14
Cities of our own
Fourteen photographers living where they work, on four continents.
The regions · Fourteen cities
Fourteen cities.Fourteen people.Nobody flown in.
A photographer who has lived somewhere for four years makes a different picture from one who landed on Tuesday. That difference is the whole reason for the expense.
Write to the deskSend someone who already lives there.
Fourteen retainers cost more than fourteen plane tickets by a wide margin. It is the largest line in the accounts and the one we would cut last.
The alternative is a photographer who arrives knowing the story and leaves before finding out whether it was true. That picture is available everywhere, and cheaply.
Every city below has had the same person in it for at least four years. Most for longer.
Where the photographers are
Four groups, one colour each
- London
- Dublin
- Madrid
- Lisbon
- Rome
- Brussels
- Berlin
- Warsaw
- Rabat
- Dakar
- Beirut
- Delhi
- Mexico City
- Montréal
The network
7
Years, shortest stay
Nobody is posted somewhere they have not already lived.
0
Parachute jobs
We do not fly a photographer into a place they do not know.
How the regions work
- Contract, not commission
- Regional photographers are on the same monthly retainer as everyone else. A quiet year in their city is allowed to be quiet.
- Language
- A photographer works in the language of the place. Where they do not have it, the caption says so and names the person who interpreted.
- Fixers
- Credited by name unless naming them would put them at risk, and paid at a published rate rather than whatever the local market allows.
- Travel
- Paid by the agency, never by anyone with an interest in the pictures. No sponsored trips, no press junkets, no free flights.
- Consent
- Obtained in the language the subject speaks, and recorded against the frame. Where it cannot be obtained, the frame stays in the archive.
Somewhere we already know?
If it is one of the fourteen, the photographer can start in two weeks. If it is not, we will say so rather than send someone to guess.
Write to the desk