The time was January 1, 2014. The place was the south of Brazil. Curitiba-based photographer Constance Pinheiro was enjoying the first day of the new year, photographing people crowded onto a sunny beach. "Suddenly I noticed a dark cloud far on the horizon. As always, I was carrying my camera with me, and I started to take pictures of it in different viewpoints and … Read the full Story >>
In 2014, the world marked the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I. In Chile, the Museo Historico Nacional and the Instituto de Geografia of the Universidad Catolica de Chile staged an exhibition focused on the Great War and its impact on the country. Patricio Arriagada, the curator of the exhibition, commissioned Chilean illustrator Fabian Todorovic Karmelic to create four posters. "The … Read the full Story >>
A reminder that the winners of the Latin American Fotografia V competition have been announced and are now available to view online. Among the 61 artists whose work was selected and chosen for the competition: Juan Carlos, Annick Donkers; Patricia Ackerman; Susan Bank; Sebastian Castenda; Ari Barnett Barnett; Kirsten Schmitt; Geralyn Shuckwit; Rafael Roncato and Joe Reynolds. Congratulations to all! We look forward to profiling the winners in DFLA. Read the full Story >>
One of the nominees for the 2016 Alfred Fried Photography award, Peter Bauza, is also a winner of the Latin American Fotografia competition. A German photographer who moved to Brazil several years ago, Bauza was nominated for his series “Copacabana Palace,” which looks at life among squatters in a neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro. “Despite immense anti-poverty policies that largely benefit the working class, millions of people are still homeless or are living simply in grossly inadequate housing,” Bauza notes. Read the full Story >>
Whitman White fell in love with San Miguel de Allende long ago. White, a travel photographer based in Venice Beach, California, first traveled to the colonial-era city in Mexico in 1989. Since then, his parents moved there and he himself has bought a house in the city. "I would go down there to hide out and shoot often," he says. His series "A la … Read the full Story >>
Paulo Mittelman is a clinical psychologist. But he is also a Rio de Janeiro-based photographer. "These two activities are inextricably linked in me," he says. "The human being in all its diversities and internal dialogues, beyond the projections of unconscious elements in the perception of the world around us, is what I try to express in my photographic work." Mittelman was named a winner … Read the full Story >>
"To me, to be a photographer is about painting with the light," says Fer Quirarte. The Mexican multi-disciplinary artist was named a winner of the Latin American Fotografia 4 competition for his image "Lay in the Sun," which captured a glimpse of Mexico's colors, textures, and contrasts, as well as the mysticism of Mexican culture. While visiting Chapala, Mexico's largest freshwater lake, he saw … Read the full Story >>
Moments of crisis can give rise to a new birth. Chilean illustrator Javiera Reszczynski describes such transformation as "renacimiento forzoso," or "forced renaissance." That term is also the title of one of her memorable personal projects, a winner of the Latin American Ilustracion 4 competition. "I felt inspired by the idea of violent changes around me, in all levels," she says. The work hints … Read the full Story >>
For Lynn Savarese, photographing water is a passion. And in early 2015 she was able to indulge that passion during a three-day trip to the mighty Iguazu Falls on the Argentine/Brazil border. The New York-based fine-art photographer had just wrapped up a photo trip to Buenos Aires and decided to investigate the tumultuous site. The experience, she says, "was cathartic." One of her images … Read the full Story >>
"I like my images to talk about ecological topics," says Buenos Aires, Argentina-based illustrator Vero Escalante. In 2014, Escalante was commissioned to create a cover illustration for an art festival featuring themes of nature and mankind's place in it. "What I did, was to create a magical, imaginary world, where vegetation was exuberant and where there is this person about to make a healthy … Read the full Story >>
When it doubt, experiment! You never know what will happen. In 2014, Maria Paula Weinreich, a design student and avid photographer based in Bogota, Colombia, was visiting a friend when she felt the urge to try something new with her camera, a Nikon D3000. Her friend had an audio amplifier, so together they got paints of various colors, turned up the bass, and created … Read the full Story >>
Peter Ra is currently based in Melbourne, Australia, but he got his start in art while employed as a shipbuilder in his native Glasgow, Scotland: A welder, he marveled at the shapes of the colossal steel fabrications he worked on, a fascination that led him to art school. He describes his work now as "a fusion of myths, legends, icons, archetypes, surrealism, and Jungian … Read the full Story >>
Eleven Madison Park is a chic restaurant in New York City's Flatiron District. The New York Times noted that chef Daniel Humm turned heads in 2012 after introducing a four-hour tasting menu. When Travel+Leisure Mexico decided to feature the restaurant in its pages, the magazine assigned Vanessa Rojo de la Vega, a New York-based and Mexico City-born photographer, to shoot the pictures for the … Read the full Story >>
As we noted earlier, entries are now being accepted for the Latin American Fotografia 5 and Latin American Ilustracion 5 competitions. You can view previous winners at the LAF archive and the LAI archive. Winners are also featured weekly here at DFLA. (Please see below for this week's profile of Brazil-based photographer Renata Duarte.) The deadline for submitting work is June 3. Meanwhile, the six jurors for LAF 5 and the six jurors who will be judging LAI 5 entries have have been announced; hit the jump to meet them all. Take part in this global exchange of art and ideas! Read the full Story >>
Ushuaia, a resort town on Argentina's Tierra del Fuego archipelago, at the southernmost tip of South America, has been nicknamed the "End of the World." It is a windy place, surrounded by the Martial Mountains and the Beagle Channel, and the embarkation point for Antarctic cruise ships. It was in this region that Sao Paulo, Brazil-based photographer Renate Duarte shot her Latin American Fotografia … Read the full Story >>
In 2014, Abraham Balcazar was among seven artists invited to contribute illustrations for the book "Cuentos Populares Mexicanos," a compilation of popular short stories based on traditional oral tales from various regions of Mexico. Balcazar's illustration brought to life a tale about a man who is attacked by a tiger, only to discover later that the animal is his own wife - a woman … Read the full Story >>
Is it possible to wage a war against war? In 2015, Mexico City-based photographer Javier Medellin Puyou created an illustration based on that theme as part of the Italian Poster Biennial competition. "I don't really consider myself a proper cartel/poster maker; this was really an 'exercise,' says Medellin. His conceptual poster, featuring a warplane dropping a payload of doves rather than bombs, was named … Read the full Story >>
Lianne Milton’s work has been featured a number of times at DFLA. An American photojournalist now based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Milton has worked all across Latin America. She is a past winner of the Latin American Fotografia competition and her work has been featured in the LAF “Los Diez" traveling exhibition sponsored by Epson. She is also a member of Panos Pictures. Go here to read a 2014 DFLA profile of Milton and her project “La Vida No Vale Nada,” about violence in Guatemala. Read the full Story >>
In February 2015, a 14-year-old boy was shot dead by police at an anti-government protest in the western Venezuelan city of San Cristobal, setting off weeks of chaos in the region. "Hundreds of students entrenched themselves in the University of Los Andes for nearly a month to demand justice," notes Venezuelan photographer Adriana Loureiro Fernndez. Loureiro traveled to San Cristobal from Caracas to document … Read the full Story >>
Francisco Valle is a skull artist. It's an unusual job description, but entirely accurate: Valle, a Brazilian illustrator, creates skull designs that end up on a number of products - everything from tee shirts to smartphone covers, as well as fine-art prints featuring both highly decorated skulls and abstract work. His advertising work, meanwhile, has been shortlisted for a Cannes Lion prize. Valle's illustration … Read the full Story >>
