Of the things we learned on our cross-country road trip, and there were many, one was that one can freely and openly photograph the White House — arguably one of the most at-risk targets in the world — but the same can’t be said of office buildings in downtown Los Angeles.
To see more of discarted’s photos from this day, go here.
Photo by discarted
We were contacted by a staff attorney at the ACLU of Southern California, and apparently they are looking into the harassment of photographers by law enforcement, specifically “incidents involving LAPD or other local agencies detaining or arresting people solely for photographing, seizing cameras, or ordering people to delete pictures.” If you’ve had an unpleasant experience with law enforcement in the LA area, please email us and we will give you his contact information.
The ACLU is a staunch defender of individuals’ rights and the First Amendment, and it could mean good things for photographers if they took this on.
More rumblings from the Republican Convention: Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, was arrested in St. Paul today when she stepped in to help two of her producers who were being detained by Twin Cities police. AP photographer Matt Rourke was also arrested. They were both covering anti-war protests outside the convention.
While the crowd of more than 10,000 was mostly peaceful, there were pockets of aggressive demonstrators who vandalized windows and harassed law enforcement, which is apparently where Goodman and Rourke got caught up. The 51-year-old Goodman can be heard on the video pleading with police not to arrest her, but the cops, in full riot mode, weren’t in the mood to distinguish between journalists and protesters.
Read the Democracy Now! statement here.
Article from the AP via TwinCities.com.
It’s not surprising that the political conventions have proved to be hostile venues for some photographers. Politicans and media types don’t always mix well.
At the Democratic Convention in Denver last week, an ABC News producer was arrested for trying to shoot film of some Democratic senators and bigwig donors leaving a private meeting at a hotel. Asa Eslocker was manhandled by the Denver police, one who couldn’t even be bothered to put down his cigar before handcuffing him. He was told by one officer that he was “lucky I didn’t knock the f–k out of you.” See footage of the arrest here.
And in Minneapolis this week at the Republican convention, three New York filmmakers from the Glass Bead Collective were detained by police for filming in the Shoreham Rail Yard. Fittingly, they were in town to document police brutality. Confiscating the trio’s belongings, including cell phones, cameras and hard drives, the police justified the search and seizure as a homeland security matter.
Also in Minneapolis, though not relating to the convention, photographer Guy Still was handcuffed and detained for taking photos of a police special operations center. Through a chain link fence, Still photographed some officers getting into a van, which triggered the requisite terrorist accusations. One officer told him he remembered “the good old days [when] we used to take people like you in a van.”
Whatever that means.
Articles via ABC News, My Fox Twin Cities and My Fox Twin Cities.
In one sense, New Orleans is back to business as usual. In the French Quarter, there was the regular mix of drunken frat guys, distinctive oddballs and run-of-the-mill tourists. And in the Garden District, the most striking site was street after street of gorgeous Victorian houses.
But then it was also surprising that driving through some of the worst-hit areas in St. Bernard Parish and the Lower Ninth Ward how many houses and businesses were so dilapidated and boarded up, still bearing the spray paint markings from the search and rescue teams. Inside, the houses were completely stripped bare of anything — furniture, toilets, fixtures — of value. It was pretty eerie to think of the people trapped in those homes three years ago and what a mess it must have been.
Photo by discarted
We’re keeping a tally of the wildlife we see on the road, and oddly enough, while we’ve been through some pretty remote, and even desolate, areas, not one rattlesnake or coyote. So far the list includes: deer, jackrabbits, cottontails, owls, lizards, a grey fox, one cottonmouth, skunks, spiders, turtles, vultures, eagles, wild turkeys, one black bear with two cubs, a giant millipede, tarantula-like water spiders, alligators, salamanders, skinks and horned lizards. And then there was the endangered Comanche Springs pupfish and the Pecos gambusia in the Balmorhea State Park in Toyhavale, Texas, the only place they’re found in the world.
Unfortunately we’ve come across some dead ones, too (both in New Mexico).
Photo by discarted
Photo by discarted
Something’s wrong when you start to think $3.85 is cheap.
Our first stop out of LA was Niland, CA, to see Salvation Mountain, Leonard Knight’s 50-foot high, 150-foot wide mound of religious folk art. Located in the Salton Sea area, it was really, really hot (like blistering), but Leonard still showed us around the place, saying he was absolutely “tickled” we had come for a visit. Leonard is funny and quirky and one of a kind. He also loves visitors, and traffic has spiked considerably there since it was featured in the movie Into the Wild.
Now in his 70s, Leonard created the site almost entirely himself out of red clay, except for the occasional help of some teenagers, driven by his unparalleled passion for God. He said he wasn’t much of a believer until he hit 35, when he was compelled to say, “Jesus, I’m a sinner, please come upon my body and into my heart” … and Salvation Mountain is the result.
Photo by Bryan Villarin
Downtown LA continues to be a difficult place to take photos. We postedon Travis Puderbaugh’s experience at Grand and 3rd a few months back, and now comes this from photographer Bryan Villarin.
Last Thursday Bryan was taking photos of the TCW Tower on 8th and Figueroa when he was stopped by security. Security radioed in for bigger security, and the head guy came out to say Bryan had to stop because the building was “proprietary and is prohibited from being photographed.” I’m still puzzling over that usage of proprietary and I don’t think it really applies to buildings, but anyway, Bryan writes this on his blog:
I mentioned Google Maps and he said that it wasn’t as detailed because it’s a bird’s eye view. (Apparently, he hasn’t heard of Street View. I could see it from the street perfectly — without even being there!)
Bryan left willingly without further incident, but it does make one wonder what’s the big deal.
And, according to skyscraperpage.com, the TCW Tower won the Los Angeles Tall Building Structural Award for Outstanding Design in 1990. Isn’t it a shame that an award-winning piece of architecture isn’t allowed to be photographed?
Both the New York Times and the UK’s Guardian picked up photographer Zoriah Miller‘s story, which we posted on last week. Miller lost his embed status in Iraq after posting photos of bodies of marines killed in combat on his blog. (The marines were not identifiable.)
The New York Times piece says that, in contrast to the Vietnam war where the media had much access, five years in Iraq and over 4,000 US military deaths has produced only a handful of graphic images, which is absolutely incredible when you think about it.
From the New York Times:
“It is absolutely censorship,” Mr. Miller said. “I took pictures of something they didn’t like, and they removed me. Deciding what I can and cannot document, I don’t see a clearer definition of censorship.”
It’s nice to see this story finally getting the attention it deserves.
boywithgrenade.org 
