“Although Roger Ballen's disquieting scenes of ambiguous, psychological tableaux look unlike any photography being produced today, Bowie will present historical photographs-both celebrated and obscure-to demonstrate what he calls "Roger Ballen's spiritual and aesthetic ancestry." Drawing from startling and evocative images from the past 150 years, "Before There Was Ballen" will explore photographic pioneers who sought to capture the tensions of insanity, theatricality, the grotesque, spontaneity, power relationships, animal interaction, and classical portraiture with their cameras.”For those of you like me who sadly won´t be able to go, make sure you stop by his aforementioned blog, That´s a Negative which features a great selection of meaty critical essays and photography reviews to sink your teeth into. It really is such a great online publication that it must be added to your reader if, for some strange reason, it isn´t already!
“The photographs Bowie plans to discuss include wide-ranging examples such as a remarkably formal abstraction by Roger Fenton of the queen's rifle target from 1860; Ralph Eugene Meatyard's hallucinatory compositions of children posing in latex masks of elderly, shriveled people 100 years later; archival portraits of 19th century zookeepers posing with their animal charges; and photo documentation of the female inmates of the Surrey County Lunatic Asylum from the 1850s.”
"The pictures in the series, Alibi appear to be far removed from reality and present in a disturbing way. Time and place seem to disappear-the photographer moves through timeless and undefinable spaces. A space of interpretation as wide as possible emerges and the beholder is required to make up his or her own stories."Thorsten Kirchhoff was born in Thuine, Germany (1973). He studied Publishing in Leipzig and Photography at Fas in Berlin. He has worked as a book designer for different publishing houses including Powerhouse Books, New York and was also a member of Neonplus, a collective of photographers in Berlin. His work has been the subject of numerous exhibitions at the Konika-Minolta Gallery (Tokyo, Japan), Prg (Bern, Switzerland),Museum Neukolln, Fas and Neonplus (all Berlin, Germany), Phototrinnale Hamburg 2008 (Hamburg, Germany), Photomonth Crakow (Crakow, Poland) and more recently at the Inaugural New York Photo Festival 08 (New York,USA).
"I would like to re-involve myself with the people who are, or who have become a part of my family. I've been inspired by the aesthetics of painting, and would like to reinterpret the poses and iconography through a contemporary lens. As humans, we collect tangible and intangible artifacts to voluntarily remember places and times. However, it is often the most nondescript cues that trigger recollections of the past without conscious effort. Through photographing the interior spaces of my family's homes, I want to address the ties between memory and collecting. I am curious about the value and significance we give to objects, and how that value does not always transcend our personal and cultural differences. In addition to the interiors, I want to re-address the landscapes of my childhood by photographing the spaces I grew-up in."Alana Celii was born in Chicago in 1986. She is currently pursuing her BFA from Parsons School of Design, and lives in Brooklyn. Her work has been featured in publications such as A Field Guide to the North American Family, Hijacked, Canteen Magazine, Beautiful/Decay Anthology, Ruby Mag and Look-Look magazine. She has exhibited work in group shows in New York, Berlin, Los Angeles, London, Sydney and Dallas. I expect we will be hearing a lot more from her in the future.
"America's beauty culture is a complex and pervasive phenomenon. Its scope and power can be found in the many cyberspace forums devoted to the subject. On these anonymous message boards patients share their results, questions, and feelings. This easy access to information has triggered the rapid growth of the industry. In 2004, 12 million Americans had a cosmetic procedure and the numbers continue to grow. Today there is a never-ending array of tools and machines to make us beautiful. Patients look in the offices of Cosmetic Surgeons for the promise of happiness. Instead they often discover their own fears, self-loathing and anxieties. The American Society of Plastic Surgeon's website states that, "Even a small change on the outside can create an extraordinary change on the inside, allowing an individual's self-confidence to flourish." The message is clear - we can now reshape our characters with a scalpel or a syringe. This body of work coincides with a long and personal struggle with body and self esteem issues. But in photographing these doctor's offices, I have been able to conquer many of my inner demons and in the words of Susan Sontag make "familiar things small, abstract, strange and much farther away."Last week Cara also launched Woman in Photography, an arts initiative which she co-curates with her pal Amy Elkins. WIPNYC showcases exciting work from female artists in the form of solo exhibitions that will take place every other Tuesday across different venues in New York. Their next show is on June 17th. Well worth a visit me thinks.
"I have decided to meet the actors, selecting interesting strangers in the streets and isolating them from the crowd for a few minutes in order to shine my interrogating lights on them. Each series of pictures is a social survey, a photographic census of a place or a type. The Bridge series is made on a bridge over London's river Thames, an exposed location that gives no cover to my subjects who find themselves isolated like microbes on a microscope slide. We don't expect to be singled out in a city the size of London, I am sure everyone I approach thinks they are about to be mugged and in a way they are."Nick Turpin began his photography career in 1990, at the age of 21, by landing a job as a staff photographer for The Independent. Since 1997 he has been shooting design and advertising projects for clients around the world including Toyota, Jaguar, Land Rover, VW, IBM, Barclays Bank, Vodafone and Sony. In 2000 he founded the international street photographers group iN-PUBLIC which has led to lecturing and teaching street photography at London's Tate Modern, Yale School of Art and on TV.
