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This special issue is the most personal issue we at Rear Curtain have put together. Not so much because two of the stories are from RC team members but because all of the stories have a personal connection to the storytellers in some way.

Bookending this issue from Thailand are stories from a week Sabrina Henry and I spent in Northern Thailand late last year. What began through a just personal network of work colleagues and childhood and college friends, revealed our shared vision for the world. “A Small Step” highlights how the Doi Tung approach can solve real world problems. Respecting the intelligence and goodness of those needing help to change their lives for the better is so simple yet most of the world hasn’t ever tried it. But it works. “Grounds for Change” focuses on the story of how the lives of ex-opium farmers and villagers in the Golden Triangle were transformed by this approach.

One of those personal connections we made is with Chotiwat Lattapanit. He attended the Bangkok Christian College with Sabrina’s work colleague Titichai Navessin (both of whom we owe a debt of gratitude for our time in Doi Tung). I asked him to share his story “The Jaturamitr Way” because it reveals how lifelong personal connections reflect our own sense of values and how they can translate into a photo story with a universal meaning for all of us.

This issue has no interview or “how to” essay instead we decided to bring you a personal story on what one person is doing to make a living telling stories with his camera through one of the most traditional careers in photography. Photojournalist Jack Kurtz’s “Starting Over in Bangkok” is a short story on how it’s never too late to live your dream.

In “The Train Story”, we return to the tradition of pairing a writer, Fullbright scholar and Rear Curtain Intern Emily Kawahara, with a photographer, Bangkok-based Rammy Narula. In the arts we talk a lot about making connections and nowhere is this more prevalent than in photography. Yet rarely do we hear what that connection means or how it comes about. Here we can see how the photographs conjure up feelings and move a writer to create a personal story of her own.

No issue of Rear Curtain would be complete without a Noir piece from regular contributor Mark Krajnak. He dug into the archives from his many travels to find a fitting image for us. Although you can tell from its title “Old Shanghai” is not from Thailand, it gives a nod to Asian Noir and we hope it inspires storytellers to explore this genre for themselves.

A shared vision makes a lasting connection with people. It is a binding of common goals that can take many different paths but all lead to the same place: making stories that matter.

This is the Editor’s Note from our special issue on Thailand. We invite you to pick up a copy today using the link below.

March 18, 2013 sabrinahenry Essays Comments Off

As I sit here, watching a movie with the sound off, I think of all the ways stories have been told through time and how important those stories are to connecting us to one another. From the smallest story on how to do something to those we’ve experienced that we share with our family and the world at large, the stories we tell become our legacy.

Because story is a concept not a structure, the ideas and experience of story can weather the changes that technology brings. The education, understanding and change resulting from those stories are important connections between us whether those stories are fact or fiction. Both can and have had more impact and influence as stories, even visual stories.

Renowned author and photographer Michael Freeman has just released his new book The Photographer’s Story. It is the most comprehensive look at modern visual storytelling in photography I have seen. It will become one of the few books I will refer to on a regular basis. His insightful look from several points of view–from what makes a good visual story to the different requirements for all manner of presentation–will help photographers build stories.

In this issue we are very pleased to include an essay from Michael Freeman whose long career includes working for major international magazine and book publishers with more than 170 books covering a variety of subjects from Japanese design and architecture to ethnic minorities in Southeast Asia and of course the practice of photography. Some contemporary photography writers have borrowed extensively from his books including The Photographer’s Eye, reflecting his authoritative voice on many of the topics covered in his 50 books on photography.

The Rear Curtain team has also been working to bring some of their own visual stories to you. From the spending a week at the Mooreland Free Fair in Indiana this summer to time at the Doi Tung Development Project in the Golden Triangle in Thailand this fall, the crew has been hard at work. We plan to present these two projects in different forms in the hopes of helping others build their own visual stories and spread the word on how vision is building a better world for many.

We want to do more than just encourage people to tell stories though, we want to be a part of making that happen in a tangible way. Earlier this month we announced the winner of the first Rear Curtain Fellowship Award. Brian Miller’s submission “On the Bench” is a story about baseball but it’s no ordinary story. He is exploring the side of the game not many people talk about—wanting to be in the game and never quite making it.

Story and storytellers. They’ve been part of the fabric of life since the beginning of time. Although how we told those stories has changed over the centuries, the essence of storytelling hasn’t changed and if we are to reach the full potential of our stories we need to remember who we are creating them for and why. Who is our real audience? Other photographers or people who have the ability to make a difference in places that need it? In some cases they are one and the same but we need to speak not to the photographer in us but to the person who is in all of us.

This is the Editor’s Note  from Issue 3. To learn how our storytellers bring together their vision in a story, please pick up a copy today.

Rear Curtain: Rear Curtain Issue 3

In this third issue of Rear Curtain magazine we delve into what compels photographers to tell their stories and how they structure their narratives. Whether the subject is a mask maker in Italy or umbrella maker in Myanmar and the place is downtown or your own backyard, these stories will connect…

December 4, 2012 sabrinahenry Essays Comments Off

As photographers and storytellers it is our responsibility to find those split seconds in time that express something important and ask questions of our audience. Our ability to stop that moment for reflection and thought is unique to photography and as such, requires thinking about what we want to say when we pick up the camera. If our aim is to tell a story with our images, we must know what that story is before we communicate it. For others to connect to that story, there must be more than just a presentation of what we saw. Whatever we include, it must pull us in and make us care.

People are interested in stories and will see more in the images if they can find something in common with them. But we can also connect to a story if there is no common ground. If there are universal feelings and experiences in a specific story, it can have meaning to us beyond mere information. Images that show how you feel about a subject or a place are more of a statement than a story. Stories need to do more. They need to leave the audience with questions or relate to larger issues that affect all people rather than some selfish display of emotion or a statement of “I was here, saw this and felt this”.

A successful story draws us into the emotions and reasons why you felt what you did or why you were there to see what you shared with us. It asks us to be involved beyond the reasons that you, as the storyteller, care about something. If we are left with a universal lesson, moral or view, or if we gain a new understanding about something that is important to the audience as well as to the teller of the tale, then you have a story rather than a statement.

Documentaries, photo stories or photo essays can be about solutions as well as showing the world what needs to be repaired. A good tale has an anchor not only in today’s world but also in the past and in things that will have meaning in the future. This is what makes some novels, and the classics in particular, so timeless.

Content matters. Take a look at the world around you and see connections more than just single statements, ask questions about what matters, and share those stories. Finding a slice of life and sharing it with the world fosters understanding and creates a common bond.

That is the vision of all of us at Rear Curtain.

This essay is an excerpt from Issue 2. To learn more about storytelling and see some wonderful examples, please pick up a copy today.

Rear Curtain: Rear Curtain Issue 2

The second issue of Rear Curtain magazine continues our mission to find and promote photographic stories and essays from around the world. From a Spanish luthier to the rodeos of the American West; from the Mississippi Delta to cockfighting in the Philippines, this issue showcases the human story…

May 31, 2012 sabrinahenry Essays Comments Off

The IDEA group Sabrina wrote about on her blog last week is an off-shoot of the Artist Round Tables (ART) but with a different focus. It’s along the same idea of understanding and developing voice but we also look at how our own work fits into the larger scheme of art and the world around us. It’s said that those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat the past and the IDEA group is a step in non-repetition.

Making images that matter–ones that will have an impact or be of lasting importance–takes much more than good composition or an understanding of the “rules”. It requires an understanding of what makes the iconic images that shaped photography important and how they relate to the times that shaped them. This is more than just a visual exercise and requires looking beyond the visual surface. Understanding art and images is also understanding of the relationship of art to its own past, how it relates to the social and political times in which it was made. The importance of an image like Pepper #30 goes far beyond tonal values or composition–those things are only supporting props to what makes this image so important and lasting. Much of this work was aimed at higher goals. Unfortunately those goals seem to have gotten lost in the pursuit of craft for craft’s sake in today’s “hurry up” world.

IDEA is a group of 5 photographers with relentless curiosity and a desire to make meaningful images using their own voice. The image discussion and understanding the impact of these images on the world and the art of photography allows us to see how they have shaped our current standards. And learning the all things that go into making art will allow us to develop a voice and say something new.

I’d like to invite those of you interested in discovering your own voice to apply to this year’s Artist Round Tables. This relationship of our own work to the history of art is sure to come up along with the reasons and ways we can develop unique work that will matter beyond our times.

February 20, 2012 ray Essays, Mentoring 1 comment