"Designing Your Life: Tall Ships versus panAFRICAproject"
by Lou Jones, ANEC- MA
Monday, September 13, 7:30 PM


Lou Jones, ANEC is a favorite speaker at greater Lynn but has not presented for us for over five years. We welcome him back with his unique thoughtful images and his wonderful stories on how he achieved them and what it takes to do some of the projects he has been hired for. This presentation will cover more details and images of two of those projects-Tall Ships and Africa.

Lou States- A big break in my career was when I was hired to be the official photographer for BOSTON 200 which was Boston's envoy to the national Bicentennial celebration. I turned the job into my own creation, photographing festivals, parades and historical events. Eventually I had to document Queen Elizabeth's visit and the Parade of Sails. Being a kid from the ghettoes of Washington DC I covered it very uniquely and because of what I learned have continued to follow and photograph tall ships all these years.

More recently my studio has started to photograph each of the 54 plus countries in Africa-one by one. So far we have been in fourteen. The mission is to dispel the neocolonial misconceptions of Western media, education and politics. We seek to reveal the REAL Africa where many of the most progressive innovations and traditions have been maintained for generations. We spend extended periods of time recording modern life, industry, education, culture and resources.

I will discuss the creation of these projects, execution, equipment necessary, funding and engineering. My studio has departed from the normal methods and theories of photography to be more innovative and solve problems of access, travel, communication and truth.

Lou Jones has maintained a photography studio in Boston for many years. He and his staff specialize in large production advertising, corporate and branding photography for Fortune 500 companies as well as smaller institutions. For most of his career he has also done editorial photography for publishers and magazines around the world. To date he has completed assignments in 60 foreign countries and 48 of the 50 USA states. He has also covered thirteen Winter and Summer Olympic Games.

Jones has served on the Boards of Directors of a number of arts organizations including the Photographic Resource Center, Griffin Museum of Photography and is currently on the Board of the Foundation of the American Society of Media Photographers -ASMP. His teaching credentials have been used by Boston University, Tufts University, Art Institute of Boston, Maine Photographic Workshop and he was a co-founder of the Center for Digital Imaging Arts.

Lou has exhibited extensively at places such as Smithsonian Institution, DeCordova Museum, Kayafas Gallery, Cape Cod Museum of Art, Roxbury Community College, Museum of African American History, plus, and his photography is collected by Harvard University, Wellesley College, Boston Athenaeum, etc.

He has published over a dozen books like travel plus PHOTOGRAPHY, Speedlights and Speedlites, Final Exposure- Portraits from Death Row and Saint Petersburg, Russia. He has been featured in articles, podcasts and ZOOM lectures for his entire work life and especially during the pandemic.

Throughout his career he and his studio have engaged in multiple long term self-initiated projects such as- jazz, pregnancy, tall ships and COVID19. A local client has him climbing the skyscrapers and cranes under construction in downtown Boston for www.IronCladPhoto.com and for the past few years he has been documenting the 54 countries in Africa for www.panAFRICAproject.org which has produced the first volume of a series of related books.

Lou will have his book available for you to see and order from the store if you wish in soft back and hard back. The cost of the books are - Soft cover $105 plus shipping and handling-Hard cover $200 plus shipping and handling. Order from Africa Project Store

To see more of Lou’s work and his projects please visit these websites:
www.fotojones.com
www.panAFRICAproject.org
www.IronCladPhoto.com