Angkor Photo Festival Program 2011

I take great pleasure in featuring the 7th Angkor Photo Festival Program Preview which is to take place in Siem Reap from November 19 to November 26, 2011. This well established event is the first photography festival held in Southeast Asia and for 2011, will exhibit the work of 110 photographers, out of whom 60 are from Asia.

The 2011 list of exhibiting photographers includes Andrew Biraj, Pep Bonet, Paula Bronstein, Marco Di Lauro, Tewfic El-Sawy, Siddharth Jain, Yuri Koryzev, Liz Loh-Taylor, Wendy Marijnissen, Erica McDonald, Palani Mohan, and many more.

My photographs from the photo essay The Possessed of Hazrat Mira Datar will be screened during the festival.

Angkor Photo Festival will hold 12 exhibitions, 7 evenings of slideshows, free workshops for 30 Asian photographers, and a lot more. It's curated by Francoise Callier in consultation with a 9-member international committee. The program is coordinated by Camille Plante and Jessica Lim.

For the PDF Press Release which also contains sample photographs of the exhibits and screenings, click here.

If you haven't considered attending the Angkor Photo Festival, I encourage you to do so. It's an unmissable photography event.

Angkor Photo Workshops 2011

Now in its 7th year, the free 2011 Angkor Photo Workshops is now officially accepting applications from all young Asian photographers.

To get started, photographers can download and read through the application guidelines and the application form below:

• APWS 2011 Application Guidelines
• APWS 2011 Application Form

The guidelines and form contains all the information needed on how to apply for this year’s workshops. However for clarifications and or questions, the Angkor Photo Workshops can be contacted email at angkorworkshop [at] gmail.com .

The workshop will be held from November 17 – 23, 2011 in Siem Reap, Cambodia. As per the previous years’ workshops, 30 participants will be selected from amongst the applications received. The deadline to submit the application is July 15, 2011.

Since its inception in 2005, more than 180 young photographers from all over Asia have been selected to participate in the annual free Angkor Photo Workshops. Conducted by renowned international photographers who volunteer their time, the Angkor Photo Workshops provide participants with firsthand training, invaluable exposure and a chance to perfect their art.

Over the years, the workshop has highlighted emerging talent from the region, and many previous participants go on to embark on successful photography careers both regionally and internationally.

I'll be there!!

Global Post: Ali Sanderson's Mekong River

Photo © Ali Sanderson- Courtesy Global Post-All Rights Reserved

Global Post periodically publishes a photo feature called Full Frame, which showcases some interesting work by emerging photographers. This one is on the Mekong River and is by Ali Sanderson, an Australian photographer from Australia who was based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. She worked on productions with leading broadcasters such as National Geographic TV and Radio Free Asia.

In Phnom Penh, Ali, with three other Australian filmmakers, formed a film production company focusing on documentary films dealing with environmental and human rights issues. This led to projects commissioned by Radio Free Asia.

The Mekong is the 10th-longest river in the world, and the 7th-longest in Asia. Its estimated length is 4,909 km (3,050 mi) and runs from the Tibetan Plateau through China's Yunnan province, Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.

Book: 'To Cambodia With Love' Is Now Available

Finally! To Cambodia With Love,  the book with my photographs of Siem Reap and its environs has been published. It's available from a long list of booksellers all over the world.

It's described on Amazon as "From a tarantula brunch in the remote Cambodian countryside to a leisurely cyclo ride through the streets of Phnom Penh, To Cambodia With Love is a true collaboration, containing personal essays by more than fifty writers. Among them you will find Angkor Wat expert Dawn Rooney, acclaimed memoirist Loung Ung (First They Killed My Father), and Lonely Planet’s in-the-know Nick Ray. Each essay is paired with a practical fact file so that travelers can follow in the writer’s footsteps. In addition, the book is illustrated with vibrant, full-color photographs."

I am hugely chuffed that a book with my vibrant, full-color photographs is on major booksellers' websites, even if my name is misspelled. It's correctly spelled on the book's cover, which is all I care about. What's a Twefic from Tewfic? Just a W that doesn't know where it ought to be.

I hope readers of The Travel Photographer blog interested in Cambodia will buy this book. If I get free copies, I will come up with a contest of some sort and give away copies to winners.