understood me, and on a certain level knew that my mind was made up. Still, she stormed away a few times, condemning me for my selfishness and cursing at me in Dutch. Dutch cursing is always very impressive and intimidating. Ultimately, she supported me, and I often stay with her son Sander before or after I go to wars. The last time I saw her was after leaving Afghanistan last month. I showed her my pictures from the previous two years. She offered a stern critique, but was also very proud. She was a truly wonderful person, and it meant a lot to get the news in her house.

» Peter van Agtmael's Website
» Video: Five Years in Iraq by Peter van Agtmael
» Interview with Peter van Agtmael on Conscientious
» Interview with Peter van Agtmael on Smithsonian
» Photographer's Notebook by Peter van Agtmael on abc News

Accomplished Magnum photographer Cornell Capa passed away early on the morning of May 23rd at home in New York.

Cornell Capa was born Cornell Friedmann to a Jewish family in Budapest. In 1936 he moved to Paris, where his brother Andre (Robert Capa) was working as a photojournalist. He worked as his brother's printer until 1937, then moved to New York to join the new Pix photo agency. In 1938 he began working in the Life darkroom. Soon his first photo-story - on the New York World's Fair - was published in Picture Post.

In 1946, after serving in the US Air Force, Cornell became a Life staff photographer. After his brother's death in 1954, he joined Magnum, and when David 'Chim' Seymour died in Suez in 1956 Capa took over as president of Magnum, a post he held until 1960.

Capa made an empathetic, pioneering study of mentally retarded children in 1954, and covered other social issues, such as old age in America. He also explored his own religious tradition. While working for Life, Capa made the first of several Latin American trips. These continued through the 1970s and culminated in three books, among them Farewell to Eden (1964), a study of the destruction of indigenous Amazon cultures.

Capa covered the electoral campaigns of John and Robert Kennedy, Adlai Stevenson and Nelson Rockefeller, among others. His 1969 book, New Breed on Wall Street, was a landmark study of a generation of ruthless young entrepreneurs keen on making money and spending it fast.
In 1974 Capa founded New York City's influential International Center of Photography, to which for many years he dedicated much of his considerable energy as its director.

» Cornell Capa's Magnum Portfolio
» International Center of Photography
» New York Times Obituary
» PDN Obituary

USA. New York. Dance School. 1977. The image is from part of a photo story about "upper class" children getting dancing lessons and being taught the "social graces". © Elliott Erwitt/Magnum Photos

Pia Frankenberg: Since when do you two know each other?

Burt Glinn: We first met in 1952 or ´53 I guess.

Elliott Erwitt: In the morning, I think.

BG: We got introduced and I said to somebody "what's so good about Erwitt?" (grins) I am actually still asking myself that.

PF: When did you join Magnum?

BG: Roughly around the same time, I guess.

EE: ´53

BG: Magnum wasn't a very large organization then. It was... - (turns to Elliott) Oh, by the way, Marc Riboud called the other day and said he'd come across a treasure trove of letters from Henri (Cartier-Bresson, Magnum founding member) to him that he is going to edit and maybe make a book of it.

EE: Really?

BG: He said he didn't know if certain photogaphers would like to have Henri's opinion on record and I said it's okay with me (grins).
Anyway ... I came to New York in ´53 because the Queen was going on a world tour. I don't know whether Elliott did anything on that but I know Eve Arnold did Bermuda or Jamaica and I did one of the Caribbean Islands, too, and that's when I got to know some of the older Magnum people. And then, when Bob and Werner were killed (Robert Capa, Magnum founding member, was killed by a landmine in Indochina and Werner Bischof, a member since 1949, died nine days earlier in a car accident in Peru) we all sort of got together a lot in New York. For one of the most painful funeral services that I ever attended. Do you remember that? For Bob?

EE: Yeah. 1954. May 25th. I remember that because it was my fathers's birthday.

BG: That's when I met Chim (David Seymour, Magnum founding member) for the first time.

Elena Glinn: I think Burt was talking about ´52 before. The queen was covered in ´52.

BG: That's right.

PF: Do you mean the boat "The Queen" or the Queen?

EG: The Queen.

EE: There's only one queen.

BG: Oh, I don't know!

EE: There's only one queen and, huh, what's his name... it's ...

BG: Elton John.

EE:.... he did "My fair Lady". He did the costumes for that.

BG: Oh... Cecil Beaton.

EE: Cecil Beaton! That's the queen.

PF: Do you remember any assignments that you worked on together?

BG: In the early days we both worked a lot for Holiday Magazine. We worked together on an issue on Rome. We were a very strange group of photographers there. Henri and Elliott and Slim Arons and Arnold Newman...

EE: Actually the ususal suspects.

BG: ... and I remember, the government of Italy was so pleased to have a special issue on Rome that they gave what was the Italian equivalent of the Legion of Honor to the editors of Holiday Magazine. I guess we also worked together on the Krushchev tour of America.