© Stan Gaz/Courtesy ClampArt, New York City

Origin (Arizona Impact 5), 2007, photographed by Stan Gaz from his Impact Series.

During his youth, photographer Stan Gaz was facinated by the notion of meteorites. Thus, he recently began to photograph meteorite impact structures and their surrounding landscapes. Many of these locations are sacred to various tribal communities and have a variety of stories and beliefs attributed to them. Although many versions exist, most relate to the notion of the craters possessing secrets of mankind’s origin.

An opening reception for Stan Gaz: Impact will be held on Thursday, April 30, from 6–8pm, at ClampArt in New York City, the exhibit runs through June 6.

© 2009 Diane Cook and Len Jenshel/National Geographic. In honor of Earth Day, we present a series of rooftop gardens photographed by Diane Cook and Len Jenshel and published in the May issue of National Geographic Magazine. View more of the Cook and Jenshel’s green roof images on the National Geographic site. Pictured above: New York’s Empire State Building gleams in the windows of architectural firm Cook + Fox. Specialists in green buildings, the designers wanted their own space to reflect the fact that more plants in more places make for more livable cities. At right: Cover © 2009 National Geographic Society

(more…)

Photo © Brian Widdis.

The 50th annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade rolled through Detroit’s Corktown neighborhood Sunday afternoon, March 15, 2009. Following the parade, two area high school marching bands, including Detroit Academy of Arts and Sciences Marching Band (pictured) squared off for a marching band battle in front of Detroit’s abandoned Michigan Central Station. The train station has been vacant since 1988 and stands as a powerful symbol of Detroit’s problems. In 2004, a proposal to refurbish the station and move the Detroit Police Department headquarters there was announced, however the plans were canceled in 2005. In early April, 2009, Detroit City Council voted to expedite demolition of the building.

This image is from a collaborative project between Widdis and photographer Romain Blanquart called “Can’t Forget The Motor City.” Widdis and Blanquart are Detroit photographers who contacted us after reading a PDNPulse post about the abundance of photo projects showing run-down spaces in Detroit. “Our goal is to show Detroit as a whole—to tell the story of the city and its people,” they wrote. “We believe that beyond the easy and exotic snapshots of crumbling buildings lays the real story of the Motor City.” Widdis shoots in black-and-white and Blanquart shoots in color.

Inspired by the TV show Mad Men, which takes place at an early-1960s ad agency, we recently picked up a stack of old magazines from 1962. Here we present some of the advertisements we found. We scanned and color-corrected the ads to remove the yellowing effects of old paper. The names of the photographers who shot these ad campaigns are lost to history, but their work lives on in our gallery. (14 more images follow.) (more…)

Photo by Laura Novak. This image won best in category in the Ceremonies division of PDN’s 2009 Top Knots: The New School of Wedding Photography contest. You can see all the winners on our online gallery of wedding photo contest winners.