Sharjah Media Centre Announces Training Workshops with Celebrated Photographers

ACE PHOTOGRAPHERS IAN BERRY AND CAROLYN DRAKE FROM MAGNUM PHOTOS TO TRAIN ASPIRING PHOTOGRAPHERS AS PART OF XPOSURE INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL IN SHARJAH IN OCTOBER 

Sharjah, UAE, August 20, 2016:  There is good news for all amateur photographers and photography enthusiasts. As part of the upcoming Xposure International Photography Festival, to be held from 12-15 October, 2016 at Expo Centre Sharjah, Sharjah Media Centre has teamed up with Magnum Photos and celebrated photographers Ian Berry and Carolyn Drake to offer photography workshops from 11-15 October, 2016.

Announcing the tie up with Magnum Photos, the widely regarded international cooperative of world renowned photographers, journalists and artists, Tariq Saeed Allay, Director of Sharjah Media Centre (SMC) said that we are proud to join hands with Magnum Photos and internationally acclaimed photographers like Ian Berry and Carolyn Drake for these photography workshops to be held as part of Xposure International Photography Festival.       

The SMC Director said that these workshops on the sidelines of the Xposure International Photography Festival are an excellent opportunity for all amateur photographers and all those looking to earn themselves a career in photojournalism or documentary filmmaking to learn from masters and award-winning professionals, pointing out that until now no such opportunities have been available for aspiring media professionals.    

While the Magnum Photos Photojournalism & Reportage workshop will be led by Ian Berry, Carolyn Drake will head the workshop on Creative Documentary.  Aimed at photographers with a good understanding of camera, each Magnum photographer will lead their groups through a daily programme of shooting, reviews, group critiques, mentoring, and editing sessions, Allay said.

Ian Berry will share valuable insights about the practical aspects of working as a photojournalist, from working in challenging environments, to the ethics of journalism.

Trainees will be tasked with creating a documentary story set in Sharjah, responding to the locality. They are expected to research local culture, community, and industry, in order to pursue a chosen story over the week of the workshop.

In Carolyn Drake’s workshop, trainees will explore photography, not as a method to document the real world, but as a creative practice: a tool to engage with, interpret, tell stories about, and provoke thought and feeling about one’s surroundings. Trainees will spend a week shooting, experimenting and editing, to create a personally driven photographic series.

Trainees will spend the five days alongside their selected photographer, developing their own visual language, photographic identity, and the practical, technical and conceptual skills to work as a photojournalist or documentary filmmaker. Upon acceptance, trainees will be emailed a welcome package with directives from their instructor as well as necessary details about the workshop and information on traveling to, and working in, Sharjah.

Ian Berry is a world-renowned photojournalist, currently based in England. Barry has documented Russia’s invasion of Czechoslovakia; conflicts in Ireland, Vietnam and the Congo; famine in Ethiopia; and apartheid in South Africa.

Carolyn Drake is based in Athens, Georgia and studied Media/Culture and History in the 1990s at Brown University.  Between 2007 and 2013, Carolyn traveled frequently to Central Asia from her base in Istanbul to work on two projects which became acclaimed photo books. The first, Two Rivers, explores the connections between ecology, culture and political power along the Amu Dary and Syr Darya rivers. The second, Wild Pigeon, is an amalgam of photographs, drawings, and embroideries made in collaboration with Uyghurs in western China.