Attention Graphic Designers: Buy Molly Ahearn Photos Through Alamy

Signed up with British company Alamy to sell my photos online. As a designer, I find their images fresh and varied and their user interface lightning fast. It’s the first place I go to look for royalty or licensed images. So far, I’ve uploaded a few hundred images. Search my Alamy library by hitting the link above the search box, or type in Recession, Alaska, Hudson Valley or Outer Banks. (Designers, maybe you’d like to bookmark my Alamy page?)

Fellow photographers, Alamy offers a 60/40 split favoring the artist; a heck of an improvement over the 50/50 or 40/60 of other agencies. Take advantage of their extensive keywording opportunities to make sure your photos get the most traffic. I also put a link to my Alamy search page on the home page and the portfolio page of my Web site.

I Was Bruce Davidson’s Apprentice

In the early 90s I worked with Bruce Davidson, famed for his street-style photo documentaries of the New York City subway, life on E. 100th Street, Central Park and others. This is an excerpt from a journal I kept recording our time together.

New York City, March 18, 1991. Palms sweating, I got off the elevator and stood before Bruce Davidson's door smelling the overwhelming odor of cat urine. Here I found myself before Bruce Davidson’s door; my hero’s door. After sending a desperate letter pleading for him to ‘engage me in some capacity,’ he called to say he was interested in meeting me. "Oh God, I am so lucky to even have the chance to talk to him for a half hour – and he's going to look at my pictures."
As soon as Bruce’s wife opened the door, all of the nervousness left me. Their home is just that—homey, safe and welcoming. The first thing I saw was an oversized photo from the Subway series; on another wall, a 4-foot by 3-foot blow-up of the Verrazano Bridge amidst the fog, a ship passing underneath.

Then Bruce popped his head in—balding; glasses propped on top of his head, the glasses string hanging in front of his head instead of in back; short, and so nice. He wanted to see my work right away. His eyes soaked up my images; he looked through my book several times without comment. Then he carefully suggested ways for me to improve upon the images and the way in which they’d been printed. Should have burned the back of the pig more. Should have focused farther into the car with the three Puerto Rican teens which would have gained me more depth of field. He said I could have used fill flash here to solve the depth of field problem altogether—f11 or f16 with 1/8 to 1/4 fill. First thing he said was he’d take me in the dark room and he’d show me how to print one of my shots better than I had already done. (Unbelievable!)
We talked and talked. He gave me a tour of his apartment and his photos. The couple from E. 100th St., the Hispanic woman sitting on the edge of a pink spread turning around to the camera, the dwarf in a restaurant onlookers jeering and snickering, scenes from Wales, the shot of E. 100th St. itself, the buildings like a wall with a triangle of street in the cover corner, people hanging out the windows.

Overwhelming to see those images that have been dancing in my brain for these past years. If B.D. only knew the number of times I’d taken his books out of the library. The time I’d spent studiously trying to understand what makes his pictures so perfect, so alive and so meaningful. I think him the greatest American photographer. And, here I am in his studio looking at his pictures. He talking ot me as though he’d known me for years—as though he’d been waiting for me.

He had obviously decided to take me on before I came. I took off my jacket and started to work for Bruce Davidson.

First order of business was to organize his 450 contact sheets (in numberical order) from his recently completed four-month assignment to shoot the people of Chicago for National Geographic. What a learning experience to see how B.D. stalks a shoot. How encouraging to see that every frame isn’t perfect, isn’t what he wanted. Sometimes he misses the focus, too.
The final images are so strong. The opening picture is of a black street musician singing up into his microphone, the streets of Chicago passing by him. A Polish woman cutting her husband’s hair with a sister standing by laughing. Flags. Mexican flag waving over a parade held by a Mexican mounted on horseback. Real people doing real things. How does he do it?

B.D. tells me his next assignment from National Geo is Central Park. He’ll take me with him (I’m dying!). A woman in his bilding was formerly involved with the Parks Commission and knows some of its deepest secrets—a man who cultivates honey from honey bees. This would be a great opportunity to work a photojournalistic assignment with ‘The Master’ that I couldn’t share if the location were farther away.

Bruce made us lunch from leftovers of a dinner party they had last night. His wife is apparently a good Mexican chef. Over lunch he quizzed me on what kinds of lenses I have. I told him 50mm, 70-210, 300/doubler and the 28mm I shoot with most. He recommends I buy a 35mm. B.D. shoots with a Canon EOS system; replacing his trusty Leica. I don’t know why, especially since he claims the Canon is so complicated he hasn’t figured it out yet. Think Canon gave him the camera for the promo of him using it.

Later in the afternoon, a potential investor showed up to look at B.D.’s work. He has no idea who B.D. is—his son and B.D.’s daughter were in some high school production of Cabaret and I secretly believe all he wants is copies of the pics B.D. shot of the show. Once the guy came, he wouldn’t go away! He kept asking, ‘what else?’

Flash Failure

You plan and plan. You shoot tests. You get in the right spot, despite the crowd. And then someone accidentally bumps into your camera knocking the flash just enough off of its seat that it doesn’t fire. By the time you notice, the event is nearly over. Ugh. That’s what happened to me during the Sinterklaas parade. Frustrating! I did get some cool shots of the fire-eaters. Richard Prouse’s painting of the Hudson River valley made a spectacular backdrop. Jeanne Fleming did an incredible job organizing the weeklong series of events. Really cool stuff—7-foot tall puppets, dancers, bagpipe players, celestial figures, singers and storytellers. The kids really enjoyed being part of the event carrying their lit stars. Hundreds of people were involved and thousands enjoyed the fruit of their labor.

Caribbean Artists’ Village

Right out of college, I managed to land a job working for a newly formed artists’ village in the Dominican Republic called Altos de Chavon, a truly magical place. Hot pink bougainvillea flowers drip from balconies. Cars are forbidden on its narrow cobblestone streets. Honey-coated notes from a practicing musician occasionally drift up from the outdoor amphitheater. Handcrafted metal sculptures peer from under handhewn wooden eaves. If you’re lucky, a breeze, soft as a whisper, might dance across your face; brief relief from the jungle’s nearly tangible heat.


Today, Altos is an established cultural center. Artists from all over the world take advantage of its residency program. Students attend its design school, a Parsons affiliate. Exhibitions of Dominican and international art hang in its galleries. An archaelogical museum honors the rich Taino Indian history. When I worked there, it was my job to book the talent in the 5,000-seat outdoor amphitheater(!) I met my husband there—he was my boss. These pictures are from a trip we made years later.

If you go, stop by Milton’s supercerveza in La Romana on the way. He’s mastered the art of preparing a beer just on the brink of freezing. You’ll be sitting on a bar stool out in the open, sweat dripping down your back; he’ll set a Presidente in front of you but motion that it’s not ready to drink. He’ll go back to talking with his cronies. Just when you think he’s forgotten all about you, he’ll motion for you to go ahead. It will be the best beer of your life.

Want me to write more about Altos?

Shoot First, Ask Questions Later?

When I was first interested in photography, I bought a copy of The Family of Man, Edward Steichen’s selected photographs for a MOMA exhibition celebrating human life, birth to death. To write this, I grabbed it down from the shelf and dusted off the cover. As powerful as ever, I marvel at its complete documentation of an era. Now I see where I developed my love of black-and-white imagery. Somehow, black-and-white conveys a purity of intention and motion that can get lost in the glamour of color. Flipping through its worn pages, I stop at two different, but same, portraits of three generations. On one page, an African family from Bechuanaland (now Batswana) poses outside their grass hut (Nat Farbman for Life); opposite, an American family gathers around the wood stove (Nina Leen for Life). There is a stark contrast in lifestyle but there is a sameness in the value of family. I treasure the work of many of the photographers within its pages: W. Eugene Smith, Dorothea Lange, Margaret Bourke-White, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank, Elliott Erwitt, Gary Winogrand and so many others. I was drawn to the way they said so much within a simple photographed moment. A boy screaming his support of his little league team, an American-Japanese woman at a U.S. prison fence, a man throwing his girlfriend playfully into a Coney Island wave, a German boy headed to school amid the war ruins, a scientist holding the hope of a solution in a glowing test tube.

Did these photographers stop to ask permission? Not all tell. There has been a lot of controversy about the Robert Capa’s Spanish Civil War photograph of a loyalist soldier collapsing to his death after having been freshly shot. Capa, who said, “if your photos aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough,” claimed he was in the right place at the right time. Many, however, feel that the chances of him being that close and ready with his camera at exactly that moment, are slim. If he did stage it, does it make the photo less powerful?


What are the ethics involved with photographing people? Should you ask first? Is it invading someone’s privacy to photograph them without their knowledge? Does it make a difference if you shoot for art or if you’re a reporter? Were some of the famous spur-of-the-moment photos really staged, and not spontaneous?





My own feelings and actions have changed over the years. As a younger, less confident person, I pretended to be with the press. People love to have their picture in the paper. Plus, I have always found that if you have a big camera and a little guts, people will let you shoot wherever you want. During the 1991 Desert Storm parade through lower Manhattan, I went wherever I wanted, with the blessing of the cops. I shot inside the ring for many a rodeo, diving for the fence when a bull got too close. I never asked anyone if I could take their picture, fearing they’d say no. But, they always knew I was photographing them.

I still don’t usually ask permission first, but for different reasons. My feeling is that you’ve lost the moment if you stop to ask. Somehow asking permission implies a complicity between you and them that prevents genuineness. Better to shoot first, ask later. Now that I’ve developed a body of work that I’m proud of and feel represents me, I tell people the truth, that I don’t work for the press, but for myself. Sometimes they don’t want anything to do with me, but most of the time, people support me and agree to let me show their image. I confess it still makes my stomach flip a little when I ask someone to sign a release. It’s so important to me, and they have the power to build me up or tear me down.

I do feel, however, that you have to be careful not to compromise a fellow human being’s dignity. I don’t think photographers should exploit their subjects. To me, there’s a big difference between a ‘stolen’ shot of a homeless person asleep on a stoop vs. a portrait of a person down on their luck that conveys a sense of compassion. That would be one instance where I’d ask first.

What do you think?

Mill Friends

All the work I’ve put into my website is paying off! Last week I got an email from someone who found my site through a google search, liked my work and wanted to hire me. Two months ago, my name would not have surfaced.

Jessica and a group of self-described creatives rented an old mill house in Salt Point, NY for the weekend. I’ve passed the place many times and wondered how it remains standing considering the violence of the water running through the base of the house. During spring melt off, the entire first floor appears under water. Jessica wanted me to take a portrait of she and her friends. I don’t normally shoot portraits, but was intrigued by her description of their strong bond and the unusual location.

Up close, the house shows its age. The uppermost walls are crumbling, but beautiful still in their masonry. I had to duck my head to rap on what I took to be the door. The anteroom was full of broken rock, two shuttered windows above the river crashing below. I’m glad I didn’t know there were nine of them before I arrived. How do you photograph nine people in an artful way?

Inside, the house was frozen in time, about 1975. One of the bedrooms had a row of windows overlooking the living room on the first floor below; a perfect foil for this lively bunch. They grouped themselves in the windows and performed for me. I liked the deck as backdrop. Blue sky above the falling walls, strong lines of the wooden deck boards at an angle to the corner. Some groovy orange chairs arranged back to back and the rest was all about them. They have an ease and respect with each other that you can see even in the photos. So strong their gift of friendship, so rare. I wanted to capture the power of the water in one of the setups and had them stand opposite the house on a small spit of land. A couple of the women wore heels but didn’t flinch at my request. I climbed through one of the anteroom windows and stood on the ledge above the roiling water to get the shot. One false move and me, or worse, my camera, would fall into the frigid torrent and be forced out the hole in the wall. Not as powerful a portrait, but a strong statement about the place they’d shared.

The Woman in Blue is my favorite of the day. Though she is play posing, her spirit is real, the blue and orange fill the frame with painterly color, her beauty seduces us. She makes us wonder what she sees in the distance. Thanks to Jessica and her friends for allowing me to share their day.

Can You Land that Helicopter Again?

The day dawned with a crystal blue autumn sky, so clear it hurt your eyes. We couldn’t have ordered a better backdrop for shooting an emergency helicopter landing at Saint Francis Hospital in Poughkeepsie, NY. Nadine and I had been hired to take documentary-style photographs with special emphasis on their acclaimed trauma services. Our contact, Karen, was very excited about the work we’d already delivered.

After years of deliberating, I’d bought a high-end digital camera (Nikon D2H) a few months earlier. This was its first commercial outing, October 2005. We’d done a bunch of semi-staged setups over the course of the week prior. At night, we’d save out a bunch of low-res jpg files for Karen to review and forward to her team. It was a much easier and infinitely more artistic process than looking at contact sheets through a loop.

We’d done our homework and knew exactly where we wanted to be when the helicopter was due to arrive. Saint Francis overlooks the Hudson River valley and from the topmost building there was a stunning wide-angle view of the hospital grounds in the foreground, the valley in the background and the welcoming statue of Saint Francis not far from the helipad. I think the building had six floors plus the extra stairs to the roof. Of course, the morning of the shoot, the elevator wasn’t working. No problem. We were early. We energetically mounted the stairs to stake out our position. No sooner had we set up the tripod, Karen got a call that one of the doctors we’d been unsuccessful in photographing earlier was available, but only briefly. We had time to shoot the doctor and still make it back for the helicopter. So, we packed up, went down the seven floors to emergency, set up the lights and photographed the doctor in action.

Minutes to spare, we ran back up to the roof. At that point, we’d set this up several times, so our fingers flew, the camera was mounted on the tripod in no time. The pilot had radioed in. I tried to slow my heart back to normal after running up the stairs and patiently waited for the helicopter to appear in the viewfinder. One of the reasons I’d chosen this camera was its fantastic burst rate. It shoots something like eight frames per second. I set the camera to continuous shoot mode and as soon as the speck of the helicopter was in the frame I simply held down the shutter button. Delightfully, the camera fired off frames at a dizzying pace. But then, just as the helicopter was getting close, the camera quit shooting. I’d maxed it out and it needed to save what it had shot before letting me continue. I was frantic. The pilot was coming in slow to make sure I got my shot, turning different angles for me. Ugh.

Pilots are always so cool. He didn’t flinch when I asked him if he would land again. In fact, I think he’d been asked the question before, because his ready answer was that helicopters look the same taking off as they do landing. While we were talking, they got an emergency call and had to leave asap, so we ran back up the bloody stairs to get them on their way out. This time, I was more selective with the shutter.

Later that same afternoon, a real trauma case was coming in by helicopter. Karen got approval for us to shoot their arrival. We stood with our backs to the helicopter till the whoosh of the blades died down. The shots I took of the team unloading the patient and rushing him into the ER are so much toothier than the staged shots. You can feel the urgency.

Sunset was near as we ran up the stairs one last time to shoot the helicopter’s departure. A pink light escorted them out of view. Our thighs burned for days afterward.

Cowboys in Georgia?

My husband’s family is from Georgia and we visited with them a couple of weekends ago. While we were there, we went to the Booth Western Art Museum, known locally as the Cowboy Museum. My initial reaction was, ‘cowboys in Georgia? huh?’ But there it stands in downtown Cartersville, affiliated with the Smithsonian, too. The dynamic angles of the building and its outdoor sculptures inspired me. In this time of reduced funds to the arts, I feel it’s important to give back when I can (plus you never know, something else could come of it). After returning home, I offered free use of my photos in return for photo credit. They were delighted and are going to use this photo in their press kit.