Brent Stirton: "I was a terrible photographer, but I'd like to think I got better" (Interview in English)
Brent Stirton zählt zu den renommiertesten Fotojournalisten weltweit – und wurde für seine beeindruckende Arbeit bis dato allein 13 Mal mit dem "World Press Photo Award" ausgezeichnet.
04.02.2024 60 min
Zusammenfassung & Show Notes
Brent Stirton zählt zu den renommiertesten Fotojournalisten weltweit – und wurde für seine beeindruckende Arbeit bis dato allein 13 Mal mit dem "World Press Photo Award" ausgezeichnet. Doch der Weg dahin war lang – und keinesfalls geradlinig.
Wie er es geschafft hat, einer der besten visuellen Geschichtenerzähler der Welt zu werden, verrät Brent Stirton in diesem Interview, das ich letztes Jahr zusammen mit Pia Parolin im Rahmen der Medientage von Europas größtem Fotofestival „La Gacilly - Baden Photo“ geführt habe.
Seit ich den Podcast Ende 2016 gestartet habe, sind mehr als 380 Folgen erschienen. Im Laufe der Zeit hatte ich das Privileg, mit vielen fantastischen Fotografen:innen zu sprechen - aber das Gespräch mit Brent sticht heraus.
Wie er es geschafft hat, einer der besten visuellen Geschichtenerzähler der Welt zu werden, verrät Brent Stirton in diesem Interview, das ich letztes Jahr zusammen mit Pia Parolin im Rahmen der Medientage von Europas größtem Fotofestival „La Gacilly - Baden Photo“ geführt habe.
Seit ich den Podcast Ende 2016 gestartet habe, sind mehr als 380 Folgen erschienen. Im Laufe der Zeit hatte ich das Privileg, mit vielen fantastischen Fotografen:innen zu sprechen - aber das Gespräch mit Brent sticht heraus.
Brent Stirton. Dieser Name ist untrennbar verbunden mit einer leidenschaftlichen Hingabe an die Fotografie und die drängendsten Fragen unserer Zeit.
Mit zahlreichen Auszeichnungen und Veröffentlichungen in renommierten Magazinen wie National Geographic hat Brent nicht nur die Welt bereist, sondern sie auch ein wenig verändert. Seine die Themenpalette seiner Arbeit reicht von Umweltschutz bis zu Menschenrechten.
In diesem Interview erzählt Brent von seiner faszinierenden Reise durch die Welt der Fotografie. Er verrät, was ihn antreibt, welche Herausforderungen er auf seinen Reisen meistern muss und wie er es schafft, mit seinen Bildern zu berühren und tiefe Botschaften zu vermitteln.
Mit zahlreichen Auszeichnungen und Veröffentlichungen in renommierten Magazinen wie National Geographic hat Brent nicht nur die Welt bereist, sondern sie auch ein wenig verändert. Seine die Themenpalette seiner Arbeit reicht von Umweltschutz bis zu Menschenrechten.
In diesem Interview erzählt Brent von seiner faszinierenden Reise durch die Welt der Fotografie. Er verrät, was ihn antreibt, welche Herausforderungen er auf seinen Reisen meistern muss und wie er es schafft, mit seinen Bildern zu berühren und tiefe Botschaften zu vermitteln.
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// Werbung //
Mit neuem Konzept ist der GATE7-Podcast nun der Podcast der interaktiven Lernplattform “Abenteuer Reportagefotografie”. Hier dreht sich alles um visuelles Storytelling in der Street- und Reportagefotografie.
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Es erwarten dich:
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Transkript
Look, I was lucky, you know. I knew what I wanted to do earlier in my life, and that's a blessing.
I mean, if you have that, that's a great luxury.
You know, you can be very focused from a young age and not distracted,
and I was lucky to have that.
Music.
I was a terrible photographer, but you know, I'd like to think I got better.
Yes, he was a terrible photographer in the beginning, says Brent Sturton.
Meanwhile, the South African is one of the most renowned and influential photojournalists
in the world and has been awarded 13 times at the World Press Photo Award for
his impressive work, among other things.
How he managed to become one of the best visual storytellers in the world, zu werden,
das verrät Brent Sturton in diesem Interview, das ich im vergangenen Jahr zusammen
mit Pia Parolin im Rahmen der Medientage von Europas größtem Fotofestival Lagasili
Baden Foto geführt habe.
Und damit herzlich willkommen zu einer weiteren Folge des Gate7 Podcasts und
zu einer ganz besonderen, seit ich den Podcast Ende 2016 gestartet habe,
sind mehr als 380 Folgen erschienen und im Laufe dieser Zeit hatte ich das Privileg,
mit vielen fantastischen Fotografen und Fotografen zu sprechen,
aber das Gespräch mit Brent Sturton sticht sicherlich heraus.
Brent Sturton, dieser Name ist untrennbar verbunden mit einer leidenschaftlichen
Hingabe zur Fotografie und den drängendsten Fragen unserer Zeit.
Mit zahlreichen Auszeichnungen und Veröffentlichungen in renommierten Magazinen
wie National Geographic hat Brent Sturton nicht nur die Welt bereist,
sondern sie auch ein wenig verändert.
In seiner Arbeit beschäftigt sich Brent Sturton mit einer breiten Palette an
Themen von Umweltschutz bis zu Menschenrechten.
In this interview, he tells about his fascinating journey through the world
of photography, he tells what drives him, what challenges he has to face on
his travels and how he manages to touch with his pictures and convey profound messages.
Before we start the interview, a short note on my own.
Under the motto Post from Buenos Aires, I report live on Zoom what I am currently
experiencing in my second home, Argentina, Thank you very much.
Ja, vielen Dank an dieser Stelle auch an Thomas Jones für den Crashkurs im Videoschnitt.
Den Link zu meinem neuen YouTube-Kanal findest du in den Shownotes zu dieser Episode.
Geh dazu einfach in die Podcast-App, mit der du diese Episode hörst.
Oder such einfach direkt auf YouTube nach meinem Namen Kai Beermann.
Den Link zum Zoom-Meeting am 20.
Februar findest du ebenfalls in den Shownotes oder im Terminkalender unseres
begleitenden Projekts Abenteuer Reportage Fotografie. So, und jetzt geht's los
mit dem Gespräch mit Brent Sturton. Viel Spaß!
Hello, Brandt. Thank you very much for taking the time to sit down for this interview.
Sure, no problem. Thanks for having me here. We are also sitting here with Pia
Powerlin, who is also taking part in the interview.
So we have a nice little group here to talk.
Thank you very much also for being here, Pia. Thank you very much for letting me be part of this.
Brandt, last night you were on a panel discussion talking about your work.
And we saw the images that made you the photographer that you are today,
one of the most award-winning and most relevant photojournalists these days.
What I'm interested to know is how you got there, your journey to become this
kind of photographer that you are today.
So you were born in South Africa, and in the beginning, there were no clear
signs that you were going to become a photographer. There were some other career plans.
Yeah, sure. I, you know, I had always, you know, aspired to be a doctor growing up.
I was always interested in during the medical profession.
My father's father was a surgeon and a guy who specialized in conflict medicine.
And that was very interesting for me.
So I had always imagined going down that
road but we had a conscription
in South Africa at the time we were fighting wars in
Angola and Mozambique and we were
caught up in geopolitics at the time so I was involved in part of that and as
a result for the first time I was working with black guys I was living in apartheid
South Africa and living in a segregated society.
And the military experience really helped me to...
Understand the common humanity between the two of us and to make real brothers in that experience.
So I came out of my military experience wanting to report on anti-apartheid issues.
And because of the context that I had, I was able to work in the townships,
speak the language and report on what was going on in my country. And this was 1993.
So there was a great deal of factional violence. It was the time of necklacings,
kangaroo courts, ultraviolence in the pursuit of political ambitions.
So, you know, for me, I started, I was writing at this point,
studying journalism while I was writing. I was working for Reuters.
I was working for Gamma. And they said to me, look, can you find a photographer to work with?
And I couldn't find a photographer. photographer because i was i was working
at the coast um at a place which is the heartland of the zulu people who yeah
i think it's fair to say were the most warlike of the groups in the country
at the time so there was a lot of violence um there were also third force activities etc etc so,
yeah you know most of the photographers most of the foreign press were in johannesburg
working out of there whereas i was working at the coast yeah um and it was less
covered but less coverage.
So I couldn't find a photographer, so I bought a second-hand camera.
A canon a1 with a squeaky shutter and um yeah you know for the next couple of years,
um it was just really a matter of being in the right place at the right time
because a lot of things were happening yeah and then we
had the democratic elections in south africa and we
had a massive influx of foreign press so i
met a lot of people and because i had contacts in
the townships and you know i knew the coast um
you know i met people yeah and um you know then we had the iranian genocide
we had the fall of the drc we had the famines in somalia we had five very tumultuous
years of african journalism you know um and i was a terrible photographer.
Um you know i i yeah i mean
i don't really even have a lot of pictures from that time but you
know I'd like to think I got better but that's
how I started well that's in a way comforting that you
say that you actually took some bad pictures but I still
take plenty of bad pictures yeah no this is a
this is this life is a work in progress yeah
yeah yeah but very fascinating
journey that you were first surrounded by
all these topics that you are covering now as well
you were immersed in these topics and then later on you
found your way your tool to tell the
stories which is the camera uh these days
and uh and lots of um yeah coincidences along on the way it was not like a straight
road to where you're right now look i was lucky you know um i knew what i wanted
to do early in my life and that's a blessing yeah i mean if you uh if you have
that, that's a great luxury.
You know, you can be very focused from a young age and not distracted.
And I was lucky to have that.
What was it then that uh raised the the bar or the quality of your images how
did you uh evolve as a photographer was it uh learning on the job learning by
doing or did you have mentors along the way that taught you like what's important
to take a good uh news photo.
Look the thing is you know i grew up at a time you know i'm i've been doing
this job for nearly nearly 30 years, so that's pre-internet, you know.
And I was working in places where you didn't have a lot of contact with other
photographers, but during the elections,
the 1994 elections, I met James Nachtwey, and he's been the most influential
photographer for me, unquestionably.
And I think across our profession, probably the most influential photojournalist, you know.
Know um so his ethics uh his framing his combinations of like potent communication
combined with great aesthetics that's that was very interesting for me you know um.
Yeah so you know as i said this this career is is always work in progress you
know you're always trying to get better yeah you mentioned that you were lucky
you said that in your talk yesterday I don't really believe in luck.
In a way, you need a good coincidence,
but I think it's more about determination and you have a certain goal,
even if you don't know exactly where that is, and then something pops up and
you can grab or recognize the situation and use it for yourself.
Self so sure i mean i think you have to
be able to recognize opportunity but you are lucky to have a singular vision
you know to be able to be that focused and know okay this is this is where i
want to go without distraction and that's that's definitely what happened for
me um as far as um you know as far as um.
You know, maximizing opportunity in this job. There's a couple of ways to do this.
You're either a news person and you work through the news cycle,
or you're a long-term photojournalist and you work on long-term projects.
And, you know, ideally you survive through grants, et cetera,
or you are a features assignment person. And I am a features assignment person.
So I've, I never really worked for newspapers. I worked for magazines.
So I never worked in a singular image environment. It was always essays.
So I've always been interested in causality, cause and effect.
Why is this happening? What are the consequences? What are the A to Z of this issue?
That's how I prefer to work. I'm as interested in understanding this issue for
myself as I am in being able to communicate that to a wider audience.
And how much of a new project
that you start is already ready in your head and and how much is then just spontaneously
taking a new direction everything is interconnected everything you know none
of the stuff exists in isolation you know so for me um it's trying to make those connections You know,
so if I'm looking at, you know, conservation issues, for example,
I see that as a web, you know, so right now I'm involved in looking at how fundamentalist
Islam is affecting conservation across Africa.
And that's very challenging because of access. It's very difficult to work in
those areas and to be safe and also to make effective images.
Images, but you can understand how a project like that is multidimensional,
but I'm really attracted to that kind of work. I'm attracted to complex themes.
I'm as interested in talking to think tanks, in talking to scientists as I am
in talking to journalists, in talking to my editors, et cetera.
There's so much involved. It's not just the taking on the picture,
but all the research that goes into it. The taking of the picture is the easy part.
Honestly, by the time that, my job is 90% research and 10% photography.
But that needs to happen quickly, because you also need to make a living.
So you need to develop the means by which to think quickly and to arrive at
indisputable conclusions quickly. quickly, and then manifest those into photographic situations.
Yeah, you just mentioned access, and I was thinking this yesterday when you
showed your two almost iconic photos that I had seen a lot of times before of
these women who were really badly injured,
and I asked myself, how does someone like you get access to a woman like that?
You know what I mean? A man, a white man, and these women and their religion
and their family context,
that must must be so such a long work that you have
to do before doing this you know it's funny because
there's always this this supposed idea that that
we don't have access to those things but i've had
a lot of access to that stuff you know and i think that you can um you know
you can speak honestly to people about what your motivations are you can try
to be patient um but it's the presentation of your reasoning is the presentation
of your motivation that affects your access success.
Um, so for me, um, it's really just been a matter of trying to be very open
about why do I want to photograph you?
Um, and then understanding that a lot of the people that you want to photograph
in that situation, they want their story to be told.
They, they don't want the suffering to go unnoticed really for want of a lesser cliche.
So, um, I always feel, um, a real sense of responsibility to do that in a way
that has some dignity and which conveys the fact that this person matters.
And I think that when I talk to these people in those situations,
they get that. They understand that.
There's so much about human communication that isn't about how you speak.
It's about your demeanor. It's about what they sense about you.
And there's also Also, great misconception about the sophistication of human
beings around the world.
Just because you are a farmer doesn't mean that you are not a smart and cognitive
person who is completely capable of processing the motivations of another human
being and deciding for yourself whether that is something you value or not.
So I go into those situations very, you know, I'd like to think that I'm respectful.
I'd like to think that I'm having an open conversation with another human being
who sees the human being in me.
Um, and we arrive at a situation which either works for you or it doesn't.
And a lot of people say no, you know, I've, I've had lots of situations where
it didn't work and that's fine.
That's fine. Um, I'm comfortable with, with people saying no to being photographed.
That's absolutely fine. I mean, I'm, I'm actually working on something at the
moment, which is really challenging.
I'm working on, you know, people from the LGBTQIA communities that have been
forced into hiding in Africa.
And that's a whole other ballgame because you're dealing with people who are
speaking about themselves in ways that are new for me.
So I have to develop new sensitivities to that. And that's challenging because I'm a 54-year-old guy.
And I don't speak that language. But what they see is that I'm open to learning
how to communicate with them.
And I might not be getting it right, but my intention is clear.
And I think that's the key. So I'm wide open.
So for the most part, people see that. And that's where your access lies.
A question that still arises in my head is uh
if someone says no how long would
you still try to stay on it in a sense that
not not trying to manipulate the people but
i often experience that people try to be nice and show me the nice part of their
life and i really have to go on asking questions to get deeper and deeper so
they won't just tell the story right away and they maybe Maybe forms something
like a safe wall around and you have to go through this wall.
And where do you stop and where do you go through?
Look, a lot of that comes down to the research you've done ahead of time in
terms of knowing the truth of the situation that you're entering into.
Okay, so if you come into that situation knowing the facts, people are often
surprised that you know those facts and it disarms them.
You know they go okay this person
actually really understands what's happening in my community or
with me um people are also perpetually
disappointed by journalists you know
because people you know and it's often well intentioned but people come in there
um and they peddle hope you understand they they are you know at the same time
it remains a truism that if you're not talking about what's happening to you,
then it will remain with you.
And I think it must be exhausting for Ukrainians, for example,
at the moment to deal with journalists.
It must be exhausting for the woman of Afghanistan to have to deal with yet
another journalist, et cetera. But there is.
I think people do understand that there is a need to keep talking about these things.
As far as getting to the truth of the matter, as far as people saying no to you, I accept that.
There is a level where you can see that this person is emphatic.
They're not being coy. They don't want to talk to you. They don't want to be
photographed by you. And that's fine.
There's a limit as to how much you can impinge on someone's dignity.
Look it's challenging because you have two situations you have
a dynamic one where people are winded or
they are you know in terrible circumstances or there's been a
natural disaster and you're photographing something evolving in
real time um i tend to end up in quieter situations than that most of the time
where it's it's a direct question it's like i'm in your space this has happened
to you will you show me what happened to you um and then it really comes down
into the purity of your intent and how they sense that.
I mean, that's it. That's all you have.
But like I say, I think that people can tell a lot from your demeanor.
And you can also, if you know you're going to go into those situations,
to take examples of work you've done before is not a bad idea.
And also when I'm in communities where maybe I'm working in West Papua,
or I'm working in Borneo, or I'm working in places where, okay,
they don't see National Geographic, or they don't see GEO, or they don't see Stern. So take it with.
And explain the concept of Western media and take the time to do that and explain,
look, this is the readership. This is what it means.
So if I photograph you, you will be seen by this many people.
And I can't guarantee that it's going to change anything for you,
but it is an effort at communicating what's happening.
So I just talk gently and patiently to people like that.
And most of the time, 70% of the time, and people allow me to photograph them.
But I don't do that casually. There's some responsibility to that. Yeah.
How attached do you get to the people you photograph and to their stories?
Because as you said, you really take time to understand their situation.
You do a lot of investigation, and you see lots of things. You see people in
crisis, very vulnerable. the world.
What does it do with you? The key to working in this profession long-term is
building those relationships so that, you know, our jobs are cyclical.
You're going to go back to certain places time and time again.
So being able to go back into communities where you've been before and have
that community go, oh, okay, we know you.
You didn't screw us before. You told the truth about what's happening.
Maybe it changed something. Maybe it didn't. Most of the time it It won't,
but we appreciate the consistency of your intent, okay?
That's all you have, you know? But what I will also say is that we live in a social media world now.
So when we make impactful pictures, they tend to appear on social media in some
way, whether it's posting yourself, whether it's the magazine posting,
or whether it's someone, you know, sees an image of yours and posts it and comments,
et cetera, et cetera. That's the world we live in.
So um you know a
lot of the time that can be a positive it can lead to fundraising it lead to
that sort of thing but it can also lead to misinterpretation so you have to
be very clear in your own mind as to what your motivations were what you were doing um and um what your,
what that time was like with that other with that
person you know so that you can defend your motivations
and your reasons for being there but you
live in a time where you're not going to win all the people all the time that's
never going to happen um and i'm fine with that you know um at a certain point
you know you can build these relationships in these communities etc but you
also move on to the next story and people understand that yeah you know um.
Yeah. Look, it's not a perfect profession. It isn't. And I would be lying if
I said that there haven't been times where you feel that you've been exploitative, et cetera.
That's a natural part of working with people or communities or environments
where there's been suffering and it hasn't impacted you directly.
That's natural. Okay. but you are also making choices to be there and to try
to do that kind of work. I'm not a hedge fund manager.
The motivation of my life is not to make money, etc., etc.
So, as I say, it's not a perfect science.
Yesterday, the talk was about what kind of impact images can have these days.
And you gave some good examples where you talked about specific images that have had an impact.
Can you name like one or two examples of images that had a direct impact with
people like as a reaction that they raised awareness that made people donate
money and jump on a course?
Yeah, sure, sure. I mean, I've been lucky because I've had a few of those.
All right. So I did a story on the connection between ivory and terror groups.
I did a story on the connection between ivory and organized religion.
In both cases, those stories changed legislation in Congress in America.
So when it came to ivory and terror groups, there's an American director called
Kathryn Bigelow and she made an infomercial which painted Al-Shabaab as the
largest ivory poacher in the world.
Now, myself and my writing partner at the time, Brian Christie,
we looked at this and we knew that wasn't true.
So we decided, okay, well, who are the groups that really benefit from this?
And we identified five groups where we knew, okay, these guys definitely do this.
El Shabab makes their money from Saudi and from charcoal, you know, and some piracy.
That's how they make their financing. It's not from ivory, right?
That would be a side business at best.
Anyway, in the course of that story, we traced the path.
We put a tracker into a tusk, and we followed the movement all the way up to Joseph Coney's camps.
And we did various things where we could verify exactly who was doing what.
There was no bullshit. These are the facts.
And again, that was an example where when we tracked down the advisors to Catherine
Bigelow, they couldn't defend their position.
Um, so, you know, be careful because people will tell you something,
but you have a responsibility to research that yourself, you know?
Um, and in the course of that story, what,
what happened was that Hillary Clinton got involved, uh, the American Congress
and the Senate decided that they would, they would spend more money on anti-poaching,
um, because they recognized that it was an incredible intelligence gathering mechanism.
So, AFRICOM, the American military in Africa, began a closer relationship with
certain organizations as a monitoring tool, because they saw the connection.
So, that was helpful. helpful. On the previous story on ivory and organized religion,
the Pope and the Vatican changed their policies on ivory and how the manifestation
of religious idealism within the Catholic space.
They talked about the fact that that's not something that should continue using this substance.
A priest in the Philippines was excommunicated, and we exposed a guy who was
wanted for pedophilia in America who had escaped to the Philippines.
We also disrupted a number of online businesses that were using Facebook and
other things to move ivory.
Every um you know
sometimes it's small sometimes it's big
you know and sometimes you hear things but there's no way to verify that so
you know in 2007 i was um i made a photograph of a group of mountain gorillas
that had been killed and i was told by um by conservationists that i respect
that it raised a great deal of money.
But where that money went, I can't say.
Ultimately, that's not my job. My job is to make verifiable information available.
So that people can make up their own minds.
And ideally, you talk to the corridors of power and they use that for good.
That's the best we can hope for. Mm-hmm.
But these examples show that there is a clear impact that you make with your
images and that's something these days that sometimes is,
well, there's always a discussion like what kind of impacts do photos or does
photojournalism have these days with the amount of images,
the amount of information that's out there.
That uh but this is quite
hopeful to hear that uh yeah it actually if
you put in the work if you do the research and if you present
verifiable information and you do a good job then there is an impact well look
i think we see every day that's valuable i do i mean you know when you look
at the the impact of ai when you look at the uh the rise of fake media and the
way that that truth-telling is propagandized,
and you look at the way that that's become a popular phenomenon based on people like Trump,
et cetera, et cetera, I think we're entering an era of journalism where authenticity
is going to have to become a more guarantee-based phenomenon.
And so you see people like Adobe working on authenticity, authenticity,
working on being able to guarantee that this is not a manipulated situation.
You see companies like Getty and others taking on AI companies and that debate
escalating into a value system.
We need that. We need a system of ethical checks and balances now.
And so what I'm hoping is that we will see the emergence of standards that are transparent.
And what I hope I hope that brings us a greater value to our profession because
that's what's necessary now.
We need to be able to combat things by being seen to be above manipulation.
And that's the key to our profession going forward.
That's interesting to hear that you say that there is, or the media outlets that you work with,
they have this on their agenda to construct or to put in place value systems
and checks and balances to confront the challenges that come with AI.
Well, I mean, you know, it doesn't even have to be AI.
You know, if you look at the way Fox News is reported, if you look at the manipulation
of news by Breitbart, by other right-wing media, etc., just the exclusion of the truth,
just the evolving of cult of personality rather than reporting the facts.
If you look at the voting machine controversy with Fox News,
et cetera, guys, you know, if we don't do this, you're going to see civil war.
You will see civil conflict because you've confused the population to the point where they're angry.
You know, you've polarized the population to the point where reconciliation
and a mutual sense of forward progress is impossible.
If you paralyze society like that for your own gain, you'll see conflict.
So we absolutely have a responsibility to do that and I'd like to see,
you know, honestly, it would be great if we could evolve some sort of global
body where, you know, the leading papers, the leading magazines,
there's some sort of, you know, almost like platform of elders that represents
a standard and that that standard becomes an absolute.
Salute we're going to need that yeah you know because there's just too many
things that are you know designed to manipulate truth telling for their for their own agenda and.
You said an important sentence, information disarms the people.
And I wonder with all these subjects that you are approaching,
like conservation, women, even pedophilia, LGBTQ, Islamic problems, everything.
How do you find even the time to get all the information in depth?
Like, do you have a team working with you?
Look, I'm fortunate that I work with good journalists. you
know it's two brains and I work on multiple things but when I'm on the plane
going to that particular story that story is what I'm focused on I come off
that story then I move back into a space where I'm preparing multiple projects
but while I'm on the ground that is my focus.
Look the thing is we live in a time where information is accessible,
I can be sitting in the sedan and do a tree and I can do my research,
you know, as long as I have my, you know, some kind of satellite modem or whatever
it is, but that's more accessible,
and more affordable than it's ever been, you know.
So, you know, when you said, you know, information disarms people,
I think it also arms them, you know.
And my job is to, once again, create this verifiable source of information that
is in support of truth-telling.
You say you work with reporters as a team, that you take pictures and you have
a reporter that provides the text.
How does that work, or this teamwork, what does it look like? How does it work?
I mean, it's different here. Different reporters have different ways of working, et cetera.
But to a large extent, you're engaged in the same thing.
You want to understand the phenomenon and report on that phenomenon.
So there's a lot of discussion.
I mean, for me, I do my research and I compile a thesis.
Every time it looks like that. So I've been fortunate to do a lot of work for
National Geographic magazine, and they require a thesis.
Basis so you know you write a
proposal and that proposal goes before the society
and they they come back and there's a discussion you know um i'm also required
to talk about what i think the photographs will be what the budgets will be
so there's a lot of of thinking that goes into it before you go out the door
at the same time we're always wary of preconceived ideas so there is we We are
open to what we encounter,
but we try to assemble the best information we can before you go into the field.
And that's often the difference between working on features and working on news.
Working on news, you're responding to something in real time.
You're doing as much research as you can, but you're also learning in real time.
That's a different – that can be a different thing. But obviously, also,
you know, it's always interesting that like the New York Times,
on the second or third page, they always used to have a little section where
if there was a mistake in their reporting, they would say, we got this wrong.
And they put a correction. And I always admired that, you know,
because when you consider the immensity of that job, you know,
these guys have got to report all over the world in real time on an issue.
You they're doing the best that they can with very experienced people on
the ground um but occasionally they're going
to get something wrong it's it's almost impossible not
to but again it's a question of their intent you know they they went into the
situation as honestly and transparently as possible um they reported what they
thought to be the complete truth they then learned that okay we didn't get that
right or we didn't have we didn't include that particular piece but then then
they put it back in the paper.
Perfect. That's as good as it gets. You know, it's like, especially when you're
dealing with an evolving new situation, you know.
And honestly, it's the same for me in the sense of doing features.
You do the best research that you can, but you will always find that once you
get into the field that something might be not quite as you thought or we didn't
consider this, et cetera.
But as long as you report on that, then I see no issue.
And that's also where, you know, having two brains, having a guy or woman that's
with you who is, who is writing, um,
it informs your pictures. And sometimes my pictures inform their writing.
A lot of the time we don't work together. With geographic, the photographers
usually get a couple of weeks longer in the field than the writers because we
have to do our job in real time.
They can go back and ruminate and think about the issue.
They can access information online, on phone calls, Zoom, et cetera.
We can't do that. but yeah two brains
always better than one yeah exactly you said
that uh you you rather work in in multiple
images uh in essay in the essay form and not the single image what is the difference
i imagine like when you have a single image only there's a um other requirements
that have to go into the composing of the the image including the information
then and when you have more space to to tell a story.
It's a space issue. I mean, look, the guys working for the New York Times,
they're generally publishing a single image at a time, but they are also creating
essays, and you see them largely in the digital domain, okay?
But guys that are daily news photographers, usually it's a single image that makes it into the paper.
For me, a lot of the stuff I'm working on, it's wrong for me to say that it's
more complex because everything's complex.
But I generally have more space in which to talk about the story.
So that's a luxury, you know. But at the same time, you know,
your average magazine story is between 8 to 12 pages.
If it's geographic and you're really lucky, you might get 20.
But that includes the words.
So, yeah, man, it's, you know, space is always the most elusive thing,
you know, so you must make primary images that speak most conclusively to the
subject matter that you're dealing with.
Looking at your images, you have this combination between on the one side,
the aesthetics, the artistry, and the content, the narrative that go into your images.
Is um well most uh an example for
that like using um an out of
camera flash the the the portraits that you
do uh can you elaborate a little bit on on that on that technique and and why
you use it sure sure look um i've used lighting since two since the year 2000
you know so one i like the fact that it gives you a different look um because
so much of the issues that we cover, they're repetitive.
So if I can make something that looks a little different to what happened before,
then maybe I'll look at it for a little bit longer.
Secondly, I like the fact that it can give a little celebrity to the subject.
A lot of the people that I meet, they're deeply honorable people,
and I want to celebrate them.
So lighting is a way of doing that.
Thirdly, I'm often asked to do impossible jobs, like can you cover a country
in a week? can you cover a really complex issue in a week and one way of dealing
with that is to make documentary portraits in which I can try to,
Shoot something meaningful and some of the issue you will see in the person.
You know, that's another way of doing it.
I also spoke about the fact that I do do quite a lot of lighting where I simply
teach a local person how to hold the light on a pole.
And then I teach them, okay, if you stay five minutes from me and you stay at
this angle, no matter where I go, if you are at that angle to me, I can work.
And it's simply a way of creating photojournalism which, one,
I'm not influencing events, but I'm photographing it in a slightly different manner.
But all of that is designed to maintain your attention just for that much longer.
It's designed to maximize a situation where often I can't shoot in good light. I have no time.
I've got to get from this town or this village to this place.
That means I've got to drive 200 or 500 kilometers that day.
So, I must shoot you now at 12 o'clock in the worst possible light and it looks terrible.
So, how can I work with that to improve it? And so, lighting is one answer to those situations.
It's just a tool. Yeah.
And when it comes to constructing your narratives in a photo essay with several
images, how do you go about constructing a compelling narrative?
With many images. What kind of images do you need to tell? Okay, so look.
The classic National Geographic way is that you want to open your essay with
three or four truly important, all-encompassing pictures, okay?
And then you want to fill that from that point onward. So I tend to shoot large essays.
I mean, my finished edits so usually 100 pictures plus, you know?
And there's a couple of reasons for that, but in terms of how I construct my essay.
I'm trying to firstly cover the A to Z of something, but I'm doing that by first
identifying what I think are the most important aspects of this issue.
And so I'm going, all right, well, I need a picture to support each of those points.
And then I need to assemble those pictures in order of the importance of that
issue within that narrative.
Does that make sense? Yeah, that's true. That's how I think about it.
You know so it's very linear and it's very um it's
very based on how um how important i think that issue with within the greater
essay really is you know and then you know look we live in a time guys where
we don't make a lot of money yeah um so if i have the opportunity to shoot an essay,
i will shoot it in many different you know i try and shoot it in a number of
different ways while while I'm working because what that gives you is the ability
to publish that essay in different forms.
And that's important because these days budgets are so small that you might
actually just cover your expenses.
So if you can, ideally you do want to try and sell that story another three,
four times if you can. And that's hard to do now.
But that was always the model. That's That's the model I grew up with as a journalist.
And it's the model that I believe in. So in a time where a magazine has no money,
they can maybe support your travel.
But as you come back, they publish that essay. Then I talk to another country
and I go, okay, I have this body of work.
You don't have to pay me to go there, but I have this work. What can you afford to buy the essay?
And guys, 30 years ago, people made really good money doing this. Now you survive.
But if I shoot an essay for National
Geographic, it is the greatest opportunity in print for the issue,
but it is also the greatest opportunity to build an essay that you might be
able to put into different forms and sell to other people once the embargo period is finished.
Right. So you assemble the material to… Look, in order to live and sustain yourself
in this profession, you have to also remember it's a job.
It's a business. so you are in the business of truth telling and that's primary
but once you've compiled those essays you need to move them to other audiences
and the more variety you can bring to your essay the greater chance you have
of publishing it elsewhere,
just makes sense absolutely yeah it does.
Well I think that everybody who
takes photos tries to bring some meaning into
their photos and which is the difficult part and
as far as i understood from you now the only way to
do that is not to look for i want to win
an award or something but to have the real real interest in a sure and the people
in the story and i wonder if you get an assignment to which you don't commit
to 100 do you succeed in your photos like do you really have to be 100 involved
yourself with your your passion?
Look, I'm the kind of person who I see the good in people.
That's like, it's sometimes that's a failure on my part, but for the most part,
I'm optimistic about people and how that translates is that no matter what you
asked me to do, I'm going to see something in that, which is compelling.
You know, that's part of my job. That's part of why I'm the right person to do this job.
You understand? It's like, you know, you get biologists who
they're dialing that in you're phoning in the job you
know and so maybe you're not the right person for the job but i
think that journalists who survive in this profession they have
a natural ability to see the story within
any phenomenon you know so yes there have been there have been stories where
i'm like okay what am i going to do here but amazingly enough that generally
tends to work out and then And sometimes that can be a matter of making a very technical picture or,
you know, it can be one that involves a choice of aesthetics or formats or it
can be a matter of like, all right, I thought this about a story.
But in fact, this person was far more multidimensional than I expected.
So how good was your ability to get inside that person's head and understand
who they are as a person, what they really do, what the potential of their job really is?
What did you bring to the perception of that story?
Am I making sense? Because I think often you hear, oh, this person does this
job, or this story is about this theme, and you see limitation.
Your job as a journalist is to see beyond that. It is.
Do people or groups or NGOs sometimes come up to you and ask you to do something to help them?
I think of Minamata, the project. Yeah, sure, sure. Does this happen to you?
Look, it's almost impossible to do our job without working with NGOs at some
point because often they're the only people with logistics in the areas where
we work. So of course you work with them.
It's always important to maintain an objective relationship,
but I also work directly with NGOs on some of their work and I have no problem with that.
It's easy to know, to do investigations into the kind of work people do.
It's easy to understand, okay, if you work with Doctors Without Borders,
it's uh these are good people you know
if you're working with um groups that are maybe less
well known then you have a responsibility to investigate them
but um you know and that's interesting
because um if you work with corporates the
same things apply but i've always felt that it's
better to be in the boardroom talking to the directors than to be standing outside
with a sign protesting i'd rather be having the dialogue with those guys you
have a greater chance of success of getting them to increase their CSR program
or to maintain or even continue with medical distribution or whatever it is.
You know, the thing with working as a journalist, it's almost impossible to work in isolation.
You have partners in the field and those partners can be ICRC,
they can be Reporters Without Borders, Doctors Without Borders,
they could be Save the Children, they could be UNICEF, whatever it is.
You're not going to be able to work without contact with those
people at some point in your career so um yeah
i'm sorry i think i'm forgetting your original question you answered
the question that was if people come
up to you with projects that maybe are not funded but they have a real issue
yeah they need support for like this i said as an example the minamata project
with w eugene smith which is a bit iconic no look and there's lots of things
that come out of that and the thing is you meet incredibly dedicated,
well-intentioned people. And those people deserve your help.
Look, I also give a lot of pictures to people. I mean, I really have no problem
doing that. It's the least that I can do.
And I do a lot of talks on behalf of different NGOs, and I've done plenty of
auctions of prints, et cetera, et cetera.
Again, it's the least you can do.
I mean, it's not that difficult to see good people and to be in support of them.
And why wouldn't you do it? I really I think it's quite selfish to consider not doing it.
Hmm. You won so many awards, 13 World Press Photo Awards and several others.
What do these awards mean to you and how, well, it's one way to measure success
of your work, but do you have any other measures of success that are more on
a personal level, maybe? Yes, absolutely.
Look, awards are confusing. Just remember, I'm 54 years old.
I've been doing this for a long time.
So, yes, I've won a lot of stuff, but I've won it over the course of 30 years.
So, I'm not some sort of prolific award winner. I've just been doing this for a long time. time.
You need to be careful of awards because you begin to have pressure to win more.
There's a sense of expectation to win more. And that can be,
you need to be careful because that can affect the direction that you're thinking.
And it can, you can find yourself subscribing
to a pressure that you don't necessarily need to feel, you know.
The best thing with awards is that it helps to to give your work a second life.
Really, that's been really good because people might, you know,
you publish something and a week later, it's gone.
You know, people forget about it or maybe it lingers in the minds of people
but they forget about it.
Award season comes around and you win, that piece lives again.
And often it can mean that it will get published again. You know,
so you go to World Press, you go to POI, you go to whatever it is, Visa, et cetera.
And you'll meet someone and they might want to publish that piece again. Thank you very much.
That's a phenomenal piece. But another aspect of awards is that it forces you
to go through your work at the end of every year. And that's a good exercise.
Because you're editing your thinking process. You're looking at what did I actually
do this year? What might I do better next year?
You're also really forced to confront whether you're doing good work or not
and to be honest about it. A lot of what I do is shit. It's really not good.
And when you go through that editing process every year, you are in a process of refinement.
And I think whatever profession you do, you should have an audit of your efforts
every year. And that's really what awards are for photographers.
It's an audit of what you did that year.
So, yeah, it's an opportunity to grow. you know it also I'd be I'd be lying
if I'd said that it didn't didn't matter to publications it does matter you
know it keeps you in the mind of editors and that's that's like any career that matters,
but yeah you do you do have to be careful of not having of not subscribing to
the pressure to win yeah that that is a reality I think people like the New
York Times, et cetera, feel that more.
The agencies feel it more in terms of the Pulitzers.
But that is in the thinking of, you know, because it's a direct manifestation
of success, you know, and people want those benchmarks.
You know, it's an affirmation, it's a business success, et cetera.
But the vast majority of photojournalists that I meet that I think are really
good at their jobs, that's certainly not their primary motivation.
It's a byproduct of their efforts, but it's not their primary motivation.
But it does help keep you in the field. Yeah. And that's just a reality,
you know. And what are your personal benchmarks for success?
Personal benchmarks are the respect of my peers.
I'm fortunate to know some of what I think are the greatest photojournalists of our time.
And the ability to be friends with those people and have them treat me with
respect means more than anything.
I'll give back anything I ever won for that.
Thank you. You know, I won National Geographic's Photographer's Photographer
Award. I think that was in 2016.
And that's an award where the photographers of the magazine vote on who they
think is the guy, the man or the woman who they felt did the best work that year.
That sort of thing is very valuable. And that's not a public award,
but that is, you know, the respect of your peers. and the ability to have dialogue
on an equal footing with people that are legends in your mind.
That's amazing. I had an experience with Jim Nachtwey a couple of years ago
in France where he had a major retrospective.
And I don't know him very well, but he knew my work.
And that blew me away. That blew me away because he was important to me.
So, yes, I will give back everything I ever won for those five minutes of seeing
you from someone who you respect at that level.
Yeah, that's beautiful. It's just the truth, you know.
On your website, there's this one sentence that photography has blessed you
with an incredible life.
You went to so many places. You saw so many things.
Sure. It's an incredible, exciting way of life.
What is it that photography has taught you about life?
Look, honestly, the commonality of humanity.
Really, for want of a lesser cliche, the fact is that of all the countries in
the world, we have far more in common with each other than we have difference.
Far more. I mean, you know, we all want the same things. That's really the thing.
So, you know, the great irony of it is how divisive, you know,
the world is and how polarized it's become in spite of the fact that we have so many similar values.
That's probably the number one thing that I've learned. And the fact that people are generally good.
You know, people are well-intentioned and are pure of heart.
Far more often than you'd expect.
And also the graciousness of the poor.
The absolute open-heartedness of people with nothing.
That's been a constantly humbling experience in my life.
And I wish I could do a better job of bringing that perspective,
of living that perspective.
Because I come home. I live in California. California.
My wife wants to live in California and we have a child with special needs.
So there are facilities in California that are better for him.
But it's always a surreal experience to come from a place where people have
demonstrated such graciousness to you than to be confronted with very Western
problems, which are not problems at all.
But yeah, I wish I could do a better job of communicating that and living that.
At this is what staying
on that topic what you just mentioned to to travel
between these very different worlds what does
that do with you and and are you able
to when you are in california with your family to
to be with them without well having
to process what you might have seen on
a previous assignment it's work in progress i mean that
never changes you know it's um look the thing
is you have the immediacy of a five-year-old so it's
like you know indulging yourself flies out
the window because when i get home my wife is exhausted and
rightly so and i am guilt-stricken because i'm providing
for my family and doing my job but i'm not
being the father that i should be so you you are
caught up in the human drama that's so much over there we all feel
that you know um so yeah what
you're talking about it is an indulgence but to a
large extent it's in it's an indulgence for single people who do
not have kids yeah that's the reality you
know yeah i'm uh i'm not a subscriber to the romantic idea that you are you
know that the things that you see and the things that you experience in your
profession should come to dominate your life and be more important than your
family or your other responsibilities you know um Um.
You know, PTSD is a real thing and, um, you know, I've had some of that, but, um,
I also find that, uh, the realities of my life balance that out and committing
to my responsibility for those realities balances that out. Yeah.
That's how it's worked for me.
And, um, yes, you know, um,
There are, you know, that's a, that's a person by person thing,
but that's what I would hope for.
Well, excellent. Thank you very much. Ren, it was a pleasure talking to you
and, uh, thank you for sharing your, your thoughts on photography while telling
about your incredible career.
Um, I, I really enjoyed it and, uh, thank you very much for taking the time.
Thank you. I mean, look, ultimately, you know, I'm still pinching myself that
I do this for a living, I'm still waiting for someone to turn around and say listen,
that's enough of that bullshit this is who you really are so I just feel lucky
I mean, I don't stack bricks for a living,
I'm not out there like picking up garbage you know, it's a privileged life, you know, so,
yeah, thank you for having me All the best for what's to come Thank you,
yeah Thank you very much Yes, that was the interview with Brant Sturton.
I hope you enjoyed it. And if you haven't subscribed to the Gate 7 podcast yet,
then I would be happy if you do so in the future.
And as mentioned at the beginning, I will be back on Zoom on February 20, 2024 at 7 p.m.
On the streets of Buenos Aires. I am currently in my second home and report
to you what I photograph and film here.
You can get a first impression of it on my new YouTube channel.
There is a first video. Take a look there and everything else then on February
20th from 7 p.m. You can find the link in your podcast app.
I would be happy if you were there. Thank you for listening and see you next time, your Kai.