The Avantgarb{age} series, which started here on this blog as the Trash Fashion series with Argentine designer Aidana Baldassarre now has its own web space, Avantegarb{age}
We’ve finished shooting, finished processing (sort-of) and we’ve even put together a small sample book to ship around. Most importantly, we’ve started contacting publishers. I approach this stage with the blissful ignorance of one avoiding the reality of book publishing and jumping in despite the sharks in the water.
The mantra: What does it hurt to try? Which translates we’ll be sending out proposals, even without that golden personal contact inside the organization.
So, well that sort of brings me to a request. If you like the work (or not) and have a contact inside a publishing company, we’d be grateful for the information. You can email me directly at cate (at) cateincba (dot) com.
I thought I was done with Sumo for awhile when the opportunity came up to photograph a different type of Sumo wrestling. It is called Sumo Okinawense. Each participant wears a red or white cloth belt. The grab each others belt and do not let go as each wrestles to get the back of their opponent on the ground. It made for some good faces and good photos.
This past Saturday, October 17, 2009, the 14th South American Sumo Tournament and the 2nd Feminine Sumo Tournament, was held in Buenos Aires, Argetina. Among the participants were wrestlers from Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brasil and Argentina.
I photographed the event for Sumo Amateur Argentino and posted the photos to Flickr. Personally, I used the event to take a series of portraits, along the style of the previous Los Pibes project. Those will be uploaded in the next few days.
So, in no particular order… Enjoy the action.
(click an image to see it larger and then you’ll be able to scroll through the images by clicking the arrow below each)
It begins with a crack in the formidable Patagonian glacier. A fissure appears as the ice shifts, slides, moves onward. Exposed beneath the white surface is the cool blue of ice, compressed over the years. Newly exposed, beaten by the sun, it begins to melt, the fissure widens, deepens. It happens quickly, without warning, no map, no way to know where to see such beauty. We walk the ice, trek the seracs looking for the birth of blue.
But, will we miss it?
The blue fades, retreats, pulls back from humanity. Its beauty lost to the generations that come. Photographs remind us, but we can not touch the ice, feel the cool blueness, run out hands over the rough, wind pocketed outer-surface or slide between the icy peaks. The intricate beauty of abstract forms, of cracks in the ice, of water so cool, so clear, so pure, gone. Restricted to two-dimensional paper, bits and bytes of the computer. A grandness reduced to numbers, reduced to being filed away and a faded memory.
but, will we miss it?
Water escapes us, we thirst. The glaciers that supplied our water and our lives are gone. Melted. Less snow, more heat, no accumulation, no rebirth. The fissure widens, deepens. But it is not the birth of blue that arrives. It is the death of the glacier. One crack at a time. It is the death of us. One drop of water at a time. Melting.
Yes. We will miss it.
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The point and purpose of Blog Action Day 2009 is to bring awareness to climate change. With over 7,000 bloggers registered, the electric ether seeks to correct our ignorance and obstinacy. To keep us from ignoring the signs, from losing such integral parts of our planet as a glacier.
We will miss it.
When the glaciers are gone, we will miss them. For their beauty, for their water, for their climate control.
So what can we do before we miss it, before we miss our opportunity? December 7th, 2009 in Copenhagen many in the world, including some of our leaders will gather for the United Nations Climate Change Conference where they will be negotiating to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This is our opportunity.
Tell them we will miss it. The glacier. The water. The beauty.
I have no head for numbers. I see blue fields of ice, not the rate of retraction. I see awesome peaks of accumulated snow, not the decrease in precipitation. But after touching it and trekking it, I know I’ll miss it. But if you want the maps and percentages and the stuff that should give us all nightmares, download the Greenpeace Argentina report, Futuro Negro para los Glaciares(obviously written in Spanish).
And don’t miss it.
Below are a small selection of images I’ve taken throughout Patagonia. If just to remind you of the beauty we’d all miss.
Osvaldo Ortega, 80 and his wife Celia Liano, 80 dance inside the Uruguay subte station.
Among the sounds of screeching train brakes and horns inside the Buenos Aires subte this past Sunday, was melodious jazz, rockin’ blues and plenty of applause. In the yearly Festival de Jazz, September 20, 2009 the Metrovias organized music in different subte stops, free of charge.
Some came with mate, some rode the subte from one concert to the next and others danced to sweet memories surrounded by metal and flourescent lights.
For me it was five hours of riding the subte, mostly the B-line, so I could make it from one concert to the next quickly. The finale, Deborah Dixon at the J. Hernandez stop on the D-line was overfull and I pulled out my camera, pushed politely through the crowd and caught the last song and a half.
Twenty groups participated, playing along the B, D, A, and E lines. The music ranged from jazz vocals, jazz trios, blue-grass to a little swing.
So despite the wonderful spring afternoon, I spent my Sunday underground having one of the best musical experiences in Buenos Aires.
I have a Youtube video made from the new Soundslides conversion below. Yeah. Tell me what you think, feel or see.
(I recommend you hit play and immediately hit pause. Let the red bar load and then hit play again. This will give you better sound flow.)
Note Cards now available. Four scenes of Buenos Aires at Night
Note cards now available. These cards were made with four images from the Buenos Aires at Night series. They are glossy, high quality prints on the front, blank inside and bearing my logo and description on the back. At this time, I am only selling these from Buenos Aires. Shipping not included in the price.
4 pack with 2 silver and 2 black envelopes = $20 pesos (or USD $5.25)
I intend to seek out stores in Buenos Aires to host the cards and from which to sell, but at this time I wanted them to be up on my blog at least. Let me know if you’re interested and as always, if you have interest in a photo, I am now printing C-prints out of Los Angeles and giclees (ie, canvas, etc.) out of Colorado for stateside orders (so, shipping cost will not be from Argentina).
And if you don’t buy from me, buy from someone else.
It has been awhile since I posted one in this series. Interesting things to see perhaps. Random photos I’ve taken at random times in random ways. Nothing but a view. A different point of view on a different day.
