To generate more imagery for this project, photo sessions will be held on March 5th, 6th and 7th. Dancers of any sort are encouraged to sign up to participate in the project. Participants must signup by 5pm on Feb 19th to be considered for one of the 60 slots for the March shoots. Info on the project is at http://www.HowPhillyMoves.org

Please come join me to celebrate on Saturday, Feb 13 at the Spiral-Q Benefit, where, among many other fun things, I’ll be receiving their ‘artist activist’ award. Info is at www.spiralq.org.

The big announcement- photo © Bill Hebert

A significant update to this website is in the works – in the meanwhile, have a look around, and make sure to signup for updates – the form was broken for a while, so if you had tried to sign up but didn’t get the announcement about How Philly Moves, please give it another shot now.

Please join me on Tuesday morning for a big announcement at City Hall. 10am, but maybe get there a few mins early – in the Mayor’s Reception Room on the 2nd floor . (Bring ID to get past security, and be ready to dance, just in case you should be moved to.)

If you can’t make it then but would like to join in the celebrations, there’s WPO on the 11th, a house concert on the 12th, and I’m getting an ‘artist activist’ award at the Spiral-Q benefit on Saturday the 13th. Please help make sure that that last one sells out.

It is striking that selections like these don’t include images of human joy or celebration of life. (other than two images from the Olympics, but this isn’t something that everyday people can engage in-> They’re just another thing that we passively watch on TV.) The only images that have some true beauty are three NASA images, which are inspiring, but still unattainable perspectives for the average viewer.

You and I can’t win the olympics, nor can we walk on Mars. So instead we watch the media, and what does it tell us is important? Pain, destruction, pop stars. Take a good look at image #24 – ignore Paris Hilton, and instead pay attention to the pack of photographers. Why are they there? Is she really that important to you and I and our communities? Why does the media market so value this type of celebrity as to justify a pack of fifty photographers? Is this the type of stuff that I should strive to photograph?

Just as I was thinking about this, I saw this short video for Raj Patel’s new book. I met him in Florida earlier this year, and he’s pretty great. The video features a few of my images and has a great message; it’s well worth two minutes to watch it below.

There is a great deal of pain and hardship in the world. Many  journalists out there have undergone great hardship themselves to raise our awareness of the suffering of others, and this is valuable and important. It’s important that we know about it. But it’s even more important that we do things about it, that we cultivate alternatives and bring about positive change in the world.

When the general public watches the news, they see a choice: focus on the pain and act on it (this is *hard* for most people to do) or choose the alternative presented (the superficial pop stars, which are far less challenging to deal with) – so we have a lot of people who see stories of war and injustice and say “oh that’s horrible”, but then devote most of their brainpower to the celebrity idols to distract themselves.

What if we gave them other options?

Where are the images of joyous action, of real celebration, of engaged citizens? Are there none out there, or is it just that big media corporations are worried that it won’t sell? I believe that the media has a responsibility to tell good news alongside the bad. We need to hear stories of positive communities to inspire us.

There is joy amidst this pain. It is rarely reported on. It is rarely celebrated. But it is everywhere and there are millions of people who are aching for these stories, although they may not be conscious of it. Positive energy can be just as contagious (if not more) as negative energy. The media needs to start valuing it, so as to give their audiences some other choices, so that we can all move towards a better world.

Below’s a little animation from a recent joyous demonstration in Florida with a soundtrack by the amazing Son Del Centro. My goal for the new year is to do more of this; to devote more resources to my community projects, helping to celebrate the work of activists and artists, because even if the mainstream media doesn’t yet think that it’s very valuable, I do. I hope that you’ll join me in this in whatever way you can; let’s make 2010 a year for great positive change.

Remember, everyone is photogenic.

Happy new year,
xo,
-jj

The Philadelphia Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe are in full swing, and just yesterday I went  back to re-photograph “Urban Scuba” by Brian Sanders’ JUNK – since I still haven’t yet developed the abilities to stop time, teleport, or just levitate invisibly, it took another pass to get the overhead views of this performance that I wanted. A remote camera clamped into the lighting rig, and voila!

Today I took care of prepping some framed pieces that will be included in the Bread and Roses Community Fund’s 2009 Tribute to Change. I’m quite honored to be included in this tribute to the most excellent documentary photographer Harvey Finkle.

Speaking of framed prints and documentary photography – I just put up some of my photos of the CIW’s work for farmworker justice at the White Dog Cafe in West Philly, just in time for their Dance of the Ripe Tomatoes event. Do you know where your tomatoes come from? The prints will be up until Nov 5th.

Tomorrow morning I’m speaking to a class at the Art Institute, and then running off to shoot a rehearsal of ‘Postcards from the Woods’ by Merián Soto/Performance Practice. Wednesday will be a bit nuts, as I’m flying to Minneapolis at the crack of dawn, hitting the ground running (or rather the ice, slipping) to photograph “Being Branded”  for Deneane Richburg. I’m very much looking forward to seeing her work, but the last time that I photographed for her, a little wipeout in the ice rink resulted in a very swollen elbow for six months or so, so the goal is to not break anything while shooting.

Sadly I won’t get to hang out in Minneapolis, because I’m flying back at the crack of dawn on Thursday in order to be back in time to shoot ‘Small Metal Objects‘ – hopefully the forecasted rain won’t be too much of a problem.

Then I get a little bit of breathing room again, although not really, because I’ve got this big exciting secret project in the works… but it’s got to stay on the down-low for a little bit longer, so stay tuned, OK?
(If you’re not on the mailing list, you can sign up here for updates)

Dates worth noting:

• September 20, 7pm – Photographic Memory – Film program at International House, featuring John Pettit’s documentary about my archive among other things…
• October 10 & 11, 12pm-6pm – Philadelphia Open Studio Tours – I’ll only be there on saturday, as I’ve got to bop down to VA  to shoot another friend’s wedding on sunday – but some friends will be holding down the fort. But come saturday if you can, I’d love to have you over.
• October 15, 6pm – Tribute to Change – Bread and Roses Community Fund celebration featuring two of my prints.
• October 17 – House of Cars – Innovation and the Parking Garage opens at the National Building Museum in Washington, DC. Keep an eye out for one of my images from Kate Watson-Wallace’s CAR somewhere in there…
• Nov 4th – last night to see my prints at The White Dog (or go tomorrow…)
• November 13, 7pm – house concert featuring Pezzetino and other special guests TBA.

JJ’s random photo tip of the day: Why to use Manual Exposure mode

The two images to the right were taken split seconds apart,
by a camera set to Aperture-Priority mode.

The lighting did not change between the two frames,
and yet the second frame is over-exposed.

This isn’t a case of the sun coming out from behind the clouds and making the second frame overexposed.

The only thing that changed is that I walked a little bit more into the frame.

The second frame is overexposed because the dark shadow of my shirt taking over more of the frame threw off the exposure. The camera saw the patch of dark, thought that it was *too* dark and so let in more light to compensate, thus creating an image that is actually *too* bright.

Automatic modes are just fine if you want to make average pictures in average situations. They are easily fooled though, because they assume that your subject is evenly lit, and of average values.

If you want to make above-average images in non-average circumstances,
you’ll need to learn to work with manual exposure.

No matter how sophisticated the camera’s metering system may be, you are still a whole lot smarter than it is. The learning curve is a little bit steeper, but in the long run you’ll get better exposed photographs.

Remember, the light is never too bright, or too dark for a picture.
It’s simply that your photo may be over or under exposed,
and you might not yet be thinking about how the light works
in your particular composition.

Happy shooting!
-jj

PS these images are from JJ’s Magic Photo Booth at the 2009 Roots Picnic on Penn’s Landing in Philadelphia. See an animation of the making-of by clicking here, or to see the final images, click here.

PPS Bring me in for a workshop: www.jjtiziou.net/teaching

To the left, you’ll see some of the crew that are involved with Lear deBessonet’s Quixote, which opened this week at Broad Street Ministry. I photographed one of their dress rehearsals last week, and was rather blown away. The performance, the music, and the cast of wonderful people involved with it is really impressive. 

The first week is entirely sold out, so hurry up and get your tickets.
Trust me. 

The show combines professional actors from New York with members of a community cast.

Some are local businessfolk, some are homeless, and some are students from nearby universities… and honestly, you wouldn’t know who’s who and that’s kind of the point…

They’re all beautiful!

The people at Broad Street Ministry are doing great things to empower some of our most vulnerable populations. This is exactly what we need more of, and this is also why the No Casino In The Heart Of Our City Coalition is so important. 

As Rev. Ellis Washington, head of the Black Clergy of Philadelphia, said most eloquently:

“We do not build a healthy economy or a balanced budget by increasing levels of poverty and addiction among our citizens.” 

So, for the sake of our city, I hope that you’ll join Casino-Free Philadelphia on June 6th to Beat The House!

Tomorrow is also the beginning of the Hidden City Festival – maybe checking it out can help you remember how many real treasures Philadelphia has already… all the more reasons not to allow the predatory gambling industry into the heart of our city. 

 

 

Click here to view the individual images for prints and downloads

Or check out these animated recaps:

Pros:

• The new lightbox organization features will make it easier for you to choose your favorites.
• It will be much easier for you to order prints or download images directly via the website.
• Funds from archive print sales or downloads will help support my community work.
• While the unedited galleries won’t be publicly listed, they’ll be accessible, so if you want to get a print of that photo that I took at an event five years ago because you think that it might make a nice gift for someone, it’s now easily done.

Cons:

• Links to old galleries will no longer work, and you’ll have to contact me to find the new locations of those older series of images. This is an unfortunate side effect of the transition.
• It won’t be quite as easy for people to download my images and benefit from them them without contributing to the costs involved. 

I’m excited about using this new infrastructure, both because it will make it so much easier for viewers to interact with my archive, and because it may help me build more of a community-supported model for my work.

In the past, the internet has allowed me to easily share my work with my community, but it wasn’t as effective in helping distribute the costs. I would simply share my unedited galleries with the world, hoping that people who appreciated the images would contribute to their creation, much like I throw a few dollars in the tip jar for my local musicians.

Unfortunately, most people expect everything on the internet to be free, especially since digital has made photography practically free and instant for the average consumer. As the years have gone by, my community work has consumed more and more of my overhead. (If half the people using my photos in their facebook profiles contributed $5/month, that would probably cover the archiving costs of my personal projects, but unfortunately it’s been hard to convey that idea to people who don’t understand the significantly greater costs (both in equipment and in time) associated with making one’s living through photography and administering a million photo archive.

While of course it’s still the commercial work that primarily pays the bills, there’s a limit as to how much work I can do in for my community without funding.

I hope that facilitating online print sales will enable the audience that values my photographs and activities to take a more active role in supporting them… and get some nice prints in the process!

Many thanks for your continued support,

-jj

PS Tthere’s still an easy direct way to support my work via PayPal, either as one time donations, or as small repeating contributions.
Check out the support section.

This Saturday, as part of Nichole Canuso Dance Company’s 1st Annual Benefit Cabaret, I’ll be running a little photographic operation that I’d love you to be a part of. I’ll setup the photo booth, but we’ll need you to help make the magic happen. The event at Johnny Brenda’s will be hosted by Emmanuelle Delpech-Ramey and Jeb Kreager, with special performances by Headlong Dance Theater, Martha Graham Cracker, Rainpan 43, Charlotte Ford and more. Come join in the fun!

For another opportunity to come out and be photographed, please come out to Casino-Free Philadelphia’s West Philadelphia Town Hall Meeting on Casinos on May 21st where I’ll be running another special photo booth, with slightly higher production values than our last improvised one. More important than the pictures of course is the future direction and sustainability of our fair city, which is why I want you to come out, learn, and get involved. 

In other news, I’m continuing my zigzags back and forth to Washington DC – this week I’ll be presenting on an alumni panel at Washington International School. I’m continuing to seek out more contacts in DC in an effort to expand my work in the district, as I’m making an effort to spend more time with my father down there. My exhibit there is up through the end of May, so please encourage your friends in the DC area to check it out.

 Just got back from setting up the exhibit in DC, and tonight I’ll be presenting at the University of Pennsylvania as part of ASAP ( Artist Speakers At Penn ) – info here

The very next night, I’ll be doing another presentation at Penn, this time as part of Talk20 - 

In other education-related news, I just did a really fun shoot for the Philadelphia Cross City Campaign for School Reform. Check out the recap below-