Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2013/07/04

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Subject: [Leica] Biographical Info re Dr. Ted's Curiosity
From: amr3 at uwm.edu (Alan Magayne-Roshak)
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 2013 11:43:21 -0500 (CDT)

On Thu, 4 Jul 2013 Phong <leicaphong at gmail.com>wrote:
Subject: Re: [Leica] Biographical Info re Dr. Ted's Curiosity

>I know of Robert Gilka thru Sam Abell's "Stay This Moment", which is one of
>my all-time favorite photography books.  I had never heard of either of
>them when I serendipitously visited a local bookstore in Harvard Square
>back in the early 1990's and flipped thru some photo books.  Gilka was the
>editor who hired Sam Abell at National Geographic.

>Did you know him well ?  As chance would have it, I heard a few days ago
>that he just passed away very, very recently, as in maybe a week ago.

>- Phong
===========================================================================================================================================
I met Robert Gilka (and many other nationally known photographers) when our 
department used to host the judging for the Wisconsin News Photographers 
Association annual print competition.  We had the space to hold all the 
racks for displaying 16x20 or later, 11x14 prints, and as a helper putting 
prints up and taking them down, I got to see the work of many photographers 
close up and to stand close enough to the judges to hear all their 
critiques.  And after the judging sessions my colleagues and I were able to 
interact with these people.
(I can hardly believe the list of photographers I was able to meet through 
my job - Walter Heun (of E. Leitz), W. Eugene Smith, Alfred Eisenstaedt, 
Ernst Haas, Ed Farber; Frank Scherschel, Tom Abercrombie, Sam Abell,  A. E. 
Wooley, Howard Sochurek, Joseph Costa, Dean Conger, Steve Raymer, Eliot 
Elisofon; Harold Edgerton, David Eisendrath,  Howard Chapnick, Angus 
McDougall...and others.

I met Sam Abell when he was a judge at one of the WNPA conventions, and he 
permanently influenced my photography.  His serene color pictures gave me 
such a wonderful feeling of calmness that I started taking the kind of 
pictures (for myself) that I later found could be categorized as "miksang" 
photography (Tibetan for Good Eye).  Pictures that just please the eye with 
composition and color, or tones.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miksang>

Alan

Alan Magayne-Roshak, Senior Photographer
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Photo Services
(Retired)
UPAA POY 1978
amr3 at uwm.edu
http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Alan+Magayne-Roshak/

"All the technique in the world doesn't compensate
 for an inability to notice. " - Elliott Erwitt