Via Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
February 19, 2025
Monroe Gallery of Photography specializes in 20th- and 21st-century photojournalism and humanist imagery—images that are embedded in our collective consciousness and which form a shared visual heritage for human society. They set social and political changes in motion, transforming the way we live and think—in a shared medium that is a singular intersectionality of art and journalism. — Sidney and Michelle Monroe
February 14, 2025
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who on Wednesday used the word “lies” in describing AP content, posted on X Friday afternoon about executive orders Trump had signed before his departure. She ended her post: “The @AP was not invited.”
Update February 15, 2025
February 11, 2025
Sponsored by Rep. Sarah Silva, D-Las Cruces, House Bill 153, or the Protect Reporters from Exploitative State Spying Act, proposes an update to New Mexico’s current shield law to cover the many ways reporters operate today. House Speaker Javier Martínez and Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth are co-sponsoring the legislation.
A shield law is designed to protect journalists’ sources and communications, important in a world where powerful forces seek to intimidate reporters and stop them from doing their jobs.
The role of journalism — which has been part of The Santa Fe New Mexican’s 175-year legacy — is to be the public’s watchdog, to pay attention to accountability stories on behalf of the public. Shield laws effectively are in the public’s behalf.
Importantly, the legislation expands the definition of what a journalist is, taking into account how reporting takes place today.
A journalist might be a reporter for an established newspaper, a TV or radio station, a podcaster, an online news site, or an independent citizen covering the local school board in small-town New Mexico. These journalists deserve protection, a sentiment approved by the New Mexico Press Association, which voted to support this legislation Monday.
The communications of journalists also deserve to be kept confidential, so Silva’s bill would shield emails, for example, from state snooping. It is a comprehensive piece of legislation, put together after much research and consultation with experts.
Silva’s bill is similar to federal legislation that died in Congress in 2024, the federal PRESS Act. That law was modeled after regulations put in place by the U.S. Department of Justice under former President Joe Biden. Then-President-elect Donald Trump, however, told congressional Republicans to stop the federal PRESS Act. That leaves it to states to offer protections to reporters.
According to attorney Charles K. Purcell, New Mexico has had a law concerning a reporter’s privilege on the books, with an updated statute adopted in 1973. Purcell is an expert on the shield law in New Mexico and worked with Silva on drafting this legislation.
The New Mexico Supreme Court held the current law unconstitutional to the extent it regulated procedures in state court with its own rule of evidence. The current shield law and Silva’s legislation only will apply to proceedings in the legislative and executive branches.
Should there be an impeachment hearing in the House of Representatives, for example, a reporter’s notes naming a source could not become fodder in the proceedings. Similarly, attempts by agencies under the governor’s purview would be stymied if they targeted whistleblowers.
Despite ruling that the shield law does not apply to court proceedings, the New Mexico Supreme Court does have its own press shield rule, adopted in 1982. Journalists’ sources are protected in local and state courts — and Silva is in conversations with the Supreme Court to update that rule.
In a national atmosphere where journalists remain under attack by everyone from the president on down, ensuring reporters can work without fear of reprisal is important.
As Silva pointed out when she announced her legislation: “We see examples at the federal level of government chipping away at journalists’ ability to do their jobs by pursuing the identities of unnamed sources and deterring whistleblowing.
The integrity of unnamed sources is critical to journalists fulfilling their role as watchdogs in our society. I want to ensure New Mexico safeguards the integrity of journalism.”
February 10, 2025
"A step through the gallery doors reveals the first of many rooms that archive, dissect, and tinker with the values and experiences of American culture. The themes are immediately apparent. Domestic strife, racial politics, the suppression of queer identities, sexuality, ecology, and individuality; each of these ideas finds its example, its case. Whether considering the dual personalities in Robert Mapplethorpe’s self-portraits, the interweaving of indigenous art practices with modern photography in Sarah Sense’s work Hinushi 18, or the few surviving artefacts of the country’s abandoned towns in Bryan Schutmaat’s landscapes, the overall impression resounds. America is a nation at war with itself. Conflict, reflected in the photography, regarded as an essential component of the modern experience of life in the USA.
The results of these battles are morbid and cruel. One photograph, from Nina Berman’s collection Marine Wedding, depicts the marriage of a disfigured soldier sent to fight in one of the American governments many international warzones. Described simply by the accompanying placard, the viewer is informed that the marriage broke up, and that soldier had died from alcohol and morphine overdose since. Likewise, the piercing work of Nan Goldin chronicles her experiences with domestic violence and the AIDS crisis as it ravaged New York. In Cookie and Vittorio’s wedding, New York City 1986, Cookie Mueller, featured in another depiction of a wedding, walks the aisle with her soon-to-be husband, though anyone who knows the story will understand how tragic this became after the fact, as they both died shortly afterward."
American Photography, 7th February to 9th June 2025, RijksmuseumVia Northlight Gallery/Arizona State University
Via Columbia Journalism Review
February 4, 2025
Reflections from an independent photojournalist.
America loves to rebrand its sins as myth. In four years, MAGA loyalists have recast the January 6 insurrection as resurrection. (All photos by Nate Gowdy)February 4, 2025
By Nate Gowdy
"This is why I document: America loves to rebrand its sins as myth. In four years, MAGA loyalists have rewritten January 6 from every angle. Rioters have been framed as leftists in disguise, police as “crisis actors,” the attack an FBI setup—or, more outrageously, citizens on a “normal tourist visit.” By 2025, revisionism is big business. Conservative media churns out books, podcasts, and stump speeches recasting insurrection as resurrection. But my images tell another story: they depict a nation in fracture, where well-meaning neighbors and dutiful relatives cling to their “Big Lie” with an unwavering sincerity that doesn’t just reject facts—it inoculates against them, leaving everyone vulnerable to propaganda and less capable of critical thought."
Full article here: I Photographed January 6. Trump’s Pardons Can’t Erase What I Saw. - Columbia Journalism Review
"We are dismayed but not surprised by the removal of this artwork,” Gottesman said in a statement to ARTnews. “This clear act of censorship underscores the urgency of For Freedoms’ mission to promote free speech and creative expression. One of our missions is to be visionary, not reactionary. This work was created nine years ago, in collaboration with artist Spider Martin, and juxtaposes his historic image with a political slogan that we hope will spark conversation, reflection and deeper thinking.
“We can disagree and dislike what others say but still support their rights to express it,” Gottesman continued. “Part of what makes America great is the freedom to express ourselves, we see this censorship as antithetical to this core freedom and to our mission as an organization.”
The billboard featured a Spider Martin photograph of state troopers staring down Black protestors during a legendary 1965 demonstration in Selma known as Bloody Sunday, during which police officers violently confronted those in attendance. Over that picture, For Freedoms placed text reading MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, a reference to a slogan associated with President Donald Trump."
Artists behind Montgomery MAGA Bloody Sunday billboard: Removal a ‘clear act of censorship’
January 30, 2025
Grieve The Loss Of Local Newspapers During Photojournalism Exhibition At Milwaukee Art Museum
Worse still, at the same time, 43,000 newspaper journalist jobs have been eliminated, nearly two-thirds! Imagine any other industry critical to American society, the American way of life, and American democracy losing two thirds of its workers in less than 20 years. There’d be congressional hearings. The president would address the nation with a bold plan to reverse the trend...
Why are politicians and the public not crying over these job losses? Because journalists–the good ones–hold the powerful to account. Politicians, corporations, the wealthy. The powerful benefit when newspapers close or reduce coverage. Citizens lose....
An exhibition on view through March 16, 2025, at the Milwaukee Art Museum demonstrates how photographers have understood and wielded the power of images to convey events. Through more than 100 objects, “True Story: Photography, Journalism, and Media,” offers a window into a bygone past of robust, objective, professional news coverage in America focused on the picture makers...
Filling the void left by the evisceration of newspapers has been partisan cable news commentators shrieking talking points 24/7/365, masquerading opinion as news, perspective as information, and, increasingly, social media."
American Photographers in conversation. In collaboration with the Rijksmuseum
Feb 09, 2025, 1:30 pm - 3:00 pm, Rijksmuseum (Auditorium), Museumstraat 1, Amsterdam
Tickets for the public event are sold out. You can still purchase tickets for the livestream via the buy tickets link here.
Monroe Gallery of Photography is pleased to present a free screening of the acclaimed documentary film "The Loving Story", a simple, profound love story between one man and one woman who in and of themselves were unlikely crusaders in the fight for equity.
Saturday, February 15. Film begins promptly at 4:30. Seating is limited, RSVP essential.
In conjunction with the new exhibition "Loving", on view through April 12, 2025