Happenstance Commission

Animate Projects and The Photographers’ Gallery, London have sent word of their call for proposals for an artist to make work for The Wall at the Photographers’ Gallery and online at Animate Projects.

Happenstance is a fantastic commissioning opportunity that brings together the UK’s leading organisations for two popular, related visual artforms – photography and animation. The historical relationship between photography and animation (Eadweard Muybridge) and the tensions between still and moving are now encoded into DSLR cameras (capable of higher frame rates than traditional DV cameras). In everyday life, screen technologies have already altered the ways in which the visual image is made present and play a significant role in mediating public life. These are some of the considerations that we hope to explore in contextualising the project and exploring ideas of digital production and spectatorship.

The Photographers’ Gallery was the first independent gallery in the UK devoted to photography and has been instrumental in establishing photography’s important role in culture and society. It is the UK’s primary venue for photography with a mission to support a varied and distinctive engagement with the artform.

Animate Projects champions experimental animation, supporting artists to experiment and take risks, and working across the contemporary visual arts, animation, film and design, and where those practices intersect. Animate Projects has pioneered the exhibition of artists’ moving image through online and digital platforms. animateprojects.org is a unique resource, presenting experimental animation and a wealth of related material, in a curated context.

Happenstance builds on the synergies between the two artforms and both organisations’ curiosities about how people interact with public screens and digital images. The Wall is a 2.7 x 3m video wall in the foyer of The Photographers’ Gallery, visible to everyone visiting the building and passing by. For the Gallery, The Wall forms part of a collaborative research programme exploring issues concerning the digital image, its dissemination and display on-screen.

A particular aspect of The Wall is its specific context within a photography gallery and we want the project to further critical debate around medium specificity, digital culture, and the relationship of photography to 'animation' in ‘on-screen’ contemporary visual culture.

BRIEF

The commission is open to UK-based artists working in photography and moving image. Our priority is to commission work that responds to the public and online contexts in which the work will be situated, and which explore photographic and animated moving image practice in inventive and interesting ways.

Please see below for technical information about The Wall. Advice, support and assistance will be provided to the commissioned artist.

The organisers also state that they are open to discussion as to what the online presentation of the project will comprise, eg a single channel version of the work, or a series of tests or other material. Online, the project will be presented on its own page (for example, here).

For exhibition at The Photographers’ Gallery the work will be silent, but the online version can be silent or with sound.

£5,000 is being offered, to include all production, clearances and delivery costs and an artist’s fee. We will require commissioned artists to provide production materials (eg sketches, tests) and to undertake an interview for online, a digital image for a limited edition print, and to take part in a panel discussion.

They will contract the selected artist by the end of October 2013, and the completed work must be delivered by 17 December 2013. The work will be exhibited at The Photographers’ Gallery from 17 January 2014 for approximately 10 weeks.

HOW TO SUBMIT

To submit a proposal, please send the following (as Word docs or PDFs):

-a one page CV
-a short statement about your practice and a brief outline of your interest in, and approach to, the commission (not more than one side A4)
-a proposal (not more than one side A4)
-any additional visual material
-any links to previous work or information about your work

In your proposal, please tell us your idea, and give us a clear indication of work you’re proposing to make, including visual style and technique, and provide any key production information eg collaborators, other assistance, etc.

The deadline for submissions is 10.00 on Fri 11 October 2013.

Email your submission to happenstancecommission@gmail.com

Please note that we may invite shortlisted artists to discuss their project on 21 October (in person or by Skype).

The selection will be made by Katrina Sluis (Curator, Digital Programme, The Photographers’ Gallery) and Gary Thomas (Director, Animate Projects).

People will be informed of the decision by 25 October 2013. Please note that the organisers are unable to offer feedback on unsuccessful proposals. If you have any questions please email gary@animateprojects.org

THE WALL: TECHNICAL DETAILS

The Wall sits in the ground floor of the gallery above the stairwell, and operates 08.00 – 21.00 each day, and is visible to passersby on Ramillies Street.

It is a 2.7 x 3m video wall consisting of 2 x 4 rows of 60” Sharp PN-V602 LED, with the screens in portrait format mounted into an aperture so it is flush with the wall.

Each screen has a resolution of 1366 (h) x 768 (w) pixels.

The Wall in total is 2732 pixels (h) x 3072 pixels (w).

The screens have incredibly matte rich blacks and are high brightness so (with the correct settings) colour can become highly saturated and intense.

There is a possibility that subtle greyscale images will have more density and increased contrast, so please keep this in mind.

The backend is a single PC with a single video card with multiple outputs for the wall. The programming/control of exhibitions is via SCALA digital signage software.

Single channel/Multichannel

We can accept video either as a single 2732 x 3072 file, or can accept multiple files which can be arranged across the entire 2732 x 3072 px canvas using SCALA.

Please note that The Wall has lines or bezels visible between the screens which one should be aware of (particularly with text).

1000 Words Photography Magazine #16

We are delighted to announce that issue 16 of our online magazine is now live. To view it, please go to: www.1000wordsmag.com

To kick off this Autumn edition we meet young, German photographer Sara-Lena Maeirhofer. Speaking here to Natasha Christia, she discusses Dear Clark, a Portrait of a Con Man, a fascinating project that uses photography to explore the possibilities of fiction in its narration of real-life imposter Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, who called himself Clark Rockefeller, having developed an identity as a scion of the wealthy family.

Photography critic Gerry Badger reviews Lieko Shiga’s gloomy yet poetic photobook, SPIRAL COAST/album, shot in the Kitakama region of Japan, the area badly hit by the earthquake and tsunami of 2011.

Michael Grieve brings us an a essay on the latest photobook by British photographer Vanessa Winship, she dances on Jackson, records of her road trip across the US produced during a time of grieving.

Brad Feuerhelm takes a look at the recently released title from Morel Books, Still Lifes, Portraits & Parts by Daniel Gordon, imperfect paper constructions that spring from the fractures between photography, sculpture and painting.

James McArdle deconstructs the Photoworks publication, Memory of Fire: Images of War and The War of Images, edited by Julian Stallabrass, a timely assessment of the urgent issues relating to imaging war, the changing role of documentary photography and the enforced agenda of media networking that invariably invokes amnesia.

Swedish photographer Martin Bogren is profiled in our sixth and final feature, with a particular focus on Tractor Boys, which documents a strange ritual-mating dance wherein youngsters meet up in rural areas of Sweden to race their ‘tractorcars’, burning tyre marks into the asphalt. An essay accompanies the portfolio here from the legendary Christian Caujolle, republished with the kind permission of Dewi Lewis.

Over in our dedicated Books section, Sean Stoker leafs through Pedro Costa’s Casa de Lava, a scrapbook filled with ephemera following the Portuguese filmmaker’s trip to Cape Verde in 1992; Brad Feuerhelm gets vertigo as he stares down at Eric Stephanian’s devastating but beautiful Lucas, a self-published zine comprising one single photograph of the photographer’s son, taken on the only opportunity he was given to meet him; while Oliver Whitehead considers the more clinical but nonetheless intriguing new book from Clare Strand entitled Skirts.

As always, we are very grateful to the many photographers and writers involved in this magazine project and would like to express a special word of thanks to Sean Stoker for his editorial assistance.

Joachim Schmid: X Marks the Spot

All images © Joachim Schmid

Joachim Schmid introduces his latest project, X Marks the Spot - a thought-provking meditation on a key moment in the US's history and the role photography and surveillance plays in memorialising it through the prism of digital culture.

Dallas, Texas, Dealey Plaza. The site where John F. Kennedy was assassinated is a major tourist magnet. White X's on the pavement mark the spots where the president was fatally shot – in the middle of a freeway on-ramp. Visitors often wait for a gap in traffic, hurry to one of the X's, get their photos taken and leave the road before the next cars arrive. Some of those photos end up in online photo sharing sites such as Flickr, with captions along these lines: “I don’t know why I felt the need to stand by the X but judging from everyone else, it would appear to be the thing to do.”

A webcam is positioned in a window on the sixth floor of the former Texas School Book Depository, the site where, on November 22, 1963, an assassin allegedly fired the shots that killed Kennedy as the presidential motorcade passed through Dealey Plaza. The camera’s perspective exactly matches that of the assassin: it now shoots the tourists shooting their own memorial photos, and we can watch this in real time.

My new book X Marks the Spot combines snapshots taken by tourists at Dealey Plaza with footage from the webcam.

Joachim Schmid

 

Archisle: The Jersey Contemporary Photography Programme

Archisle: The Jersey Contemporary Photography Programme, hosted by the Société Jersiaise (Jersey Society) in the British Channel Island of Jersey promotes contemporary photography through an ongoing programme of exhibitions, education and commissions. The Archisle project connects photographic archives, contemporary practice and experiences of island cultures and geographies through the development of a space for creative discourse between Jersey and international practitioners.

Archisle is currently inviting applications for the position of Photographer in Residence 2014. This is an exciting post in its second year commencing in March/April for a period of six calendar months through to August/September 2014. The residency provides the following key benefits and opportunities:

- £10,000 bursary for the commission/production of a body of work and solo exhibition
- Studio space with access to inkjet printing and office/internet resources
- Living accommodation and stipend
- Travel costs

A key focus of the Archisle project is to engage the residency programme with Jersey culture and community through audience and participatory involvement. In addition to the production and solo exhibition of new work responding to the cultural context of the island of Jersey, the resident will be contracted to teach photography one day per week (or equivalent) over the six month duration of the project. This teaching will be delivered in a workshop format to a range of educational and community groups. Applications are therefore encouraged from practitioners possessing the desire, enthusiasm and a proven ability to impart technical skills and develop critical understanding of contemporary photography across a diverse range of participants.

Applicants are requested to submit:

- Examples of recent work (min 10/max 20 images)
- Statement describing current practice
- Statement of objectives for the residency including an outline commission/exhibition proposal
- A current CV including details of past exhibitions/publications
- An estimate of travel costs to Jersey

Applications may be made by post or email to:

Archisle Photographer in Residence Programme 2014
Société Jersiaise
7 Pier Road
St Helier
Jersey, Channel Islands
JE2 4XW

Email: archisle@societe-jersiaise.org

For email applications total file size must be no larger than 5 MB.
Any enquiries/questions about the residency should be sent to the above email address.

CLOSING DATE: 10 September 2013.

Websites: www.archisle.org.je and www.societe-jersiaise.org

Joan Fontcuberta Live at Fotofestiwal 2013

For those who couldn't make it to Łódź, the team behind Fotofestiwal 2013 has released this video featuring legendary photographer, writer and curator Joan Fontcuberta, in which he discusses the programme's main exhibition, I ARTIST: Transcendent Amateur. Fontcuberta also muses on the central questions that are crucial to the festival as a whole: Where do all the images on the Internet come from? Who creates them? What is the role of an artist-photographer in the modern world, and what is the role of an amateur photographer? Is there any difference between these two?

Wolfgang Tillmans @Les Rencontres d'Arles, 2013

All images © Wolfgang Tillmans

Following the yearly sojourn to Arles, 1000 Words Associate editor Brad Feuerhelm reports back from the 44th edition of the pioneering photography festival with his thoughts on the headline show: Neue Welt by Wolfgang Tillmans.

You could potentially misinterpret Wolfgang Tillmans’ Neue Welt exhibition at Les Rencontres d’Arles 2013 edition as a dispassionate foray into servile production values and commercialised aesthetics. With its general over-scaling, ready to impress a commodity driven art market, you could also be easily forgiven.

But that would be to overlook the qualities of this diaristic voyager of unnoticed contemporary sublimities - of photography, technology, and also of hyper-consumption.Tillmans work bristles with what Warhol Factory guru Gerard Malanga’s associated as explicit Scopophilia; the love of looking.

Clearly, the phenomenon of enforced sexuality and of the eroticised mundane is very much on display here in an exhibition that emits distinct flourishes of chromophilia. Sometimes, this is enmeshed in banal observations of car headlights, which Tillman’s enthusiastically photographs over and over. In other instances, one can replace the anxiety over the noirish branding (which exists in frame without any real reference to the make of car) to that of over-analytical paradoxes and modes of intellectual over-compensation. Thus, it becomes a tragic display of inept consumerism with a sexy commerciality, which culminates in an unnerving dead end to our insistence of rapidity and the sense of false desire photography so powerfully enables. The headlights themselves are also a crude metaphor for branded technological verisimilitude. Between the lens and the convex forms inherent in headlight design, we find a reflexive nod to the history of automobile and camera lens alike.

It is also worthy mentioning the fact that Tillmans’ exhibition is of epic size. This, combined with the grandiose scale of the prints, pitch congress with the eye near to the point of exhaustion, but somehow always manage to reel us back in. On this note, it should be observed that most of the exhibition is hung in a tighter line than is usually associated with Tillmans’ notoriously chaotic methods of display. The pleasure of the line is occasionally interrupted delicately throughout by varying print size, the first of which being the image of the fly resting on a lobster. With its mountains of pink, fleshy debris playing host to a breeding ground for further desires and maggots concurrently, it’s difficult not to read it as a nod to a hyper consuming society and the beautiful decay it produces.

The overall feeling is that of a nagging reminder of our communally myopic insight into the sublimity of our excessive existence. Neue Welt delivers a penchant for newly discovered dystopias and the revelations associated with decimated human endeavour, the white walls berating a tunnel vision of purity and respect for works which ultimately comment on the disease that our contemporary first world lifestyles need for product enforcement and so on. This is tantamount to the power of Tillmans, and his innate ability to observe, absorb and finally to reevaluate and redirect inward in an age of rampant consumption and derogatory practice of an ecological and metaphoric scale.

Typically, Tillman’s offers no answers, cares little for your reception, and is quite content to be self-involved with his internal vision and desires of display. That it is oblique or self-referential is immaterial when the work pays homage to the patterns of subjective understanding and human perception. A potential misunderstanding suggests a greater measure of the problems we are facing. We expect too much and reflect too little.

Brad Feuerhelm

Unseen Photo Fair 2013

In anticipation of its second year, Unseen Photo Fair (26-29 September 2013) has announced a programme of talks and films. Expanding on the fair’s emphasis on undiscovered talent and trends, Unseen 2013 addresses 'the abundance of images in today’s world and how photography and photographers are coming to terms with an environment that is both new and unsettled.'

The programme features the launch of Foam Magazine's Talent Issue (featuring a contribution from our Editor-in-chief Tim Clark) which, in addition to the exhibition, will include a day of debates and talks including critic, curator and Conscientious founder and editor, Jörg Colberg; 2013 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize nominee, Cristina de Middel; Foam Paul Huf Award winners, Onorato & Krebs and the 2013 Talents themselves.

Following that, experts such as The Sunday Times Magazine picture editor, Monica Allende; writer and researcher, David Campbell; professor and visual culture theorist, Nicholas Mirzoeff and entrepreneur and co-founder of wetransfer.com, Nalden, will discuss these issues, raising questions such as, 'How can we edit the world?' In addition, Dutch photographers such as Rob Hornstra, Jaap Scheeren, Ruth van Beek and Jan Hoek will present their latest work at the Unseen Theatre.

Also featured in the programme is a series of talks that focus on the globalisation of the art world, looking at the evolution of work produced by artists from Asia, Africa and The Middle East. These talks complement Unseen Cinema 2013, a selection of special screenings of rare films and talks by a number of the filmmakers.

Unseen’s General Manager, Sasha Stone, summed up the ethos of the programme, saying:

"With photography at its core, Unseen encourages the exchange of ideas, dialogue and artistic expression. Visitors will immerse themselves in a word full of new experiences, adventures, and insights. Our programme highlights the integral role photography plays within all cultures and all areas of life. I am delighted that Unseen is presenting such a varied and forward-looking programme. We hope you will enjoy Unseen 2013.”

1000 Words certainly will. We hope to see you there!