Josh in Athens, Ohio

Image Courtesy of Jim Korpi

I’ve been out of school for a bit now but one of my classmates when I was there was photographer Jim Korpi. His new website has a plethora of new work and it’s really, really wonderful stuff. Jim and I worked together in the summer of 2008 (well, at least congruently, with him in New England and myself driving all over Middle America), completing a fellowship for the non-profit NNFP, documenting people and land. He has continued to document the American landscape with inquiry regarding our relationship with, and impact on it. Please look at his blog as well. He is as thoughtful and disciplined a writer as he is a photographer. Some people’s work just makes you want to make your own work better, and heck, makes you want to be a better person.

MyMidwest, the Midwest Airlines flight magazine recently wrote up a little piece about last year’s Soul of Athens project where I had some portraits included in a project called “Rural Progressives.” Jenn Poggi, formerly of U.S. News and World Report and now working in the White House photo department helped me produce the online piece. Other photographers in the MyMidwest article were Jenna Schoenefeld, Drew Angerer, Joel Prince, Andrew List and Rachel O’Hara. I can’t wait to see what Soul of Athens brings this year from people still hanging out in that unique little town.

I’m going to use this moment in my Tuesday morning to point any of you readers to a beautiful new website by Concord, NH photographer Max Bittle.

I’ve watched Max’s work for awhile, since the days when he was a student at Southern Illinois University and would always have better pictures than me in the annual student contests. There are some photographers who do amazing work, but it’s a challenge to look at … it’s not stuff you might always want on your wall. Well Max is the kind of photographer who could fill a house with great prints.

Dinara, an interactive media student (disclaimer, she’s also my girlfriend) here at Ohio University has just finished a website about the former nuclear test site of Semipalatinsk polygon in her home country of Kazakhstan.

It’s a pretty fascinating site, which is the culmination of research and two trips to the region where she went to villages and a hospital, took photographs and interviewed people there today. This place, which consisted of the fairly large city Semipalatinsk, used to not even be on the map when they were blowing up bombs there years ago …. they said no one lived there.

Some people are throwing a big weight off their shoulders.

I will try to this week! Congratulations Kevtucky and Dinara, and everyone else who will be defending their master’s projects this week at OU. Not that a Master’s degree in photography means a whole heck of a lot, but … hey, you are a master!

I started making some portraits of my classmates before I head out, here’s just a rough scan.

Phil can also fit into my “classmates” postings because he actually has a website too! Check out his work from Las Vegas. He also likes to take a lot of blurry pictures and rock climb, which is cool.

Ross actually graduated in December, and I should disclaim that he was my roommate, but he’s redone his website and it’s fantastic. Ross has a great sense of irony and light in his photos. They are smart, compassionate, insightful and original. Anyone looking for a freelancer would do themselves a favor to hire him. His work inspires me as much as any established professional. Another reason I came to school here.

Paying Rent - Athens, OH photo Copyright Ross Mantle

on another note since I no longer have a local lab to process my film it will be a few weeks till I get home to my trusty Glen Ellyn, IL lab and process the many rolls of personal images I’ve been piling up. It’s nice and gives me a chance to showcase people who make way better pictures anyways.

Nature by California Copyright Neil Ever Osborne

Part of the reason I came to grad school was to be around people who were as into photography as I was, and to be inspired by them. One such guy wasn’t around last year but came back after a hiatus to join our class.

Check out Neil Ever Osborne’s portfolio … A biologist by training he’s taking conservation photography to a new level and I’m really glad to have a classmate like him. He can teach us all to look at things a bit differently because of his different perspective, especially among a group of folks so dedicated to “people” photography. Before so long he’ll have a project on manatees up that he was working on in some warm-ish waters while I was holed up in suburban churches.