Magnum Photographers This Saturday June 16

MAGNUM @ 60

Saturday, June 16, 2007
at 7:00 PM
Celeste Bartos Forum
Humanities and Social Sciences Library
5th Avenue and 42nd Street (directions)

LIVE from the NYPL books

$15 general admission and $10 library donors, seniors and students with valid identification

In celebration of the 60th anniversary of Magnum Photos, Live from the NYPL and Magnum Festival '07 bring together a night of conversation with Philip Jones Griffiths, Keith Beauchamp, Susan Meiselas, Gilles Peress, and Larry Towell.

With the advent of technologies that promote the proliferation of media content, the sheer number of images available has thrown the nature of photojournalism, and even the power of photography itself, into a new light. In addition, the boundaries of what constitutes “truth” and “veracity” are constantly being blurred. In light of the increasing diffusion of the media, along with the rise of media conglomerates, it is pertinent to question the responsibility of today’s media as well as to discern with whom that responsibility lies.

• Now that Internet blogs such as YouTube have emerged as a leading form of news transmission and a large population of the world owns digital cameras, how does this democracy change the role of the journalist?


• What role does the “citizen journalist” play?


• Does this undermine traditional journalism or empower it?


• Does traditional journalism have a place in the future?


• Will digital journalism ever be accepted as a major documentary/art form?


• What happens to the idea of responsibility in the world of easy, quick and cheap photo-making?


• Do photographers still have a responsibility to their subjects? To their audience? And how are they held accountable?


• How will the Magnum ethos be affected by this brave new world of image making?

About MAGNUM

In 1947, four young photographers—Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Capa, David Seymour, George Rodger—founded Magnum Photos two years after witnessing the atrocities committed against humanity during World War II. In forming a co-operative, these men were bound by a common goal of telling the world’s stories with uncompromising responsibility to authorship. They sought to break free of editorial constraints and challenged the prevailing idea that a magazine or newspaper could “own their images.” Thus, the Magnum ethos, which still guides the agency and its photographers, sought editorial freedom and ownership of copyrights.

This event is co-presented by Magnum Festival '07
http://www.nypl.org/research/chss/pep/pepdesc.cfm?id=2902