All posts filed under: Photo Docs

Documenting YOUTH and DREAMS of Tashkent, Uzbekistan

Published by VAGA Editor

Hassan Kurbanbaev’s recent project focuses on Tashkent, the capital city of Uzbekistan, in which  he was born and where he lives to this day. Attempting to choose his favorite part of the city, Kurbanbaev maintains that he doesn’t know which place he likes the most. He loves the past and the present; the places that bring to him “the joyful freedom of childhood memories”. Photographing the city from three parallel but different angles, Kurbanbaev has created three interlinked photo diaries: tashkent.DOC, tashkent.YOUTH and tashkent.DREAMS. Each diary serves an individual purpose, but focus on the city. tashkent.DOC is the body of the city, tashkent.YOUTH is its face and tashkent.DREAMS are Kurbanbaev’s feelings towards it. In tashkent.DOC Kurbanbaev set out to document the capital as it is today. Photographing random parts of the city, you can see the past interacting with the present. The stark brutal, Soviet architecture painted with bright, colourful graffiti. The older generation walking side by side with the children of today. September 2016 was the 25th anniversary of Uzbekistan’s independence from the Soviet Union. …

Youth Culture Photographer Cheney Orr — “Young in Havana, Cuba”

Published by VAGA Editor

New York City-based youth culture photographer, Cheney Orr chases the less depicted places and faces of society all over the world. His images range from raw yet deeper-level relatable (partying New York kids) to the force that pulls the wool back from one’s eyes (the streets of Kabul). Orr is not only willing to go where many don’t go; he feels a drive to seek it out and capture it. That drive has brought him to places like Ukraine, Nepal, Rwanda, Egypt, Afghanistan, and Ethiopia. Most recently, it brought him to photograph the young counter-culture scene of Cuba. Orr’s knack for simultaneously observing and communing his subjects provides an intriguing perspective on the youth culture in a country that has just become open for tourism business for Americans. The young scenes in Orr’s photographs are poignant and thought-provoking, but also new and novel for many. Here, he shares why he’s pulled toward the subjects he’s pulled to, what he found in Cuba, and the stories behind his photos. —Interview by Courtney Iseman How did you get …

cliff a trip through vietnam

Broken and Saved in Rural Vietnam

Published by VAGA Editor

After the chaotic rush of dodging semi-trucks and a million scooters, we’re finally out of Hanoi and in the northern mountains of Vietnam. I’m travelling with a Canadian and an Englishman I met in a hostel days earlier. We’re heading for the Chinese border, riding along roads that cut through limestone mountains and diverse ethnic minority villages. It’s getting dark and the road is turning steeper. Our recently purchased $200 motorcycles are rolling along nicely. The next guesthouse is a few kilometers away, but there’s still light and we have a long way to go in the next few weeks. Our map shows another place to sleep 40 kilometers up the road. “Let’s try for the second one,” Harrison says. Adam and I agree. Pulling the throttle, we continue up the mountain as the road turns to gravel and pavement disappears. Harry is leading the pack and while we’re riding along the rutted path, I hear a loud clunk and his bike skids to a stop. We discover his chain bounced off the gear and …