WSJ Photo Journal: Sufi Anniversary

Photo © Deepak Sharma/AP-All Rights Reserved
The WSJ's Photo Journal has featured the above photograph by Deepak Sharma (AP) of Pakistani pilgrims carrying an offering of embroidered cloth (which I believe is called kiswa) to cover the tomb of Sufi saint Khawaja Moinuddin Chisti on the anniversary of his birth in Ajmer, India.

I should have been there!!! My kind of event!

Shaikh Khawaja Syed Muhammad Moinuddin Chisti was the most famous Sufi saint of the Chishti Order of the Indian Subcontinent. He introduced and established the order in South Asia, and was succeeded by various notable saints such as Nizzam Uddin Auliya.

I've never checked on this, but Khawaja in Egyptian Arabic means "foreigner", and was used as a title for all Greek and Italian residents (as an example) in Egypt, so I'm not sure if there's a connection or not. Wikipedia defines Khawaja as a title used by South Asians, which is possibly related to Khoja as well.

Istanbul-Bound

I'm on my way to attend the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in Istanbul, where I'm giving a class on multimedia (Introduction To Multimedia). The class will adopt a simulated under pressure work environment where class participants have to shoot, edit and present their photographs and audio tracks to me, to eventually produce a publishable 3-5 minutes audio slideshow.

I'm stopping over in London for a couple of nights, then catching a flight to Attaturk Airport on the 19th June.

I will try to post on this trip as much as I can...perhaps even post some photographs of the workshop's going-ons. I'm taking my new Panasonic Lumix GF1 especially for that purpose. I'm also hoping to shoot for a personal project in Istanbul.

NYT's LENS: A.K. Kimoto

Photo © A.K. Kimoto-All Rights Reserved
The New York Times' LENS blog features a poignant photo essay on opium addiction in Afghanistan by the late A.K. Kimoto. The photo essay is in black & white; dark and brooding as befits such a subject matter. See it...I highly recommend it, along with its accompanying article.

Kimoto was a 32-year-old Japanese photographer based in Bangkok, who died in March while traveling to Australia.

He spent years photographing families in the remote northeastern mountains of Afghanistan, controlled by the Taliban. He roamed remote settlements in Badakhshan, Afghanistan, to find out why so many of the inhabitants (even the young) had become addicted to opium. As Emily Anne Epstein explains in the piece: "The poverty in this region is so harsh that parents blow opium smoke into their children’s noses to soothe the pangs of hunger."

A.K. Kimoto wrote:

“I offer to transport the mother and child to a clinic. One of the elders cuts me off before I can finish my thought. He smiles gently as he tells me that the child would never survive such a journey in the cold rain, and anyway, this way of life and death have been repeated for centuries in these mountains.”

Coincidentally, the New York Times reported yesterday that the United States has discovered nearly "$1 trillion" in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, which translates into approximately $35,000 for every inhabitant of the country. Naturally, massive investments will be required to mine these deposits, but in any event there's little chance that the poor of Badakhshan will see their lives improve from this eventual wealth. Cronyism, and venal corruption are endemic to the region...and only those with the power and connections will reap the benefits.

Jehad Nga Talks to BJP

Photo © Jehad Nga-All Rights Reserved

"I respond more to fashion and fine-art, carrying these fields and variables in photojournalism." -Jehad Nga

The British Journal of Photography (which revamped its website) published an interview with Jehad Nga, one of my favorite photographers. This blog featured many posts on Nga, and his distinctive chiaroscuro style.

Titled From Kansas To Nairobi, the recent interview sheds a light on Nga's decision to join the Institute for Artist Management instead of VII and Magnum.

Nga first visited the Middle East in 2001 spending months in different medical volunteering positions in Gaza. When he interned at Magnum Photos in 2002, he was also training to become an Emergency Medical Technician. But since 2004, when he moved to East Africa, he's been dedicating most of his time to photography, working regularly for the New York Times.

Via photojournalism links

MSF's Starved For Attention

"this year 195,000,000 children will suffer from malnutrition"

and so starts “Starved for Attention” the extremely well produced multimedia campaign by Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and VII Photo which exposes the neglected and largely invisible crisis of childhood malnutrition.

The campaign aims to present a series of multimedia documentaries of still photography and video from the well-known photojournalists at the VII Agency, such as Marcus Bleasdale, Jessica Dimmock, Ron Haviv, Antonin Kratochvil, Franco Pagetti, Stephanie Sinclair, and John Stanmeyer.

The first multimedia reportage is titled Frustration and is by Marcus Bleasdale, who narrates it out of Djibouti.

Bookmark this website, since the remaining reportages will be featured over the course of the coming months.

For more background on the project, JournalismNow features an interview with Ron Haviv, which touches on his work in Bangladesh for Starved For Attention.

Talking With Our Hands?

All Photos © Neal Jackson-All Rights Reserved
I just stumbled on this collage of photographs made by Neal Jackson during the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop (FPW) in Manali last June.

It appears that some the FPW instructors are fond of using their hands whilst conducting their classes....virtually the same gestures and mannerisms!

From the top left is Michael Robinson Chavez, top right is Ron Haviv, bottom right (in red) is Ami Vitale, and bottom left is Tewfic El-Sawy (The Travel Photographer). Click on it for a larger version.

The 2010 Foundry Photojournalism Workshop is scheduled for 20 – 26 June in Istanbul.

Underage Marriage in India

Photo © Prakash Hatvalne/AP Photo-All Rights Reserved
Photo © Prakash Hatvalne/AP Photo-All Rights Reserved
Two photoblogs, MSNBC's Photoblog and The Denver Post's Plog, featured images from a mass marriage ceremony held recently in the town of Rajgarh, in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Both are credited to Prakash Hatvalne/AP Photo.

The top photograph is of Mamta (7 years old) standing with her husband Santosh, who is 11 years old. While the lower photograph is of an under-age newly married couple who refused to be identified.

While Indian law sets 18 as the minimum age for a woman to marry and 21 for a man, underage weddings occur in rural areas, where the law is seldom observed.

Sociologists believe that child marriages originated 900 years ago with Muslim invasions of the subcontinent. Legend has it that invading armies -as was customary at the time- raped and carried unmarried Hindu women off as war booty, prompting communities to marry off their daughters almost from birth to protect them.

This tradition of child marriage, as many others considered by the Western world to be abhorrent, has also been created by necessity. In poverty stricken villages in the Indian subcontinent, Middle East and Africa, securing early marriages for daughters can mean the difference between subsistence and famine.

Asim Rafiqui: The Idea of India

"The close relationships between the island’s Muslim and Hindu communities in fact reveal a blurring of religious and spiritual lines, reminding us of the artificiality of the labels of ‘Hindu’ and ‘Muslim’ and the ordinary human being’s ability to find accommodation and tolerance of the practices and values of his neighbors." - Gujarat’s Faded Testaments – The Parables Of Bet Dwarka

Asim Rafiqui is not only an excellent photojournalist, photographer, a thoughtful blogger, writer and commentator, but also a friend and an inspiration in many ways.

I've written a number of posts on his wonderful project The Idea of India, and its being supported by The Aftermath Project and Blue Earth Alliance in the past year, so it gives me great pleasure to announce that he was just awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to pursue this extraordinary project.

Asim will be based for a year in New Delhi starting this September, and the scholarship will allow him to continue, expand and delve deeper into this important project.

I encourage you to visit Asim's The Idea of India writings, as well as his accompanying blog The Spinning Head. I'm certain you'll bookmark both, and follow his explorations into India's past, present and perhaps future.

As a footnote, I am undeservedly privileged to be mentioned in Asim's The Idea of India, and hope to reciprocate the acknowledgment in a small way very soon.

Antonin Kratochvil : Moscow Nights

Here's an audio slideshow of photographs by Antonin Kratochvil titled "Moscow Nights" that takes us to Moscow's decadent underworld, which is the latest feature on VII Magazine. The images themselves are vintage Kratochvil; some of which are tilted to impart uncomfortable tension (and also to be different). Although he's known for his black and white documentary photography, a few here are in color, and all show the dissolute circus-like atmosphere of this other dimension. The accompanying soundtrack is of a popular Russian music played on the accordion.

The blurb that accompanies Moscow Nights suggests that it's hard not to feel "the raw edge and danger" that exists in that underworld.

I may be mistaken, but I haven't felt that at all. All I felt was disdain tinged with pity for the characters who live such an empty existence, and watching the slideshow reminded me of the decadent characters and atmosphere in Cabaret, the 1972 movie with Liza Minnelli and Joel Grey.

Moscow Nights is also a book soon to be available, and is described as "a voyeuristic tour through the decadence and hedonism of the new "Golden Youth" as they enjoy their spoils."

SacBee's The Frame: Mr & Mrs Sadhu

Photo Courtesy The Sacramento Bee
Here's an amusing photograph featured by The Frame, the photo blog of the Sacramento Bee. It's of a sadhu and a woman "returning after bathing at the Sangam, the confluence of rivers Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati, in Allahabad."

It's uncredited on the SacBee blog, except to say it's from AP.

Although I have seen female sadhus (known as sadhvis) in Varanasi, I have rarely seen a sadhu in the company of a woman, and wonder what are these two returning to. To me, this looks like a man and his wife returning home from work. He's dressed in saffron cloths, and is carrying the Shiva trident, an accoutrement of his trade, while she's carrying some stakes.

I have seen and met countless of these so-called sadhus during my travels in India, and most of them are charlatans and con-artists. After all, it's rather an easy life they lead. They are given free food and alms, they ride public transport for free, they smoke marijuana whenever they can, and people generally give them a wide berth.

Naturally, there are also a few sadhus who are genuine ascetics, but these are rarely seen by Western tourists except at important Hindu religious festivals, such as the Kumbh Melas. However even there, the real ones are a minority.

One Shot: NYT's Rina Castelnuovo

Photo © Rina Castelnuovo-All Rights Reserved
The New York Times' Lens blog features the work of Rina Castelnuovo in Palestine & Israel. Essentially a "smooch" job by the writer, but there's no denying that she deserves every word of it.

After all, she's the photographer who captured the infamous photograph of the thuggish Israeli settler tossing wine at a Palestinian woman on Shuhada Street in Hebron.

Amongst Ms Castelnuovo's photographs on the Lens blog, I chose the one above as my favorite. The photograph is of a group of Haredi Jews (or Haredim) during a festival in the Mea Shearim district of Jerusalem. The Haredim are Ultra-Orthodox Jews who consider their belief system and rituals to extend in an unbroken chain back to Moses.

I'm intrigued by some of the hats worn by these Haredim. The fur hats worn by some are called spodik while the flat ones are called shtreimel, however I can't figure those worn by the fellows on the left of the photograph which resemble white fezzes complete with black tassels.

The fez of course, is the well-known red hat with tassel of the Ottoman Empire, which was popular in its dominions such as Egypt, the Maghreb and some Greek islands. The fez was banned by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk as being regressive.

Marc Garanger: Femmes Algériennes

Photo © Marc Garanger -All Rights Reserved
Algeria's War of Independence from France officially lasted almost a decade, but its genesis goes back to the early 40s. It was one the bloodiest struggles against a brutal colonial power with over a million Algerians killed, with thousands interned in concentration camps. To this day, the French have not accepted responsibility for these crimes.

Growing up in my native Egypt and full of nationalistic fervor against colonialism, I remember quite well the admiration we had for the Algerian resistance...the names of Ben Bella, Boumedienne, Djamila Bouhired still easily roll off my tongue.

So it was with much interest that I saw recent coverage from photo websites and newsmedia on Marc Garanger, who was stationed against his will in Algeria, and managed to avoid combat by becoming a photographer in the French army. His job was to produce images for new mandatory ID cards, and villagers were forced to sit for him.

Less than a year later, Garanger's photographs of shamed and angry Algerian women would become a symbol of French oppression over its Northern African colony.

I left a comment of the New York Lens Blog which featured Garanger's work:

"the French colonialism/occupation of Algeria was one of the most brutal in history, and the Algerians' independence war cost over a million of their lives. in my view, the expressions of these women are principally of defiance, hatred of their oppressors, and rebellion. the women were combatants as well, as has been mentioned in the article. perhaps there's an inkling of truth in that they were ashamed to show their faces, but what i sense from these expressions is that they're telling the French "you'll soon be gone"...and they were right."

Garanger received today a Lifetime Achievement Award at the New York Photo Festival for Les Femmes Algeriennes.

For further photographs, go to Algeria.com which has a number of large images of these Algerian women; some ashamed, some scared but many defiant.

RESOLVE Blog: 3 FPW Instructors Talk

liveBooks recently got an update about the impressive lineup of instructors for this year’s Foundry Photojournalism Workshop happening from June 20-26 in Istanbul, Turkey.

Some of them spoke to Miki Johnson of livebooks' RESOLVE blog.

Ron Haviv's favorite aspect of the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop is "Watching the growth of the students in such a short period of time".

Ami Vitale's is "Watching students grow in the short span of the workshop is incredible".

And mine is "the mutual camaraderie and unfettered sharing of knowledge, information, and support between instructors and students/attendees".

Read the rest on RESOLVE.

Bruno Barbey: Shanghai World Expo

Not entirely travel photography related but Magnum In Motion is featuring an audio slideshow of Bruno Barbey's photographs of the construction of Shanghai's World Expo construction site and parts of its old city.

Shanghai saw the opening of the 2010 World Expo today, starting an event to herald the Chinese financial hub's return as a major world city after the spartan industrialism following the 1949 communist revolution.

According to the news reports here in the UK, no expense was spared and like the 2008 Olympics, the World Expo will showcase China's immense economic and geopolitical importance; almost bragging its power and influence.

I haven't been to Shanghai yet, but it's quite obvious the degree by which China has developed, and is continuing to develop its main cities. It's in stark contrast with the crumbling infrastructure of many large cities in the United States.

China is spending over $4.0 billion on the Expo itself, and many billions more on other improvements for this city of 20 million people. While in the United States, we are faced with economic difficulties caused by the mismanagement of the Bush Administration, the spectacle of hypocritical Tea Baggers and a catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

It's depressing.

Foundry PJ Workshop: Instructors Line Up

What more is there to say?

POV: The Fact of The Matter...

The Marco Vernsachi & The Pulitzer Center "affair" seems to have somewhat calmed down after the considerable airing of divergent views, opinions and debate between photojournalists, photographers and journalists in the blogosphere.

Some of these views were expressed on Lightstalkers, which is a popular no-holds barred forum for photographers. Going through the posts, I saw one that claimed that the story (and its handling) was not only a blow to the credibility of photojournalism (which I agree), but also a blow to the credibility of some blogs (and their authors).

Huh? The Pulitzer Center was forced to formally admit (twice) its mistake in publishing an image of an exhumed corpse of a young Ugandan girl on its site, because of the bloggers' criticisms that it violated the rights of a child to dignity and privacy. If it hadn't been for the bloggers, these offensive photographs would be still on the Center's website, circulated on social networks and possibly worse.

I view this story and its results as vindication for those bloggers who had the courage of their convictions, and demand that these offensive photographs be pulled from the Pulitzer Center's website. It's hoped that the Pulitzer Centre will stand by its promise of redoubling its "efforts to authenticate every claim and to insure the privacy rights of individual victims".

The appropriate way to look at it is that the bloggers stepped in and redressed a wrong that would not have been committed had the parents of these unfortunate African children have recourse to a sophisticated legal system preventing such liberties with privacy rights.

POV: So Whose Lapse In Judgment Is It?

Update evening of 4.25.2010: Both Marco Vernaschi and the Pulitzer Center For Crisis Reporting responded to the critics.

I was pleased to read this final paragraph of the response (my emphasis):

We do not suggest that the decisions involved in this reporting project are anything but difficult, as we hope was apparent in our statement accepting responsibility for what we believe was a mistaken decision to exhume the body of Babirye and to publish the image on our site. It is our hope that these issues can be discussed without malice, distortions and groundless attacks on the personal motivations of others.-- Jon Sawyer, Pulitzer Center Executive Director

My morning's post follows:

Along with many others, I wrote a post a few days ago on a story being discussed in photojournalism circles and blogs, involving Marco Vernaschi, an Italian photographer/photojournalist who worked on a project documenting the phenomenon of child witches, human sacrifice and organ trafficking in Africa, and the Pultizer Center For Crisis Reporting. The story as it evolved during the past week hinged on the veracity of Vernaschi as to the circumstances behind the exhumation of a Ugandan girl, and the Pultizer Center's publication of the photograph(s) and its subsequent apologies for doing so.

I am listing the links to these blogs/websites all through this post.

Asim Rafiqui in his always insightful (and frequently provocative) blog The Spinning Head asks:

"Why did Marco Vernaschi do it?"

An important and pertinent question, but mine is different. I don't really care why Vernaschi did it. Perhaps he rationalized that exhuming a child's corpse and photographing it was the right thing to do...that it would bring this issue to the West's "consciousness" (as if we really would and could do something about it)...that it would win him more photojournalism awards...that it would make him the best photojournalist in the world...that it would justify his grant from the Pulitzer Center...that it would put bread on his table or pay his mortgage or pay his children's school fees...whatever. I believe he was wrong, and that's the end of it.

I ask the same question but of The Pulitzer Center For Crisis Reporting's Executive Director and his staff . It was The Pulitzer Center which published Vernaschi's photographs and his essays. So here's the real nub of the matter: why did they do it and why didn't they check the details' veracity before publishing? Had they done what in banking circles is called "due diligence", they may have realized what the incomparable Benjamin Chesterton of A Developing Story did. Had they investigated the story a little more seriously, they may have realized what the courageous Anne Holmes of The Vigilante Journalist did.

As I expressed in my POV: And The Outrage Continues involving the publication of a photo essay on a young girl in Kurdistan being circumcised, photographers and photojournalists operate under intense competition and pressure to submit cutting-edge work, and frequently lose sight of what is right. Exhuming the body of a young girl for a photograph is beyond the pale, but the decision for its publication wasn't Vernaschi's...it's the Pulitzer Center's. I'm not at all exonerating the photographer for what he did, but I'm more critical of those who agreed to publish these photographs.


Let's get real. If most publishers (especially those of Pulitzer's repute) refused to publish photographic tripe of dubious ethical provenance, photographers would toe the line....but because sensationalism has pervaded our media, they cut corners and lose sight of what is right..especially when it involves poverty-stricken Africans or Arabs, who have no or little legal recourse to protect their privacy rights.

Let's all remember how aghast we were when photographer Adnan Hajj was accused to have digitally manipulated photographs (ie cloning thicker plumes of smoke from IDF missiles already raining on Beirut), and we kept tut-tutting about it until Reuters fired Hajj and a photo editor, and subsequently issued new policy guidelines for its photographers. Adding some smoke plumes or exhuming a body for a photograph...which is worse?

Yes, the Pulitzer Center apologized, and promised to "redouble (its) efforts to authenticate every claim and to insure the privacy rights of individual victims."

Is that enough? I don't believe so.

Other links:

To stage or not to stage? by Jørn Stjerneklar.

Conscientious by Jörg M. Colberg.

Foundry Photo~Journalism Workshop: Istanbul

The Foundry Photo~Journalism Workshop 2010 is in Istanbul, and if your dream is to be coached by some of the best photographers and photojournalists available, do it now!

The roster of instructors reads like a Who's Who in the world of photojournalism: Tyler Hicks, Lynsey Addario, Jared Moosy, David Bathgate, Jon Vidar, Anastasia Taylor-Lind, Rena Effendi, Ron Haviv, Andrea Bruce, Ami Vitale, Kael Alford, Adriana Zehbrauskas, Henrik Kastenskov, Stephanie Sinclair, Guy Calaf and Tewfic El-Sawy.

The courses currently offered are FROM VISION TO LIFE: Documenting social issues outside the mediaʼs agenda setting; Transitioning to the new world of Photojournalism; Formulating a Photo Essay; Photographing stories; Intimacy and Empathy in Storytelling; Capturing Cultures – Communicating Without Boundaries; The Essential Guide to Backpack Journalism; Introduction to Multimedia Storytelling, and many more.

Here's another thing...photographers like Dhiraj Singh who attended a class at the 2009 Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in India was awarded Honorable Mention (Feature Audio Slideshow) in the National Press Photographers Association's Best of Photojournalism 2010 for an audio slideshow made during that workshop.

Yes, dreams come true when you attend the Foundry...so get on it! There are still a handful of places available.

POV: Marco Vernaschi & Child Sacrifice

Update: 4.25.2010: See my follow-up post So Whose Judgment Lapse Is it?
Update 4.22.2010: Jon Sawyer of the Pulitzer Center responds, and within the response is this:

"Yet we also believe, and Vernaschi agrees, that it was wrong to ask that the body be exhumed. It showed disrespect for the dead, and forced a grieving family to suffer anew. It also had the effect of focusing attention on the actions of one journalist, as opposed to a horrific crime that needs to be exposed.

We regret any damage that may have been caused. We intend to continue this project, documenting the phenomenon of child sacrifice, but in so doing we we will redouble our efforts to authenticate every claim and to insure the privacy rights of individual victims."

Here's my original post 0f 4.21.2010:

Here's another story that is guaranteed to make your stomachs churn. It involves Marco Vernaschi an Italian photographer/photojournalist who worked on a project documenting the phenomenon of child witches, human sacrifice and organ trafficking in Africa, and the Pultizer Center For Crisis Reporting.

I have linked to various photographs, but be aware that these are highly disturbing.

It appears that the Pulitzer Center funded Vernaschi to do a story on child sacrifice in Uganda, and it published some of his hard-hitting photographs in an article titled Uganda: Babirye, The Girl from Katugwe, in which the photographer convinces a Ugandan mother to allow the exhumation of her mutilated daughter's body in order to photograph it as "visual evidence". The photograph of the corpse is then shown on both Vernaschi's website and on the Pulitzer Center's. Payment (described as "a contribution for a lawyer") was made by the photographer to the mother.

Another photograph on Vernaschi's website shows an abused boy with a catheter protruding from where his penis has been cut off. His face is clearly shown.

Vernaschi's website explains that

"Child sacrifice in Uganda is a phenomenon that has embedded itself within traditional customs but that bears no genuine relationship to local culture. The appeal to "cultural beliefs" is actually an excuse used by witchdoctors to justify their crimes, and by the Ugandan government to avoid taking action. The government tries to minimize the magnitude of the problem because politicians fear losing votes and this is a a country where witchdoctors wield surprising influence at the polls."

I'm all for documentary coverage to expose and stop this barbaric practice...there's no argument there. However, for a photojournalist to ask (and then pay) for the exhumation of a body beggars belief. Had the child died in a ritualistic murder in Italy, could Vernaschi been able to ask its family to exhume the body for a few pictures? Had he been able to photograph an Italian baby boy with a catheter sticking out of his groin? Why can't these photojournalists and publishers understand that they cannot continue to show pictures of mutilated children??

It's immoral. It's as simple and as complex as that.

As I wrote in an older post: To Vernaschi and to the Pulitzer Center's Board of Directors, Advisory Council and Staff: what if Babirye and the baby boy were your children, your niece and nephew or even just a relative...or an acquaintance? Would you still have photographed and published the photographs...or is it because they're "just" Africans?

Vernaschi is an award winning photographer....and well-experienced dealing with gruesome topics. Surely he could have photographed the story differently? Or is it about winning awards and applause from the rest of the lemmings?

Update: For a more detailed and comprehensive opinion, along with some responses from the Pulitzer Center, check A Developing Story.

MoMA: Henri Cartier-Bresson

Photo © Henri Cartier-Bresson-All Rights Reserved
The Museum of Modern Art in New York City is showing Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Modern Century" this coming Sunday April 11, 2010, and the exhibition's website is truly a delight.

Henri Cartier-Bresson began traveling in 1930, at the age of twenty-two. For nearly half a century he was on the road most of the time, and the geographical range of his work is notoriously wide. Photographs of Asia (many of which are of China), North America, Japan, Africa, Europe, USSR, Middle East are shown arranged in themes, or chronology.

The New York Times has a review of the exhibition by Holland Cotter who, in the article titled A Photographer Whose Beat Was the World, writes this rather flowery sentence:

"The third and crucial constant in his career was, of course, a camera: in Cartier-Bresson’s case, a hand-held Leica, as neat and sleek as a pistol. Whether he was traveling as a journalistic eye for hire or sauntering through Paris of an afternoon, the camera went too."

I find it impossible to decide which is my favorite Henri Cartier-Bresson's photograph, but the one above of these Indian women in Srinagar (Kashmir) photographed in 1948 has always impressed me. Is it because none of their faces are visible, or is it because one of them appears as if she's holding a couple of clouds in her outstretched hands? It's described as Muslim women on the slopes of Hari Parbat hill as they pray while the sun rises behind the Himalayas, and was taken during a period of terrible violence in Srinagar. Magnificent.

Update: The New Yorker Magazine has an article/review on the retrospective at the MoMA.

From the article/review, I learned that the French title of HCB's best-known book, “The Decisive Moment, was “Images à la Sauvette”, which means “images on the fly". The French title implies something done somewhat furtively, and has much less gravitas than the English title.