robert adams: the place we live, SPE

hey all,

just wanted to remind you that the robert adams exhibition at DAM opens this weekend. this important retrospective, organized by the yale university art gallery, showcases nearly 300 works of the american photographer's 45-year career.

there is a members only preview saturday, september 24, from 10 am to 5 pm. there will be docents in the gallery 11 to 3, exhibition curator joshua chang from yale in the gallery 11 to 1, and eric will be there 2 to 4. so if you're a member and can make it to that, it will be a pretty cool experience (also, if you come see me in the gift shop, i can probably get you member tickets). the gallery will be open to non-members sunday, september 25, and the exhibition will be on view in the gallagher family gallery on level one of the hamilton building through january 1, 2012. tickets to the museum with a student ID cost $8.



i also wanted to share with you that this is happening at DAM:

Looking at Photography
Sundays, October 9–30, 1–2:30 p.m.
A four-week class will be offered in conjunction with the Robert Adams exhibition. Explore the pleasures and mysteries of looking at photographs with DAM curator of photography Eric Paddock. Cost is $75 DAM members, $85 others. Registration begins September 13, September 6 for DAM members; call 720-913-0130 or register online at www.denverartmuseum.org/.

i don't know if you're all going to SPE or if you've registered yet, but last weekend the price went up (only by $5) and will remain at this price tier until october 15. remember there's a cap of 200! the events schedule has been posted as well.
fyi, the $62 per night rate at the santa fe sage inn is for two people; it's $10 more per person for a four-person room. i also calculated that it takes 6 hours, 23 minutes to drive from denver to santa fe, and it should cost a little over $100 in gas round trip :)

http://www.spesw.org/2011/03/2011-regional-conference-santa-fe-nm/

notes from wednesday's critique

ashley, several artists working with the elderly came to mind when i looked at your work today. both phillip toledano and tearney gearon make photographs of their parents and their ailing physical and/or mental state. toledano's "days with my father" is incredibly touching. it also incorporates text, since you said you were toying with the idea of using your subjects' written stories.





gearon's work is called "the mother project" and there is a great documentary about it.
view trailer. it's available from netflix.

toledano's series has great shots of his father's objects, and gearon's work includes a lot of imagery of her mother's space.

as for thinking about ways to include text, maybe look at duane michals



jeffrey wolin ("written in memory: stories from the holocaust")


and tony mendoza ("stories")


could be inspirational! i like the idea of keeping the text physically separate, though, since the narratives are sort of separate for the subjects themselves.

mark, your idea about depicting literal sayings reminded of me an artist named jordan tate's "contemporary dictionary of sexual euphemisms."



it's pretty funny. i'm excited to see which direction you go for this class!

dominic, i had to think about your project for a while. what i took from your critique today is that you are making images about what information we gain from experiencing space and the landscape, and about how we think we know a place but only know/remember bits of it. you said that we remember specific points, like "A-1," and i really liked that in regards to the aspect of the grid (like battleship and connect four).
there's this artist who used to work in denver that i actually found out about while i was living in baltimore that you might want to look at, jason demarte. i don't really get his work.


from "utopic"

i also think you should look at john pfahl's "altered landscapes" and think about the decision making of georges rousse in his work like "construction/deconstruction."



i loved looking at and talking about everyone's work this week. our next group critique isn't until october 10, so i hope we can keep this blog in mind as a place to share things with each other.

Maybe this will help

im feeling vulnerable.

notes from monday's critique

loon, i've been thinking about the importance of text in your pieces. i asked you where the text came from and you said you just made the phrases up, and i think i remember you referring to the text as "one-liners" last semester. the phrases themselves remind me of ones i am attracted to in the work tracey emin and ed rusha. i think rusha's paintings with text in particular would be helpful to look at. i think text is important in your work! i really respond to it when it feels meaningful, as in the red print from last semester.



i was also trying to think of other materials you could use to create different textures and effects. i'm sure you're familiar with robert heinecken's "are you rea" photograms, and i think you could try using materials that have two sides to achieve the effect he does, perhaps double-sided letters or other printed documents?



the museum of contemporary photography in chicago has a lot of the images from that series in their collection online.

will, i'm really trying to think about how the importance of place ties in to your project (i know, i'm really struggling with that one). thinking about triptychs reminded me of the work of bruce myren, who coincidentally not only makes triptychs but also writes short sentences about memories he has of the place he's photographed. to me, the "markers: memory" series is really about that assignment of value to place that you spoke of.



jesse, a couple of "classic" art historical works i thought of were la grande jatte, the scream, mona lisa, the persistence of memory, klimpt's kiss, picasso's les demoiselles d'avignon, and starry night.
i think a way you could reference photography more is to recreate artworks that focus on a certain effect, considering how important "tech"- and effect-driven photography is to our and the upcoming generation. for instance, it might be cool to recreate a classic photograph, such as yves klein's "a leap into the void," often credited as the first conceptual photograph, using HDR.



conor, saw this and thought of you.



also, even just doing a google image search for magritte brings up some things i think could be pretty inspirational to your work, especially if you decide to include the figure in some way, which i thought was a great idea.



i thought critique went really well :) i definitely appreciated everyone's input, and i'm really excited for the coming weeks.

for monday's critique

things i am thinking about as i make this work:




john pfahl's compost pile pictures. i want my prints to be dark and rich like this.


the dead fawn scene from jim jarmusch's dead man.


this image and others from andrew bruce's tender.


joel-peter witkin's cornucopian dog. everything about this image.



this music video.

Our natural world concerning re-birth

So I feel like I'm going to need a lot of honest feedback with my project. It's something that I'm not sure that I fully understand myself but a topic I'd like to explore so any thoughts are really going to be quite useful.

Onward.

This image is going to have no role in my project but is what got me going down the track that I am now on. I was talking to this man ("Bucktail" Jim) about muskie fishing in Wisconsin where the activity is considered a rite of passage. I'm very fascinated with that idea of how a rite of passage, whether it be a coming of age or a search for a higher self later in life, often times, even historically, is centered around wilderness.

To deal with these concepts I've chosen to focus on outdoor baptisms. In order for the images to make sense and to help relate the spiritual aspect of the act to the place, I'm simplifying the ceremony. I'm looking for people to "baptize" themselves. Carol worded it better when she called it a re-birth which I also think is more accurate. In shooting I"m going to experiment with cropping and the re-entry into the world, perhaps trying to capture that moment just before the first full breath (kind of a reference to yoga). To relate the place, I'm going to shoot the location before the act, and again in a few months once the landscape has accepted the winter. This, I felt, might bring in a dialogue about the seasons of life and how they may relate to our natural necessity for the wild. They will be presented in large scale triptychs (estimated 2' tall by 5-6' long). I'll have some sample shots for monday but have nothing to show at the moment.

Thanks for your help! I'm excited to see how everyone's project is coming next week.

Will