From Air Jordan to the Dalai Lama, photographer Tony Di Zinno made his bones on propaganda and print campaigns for the likes of Nike, Adidas and The North Face. His career spans assignments in 50 countries and on six different continents informing his work with a distinct global - and very human - perspective.

Tony is based in Los Angeles, where he teaches at his alma mater, the Art Center College of Design. Tony is passionately pursuing a number of projects, including a new photo-centric TV show that will explore endangered cultures and environments around the world.

AIGA XCD: How did you become involved with Mountain to Mountain?

TDZ: In 2007 I was on assignment in Colorado to cover the Teva Mountain Games for Athletes For a Cure.  AFC is a great client of mine. It’s run by Scott Zagarino who is the sports marketing guru for the Prostate Cancer Foundation. In a classic tale of synchronicity, I met Shannon Galpin, founder of Mountain to Mountain who was there at the games expo promoting Mountain to Mountain vis-à-vis Greg Mortenson’s seminal book, “Three Cups of Tea”. This initial encounter led to a call from Shannon a few months later to network on Mountain to Mountain’s “Views of the Himalaya” photo exhibit to benefit a village in Nepal. As it happens, I have worked in India, Nepal and Tibet and Shannon ended up choosing an image of mine of the Portola Palace in Lhasa to add to the show. This led to deeper conversations and collaboration including how Mountain to Mountain could compliment Mortenson’s work for the Central Asia Institute.

XCD: Could you briefly describe the different projects Mountain to Mountain is involved in in Afghanistan?

TDZ: Many of the proposed projects at Mountain to Mountain are with at-risk or marginalized groups: a deaf children’s school in Kabul, a women’s prisons literacy program in Mazar i Sharif and a computer lab at girls schools in Khost, But the one I am most closely involved with is “Views of Afghanistan”, a traveling photo exhibit which directly benefits emerging journalists (i.e., radio, video and photo journalists) in Kabul.

One of our primary goals on the trip was to see the fledgling agency AINA (the mirror) to meet the Afghan photographers and curate their work for inclusion in the Views show. This way we had East and West voices present in the exhibit. This also gives us a laundry list of their immediate needs and long term goals such as, branding, web site construction, self-promotion, stock photo syndication, equipment (digital SLR cameras, laptops etc), networking, and training for multi-media presentations.

XCD: This was not some tourist trip! Your team put itself in a challenging position in a region that has many political and security issues. What did you believe your efforts would accomplish?

TDZ: Direct first hand experience will always prove to be the most profound way to learn the reality of a situation. We knew we could discover on the ground level how to best fit with the multitudes of NGOs already active without becoming redundant. Also, coming back with images of Shannon in country as visual testimony to the embodiment of Mountain to Mountain’s street credibility was important to fundraising and visibility. Of course, it has security issues…but we went to great lengths to calculate those risks whenever possible in our favor. We were welcomed with sympathetic and proven friends like A4T (Afghans for Tomorrow) and only used a long serving and loyal translator and driver referred by a photo colleague so as to avoid any so-called blind dates on that front.

XCD: More specifically, what contribution does photography make to projects like this? Do you feel this trip required special skills that you may have picked up from life experiences or other projects?

TDZ: Photography, like smart design, has the power to invite, seduce and provoke very strong feelings – which is why I often refer only half-jokingly to my job title as ‘propagandista’. For example, it may begin on a small scale illustrating Shannon’s daily blog while we’re working in Kabul. Then, increasing our audience by the order of a magnitude there is the “Views of Afghanistan” photo-exhibit, which will reach new audiences by traveling from Los Angeles, New York, Paris, Beirut and finally in a poetic return to the Babur Gardens in Kabul in 2010.

On the mass media scale, our Afghan images were prominently featured on the lead story for NBC’s Dateline broadcast (May 2009) when Anne Curry interviewed Shannon.

Ultimately, we propose to illustrate Shannon’s odyssey of the birth of Mountain to Mountain with a book in the tradition of “Three Cups of Tea” to engage, inspire and connect to those like minded who would be moved.

One of the things that preserved me in Afghanistan’s extreme environments (strange as it may seem), is one set of ‘survival’ skills I learned working in the trenches on Hollywood’s studio back lots on dozens of Weiden & Kennedy’s Nike shoots with all of their superstar talent.  Perhaps the most obvious thing is the megalomania that seems to be part and parcel of that scene. What I have learned is to check my ego at the door in any new situation and never insist upon my own self-importance. I know where I am and it never leaves my awareness that I am a privileged guest.

XCD: Many of your photos are beautifully candid and personal. How were you able to gain access to your “subjects”? Could you share any specific events or situations where photographing felt truly like a collaboration between you and the “subject”?

TDZ: It pays to be acutely sensitive to the relative emotional temperature of situations Once the subjects get used to the idea that you are there for the expressed purpose of making their portrait (‘this is what I do’), then it takes on the spirit of a creative collaboration. There is a kind of conditional invite. If one approaches with genuine respect — even animals can sense it. The rest is up to making sure you don’t overstay your welcome.

For example, running with the horses in the tribal Buzkashi event was just brilliant. Imagine rugby on horseback where the ball is a headless baby cow!  My desire was to better understand the spirit the Afghan people through their national sport. During the match the referee of the event (who was ostensibly a sort of rodeo clown) jokingly pushed me into the center of the melee of horses and riders. No wonder they call it the worlds most dangerous game!

My normal reaction might have been to be on the verge of the border of grumpy with someone playing to the crowd at my expense – but here I could see it was the minimum price of my admission.  Any show of temper and I would have been sacked.  So instead I chose to employ my famous boyish sense of ‘play’ and the next time he tried the same tactic I hooked his arm under mine and dragged him in with me – prompting a roar of laughter from the audience! I had won the crowd over and showed everyone that I too was having fun (and was nobody’s fool). It gave me permission to get as close as I did, … but I would not really recommend buzkashi for the faint of heart because it is as brutal a sport as it is beautiful – a kind of surrogate warfare.

XCD: Do you feel like these projects have changed you? How so?

TDZ: Over the years I have been on expeditions where I was the ‘stranger in a strange land’, which is a humbling experience in itself because you come to be at the mercy of others. This helps create a growing sense of interdependency and gratitude.  Because of this exposure, I also now see myself as more of a global citizen.

To me, the important question is how does one’s work help someone else by using gifts (talent, position, etc.)?  It has changed me in the sense it confirms how important meaningful work is to my self-esteem, well-being and a sense of satisfaction. The old proverb goes that when the guru was asked ‘what do we take with us into the after-life?’ His reply, ‘… only the kindnesses you do to others in this life.’

When we interviewed a master kitemaker, I was struck by how kites here are a poetic metaphor for how fragile and paper thin things are in this country. That evening, at sunset, we flew our new kites high on the hill over a mosque in Kabul as I photographed our translator Naji with his young son. It felt like a kind of communal prayer for peace. I am reminded that I live for moments of transcendence like that.

XCD: Do you see any parallels between this project and any other ones you been a part of?

TDZ: Yes. Perhaps the most obvious connection from the past to the present is the work we did at Art Center in tandem with the DesignMatters department proposing and co-teaching a photo class on ‘Non-profits’ based upon the U.N’s Millennium Development Goals.

The United Nation’s MDGs  emphasize access to universal primary education. In this respect, Mountain to Mountain also makes a practice of championing the signaficance of an educated girl on a family, a village and yes…even post-Taliban Afghanistan.

XCD: What has been the Afghani response to the Mountain to Mountain project so far?

Mountain to Mountain’s first day in Afghanistan was a time of great uncertainty. We arrived on the eve of the 2008 U.S. presidential elections (I always vote by absentee ballot). News of the results came across the radio and you could feel the swelling of cautious optimism. This set the stage for the Afghan response to our discovery trip.

Certainly, one of the high points for me personally was the emotional pitch of the reception at the school for deaf children in Kabul. The only sound was that of shirt sleeves flapping with the energy of children’s hands emphatically signing to us the greetings of Salaam (peace) and respect. Each and every child wanted and needed to be acknowledged. On the drive back after this short whirlwind tour that day with Shannon I realized my face was hurting – because I had been smiling so much!

XCD: Any challenges that you faced in setting up your projects? How were you able to overcome them? Any lessons learned that you’d apply in the future?

Getting the 501(c) Non-Profit Organization status for Mountain to Mountain was a really big deal.

I consider it a stroke of genius that Shannon named the foundation Mountain to Mountain. It does what so many other non-profits fail to do. She got people to warm to the idea of giving to help people on the other side of the world in an Islamic country that is better known for war, corruption, narcotics and terrorism than for anything else.

Mountain to Mountain,
Village to Village,
Person to Person.

We remind them of heroes like Sir Edmond Hillary (who was the first to ascend Mt. Everest) and how he made his legacy that of helping the Sherpa culture by building schools and clinics in Nepal – then they can wrap their heads around the idea as part of an Alpinist tradition. The excellent theme being social responsibility, respect for a culture and it’s people. 

It is important to recognize our influences. We accomplish things not in a vacuum but because we are able to stand upon the shoulders of the giants who come before us. And if we are living our lives well we lift up others so that they might reach where we could not.

XCD: What were some of the most surprising things you learnt about Afghani society in your work? What were some things you shared with Afghanis about the US?

We learnt from meeting highly-educated members of parliament on several different occasions a candid view of the Taliban. Both members were women doctors who had lived under the burqa and had every right to severely criticize the repression of women and girls by the Taliban. Yet these women were open-minded,  – for each recognized that there would be no peace without including the Taliban in any formative political solutions. When we asked “…who are the Taliban?” – the answer was always “they are our own countrymen…They are Afghan. So, when they are pushed across the border they will eventually come back. Therefore, any discussion of Afghanistan’s future must include them or the fighting and violence will simply return with them.”

For my part what I was able to do on a personal level was to to present myself as a photographer and a human being first — above all else. I am someone who is curious and wants to learn and share what I discover. This is why I present myself as a human being first not as someone who defines themselves by what country I was born in or whose passport I carry.

The things I shared were simple.
The love of our family and friends,
The pleasures of a wonderful meal.
And sharing a good laugh (in several languages)

We experienced each others humanity. We talked about deep personal feelings of anxiety, fear and loss. We shared many long ranging discussions…and at the end of it all, we made good friends. I can honestly say there was no agenda on either side for improving our respective nation’s image or hard selling anything. We simply helped each other and enjoyed doing so.

To view more of Tony’s visual journalism around the world, click here.

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