2015 NPOY Picture Story Finalists

2015 NPOY Picture Story – Sponsored by Leica
(Listed in alphabetical order)

 

Tyler Anderson – National Post

You may not like it but this is who we are, or at least who we were. Not us, but them — this place’s people. The ones who were here before oil made Alberta king, back when the industrious beaver made Canada possible.

This is an ancestral journey, beyond the big highway that dissects the continent to where culture is not created but comes from the land. Up here, a marten means money, a moose means food and both are essential for survival. They did not become these people and it did not become this place — it always was.

 

Darren Calabrese – Independent

In its simplest form, “mummering” involves getting “rigged up” in costume, using anything one can scavenge in the home – curtains, lampshades, old clothing – to disguise one’s identity or gender before going unannounced to neighbours’ homes for impromptu kitchen parties with music and drink.

The centuries-old Christmas tradition of mummering all but disappeared in Newfoundland and Labrador following violence associated with the practice in the 1800s along with the financial realities that have fractured the province’s tightly knit neighbourhoods. However a new generation of cultural activism is attempting to revive the one-time popular holiday tradition.

 

Rafal Gerszak – Boreal Collective

Indigenous reoccupation camps on traditional territories and unceded lands have been establishing and asserting their rights in various parts of British Columbia. The Unist’ot’en Camp in northern BC is directly located in a high-profile oil and gas pipeline corridor. There are plans for several lines to meet here and continue to the Pacific Ocean for export to Asia. The camp’s objective is not only to stand against industry destroying the environment, it’s also a collective effort to re-establish sacred traditions, languages and practices that have been suppressed for generations.

 

Melissa Renwick – Toronto Star

It begins with the boyfriend stage: romantic dates, the illusion of love and the promise of a future complete with a house they would own together. Then it’s the grooming, the gifts and the hints about how much money she could make working in the sex trade. Finally it comes to the “sale”, where a pimp persuades a girl to prostitute herself and give him all her money.

 

 

The list of all 2015 NPOY nominees.