Glitz and Grime: Photographs of Times Square
New York Photographs 42nd Street in 1997, by Philip-Lorca diCorcia, from “Glitz & Grime” at Yancey Richardson.
Friday, August 14, 2009
New York Photographs
NYT story here:
Glitz and Grime: Photographs of Times Square
New York Photographs 42nd Street in 1997, by Philip-Lorca diCorcia, from “Glitz & Grime” at Yancey Richardson.
Glitz and Grime: Photographs of Times Square
New York Photographs 42nd Street in 1997, by Philip-Lorca diCorcia, from “Glitz & Grime” at Yancey Richardson.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Lillian Bassman
Lillian Bassman is a fashion photographer from NYC whose work from the 40s to the early ’60s was published in Harper’s Bazaar. From the NYT article called Femininity, Salvaged:
Five years ago, at 87, Ms. Bassman discovered the glories of Photoshop and so began a new chapter in digital photography. She works every day in her studio, toying and reconfiguring from about 11 in the morning until dinnertime, and claims a proud proficiency with her computer. It is a skill however that does not extend to the use of e-mail or Google. “I’m not interested,” she said, “in any of that.”
NYT slideshow
Lillian Bassman, Then and Now exhibition at Staley Wise in NYC.
The book, Lillian Bassman, from 1997 is out of print but a new book will be published in the fall.
© Lillian Bassman
© Lillian Bassman, 1951
Five years ago, at 87, Ms. Bassman discovered the glories of Photoshop and so began a new chapter in digital photography. She works every day in her studio, toying and reconfiguring from about 11 in the morning until dinnertime, and claims a proud proficiency with her computer. It is a skill however that does not extend to the use of e-mail or Google. “I’m not interested,” she said, “in any of that.”
NYT slideshow
Lillian Bassman, Then and Now exhibition at Staley Wise in NYC.
The book, Lillian Bassman, from 1997 is out of print but a new book will be published in the fall.
© Lillian Bassman
© Lillian Bassman, 1951
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Kodachrome Retired
Kodak announced on June 22, 2009 that Kodachrome film will be retired after 74 years.
Read A Tribute to KODACHROME: A Photography Icon in Kodak's Blog A Thousand Words. Don't miss the Kodachrome slideshow.
Elsewhere, Forture magazine editors pick their favorite Kodachrome picks in the Kodachrome Gallery. Three of these photos by W.Eugene Smith, Robert Doisneau, and Jeff Jacobson are exceptional. For me, these all have what critic Roland Barthes in Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography
called punctum. The punctum is subjective. A photo has that detail, that special quality, that something that grabs you by the throat or it does not.
From Fortune magazine.
W. Eugene Smith, renowned for his photo essays for Life magazine, notably "The Country Doctor," typically chronicled working-class American life. He also typically never worked in color, but Fortune persuaded him to do so. This private moment in the headquarters of Connecticut General Life Insurance in Hartford, Conn., did not make it into the September 1957 issue of the magazine, for which Smith shot photographs to accompany an article on the company's "dramatic new office building."
© W. Eugene Smith
Robert Doisneau, the celebrated French photographer and creator of the iconic 1950 photograph, "The Kiss by the Hôtel de Ville," was another photographer who rarely experimented with color.
Here Doisneau pictures a man reading in a lounge chair in Palm Springs, Calif., a photo that appeared in the magazine's February 1961 issue.
© Robert Doisneau
Fortune's editors chose this Jeff Jacobson photograph of a Shanghai billboard for their "2002: The Year in Pictures" photo gallery to symbolize the need to keep an "eye on China.""For centuries, China was Asia's sleeping dragon. Now fully awake, it is the region's most vibrant economy -- and most feared competitor," the photo's caption explained.
© Jeff Jacobson
Read A Tribute to KODACHROME: A Photography Icon in Kodak's Blog A Thousand Words. Don't miss the Kodachrome slideshow.
Elsewhere, Forture magazine editors pick their favorite Kodachrome picks in the Kodachrome Gallery. Three of these photos by W.Eugene Smith, Robert Doisneau, and Jeff Jacobson are exceptional. For me, these all have what critic Roland Barthes in Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography
called punctum. The punctum is subjective. A photo has that detail, that special quality, that something that grabs you by the throat or it does not.From Fortune magazine.
W. Eugene Smith, renowned for his photo essays for Life magazine, notably "The Country Doctor," typically chronicled working-class American life. He also typically never worked in color, but Fortune persuaded him to do so. This private moment in the headquarters of Connecticut General Life Insurance in Hartford, Conn., did not make it into the September 1957 issue of the magazine, for which Smith shot photographs to accompany an article on the company's "dramatic new office building."
© W. Eugene Smith
Robert Doisneau, the celebrated French photographer and creator of the iconic 1950 photograph, "The Kiss by the Hôtel de Ville," was another photographer who rarely experimented with color.
Here Doisneau pictures a man reading in a lounge chair in Palm Springs, Calif., a photo that appeared in the magazine's February 1961 issue.
© Robert Doisneau
Fortune's editors chose this Jeff Jacobson photograph of a Shanghai billboard for their "2002: The Year in Pictures" photo gallery to symbolize the need to keep an "eye on China.""For centuries, China was Asia's sleeping dragon. Now fully awake, it is the region's most vibrant economy -- and most feared competitor," the photo's caption explained.
© Jeff Jacobson
Friday, June 26, 2009
William Eggleston at the Corcoran
The William Eggleston exhibit at the Corcoran Museum opened on June 20th and is exceptional.
William Eggleston is from Memphis, TN. Many people have wondered if Eggleston's work is "Southern" or have asked him directly about the "meaning of the South". In an interview printed in Aperture by John Howell in 1999, in response to the "meaning of the South" query, Eggleston said "I don't know what they're looking for. I don't have any idea".
Howell continues to say that "Southern" always strikes Southerners as a condescending tag.
It's taken to mean "regional," as in local, anecdotal, folkloric and outrageously melodramatic - in other words, like those novels, films and plays full of enervated aristocrats, trampy women, and idiot men-children acting out in bizarre ways. It's as if solemn phrases about the drama of the decaying South soothe those puzzled by Eggleston's pictures ("What are they about?"), and those-mostly now in the past - outraged by the "banal" subject matter.
Eggleston gives his consistent philosophic answer: "You can take a good picture of anything. A bad one too," he adds, with a chuckle. He has said many times that the subjects of his pictures were simply an excuse to make photographs. "I want to make a picture that could stand on its own, regardless of what it was a picture of.
John Szarkowski isn't quite buying this. In the Introduction to the monograph William Eggleston's Guide
, Szarkowski writes that the photos are about Eggleston's home, about his place.
...the pictures reproduced here are about the photographer's home, about his place, in both important meanings of that word. One might say about his identity.
If this is true, it does not mean that the pictures are not also simultaneously about photography, for the two issues are not supplementary but coextensive. Whatever else a photograph may be about, it is inevitably about photography, the container and the vehicle of all its meanings. Whatever a photographer's intuitions or intentions, they must be cut and shaped to fit the possibilities of his art. Thus if we see the pictures clearly as photographs, we will perhaps also see, or sense, something of their other, more private, willful, and anarchic meanings.
Photography is a system of visual editing. At bottom, it is a matter of surrounding with a frame a portion of one's cone of vision, while standing in the right place at the right time. Like chess, or writing, it is a matter of choosing from among given possibilities, but in the case of photography the number of possibilities is not finite but infinite. The world now contains more photographs than bricks, and they are, astonishingly, all different. Even the most servile of photographers has not yet managed to duplicate exactly an earlier work by a great and revered master.
Photos below are from the monograph William Eggleston's Guide
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1976, 2003
© William Eggleston
© William Eggleston
© William Eggleston
http://www.egglestontrust.com/
William Eggleston is from Memphis, TN. Many people have wondered if Eggleston's work is "Southern" or have asked him directly about the "meaning of the South". In an interview printed in Aperture by John Howell in 1999, in response to the "meaning of the South" query, Eggleston said "I don't know what they're looking for. I don't have any idea".
Howell continues to say that "Southern" always strikes Southerners as a condescending tag.
It's taken to mean "regional," as in local, anecdotal, folkloric and outrageously melodramatic - in other words, like those novels, films and plays full of enervated aristocrats, trampy women, and idiot men-children acting out in bizarre ways. It's as if solemn phrases about the drama of the decaying South soothe those puzzled by Eggleston's pictures ("What are they about?"), and those-mostly now in the past - outraged by the "banal" subject matter.
Eggleston gives his consistent philosophic answer: "You can take a good picture of anything. A bad one too," he adds, with a chuckle. He has said many times that the subjects of his pictures were simply an excuse to make photographs. "I want to make a picture that could stand on its own, regardless of what it was a picture of.
John Szarkowski isn't quite buying this. In the Introduction to the monograph William Eggleston's Guide
, Szarkowski writes that the photos are about Eggleston's home, about his place....the pictures reproduced here are about the photographer's home, about his place, in both important meanings of that word. One might say about his identity.
If this is true, it does not mean that the pictures are not also simultaneously about photography, for the two issues are not supplementary but coextensive. Whatever else a photograph may be about, it is inevitably about photography, the container and the vehicle of all its meanings. Whatever a photographer's intuitions or intentions, they must be cut and shaped to fit the possibilities of his art. Thus if we see the pictures clearly as photographs, we will perhaps also see, or sense, something of their other, more private, willful, and anarchic meanings.
Photography is a system of visual editing. At bottom, it is a matter of surrounding with a frame a portion of one's cone of vision, while standing in the right place at the right time. Like chess, or writing, it is a matter of choosing from among given possibilities, but in the case of photography the number of possibilities is not finite but infinite. The world now contains more photographs than bricks, and they are, astonishingly, all different. Even the most servile of photographers has not yet managed to duplicate exactly an earlier work by a great and revered master.
Photos below are from the monograph William Eggleston's Guide
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1976, 2003
© William Eggleston
© William Eggleston
© William Eggleston
http://www.egglestontrust.com/
Thursday, June 4, 2009
The Perfect Moment
Twenty years ago, in the summer of 1989, the Corcoran cancelled its scheduled retrospective exhibition of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe called "Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment". The Institute of Contemporary Art hosted a two-day symposium Imperfect Moments: Mapplethorpe and Censorship Twenty Years Later. The original exhibit was organized by Janet Kardon from the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia. A must read is the Janet Kardon article from 1988. The show was partially financed by the National Endowment for the Arts. One of the reasons for the cancellation was the uproar over the Andres Serrano photograph "Piss Christ" which was also funded by the NEA and exhibited in North Carolina. See the link above for the advert for Andres Serrano's SHIT show last fall.
Sister Wendy, nun and art critic, in an 1998 article in Art in America, doesn't seem at all bothered by Serrano's Piss Christ. (sorry, someone broke my link to the article). The New York Times reviewed a 10-year Serrano retrospective at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in a 1995 article by Holland Cotter.
The Guardian.UK's Jonathan Jones, in an article from Sept. 2000, writes about the Mapplethorpe polaroid portrait of Patti Smith from 1974 shown below. He nails this one calling Patti Smith "black anger in the white light".
Patti Smith, 1974, Polaroid -©Robert Mapplethorpe
Patti Smith, 1979 - ©Robert Mapplethorpe
Piss Christ - ©Andres Serrano
Sister Wendy, nun and art critic, in an 1998 article in Art in America, doesn't seem at all bothered by Serrano's Piss Christ. (sorry, someone broke my link to the article). The New York Times reviewed a 10-year Serrano retrospective at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in a 1995 article by Holland Cotter.
The Guardian.UK's Jonathan Jones, in an article from Sept. 2000, writes about the Mapplethorpe polaroid portrait of Patti Smith from 1974 shown below. He nails this one calling Patti Smith "black anger in the white light".
Patti Smith, 1974, Polaroid -©Robert Mapplethorpe
Patti Smith, 1979 - ©Robert Mapplethorpe
Piss Christ - ©Andres Serrano
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Smile and Say No Photoshop
I hope this is a trend. Photographer Peter Linbergh's non photoshopped covers for French Elle.
Read the NYT article, Smile and Say No Photoshop.
Also, in the excellent LENS blog, the Three Faces of Reese. Can you see the changes in Reese Witherspoon's chin, dimples and eye color?
More from the Elle news blog.
Monica Belluci Photo by Peter Lindbergh
Monica Belluci Photo by Peter Lindbergh
Monday, May 18, 2009
The Originals - Robert Maxwell
There is a beautiful full page portrait of the surfer Clay Marzo by photographer Robert Maxwell in Sundays, NYT's Style Magazine. Summer Travel 2009.
Clay Marzo Aqua Man
While the rest of us surf the Web, Clay Marzo hangs ten off some of the most spectacular beaches in the world. Tahiti, El Salvador, Micronesia, Spain, Bali — the world is Marzo’s tidal wave. ‘‘My favorite place to surf is Fiji,’’ he says. ‘‘There is a surfing island called Tavarua that is like paradise.’’ In search of the perfect break, he always comes prepared, typically taking four or five boards with him; he’d like to visit the coast of Western Australia next. Although Marzo has the developmental disorder known as Asperger’s syndrome, it’s never slowed him down: he got his start riding on the front of his father’s long board at the age of 1; now 19, he is one of the most lauded beach bums in the world. ‘‘I get most inspired by seeing photos of faraway breaks and sick, slablike waves.’’
Clay Marzo by Robert Maxwell
New York Times Style Magazine, May 17, 2009
More from Robert Maxwell's Originals Series
Wes Anderson - by Robert Maxwell
Gordon Parks - by Robert Maxwell
Michele Oka Doner, Artist by Robert Maxwell
The lone hunter in the Akira Kurosawa film ''Dersu Uzala'' inspired Michele Oka Doner to rethink her own clutter. ''That's when I began to want things to be more elemental,'' she says. Doner tossed the extraneous but kept a firm grip on all things functional -- and beautiful -- even in her well-known public art projects. The tiled floors she designed for Miami International Airport include celestial depictions of saltwater plants and invertebrate creatures; for the Herald Square subway stop in New York, she gold-tiled the walls to add ''radiance and reflectivity'' to a tedious commute. She's also conscious of beauty in the little things, from her sculptural jewelry (including a collection for Christofle) to her line of crystal objects for Steuben Glass.
Clay Marzo Aqua Man
While the rest of us surf the Web, Clay Marzo hangs ten off some of the most spectacular beaches in the world. Tahiti, El Salvador, Micronesia, Spain, Bali — the world is Marzo’s tidal wave. ‘‘My favorite place to surf is Fiji,’’ he says. ‘‘There is a surfing island called Tavarua that is like paradise.’’ In search of the perfect break, he always comes prepared, typically taking four or five boards with him; he’d like to visit the coast of Western Australia next. Although Marzo has the developmental disorder known as Asperger’s syndrome, it’s never slowed him down: he got his start riding on the front of his father’s long board at the age of 1; now 19, he is one of the most lauded beach bums in the world. ‘‘I get most inspired by seeing photos of faraway breaks and sick, slablike waves.’’
Clay Marzo by Robert Maxwell
New York Times Style Magazine, May 17, 2009
More from Robert Maxwell's Originals Series
Wes Anderson - by Robert Maxwell
Gordon Parks - by Robert Maxwell
Michele Oka Doner, Artist by Robert Maxwell
The lone hunter in the Akira Kurosawa film ''Dersu Uzala'' inspired Michele Oka Doner to rethink her own clutter. ''That's when I began to want things to be more elemental,'' she says. Doner tossed the extraneous but kept a firm grip on all things functional -- and beautiful -- even in her well-known public art projects. The tiled floors she designed for Miami International Airport include celestial depictions of saltwater plants and invertebrate creatures; for the Herald Square subway stop in New York, she gold-tiled the walls to add ''radiance and reflectivity'' to a tedious commute. She's also conscious of beauty in the little things, from her sculptural jewelry (including a collection for Christofle) to her line of crystal objects for Steuben Glass.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Jeff Riedel - A Night On the Streets
I just got the May 2009 issue of PDN, the Photo Annual 2009. One of the winners from the magazine/editorial category was Jeff Riedel for the New York Magazine story called A Night On the Streets. Kudos to New York Mag's photo director Jody Quon and photo editor Alex Pollack.
Lorraine Zier, 5 a.m., midtown © Jeff Riedel
William Thompson 5:30 p.m., the Bronx © Jeff Riedel
Nancy Quinn, Midnight, the Bronx © Jeff Riedel
Lorraine Zier, 5 a.m., midtown © Jeff Riedel
Monday, April 20, 2009
Pulitzer for Damon Winter NYT
Congrats to NYT photographer Damon Winter, who won the Pulitzer Prize today for feature photography, for his images of Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign.
Check out the winning photos in the NYT slideshow A Vision of History.
Also, in the NYT multimedia presentation, Damon Winter recounts documenting the crowds, security and Senator Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 2008.
3-3-2008, San Antonio, TX, Damon Winter, NYT.
11-07-2008, Cinncinati, OH, Damon Winter, NYT
Check out the winning photos in the NYT slideshow A Vision of History.
Also, in the NYT multimedia presentation, Damon Winter recounts documenting the crowds, security and Senator Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 2008.
3-3-2008, San Antonio, TX, Damon Winter, NYT.
11-07-2008, Cinncinati, OH, Damon Winter, NYT
Pictures Generation
The Pictures Generation, 1974-1984, exhibit opens at the Met on Tuesday. The Pictures Generation was a group show at Aritsts Space in NYC in 1977 that exhibited work from Robert Longo, Jack Goldstein, Sherrie Levine and Troy Brauntuch. Other artists that were associated with the "Pictures Generation" school or movement were Barbara Kruger, Richard Prince and Cindy Sherman.
Douglas Eklund in his essay from the Pictures Generation exhibit at the Met quotes semiotician Ronald Barthes and opines about why it's important for photographers to know their history.
Barthes infamously extended this concept to question the very possibility of originality and authenticity in his 1967 manifesto "The Death of the Author," in which he stated that any text (or image), rather than emitting a fixed meaning from a singular voice, was but a tissue of quotations that were themselves references to yet other texts, and so on.
The famous last line of Barthes' essay, that "the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author," was a call to arms for the loosely knit group of artists working in photography, film, video, and performance that would become known as the "Pictures" generation...
from Men In The Cities series, © Robert Longo
Douglas Eklund in his essay from the Pictures Generation exhibit at the Met quotes semiotician Ronald Barthes and opines about why it's important for photographers to know their history.
Barthes infamously extended this concept to question the very possibility of originality and authenticity in his 1967 manifesto "The Death of the Author," in which he stated that any text (or image), rather than emitting a fixed meaning from a singular voice, was but a tissue of quotations that were themselves references to yet other texts, and so on.
The famous last line of Barthes' essay, that "the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author," was a call to arms for the loosely knit group of artists working in photography, film, video, and performance that would become known as the "Pictures" generation...
Untitled Film Still #14, 1978 © Cindy Sherman
from Men In The Cities series, © Robert Longo
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