2016 Janie Moore Greene Grant is Awarded to Jiayu Su

Award recognizes those studying photography in higher education.

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Image © Jiayu Su

Jiayu Su of Powell, Wyoming has been named the 2016 Janie Moore Greene Grant recipient. He is a first-year student pursuing an Associate of Applied Science degree in Photographic Communications at Northwest College in Powell, Wyoming.

Su described the events that have led him to study photography:

“Around five years ago, I was invited to visit a small valley in a poor area in China. I had never been interested in photography until I took a picture of a little girl, who was looking at me with a bright and shining eyes. That picture touched me so much. I found out what a magical power of the photos which can change people’s heart or perspective. Then, I started to devote in taking photos.

I have never thought about photography would be my future job before I came to college. I studied communication before and I considered photography would just be my hobby. I never thought it would be my career, but after I have seen some of the images of the Yellowstone National Park which have been taken by the students in my college, I changed my mind, and also changed my major. I love nature photography so much, no matter if it is landscape or wildlife. I want to study photography and I want to be a professional photographer.

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Image © Jiayu Su

I want to gain some professional experience during my two years in the college. And I am going to be a nature photographer so that I can record the changing of our beautiful natures in the world and provide my photos to some magazines or organizations like NANPA so that people would pay more attention to our environment.”

The Janie Moore Greene Grant is a $1,000 award given annually by the NANPA Foundation through the generosity of Janie Moore Greene to a student currently enrolled in, or who has been accepted to, an institution of higher education specializing in the study of photography.

Applications for the 2017 award will be accepted beginning in late summer. For more information and updates, visit the NANPA Foundation website.

 

Michelle A. Butler Chosen as 2015 Janie Moore Greene Grant Recipient

Award recognizes those studying photography in higher education.

Image © Michelle A. Butler

Image © Michelle A. Butler

Michelle A. Butler of Middletown, Delaware, has been chosen as the recipient of the 2015 Janie Moore Greene Scholarship Grant. She is completing her master’s of fine arts degree from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco.

Ms. Butler is working on a photo-documentary thesis project to raise awareness about the condition of birds in the Americas. It highlights the habitats needed for nesting, wintering and migration and calls for conservation efforts that citizens can make to help protect these essential components to our ecosystem.

Photo © Michelle A. Butler.

Photo © Michelle A. Butler.

The Janie Moore Greene Grant is a $1,000 award given annually by the NANPA Foundation through the generosity of Janie Moore Greene to a student currently enrolled in, or who has been accepted to, an institution of higher education specializing in the study of photography.

Applications for the 2016 award will be accepted beginning in late summer. For more information and updates, visit the NANPA Foundation website.

NANPA Foundation Announces 2015 Recipient of the Philip Hyde Environmental Grant

Award highlights use of photography in conservation efforts.

Slough Creek Road at Sunrise, Mississippi River Basin, Wyoming, 2008. Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

Slough Creek Road at Sunrise, Mississippi River Basin, Wyoming, 2008.
Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

The NANPA Foundation is pleased to announce that Alison M. Jones of New York City, New York is the recipient of the 2015 Philip Hyde Environmental Grant for her work illustrating current threats to freshwater systems and proposing sound management policies and solutions to six chosen watersheds in North America and Northeastern Africa.  This $2,500 peer-reviewed grant is awarded annually to an individual member of the North American Nature Photography Association (NANPA) who is actively pursuing completion of an environmental project.

Autumn foliage of Barberry (an invasive species), Upper Raritan River Basin, New Jersey, 2012. Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

Autumn foliage of Barberry (an invasive species), Upper Raritan River Basin, New Jersey, 2012.
Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

Ms. Jones’s project will focus on the translation of interviews with local stakeholders during the more than 30 photographic expeditions that have been conducted to the six watershed locations. The project’s main goal is to raise awareness of the vital importance of freshwater resources, the perils of watershed degradation, and opportunities for sustainable resource management. More information on Ms. Jones and the project is available at www.nowater-nolife.org.

Slough Creek Road at Sunrise, Mississippi River Basin, Wyoming, 2008. Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

Slough Creek Road at Sunrise, Mississippi River Basin, Wyoming, 2008.
Image © Alison M. Jones for No Water No Life

Since 1999, the Philip Hyde Environmental Grant has been made possible by individual donations to the NANPA Foundation. It is awarded by the NANPA Foundation to a NANPA member who is actively pursuing a peer-reviewed environmental project that is consistent with the missions of NANPA and the NANPA Foundation.

This grant was named for Philip J. Hyde who was the primary conservation photographer for the Sierra Club and became known for his color images of Western landscapes that became a weapon against environmental degradation.  Photographers receiving the grant are following in his footsteps of environmental protection through photography.

The NANPA Foundation develops, supports and implements nature photography projects jointly with the North American Nature Photography Association and other organizations.  It initiates, partners, operates, and generates funding for projects that advance awareness of and appreciation for nature through photography.  For information about the NANPA Foundation, visit its website at www.nanpafoundation.org.  For information about NANPA, visit www.nanpa.org.

Crowdfunding Campaign for High School Program Successful

Nearly 100 donors contribute to the campaign.

NANPA Foundation High School Scholarship Program

NANPA Foundation’s first crowdfunding campaign was successful raising more than the $10,000 goal to pay for the 2016 NANPA High School Scholarship Program in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Thanks to all of our donors who are helping create a life-changing experience for 10 high school students in July 2016.

Karine Aigner
Lisa Auerbach
Richard Beldegreen
Clay Bolt
Myer Bornstein
Jeffrey Botkin
Steve Carter
Don Carter
Stefan Christmann
Carl M. Claus
Emily Cook
Susan Cooper
Dan & Tanya Cox
Deanne Cunningham
Jorel Cuomo
Jamie K. Davidson
Richard & Susan Day
David DesRochers
Kathleen DiTanna
James Doyle
Thomas M. Dwyer
John Eppler
Gary Farber/Hunt’s Photo & Video
Sean Fitzgerald
Dick Forehand
David Francis
Francis J Gallagher
Charles Gangas
Mary Jane Gibson
Arun Kumar Choonatt Gopalakurup
John F. Graham
Colin Haase
Dietmar K. Haenchen
Bruce K. Haley
Teresa Hastings
Arne Hatlestad
David Hattori
Morgan Heim
Ann Marie Heller
Don Henderson
James Heupel
Cindy Miller Hopkins
Ruth Hoyt
C. F. Burgess, III
Margaret E. Johnson
Thomas Kachelmeyer
Lewis Kemper
Mark R. Kreider
Alexander Kumar
Don Kurz
Jeri L Love
Michele Lowell
Abigail McBride
Daniel M. Mele
Teofilo Moreno
John J. Mullin
Louis F. Nettelhorst
John & Shirley Nuhn
Theodore Orwig
Robert J. Oswald
Panasonic Lumix
Cynthia Parnell
Dee Ann Pederson
Cheryl G. Pelavin
Sujinder Pothula
Teresa Ransdell
Sheila Reeves
Alice L. Robertson
Ronald S. Rosenstock
Gabrielle Salazar
Richard Sherman
Harvey Spears
Mac Stone
Roy Toft
William Tompkins
Strabo Tours
Rudyard Uzzell
Greg Vaughn
Sonia Wasco
Lindsey Wasson
Debra Waters
Harold Watson
Michele Westmorland
Charles Whiting
Linda Williams
W. K. Wilson
John R. Yuccas
Anonymous (11)

Environmental Grant Supports Projects with Impact

Philip Hyde Environmental Grant applications accepted through October 30, 2015.

Blazing orange Tennessee shiners and yellow striped saffron shiners densely pack in around a stoneroller on a rock nest in a small Smoky Mountain National Park river. Image © David Herasimtschuk, 2014 Philip Hyde Environmental Grant recipient.

What difference do your photographs make?

Applications are now available for NANPA’s Philip Hyde Environmental Grant, a $2,500 award given annually to an individual NANPA member actively pursuing completion of a peer-reviewed environmental project featuring natural photography as a medium of communication, nature appreciation and environmental protection. Application deadline is October 30, 2015 at midnight PDT.

Past recipients include Paul Colangelo (2010), whose efforts to bring the remote and largely unseen Sacred Headwaters of British Columbia to the attention of lawmakers and citizens outside of the Tahltan First Nation played a key role in vacating Shell Oil Company from a million acres slated for methane development; Amy Gulick (2008), whose award-winning book Salmon in the Trees, traveling exhibits, lectures and YouTube videos tell a hopeful story of Alaska’s Tongass rain forest, a rare ecosystem where salmon grow trees and support an abundance of bears and bald eagles; and C.C. Lockwood (2008), whose photographs showcase disappearing swamplands that threatened the culture and economy of Louisiana, as featured in the PBS documentary Atchafalaya Houseboat.

As applicants for the Philip Hyde Environmental Grant, these photographers successfully demonstrated the ways in which their still photographs would make a difference to specific decision-makers wrestling with a timely issue. Additionally, at the time of application, these projects were already well underway, with established collaborations, realistic schedules and practical budgets. These factors made for compelling applications that fared well in scoring.

Click here for complete guidelines, a link to the online application and additional tips for applicants.

The inaugural Philip Hyde Environmental Grant was awarded in 1999. It was established in honor of Philip Hyde, recipient of NANPA’s 1996 Lifetime Achievement Award.

Although he studied under Ansel Adams, Minor White and Edward Weston, Hyde describes his work as evolving past the hard and fast definitions of his early training. “I am not interested in pretty pictures for postcards. I feel better if I just get a few people to see something they haven’t seen before,” writes Hyde.

The Philip Hyde Environmental Grant honors this spirit, supporting photographers who clearly document in application materials the ways in which their projects reach influential people—not necessarily the mass public—and challenge them to discover something new about an imminent environmental issue.

Hyde, whose photograph “Cathedral in the Desert, Glen Canyon, Utah, 1964” was named one of the top 100 photographs of the 20th Century by American Photo magazine, played a key role in protecting Dinosaur National Monument, the Grand Canyon, the Coast Redwoods, Point Reyes, King’s Canyon, Canyon de Chelly, the North Cascades, Canyonlands, the Wind Rivers, Big Sur and many other National Parks and wilderness areas.

Photograph the “Quiet Side” of Ireland in 2016

Castle Bourke, Ireland. Image © Ron Rosenstock

Castle Bourke, Ireland. Image © Ron Rosenstock

Magical light, accessible shoreline and community await prospective tour leaders.

You’re invited on a 10-day tour of Western Ireland with veteran tour leader Ron Rosenstock, September 23 through October 3, 2016. The magical light, sacred sights and after-dinner conversation with fellow artists not only beckon you to expand your portfolio but also your career—perhaps becoming a photo tour leader yourself.

Rosenstock, retired photography instructor from Clark University in Massachusetts, has led more than 200 tours to worldwide destinations since 1967. He was first drawn to Western Ireland because of the light and extensive miles of accessible shoreline. “Being in the northern hemisphere, there are magical cloud formations daily, if not hourly,” he explains. “The light is silvery sifting through layers of cloud and sky.”

The tour is set in County Mayo, often described as “the quiet side of Ireland” and includes tiny villages, hidden beaches, castles and ancient abbeys that you could never locate on your own. It is a landscape of broad peat lowlands and dramatic coastline where soft pastel shades and the warmth of the Irish people have captivated artists for hundreds of years.

But Rosenstock’s tour includes more than just visual points of interest. He also opens his home, providing accommodations at Hillcrest House, renovated specifically to house groups such as this. Most evenings after a traditional Irish dinner, the group moves to the living room to talk about photography and how to become a photo tour leader—because Rosenstock wants others to benefit from his trials and triumphs.

“I’m the luckiest person in the world,” he explains. “In my 70s, I look back and realize I’ve been living my dream. My wish now is to pass on what I have learned, the struggles and benefits of being an international photo tour leader.”

Although Rosenstock can list many traits required of a good photo tour leader, he places the ability to listen and respond honestly and clearly at the top. He says you have to be open to the needs and concerns of all group members and flexible enough to meet them.

Participating photographers from previous tours have noted a sense of communion about the trip. Communion with other photographers, with sacred sights and with nature.

“[Ron’s] talk on photography and the spirituality of photography was a great revelation for me, as I have always felt this way about it myself,” said Michael McLaughlin. “It was great beyond words to be participating with a group of artists who were as passionate as I about photography and image making.”

Past participants have also enjoyed going to town to enjoy traditional Irish music at pubs in Westport.

The tour is limited to eight photographers. NANPA members can attend at a special rate, and a donation will be made to the NANPA Foundation. For more information, visit the NANPA Foundation’s site at www.nanpafoundation.org or www.phototc.com.

Don’t delay your registration—the tour has sold out four years in a row.

British Columbia’s Sacred Headwaters

Canada's Sacred Headwaters, the shared birthplace of three great salmon rivers. Image © Paul Colangelo

Canada’s Sacred Headwaters, the shared birthplace of three great salmon rivers. Image © Paul Colangelo

NANPA’s Philip Hyde Environmental Photography Grant Brings Tahltan Territory to Those Who Would Never See it in Person.

by Paul Colangelo

The Sacred Headwaters in northern British Columbia is the shared birthplace of three great salmon rivers—the Stikine, Skeena and Nass. It is also the traditional territory of the Tahltan First Nation, and it supports a vast ecosystem known for large numbers of moose, caribou, sheep, goats, wolves and bears.

In 2004, Shell obtained tenure of nearly a million acres in the heart of the Sacred Headwaters for a coal bed methane development that would entail thousands of wells connected by roads and pipelines, fracturing wildlife habitat. The water-intensive fracking process that would be used to remove the methane risked altering water levels and contaminating the rivers.

The response from the Tahltan people was clear and strong—they blockaded road access into the headwaters to keep industry out. This was the beginning of an eight-year campaign to protect the Sacred Headwaters, which attracted international attention.

I first visited the Sacred Headwaters to photograph Ali Howard, a northern British Columbia resident who decided to swim the entire length of the Skeena River—355 miles over 28 days—to raise awareness of the issue and unite the downriver communities. After the campaign launched, there was one glaring omission. Due to the remoteness and inaccessibility of the Sacred Headwaters, there was a lack of visual material. Without images, connecting the greater public with the place they were being asked to protect was difficult.

After seeing the Sacred Headwaters for myself and hearing the local people explain what it means to them, I decided to use photography to bring the Sacred Headwaters to those who would never see it in person—a project that lasted five years, culminating in a book, The Sacred Headwaters: The Fight to Save the Stikine, Skeena, and Nass, produced with the iLCP and National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence Wade Davis and accompanying exhibitions at Mountainfilm in Telluride, Colorado; Banff Mountain Film Festival; and the Vancouver International Film Festival. The images were also used in articles, campaign materials, websites and talks aimed at protecting the area.

We sparked an emotional response with the images, spurring action and increasing the number of voices speaking on behalf of the land and wildlife. Amazingly, these voices were loud enough to convince Shell to remove itself from the Sacred Headwaters and the British Columbian government to permanently ban oil and gas exploration in the region. This decision, made in December 2012, was the result of nearly a decade of work. A small group of people, passionate about their home, was able to take on one of the world’s largest corporation and win. For me, it was affirmation of photography’s important role in environmental conservation.

While this was a huge success for the Sacred Headwaters, the ban does not encompass hard rock mining. We are still working to protect the region from a proposed coal mine and an open-pit copper-gold mine. Please support the continued efforts by donating to Sacred Headwaters Journey.

Paul Colangelo is a photojournalist focused on environmental issues and the crossroads of culture and the natural world. Paul is a National Geographic grantee and a member of the iLCP. See more of his work at paulcolangelo.com.

Paul was awarded the Philip Hyde Environmental Grant for this project in 2010 by the NANPA Foundation. The $5,000 grant is provided by Fine Print Imaging through its Art for Conservation program, the International League of Conservation Photographers, the NANPA Environment Committee and individual donations.

San Pedro Mezquital Project Update

The last free-flowing river in the Western Sierra Madre, Mexico. Image © Jamie Rojo

The last free-flowing river in the Western Sierra Madre, Mexico. Image © Jamie Rojo

NANPA Environmental Grant Helps Protect the Last Free-Flowing River in Sierra Madre.

by Jamie Rojo

The San Pedro Mezquital project is an ongoing communications effort to protect the last free-flowing river in the Western Sierra Madre, Mexico. The river is under threat by several development projects, including a dam in the middle basin and a huge tourist resource in the upper basin.

The Philip Hyde Grant that I obtained in May 2012 was used to continue the documentation of this huge river basin, but also to give public presentations in the upper and lower basin to involve the local communities in the actions to protect the river.

In May 2012, we inaugurated a large format exhibit of the San Pedro Mezquital that was hosted by the three main cities of the basin, following the course of the river on its way to the sea. I gave presentations on Durango and Tepic on the day of the exhibit launch, and had meetings with regional authorities involved in the management of the river basin:

  • Durango, upper basin, May 2012
  • Presidio, middle basin, Oct 2012
  • Tepic, lower basin, Jan 2013

Also, in January 2013, I did a 2-week expedition with my colleague Octavio Aburto, co-financed by National Geographic Explorers Fund, to document some of the most remote parts of the upper basin (Chachacuaxtle canyon and the Tres Molinos basin), with some surprising results, and a field blog was published in National Geographic Newswatch. The Philip Hyde Grant represented a great opportunity to continue the conservation photography work in the San Pedro Mezquital river and I will always be thankful for NANPA’s support.

Please take a moment to check out the San Pedro Mezquital website, and this multimedia piece that I produced for NANPA Foundation called San Pedro Mezquital.

Children at a project exhibit in Durango, Mexico. Image © Jamie Rojo

Children at a project exhibit in Durango, Mexico. Image © Jamie Rojo

 

Jamie Rojo was awarded the Philip Hyde Environmental Grant for this project in 2012 by the NANPA Foundation. The $5,000 grant is provided by Fine Print Imaging through its Art for Conservation program, the International League of Conservation Photographers, the NANPA Environment Committee and individual donations.