Guilbault receives Master of Photographic Arts

We are very pleased to announce that at the Professional Photographers of Canada convention on April 14, 2008, Mike Guilbault, MPA, APPO, received one of the highest awards within the Professional Photographers of Canada in the form of the Master of Photographic Arts.
Mike was presented the award at the Annual Awards Banquet by PPOC President, Walter E. Janzen, MPA, SPA, F.Ph., in London, Ontario. (photo by Helen Traczynski)

The Master of Photographic Arts (MPA) award is a follow-up to the Craftsman of Photographic Arts (CPA) which Mike earned in 2003. The award is presented to photographers within the association (PPOC) that have achieved a high level of skill demonstrated through images accepted into the National Print Salon of PPOC, held annually in conjunction with the convention. In addition, recipients must have provided service to the association or its provincial member associations, and by promoting professional photography within the community.

In recent years, Mike's work has received recognition through acceptance into the Annual Print Salon, receiving several Awards of Merit and Excellence, and the prestigious honour of acceptance into the Permanent Loan Collection of the Professional Photographers of Canada.

A Worthy Quote

Found this quote by Henri Cartier-Bresson.  Kind of summarizes some of my feelings for photography:

"For me the camera is a sketch book, an instrument of intuition and spontaneity, the master of the instant which, in visual terms, questions and decides simultaneously. In order to “give a meaning” to the world, one has to feel involved in what one frames through the viewfinder. This attitude requires concentration, discipline of mind, sensitivity, and a sense of geometry. It is by economy of means that one arrives at simplicity of expression.
To take a photograph is to hold one’s breath when all faculties converge in a face of fleeing reality. It is at that moment that mastering an image becomes a great physical and intellectual joy.
To take a photograph means to recognize – simultaneously and within a fraction of a second– both the fact itself and the rigorous organisation of visually perceived forms that give it meaning.
It is putting one’s head, one’s eye, and one’s heart on the same axis." ~ Henri Cartier-Bresson, 1908-2004.