After Out Magazine saw M. Sharkey's feature 'Queer Kids' published in aCurator magazine, Sharkey got a call asking if they too could publish the images. Then I got a call from the Big Issue, London's magazine that supports the homeless, asking the same thing. He told me yesterday over a delicious home-made lunch that the Advocate also picked it up. And then he told me to pick out a print! (I chose the fabulous Brandon) Thank you dear!

The 'Queer Kids' project is a work-in-progress. For information about supporting its continuation contact the photographer via his website.

Brandon © M. Sharkey

Lynn Goldsmith has been a constant in my life for almost 20 years: a massively prolific, legendary photographer, she's pals with my business partner Michael Putland and was running her photo agency in New York while I ran Retna, until she did the prescient thing and got out of that industry in the late 90s. We haven't laid eyes on each other since we don't know when, so imagine my surprise to look up from a reviewing table this week to see her beaming face. Splitting her time between Colorado and New York, Lynn is working on a book of her self-portrait series 'Looking Glass'.

In honor of the official start of summer here in New York, here's Carly Simon at Martha's Vineyard, 1981.

Carly Simon © Lynn Goldsmith

Rapper King Kaiow

Max Colson is a London-based "digital photographer with an eye on photojournalism". He submitted some work and we began an email exchange about his use of stills within video, his attitudes towards documentary photography, the weather (we are both British after all!) and since he had submitted an eloquent artist statement, we decided he should tell his story.

"I began making serious attempts at documentary photo projects at the tail end of 2008, so it's safe to say that I am an incredibly young photographer. Over 2009 I gained more experience documenting not only the participants of the UK's full contact fighting scene, but also the rappers involved in London's underground rap scene [in two separate projects]; by the end of the year I felt that I taken my two projects as far as they could go. I was completely wrong.

Although I was not quite conscious of it at the time, my aim was largely to go in and take 'great pictures' in quite a show and tell fashion. More than anything else, I took photos in order for people to understand that I was a photographer, and that I had the so-called 'eye'. Looking back on these photos now I can see that perhaps it was my personal quest for the dramatic which was often the overriding factor in my work.

I think the reasons behind why people take documentary photographs is an incredibly important area in photojournalism today. I speculate that the influence of commerce conflicts with representing things as they really are and I think that the demands of commercial news creates a tension in any profession which has appointed itself as a recorder of history. I am currently producing a video which deals with this topic, and uses my images."

For more on Max, visit his website. I learned something new on his blog.

© Ryan Donnell

Here in NYC on polling day, lucky kids get to stay home and the grown-ups go to their schools to vote. But in Philadelphia all sorts of establishments are temporarily repurposed for the electorate. Ryan Donnell has been photographing these locations for the last couple of years, and is out in the rain today for the primaries. Visit the Philadelphia Polling Place Project to see lots more.

At the New York Photo Festival yesterday I was looking forward to a panel discussion on the future of story telling. 4 photographers nominally had 5 minutes to show their work and talk about the future. Elizabeth Biondi moderated. Only, it started late, was disorganized; Biondi hardly got to say a word; we watched videos by Lauren Greenfield and Gillian Laub which were wonderful but made me wonder whether everyone thought video had just been invented; Jeff Jacobson subjected us to stills of a road trip that we thought would relate to Obama's election but didn't seem to, with someone reading a poem over the slideshow; and Rob Hornstra made it clear he didn't like either video or audio. Conclusion? Stills, and maybe video, and maybe audio, or maybe text, are the future of story telling.

What I was excited to learn about was Rob Hornstra's and Arnold van Bruggen's The Sochi Project. These Dutch photographers are looking for private donors to help them travel to Sochi twice a year through 2014 to document the run-up to the Olympic Games.

"In 2014, the Olympic Games will take place in Sochi, Russia. Never before have the Olympic Games been held in a region that contrasts more strongly with the glamour of the Games than Sochi. Just 20 kilometres away is the conflict zone Abkhazia. To the east the Caucasus Mountains stretch into obscure and impoverished breakaway republics such as Cherkessia, North Ossetia and Chechnya. On the coast old Soviet sanatoria stand shoulder to shoulder with the most expensive hotels and clubs of the Russian Riviera. Between now and 2014 the area around Sochi will change beyond recognition. The Sochi Project will be a dynamic mix of documentary photography, film and reportage about a world in flux; a world full of different realities within a small but extraordinary geographic area."

© Rob Hornstra, The Sochi Project

There are still a few spots open in Peter Turnley's upcoming New York Street Photography Workshop from May 30th-June 5th. This will be the third time it has been held. New York City in late spring and early summer is an amazing venue for street photography and a great place to create a photo essay/portfolio during this one week workshop. The daily workshop sessions are held at Peter Turnley's apartment in Harlem, which also serves as a wonderful backdrop for this experience. The workshop embraces a "decisive moment" spirit of appreciating the reality of daily life in an urban setting. Turnley works with students to help them become comfortable with a sense of purpose in photographing people, and creating a photo story/essay.

More information about the workshop description and registration can be found here.

You can see images by students from the two previous workshops here.

June 20th ‐ 27th, 2010. Festivals are an expression of society and the ultimate manifestation of cultural change. Join award‐winning photographer Ashok Sinha and renowned anthropologist Trinidad Ordóñez on an 8‐day workshop in Ecuador to observe, experience and document the otherwise "hard to reach" Conquistadores. There's a discount for members of ASMP and ASPP.

See EcuadorWorkshop.pdf for more info.

El Quinche festival © Ashok Sinha

"I'm interested in what we define as beauty, when we choose to create it ourselves. Beauty has always been a currency, and now that we finally have the technological means to mint our own, what choices do we make?

Is beauty informed by contemporary culture? By history? Or is it defined by the surgeon's hand?

Can we identify physical trends that vary from decade to decade, or is beauty timeless? When we re-make ourselves, are we revealing our true character, or are we stripping away our very identity?

Perhaps we are creating a new kind of beauty. An amalgam of surgery, art, and popular culture? And if so, are the results the vanguard of human-induced evolution? As a race, is this the beginning of a new direction?"

Image and text © Philip Toledano

The Specials played in New York last night. Janette Beckman, who last photographed the Specials on their 'Seaside Tour' in 1981, when she was terribly young, gives her review.

"The Specials played to sold out crowd at Terminal 5 in NYC last night. Quite a few sentimental old souls had a tear in their eye as the band was just as brilliant as in the old days - in spite of not having Mr Dammers. The crowd went wild - I observed some serious skanking and a few fights going on. The skinhead look has always been a good one and pork pie hats and suspenders were definitely the thing last night."

© Janette Beckman

Outstanding documentary photographer Peter Turnley is collaborating with Mike Johnston of super-popular blog The Online Photographer to 'publish long form photo essays with a personal edit on a site seen by a worldwide audience'. Their latest publication is 'The Faces of Semana Santa, Seville, Spain' which Turnley photographed in conjunction with one of his student workshops this year during Holy Week.

Priest kissing statue, 2010 © Peter Turnley