Marc Pagani

Artist’s Biography I’ve been creating images since 1994 and have photographed a diverse range of subjects including the Tamang, Gurung, and Sherpa people of Nepal, monks in Tibet, caballeros in Argentina, schoolchildren in Patagonia, mountain and rock climbers in Argentina, Chile, Cuba, Iceland, Mexico, Nepal, Tibet, the US, and France, prisoners in the United States, and Mardi Gras Indians here in my city. I’m completely self-taught when it comes to photography, but my background as a Music Therapist working with sexually and physically abused kids, my education towards a Master’s in Counseling Psychology, and my travels have helped shape my world view. Being from New Orleans, Hurricane Katrina turned my world upside down as much, if not more than, the fire which consumed 90% of my film and print archive. I experienced the brunt of Katrina though watching clips of video footage on my laptop in the basement of a friend’s house in Chicago. When I came back to New Orleans 37 days later, I witnessed how tragic events can divid or unify people and prompt extraordinary acts of kindness, and can expose the class and race differences as well as the ineptitude of government on the local, state, and federal levels. I have a World Map on my wall in my office. There are pushpins – red dots – marking the places I’ve been and the places and cultures I want to photograph. Through my images, I am exploring that world trying to connect the dots. My “Mountaineers” series was the recent First Place winner of the Photojournalism: Sports Category of the Prix de la Photographie on Paris. My editorial work has been for magazines such as Outside, Book, Adventure World, unVailed, Groupeez, Sea Ray Living, as well as newspapers, websites, and complete catalogs for outdoor gear supply shops and outdoor clothing companies. My current show “Scaling Mountains: Small Footprints on Big Glaciers” is currently on display at Mojo in New Orleans. Work is also on display at the Hi Ho Lounge and the Garden District Pub in New Orleans, and was featured at the Teva Mountain Games in Vail, Colorado in 2006 and 2007, at the Banff Festival of Outdoor Films in 2002, at Blue Sky Rules in California, and at SWK, Active Endeavors, and in the play “Art” in Chicago. My work has appeared on the walls of coffee shops and lounges and restaurants in New Orleans like the Bridge Lounge, CC’s Coffee, and Surrey’s Cafe. Scaling Mountains: Small Footprints on Big Glaciers I have been climbing mountains and rock since 1994. Starting out on Colorado “14’ers” (Colorado has 53 peaks over 14,000 feet), I soon graduated to the Andes, the Alps, and the Himalayas. I found that in photographing these places, the sheer enormity of the mountains and glaciers is never fully realized unless it’s put into perspective, with some sort of known quantity or figure offering a contrast and giving the mountain “scale”. The environmental portraits presented here were all created on an expedition to climb the given mountain or to climb another mountain in the same range. They are all “candid” portraits as none of them were set up – they all were shot as they occurred, capturing a moment in time where the light, the shadow, the conditions, the movement of the climber, and the world were “just right”. It’s interesting that the climbers appear so small and insignificant in these images, yet their “small” footprint is directly in contrast to the HUGE footprint the Human race is placing on the glaciers shown here. As they continue to melt due to climate change (yes, the science is in and has been in for 20 years…it’s happening), I realize that my young nephews and nieces may never stand where I stood or see the vistas I’ve seen. Capturing these moments in time has taken on a new significance to me and I am trying to communicate a bit of that urgency and certainly some heightened awareness to our combined footprints on the environment.