resurrection of documentary . . .

Los Angeles based artist William E. Jones has created this visually frustrating animation from rejected negatives. The photos were originally taken by Farm Security Administration photographers to document the American depression. FSA head Roy Stryker performed the editing with a hole punch. Watch the video below and click here to read more.

Punctured from The Paris Review on Vimeo.

ichat portraiture . . .

Take a look at Laura Sackett's images of young teens iChatting with their friends. She thinks of her work as a new kind of portraiture. Click here to see more photographs and read about her concept.

is there such a thing as privacy? . . .

Philip-Lorca diCorcia talks about shooting his "Heads" series. Watch as he describes his simple lighting set-up and discusses the existence / non-existence of "privacy" in our contemporary world.

julietta cervantes . . .

Frequently, photographs of cemeteries and gravestones fall into the category of "cliché. But take a look at these pictures taken in Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery by Julieta Cervantes, an accomplished photographer who has received numerous awards for her images of dancers. She uses multiple hand-held flashlights as her light source. Read more here in the New Yorker's Photo Booth column, and you be the judge . . .

street photography . . .

"defenestration" . . .

This piece is part of a John Baldessari retrospective coming to The Metropolitan Museum of Art on October 20, 2010. He is a master of conceptual photography. It will be there through January 9, 2011, so if you're in NY be sure to check it out. Fun stuff!

John Baldessari (American, b. 1931)

Floating: Color, 1972

Six color photographs; 11 x 14 in. (27.9 x 35.6 cm) each

Collection Mario Bertolini, Breno, Italy

© John Baldessari

Baldessari once remarked that a large part of his work "arises from a single word, a chance phrase, or an overheard comment or part of one." For Floating: Color it was "defenestration"—the act of throwing something out a window—a word the artist liked, "because it had a limited meaning, specific to a particular act." Deciding that he should throw colors instead of objects, and basing his sequencing on the simple order of the spectrum, Baldessari jettisoned large sheets of colored paper from his window and captured the process on film. (quote from Met web site)

take the haiku review challenge . . .

Can you summarize an art exhibition in a few words or sentences? A haiku, a sonnet? Click here to read more. Check out these examples . . .

Haiku Review: Allen Ruppersberg’s decades-long text-and-(found)-image project into memory and reconstruction has taken many practical and strategic turns. The latest, “No Time Left to Start Again,” is one of the most accessible and, perhaps for that reason, most affecting. This time Ruppersberg is acting the avid record collector, documenting early rock ‘n’ roll through its recordings; the amateur magician, researching spells; and – returning to his own salad days – a topical historian of “LA in the ‘70s,” and who knew whom and how.

Allen Ruppersberg. Honey, I rearranged the collection asking myself the question—Who is the founder of conceptual art?, 2010. Silkscreen and collaged photographs on paper

38-1/4 x 50-1/8 inches

Image courtesy of Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles

Photography by Brian Forrest

Copyright Allen Ruppersberg

(Margo Leavin, 812 N. Robertson Blvd., W. Hywd 90069, thru Oct. 23.)

Haiku Review: Ron Rizk and Cindy Kane are both masters of a kind of meta-still life. Rizk describes observed objects with exacting precision within gently weathered framing structures (actually painted illusions) while Kane wields a somewhat looser brush in her intimate rhapsodies of objects enlivening the covers of art and other magazines. (Yes, the New Yorker.)

Ron Rizk, Time Exposure, 2010. Oil on panel 28 x 22 ”

Courtesy of Lora Schlesinger

(Lora Schlesinger, Bergamot Station T3, S. Monica 90404. Thru Oct. 16.)

fun typology . . .

Remember the Boombox? You may even have one? Here's a link to a photography project by Lyle Owerko that's all about remembering these giant portable music boxes. Read more about it here.

photograph as starting point . . .

It's worth a trip to Fort Worth to see this fascinating installation by Eve Sussman and the collective called Rufus Corporation at Fort Worth Contemporary Arts. Based on a photograph,Yuri's Office is a detailed re-creation of the office of early cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space. Click here to read about it.

lupita murillo tinnen . . .

UNT photography alum Lupita Murillo Tinnen is showing her work alongside that of Keith Wilson in a new exhibition "Context" at Richland College in Dallas. Click here for more information. The "cityscapes" of these two artists depict interiors and exteriors of the homes of Mexican-Americans.

Lupita Murillo Tinnen, mesa

Lupita Murillo Tinnen, pajaritos

Lupita Murillo Tinnen, el sofa rojo

Kieth Wilson

Kieth Wilson

"mexican suitcase" negatives rediscovered . . .

A suitcase of negatives taken during the Spanish Civil War by Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and Chim (David Seymour) and missing since 1939 has been rediscovered. These remarkable images of war have arrived from Mexico City and are on view now at ICP in New York. Click here to see and learn more.

One of three boxes containing negatives by Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and Chim (David Seymour).

© International Center of Photography

Robert Capa, [Exiled Republicans being marched on the beach from one internment camp, Le Barcarès, France], March 1939. © Estate of Cornell Capa / ICP / Magnum, International Center of Photography

Chim (David Seymour), [Mother nursing a baby while listening to political speech, near Badajoz, Extremadura, Spain], late April–early May 1936. © Estate of David Seymour / Magnum. International Center of Photography

Gerda Taro, [Young Republican soldier, Brunete, Spain], July 1937. © International Center of Photography.

concept, concept, concept, concept . . .

Look at this exhibition at MoMA for an inspiring view of the work of 4 comtemporary photographers . . . Click here to see and read more about this exhibition. To quote the Introduction: "Infusing the seductive language of film and advertising with a touch of sly conceptualism, the artists included in New Photography 2010 explore the relationship between straight and constructed photograph, image and picture."

Roe Ethridge, Pumpkin Sticker, 2010

Elad Lassry, Guinevere (Green), 2009

Alex Prager, Despair, Film Still #1, 2010

Amanda Ross-Ho, Irreconcilable Indifferences, 2010

seeing without eyes . . .

Take a few minutes to watch this short inspiring film about a project by blind photographer John Dugdale. Watch to the very end to see his provocative, elegant, inspiring photographs.

lolo veleko . . .

New York Times critic Holland Cotter has described these portraits by South African photographer Lolo Veleko as "eye-tingling", and Nigerian-born art historian and curator Okwui Enwezor considers this work an antidote to what he calls "Afro-pessimism". Click here and here to see and read more.

exquisite corpse" . . .

Here's a fun approach to creating a causal sequence of photographs. In this version of the Exquisite Corpse game by The Fab Collective, each photo actually takes part in causing the following photo. Click here to see the entire sequence so far . . .

a logical sequence . . .

The image below depicts a portion of Fibonacci 1202, 1970 by Mario Merz. Much of this artist's work addressed the "fibonacci sequence", a logical sequence of numbers in which each successive number in the series is the sum of the previous two numbers. In this piece he presents a sequence of photographs depicting increasing numbers of people seated in a restaurant. The corresponding fibonacci numbers are displayed in neon above the photos. Think how you might construct your own logical photographic sequence . . .

Mario Merz, Fibonacci 1202, 1970

cause and effect . . .

The collaborators Peter Fischli and David Weiss (click here for link to Frieze Magazine interview) create films that depict causal sequences. Think about using still photographs to record a cause and effect sequence of your own - minus the fire and explosions, of course - CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME!

Fischli and Weiss, The Way Things Go, 1987

duane michals . . .

This is just one of many thought-provoking sequences by photographer Duane Michals. He is a photographic artist you definitely need to research. Click here for interview in Double Exposure.

look at these "new-old" photos . . .

Joachim Seinfeld's Modern Nostalgia In Istanbul

Joachim Seinfeld works with painting, gelatin prints, and photography - an impressive feat on its own. Born in Paris, educated in Florence, and exhibited throughout Germany, its only a matter of time before his name is passed from gallerist to gallerist in the US. He's presenting this new body of work at Canakkale Biennial and the Istanbul Art Fair this year.

The paintings used in these works originate from walls of demolished or readjusted buildings. With the aid of a special procedure they are removed from the walls and fixed to a new support, whereby a silver gelatine photograph is developed upon them. The photographs from this series date from the time of the making of the houses.