Admiring the 2012 World Press Photo Contest (http://www.worldpressphoto.org/gallery/2012-world-press-photo), a couple of things strike me: how the winning image echoes iconography going as far back as the European Renaissance. The first prize reminds me so strongly of dozens of paintings, often depicting catholic themes, many portraying suffering. I’m aware it portrays a Muslim woman with her wounded son.

The first time this occurred to me was during the war in ex-Yugoslavia. In 1990 the winning image of a wake, where family and friends were mourning a loved one, had such a Renaissance look, it seemed so much like one of that periods’ paintings. The colours were subdued, the people dressed in a manner that was timeless. In 1997 the same occurred.

But this is not a European Renaissance franchise. Human suffering is universal.

Other winning images have in common the shape of a pyramid, composed of humans overcoming extreme difficulties, the triumph of the human spirit. From sports to war imagery – such as the raising of the flag in Iwo Jima (which we know was staged, but it nonetheless became an icon) – the pyramid, triangles, diagonals, are successful compositional elements.

As beautiful as can be … honour is due to the World Press Photo organization and the photographers.

I have the Kindle that is one version before the Kindle Touch, with a keyboard in the bottom.

I purchased it thinking I would save money: instead of getting physical books, I would get ebooks, which OUGHT to be MUCH cheaper.

Almost all, if not all, books nowadays are digitized before being published. Even if the author writes by hand, someone types the book in a computer. To convert this digital file to amazon.com’s proprietary ebook format (or a pdf, or any other format) is a relatively simple (i.e. cheap) process. It follows that an ebook’s production and storage costs are MUCH lower than the cost of printing and binding a book, plus the shipping to amazon.com’s warehouse, and storing it there until sold.

Therefore, when I see ebooks priced at almost the same as paperback editions, sometimes even MORE expensive, I feel ripped off.

It reminds me of Kevin Spacey in American Beauty: “Well honey, that’s just nuts.”

I know it’s a nascent industry, that ebooks are not standardized, that we are locked into our e-readers, and that, as good business managers, amazon.com’s executives have to get as much profit as possible out of the markets.

If you live in a country where the cost of shipping, and possibly an import tax, is significant, then the Kindle is advantageous. Otherwise, it can be justified by its practicality – by not having to carry around a stack of books, or a heavy book – and what else?

A commentary on Roman Polanski’s 2011 film Carnage

After Linda Blair’s vomit scene in The Exorcist (1973), which must have set some kind of record for ‘disgustingness’, this film’s vomit scene is amazing.

Let it be clear that I am not a fan of vomiting, just an admirer of good cinema, and I thoroughly enjoy a good laugh (burping and farting scenes tickle me). Here, it happens not without warning, but it does catch one by surprise as it is so well done and graphic, and leaves a terrific mess in a middle class couple’s living room table.

All the petty issues, old gripes, recurring arguments, that accumulate after many years of marriage surface in this notable film (based on Yasmina Reza’s play). Other themes such as class, ambition, materialistic bourgeois values, cellular phones’ ubiquitousness, are touched upon.

It reminds me of Luis Buñuel’s 1962 film The Exterminating Angel, wherein the guests to a refined dinner party cannot leave the dining room, for no apparent reason. The bourgeoisie is too attached to their values, their comfort, their vanity.

Here we have a less radical film, but still an excellent commentary, with great humour, if only a bit too short.

Recommended with 7/10

May 2012 lead to peace, prosperity and the realization of your dreams.

www.AltiplanoAndino.org

This marks the beginning of a blog concerning (mostly) photography, my passion ever since I first saw Ansel Adams’ masterpieces (Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico; Aspens, Northern New Mexico; Yosemite Valley, Winter, to name only a few).

Strangely, I have not engaged in black and white photography. However, Ansel Adams’ photographs have such contrast and overall visual strength that they are ‘coloured’.

I hope you will join me in this exchange of ideas!