Haiti, one year on – in pictures, around the web

A boy cries in the cafeteria of Centre d’Action pour le Developpement, a transit centre for children without parental care in Ganthier, a town near Port-au-Prince ©UNICEF/LeMoyne on Flickr

In my previous post I talked about how numerous photographers and organisations have attempted to document some of the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake – which happened almost exactly a year ago today – increasingly using multimedia storytelling techniques.

But as the world reflects on what happened a year ago, and what has – or hasn’t – happened since, I thought I’d just collate and share some more of the ‘one year on’ photography/multimedia presentations that I’ve encountered over the past few days.

I think some of them work really well, others not so. And I’m sure there are many other takes on this out there that I haven’t seen – I’d love to hear about any that anyone thinks should be added to this list.

I was going to focus on pieces that profile people and situations as they are now, a year on. But as I’m writing this evening, I came across this audio slideshow from Time Magazine, featuring Daniel Morel, the Haitian photographer whose images of the immediate aftermath of the quake were some of the first to emerge in the dark hours of the evening of 12 January 2010.

I’ve written previously about Morel’s images, and what happened to them via Twitter, Twitpic and various photographic agencies. Other people such as The British Journal of Photography have written much better about them as well.

But I think that this is first time that many of Morel’s pictures have actually been seen, and to see them along with his own commentary – well, it seems somehow the only place to start.
http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,746598186001_2041945,00.html

Other multimedia

Wolfgang Tillmans/Christian Aid

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-12111627

This slideshow of diptychs by the Turner Prize winning German photographer is currently running on the BBC News website. Apparently it’s a collaboration with Christian Aid. I have mixed feelings about it to be honest. I’m not sure that it showcases Christian Aid’s work particularly well, and I’m not sure the selection of images either. It’s certainly an interesting collaboration, and I’d love to hear what both parties feel about it, what they set out to achieve, and whether they feel that it’s successful.

The BBC’s Mike Thomson – Haiti carnival/earthquake art audio slideshow
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-12129690

Another one from the BBC News website, but a very different take on Port au Prince today. Correspondent Mike Thomson and editor Paul Kerley have produced a number of audio slideshows over the last year or so, most of them reporting on stories in Africa if memory serves correct. I always find Mike Thomson’s pieces for radio to be compelling, and I think they’ve done a great job here again of combining radio audio and photographic reporting.

Plan International

Two pieces from the NGO Plan International – one a short film, the other the results of a collaboration between Plan, photojournalist Natasha Fillion and 22 Haitian teenagers. I think both are fantastic in very different ways. Plan’s film about the work they’ve done in Haiti over the past year is informative and authoratitive but, I think, pitched just about spot on: http://plan-international.org/about-plan/resources/videos/haiti-earthquake-one-year-on

The collaboration with Natasha Fillion has also yielded something successful, and hopefully inspiring and empowering for the people involved. Through their own eyes http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/gallery/2011/jan/12/haiti-teenagers-life-gallery

AlertNet – one day in Port au Prince

http://www.trust.org/alertnet/multimedia/in-focus/haiti/

AlertNet have used an extensive range of photography, video and audio to present a number of stories of ordinary Haitians, telling their own stories in their own words. Strong, simple and powerful.

And finally, for now, @RAMhaiti

@RAMhaiti is Richard Auguste Morse, a Haitian-American musician and manager of the legendary Hotel Oloffsen in Port au Prince (the inspiration for the hotel in Graham Greene’s ‘The Comedians’). He’s been tweeting almost daily since the earthquake, and often posts photos taken in the city and around the island.

Earlier this evening he posted this image via Twitpic, of Haitian presidential candidate Michel Martelly paying his respects outside the ruins of the Villa Manrese, a former religious retreat in Port au Prince. It certainly seems like a solemn image on which to end for what he rightly calls a solemn day.

Prayers on a solemn day.. 12 Janvier 2011.. Michel and Sophia Martelly http://twitpic.com/3pggwz—
Richard Morse (@RAMhaiti) January 12, 2011