1968 Olympics Black Power salute: Tommie Smith (center) and John Carlos (right) raising gloved fists during the medal ceremony for the 200-meters at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, on October 16, 1968. Silver medalist Peter Norman of Australia (left) John Dominis/©The LIFE Picture Collection
August 6, 2021
July 26, 2021
Twenty-one distinguished journalists will pursue a diverse range of projects related to science, health, technology, and the environment.
The Knight Science Journalism Program (KSJ) is pleased to announce that it has selected a group of 21 distinguished science journalists for its 2021-22 project fellowship class — a cohort that ranges from award-winning freelance writers to staff reporters for outlets such as The Dallas Morning News, The New York Times, and MIT Technology Review.
It marks the second year that KSJ will offer the remote project fellowships, which were established in response to the unique challenges and public health concerns presented by the Covid-19 pandemic. The fellowships are designed to support journalists pursuing a diverse range of projects related to science, health, technology, and the environment. Each fellow will receive a stipend and a budget for project related expenses, as well as access to seminars, workshops, mentoring, and a large offering of online resources at MIT. (KSJ’s traditional in-person fellowships are expected to resume in the 2022-23 academic year.)
The newly selected fellows will pursue in-depth reporting projects probing issues such as globalization in the artificial intelligence industry, inequities in maternal health, animal lab testing, and environmental justice in the Deep South. “It’s an impressive array of projects that really embodies the multitude of ways our lives are touched by science.” said KSJ associate director Ashley Smart. “We’re proud to be able to support so much important work — and the talented journalists who are undertaking it.”
“The Knight Science Journalism Program is honored to contribute to the work being done by this talented group of science journalists,” said KSJ director Deborah Blum. “It’s a pleasure to see such innovative and insightful work across so many platforms – books, documentary films, podcasts, long-form investigative stories – all with such a promise of making a difference.”
Selected from a highly competitive pool of applicants, the 2021-22 fellowship class includes authors, reporters, documentary photographers, and multimedia journalists representing every time zone in the contiguous United States. Seven journalists will receive full-year fellowships supported by $40,000 stipends; fourteen will receive single semester fellowships supported by $20,000 stipends, with nine in the fall semester and five in the spring semester fellowships.
The Knight Science Journalism program, supported by a generous endowment from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, is recognized around the world as the premier mid-career fellowship program for science writers, editors, and multimedia journalists. The program’s goal is to foster professional growth among the world’s small but essential community of journalists covering science and technology, and encourage them to pursue that mission, first and foremost, in the public interest.
Since its founding in 1983, the program has hosted more than 350 fellows representing media outlets from The New York Times to Le Monde, from CNN to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and more. In addition to the fellowship program, KSJ publishes the award-winning digital magazine Undark and administers a national journalism prize, the Victor K. McElheny Award, honoring local and regional science reporting. KSJ’s academic home at MIT is the Department of Science, Technology and Society, which is part of the School of Humanities Arts and Social Sciences.
Nina Berman is a documentary photographer, filmmaker, author and professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Her books include “Purple Hearts – Back from Iraq,” (Trolley, 2004), “Homeland,” (Trolley, 2008) and “An autobiography of Miss Wish” (2017). Berman’s project, When the Jets Fly, is a multi-channel documentary film, photography and audio report investigating the environmental impact of USA military training focusing on Whidbey Island, WA, and the greater Puget Sound area.
Via The Committee To Protect Journalists
New York, July 19, 2021 – In response to reports that at least 180 journalists were identified by investigative reporters as possible targets of Pegasus spyware, produced by the Israeli company NSO Group, the Committee to Protect Journalists reaffirmed its call for immediate action by governments and companies around the world to stem abuse of powerful technology that can be used to spy on the press.
“This report shows how governments and companies must act now to stop the abuse of this spyware which is evidently being used to undermine civil liberties, not just counter terrorism and crime,” said Robert Mahoney, CPJ’s deputy executive director. “No one should have unfettered power to spy on the press, least of all governments known to target journalists with physical abuse and legal reprisals.”
The reporting, known as the Pegasus Project, was conducted by a consortium including investigative journalism nonprofit Forbidden Stories and global media outlets such as The Washington Post. Amnesty International, which performed technical analysis, reported that more than 180 journalists had been identified by the consortium on a list of 50,000 phone numbers allegedly linked to clients of NSO Group technology. In a statement emailed to CPJ, an NSO spokesperson said there was nothing to link the 50,000 numbers to NSO Group or Pegasus. In a rebuttal published online, the company said the consortium’s allegations were false.
NSO has repeatedly told CPJ in the past that it licenses Pegasus to fight crime and terrorism. The July 19 statement said its products were “sold to vetted foreign governments.”
“NSO Group will continue to investigate all credible claims of misuse and take appropriate action based on the results of these investigations,” it said. “This includes shutting down of a customers’ system, something NSO has proven its ability and willingness to do, due to confirmed misuse, has done multiple times in the past, and will not hesitate to do again if a situation warrants.”
CPJ has issued recommendations to policymakers and companies to combat spyware abuse against the media.
On July 16, 1979, the worst accidental release of radioactive waste in US history happened at the Church Rock uranium mine and mill site.
While the Three Mile Island accident (that same year) is well known, the enormous radioactive spill in New Mexico has been largely unknown - it is the US nuclear accident that almost no one knows about. Just 14 weeks after the Three Mile Island reactor accident, and 34 years to the day of the Trinity atomic test, the small community of Church Rock, New Mexico became the scene of another nuclear tragedy.
More than 1,100 tons of uranium mining tailings and 100 million gallons of radioactive material emptied through a collapsed dam and into the Puerco River, running directly through numerous communities. The" in a remote area inhabited by possibly the most poverty-stricken and disenfranchised community of people in the country - Native Americans. Rarely is the Church Rock anniversary either known or noted.
June 24, 2021
Photographer at Fillmore East recalls brief but legendary run
NEW YORK - Sunday marks the 50th anniversary of the last shows performed at the legendary Fillmore East music hall where the likes of The Grateful Dead and the Beach Boys once played.
The Fillmore is now a bank but its heyday- as a prime music venue- is remembered by resident photographer Amalie Rothschild.
I was a fly on the wall," said Rothschild. "I really didn’t want to be hit on. I wasn’t looking to hook up and my cameras were shields. I was serious. I was an artist. A photographer. I didn’t have the kind of confidence as a young woman yet, but I had the right mentality."
During its’ brief but legendary three-year run from 1968 – 1971, the roughly 2,600 seat Fillmore East in the East Village played host to a who’s who of legendary performers. Elton John, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, The Who, and the Allman Brothers just to name a few.
Rothschild was, in essence, the venue’s house photographer.
"When the Fillmore opened. The tickets were $3, $4 and $5. And when they closed it was $3.50, $4.50 and $5.50, said Rothschild.
Tickets to similar see bands with similar star power today would cost $500.
"And the first tickets to sell out were the last four rows in the balcony, in the top of the balcony," added Rothschild.
Rothschild, who has enjoyed a long successful career as a photographer and filmmaker, captured some of her most famous photos during a Thanksgiving Day Rolling Stones Show in 1969 at Madison Square Garden. Ike and Tina Turner opened and Janis Joplin made an unexpected cameo onstage.
"Before they went on, Janis was just standing at the side of the stage with a few friends and right as I pulled the shutter I saw someone walk into the frame and when I developed the film and developed the contact sheet, I went ‘oh" because the person who walked in was Jimi Hendrix," said Rothschild.
Historical in more ways than one. Once bands like the Rolling Stones made their leap to arenas, making more money playing fewer shows to bigger audiences, the days of smaller theaters like the Fillmore were numbered.
In April of 1971, promoter Bill Graham announced he was shutting the venue.
"No one had any clue. It was a terrible shock for the staff to take in. He could’ve kept it going for a few more years but it wouldn’t be the same," said Rothschild.
The final show was a sendoff for the ages. A June 27 1971 all-night show headlined by the house favorites, the Allman Brothers.
"As you know no one wanted it to end.. and one of my favorite pictures of the Beach Boys is that I was able to catch all of them onstage with Bill Graham behind a speaker column watching them onstage.... it went until dawn and we walked out and the sun was out and everybody was crying and we went to Ratner’s for breakfast and it was a real tear-jerker and real difficult.'
Via Helsingin Taidehalli (Helsinki Art Hall)
Helsingin Taidehalli has added video tours of the Tony Vaccaro exhibition "Life is Wonderful", in Finnish and English.
Tony Vaccaro, Life is Wonderful, guided tour in English from Taidehalli Helsinki on Vimeo.
The Washington Post:
Richard Stolley, the Man Who Launched PEOPLE Magazine, Dies at 92
Santa Fean recalls day he secured rights to video of JFK assassination
Via Pasatiempo, The Santa Fe New Mexican
June 18, 2021
Michael Abatemarco
Staff Writer
Photography is among the most essential messaging tools for documenting the extraordinary political, social, and economic events of contemporary times. The group exhibition Present Tense, Monroe Gallery of Photography features images that were all taken in the past few years and that underscore the upheaval and intimate and public dramas occurring in the social spheres as captured by a new wave of independent photojournalists. Images include the 2017 white supremacist tiki-torch rally at the University of Virginia, the protests at the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, the January 6 storming of the United States Capitol, the protests that followed the police killings of Michael Brown and George Floyd. Photographers include Ryan Vizzions, David Butow, Ashley Gilbertson, Sanjay Suchak, and Gabriela Campos. The exhibition is currently on view and runs through Aug. 22.
Monroe Gallery of Photography, 112 Don Gaspar Ave., 505-992-0800, monroegallery.com
Present Tense (Photography Show)
Monroe Gallery of Photography
Fri, Jun 18 - Aug 22, 2021
FULL DESCRIPTION
A significant exhibition documenting recent extraordinary political, social, and economic events, including the COVID-19 Pandemic.
For 20 years, Monroe Gallery of Photography has presented visual moments indispensable to an understanding of 20th- and 21st-century societal and political change. PRESENT TENSE, however, is entirely unique in the Gallery’s history: its first multi-photojournalist presentation of age- and perception-changing news events of just the last few years, as well as a celebration of the new wave of independent photojournalists who are battling both real situational danger and gathering selective public denial of journalism broadly.
Depicting moments both momentous and intimate, but all radiating with meaning, PRESENT TENSE was conceived as a collective way of briefly pausing the roil and rush of virtual imagery we are all subject to—a storm of constantly flickering perceptions—and recognize, through painstakingly curated photographs, that we are living in an epoch-changing history in terms of societal understanding, betterment, and, ultimately, survivability.
Monroe Gallery of Photography
112 Don Gaspar Ave. Santa Fe NM 87501
505-992-0800
Watch a brief video introduction to the exhibit on YouTube here.
