EXHIBITION
What: NatGeo Live with Ami Vitale: Rhinos, Rickshaws and Revolutions
Where: Royal Theatre
When: Tonight, 7 p.m.
Tickets: $39.50-$54.50, can be purchased online at rmts.bc.ca, by phone at 250-386-6121 or in person at the McPherson Box Office
Documentary photographer and filmmaker Ami Vitale spends more time in remote regions than she does at her home in Montana.
That鈥檚 not unusual for journalists covering world events, but a world-weary Vitale figures she spent just three weeks at her Montana home in 2017, considerably less than what she would have liked. 鈥淎nd [those weeks] were not at one time,鈥� Vitale said.
Between field shoots, workshops and speaking engagements, she dreams of the quiet of her Big Sky Country abode. 鈥淚t is the antidote to all the insanity,鈥� she said.
The Florida native will not be back in Montana for the foreseeable future, as she has made a career out of being in motion.
Vitale flew from Portland, Oregon, to Victoria on Tuesday to prepare for her Royal Theatre presentation, Rhinos, Rickshaws and Revolutions, which starts at 7 tonight. Vitale plans to talk about the relationship between humans and animals, particularly in India and Africa.
Vitale got to know elephants when she moved to India in 2001, weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York. It was there that she cemented her working relationship with Getty Images, one of the world鈥檚 top photo agencies. She has moved around in the years since, and is now a documentary photographer for National Geographic.
Nine years ago, her work with National Geographic sent her to Kenya. She quickly developed a love for the country and its people, and has become their champion, of sorts.
Vitale is especially passionate about the Reteti Elephant Sanctuary Community United for Elephants in northern Kenya, a project she calls the beginning of a transformation, in terms of how people relate to wild animals.
Orphaned elephants at the sanctuary are raised by Samburus, semi-nomadic people from the area who herd animals, with the ultimate goal of having the elephants rejoin their herds.
Images from Vitale鈥檚 National Geographic feature about the sanctuary, headlined Warriors Who Once Feared Elephants Now Protect Them, was chosen for the magazine鈥檚 Best Photos of 2017edition. 鈥淚鈥檝e known about this since it was just about a dream that people laughed at and thought would never happen,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t has been such a privilege, because the community has invited me to be the person to tell their story.鈥�
She is going back to film a documentary about the sanctuary, the first community-owned and operated elephant sanctuary in Africa. Vitale said she wanted to tell stories about humans, not just animals.
鈥淔rankly, the way we film documentaries and look at the world, we always leave a lot out of the frame 鈥� mostly people. [Photographers] pretend that there鈥檚 the pristine world where there鈥檚 no people. Turn the camera around. Everybody is behind the camera, so let鈥檚 actually talk about the world in the way it really exists 鈥� with people in it.鈥�
Vitale laughs at her reputation as 鈥渢he elephant lady,鈥� as she was once known as 鈥渢he panda lady.鈥� Though her years of research and experience with wild pandas resulted in her first book, Panda Love, The Secret Lives of Pandas, which is due in June, she has spent recent years researching and documenting elephants and rhinoceroses.
鈥淎ny time you start working on a project, people forget everything else that came before it,鈥� Vitale said with a laugh.
鈥淣ow, all of a sudden, I鈥檓 the elephant expert. Before it was all pandas. That was all people could talk about.鈥�
Prior to her panda and elephant excursions, Vitale had no nickname; there is nothing to joke about when you鈥檙e a news photographer covering the Kosovo conflict and strife at the Pakistani-Indian border.
She developed her fondness for environmental exploration after a successful career in hard news, which won her the International Photographer of the Year prize, the Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding Reporting and Magazine Photographer of the Year from the National Press Photographers Association in the United States.
When Vitale was a photojournalist working for the Associated Press, her priorities were different, she said.
鈥淚t was all about being timely. And my thinking nowadays is about making timeless work.鈥�
