The Awesome Drama of Storms in Black and White: 18 Powerful Images

Photographs of storms can be among the most emotive of images. Add to that the drama that black and white can bestow on a photograph and you can get some very impressive images. We think these examples of black and white storms really hammer home how impressive the combination can be. We hope you like [...]

Photography Tutorials, Case Studies and Discounts - LightStalking Photography Newsletter.

Source: http://www.lightstalking.com/black-white-storms

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7 Great Photography Websites You May Not Have Heard Of

By now, we?ve all heard of Flickr, Strobist, and the many other popular websites geared towards the photography crowd. While they are fantastic resources, there are surely some other noteworthy websites to visit. From contests to tutorials, we have 7 useful, but lesser-known websites that are definitely worth a visit. 1. Photo Answers This website [...]

Photography Tutorials, Case Studies and Discounts - LightStalking Photography Newsletter.

Source: http://www.lightstalking.com/7-photography-websites

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How Adding Interest to Foregrounds Can Make Your Images Pop

The concept of foreground interest is not a new discovery, but it?s a monumental way to take an ordinary image and make it stunning. Images with foreground interest (mostly landscapes) are generally more visually intriguing than those without. It creates a layered photograph that provides a focal point to start on, and then allows you [...]

Photography Tutorials, Case Studies and Discounts - LightStalking Photography Newsletter.

Source: http://www.lightstalking.com/how-adding-interest-to-foregrounds-can-make-your-images-pop

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Photographers are Terrorists

Photography is Not a Crime shows us a new poster by the Transportation Security Administration that makes a pretty clear assertion: if you are a photographer near an airport you are potential terrorists and must be reported. Next thing you know some church in Florida will start burning copies of The Americans.

UPDATE: The TSA responds. Thinking about it more, I don't know if the greater insult is the implication that photographers are terrorists or that we dress like LES skate rats.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/09/photographers-are-terrorists.html

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A Line Describing The Sun

William Lamson is a fellow POCer and one of the most original, witty and creative artists working today. For his latest project, A Line Describing The Sun, William has finally scaled his genius to its appropriate size.

A Line Describing the Sun involved a day long performance in which I followed the path of the sun with a large Fresnel lens mounted on a rolling apparatus. The lens focuses the sun into a 1,600-degree point of light that melts the dry mud, transforming it into a black glassy substance. Over the course of a day, as the sun moves across the sky, a hemispherical arc is imprinted into the lakebed floor.

A Line Describing the Sun is on display at Pierogi in Brooklyn through October 10.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/09/line-describing-sun.html

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Tales From FotoFest

The stage is set for portfolio speed-dating
I've always wanted to go to Houston for FotoFest. The shows, the people, the line dancing. One year I'll get down there. In the meantime I asked a two friends, Phil Toledano and Justine Reyes, who attended the portfolio reviews this year to report back from the trenches. It's been a few days since they returned home, but you get the idea.

Phil Toledano
Now I know what it?s like to be a cow at the meat-yard, waiting for the compressed-air bolt to the forehead.

Fotofest is a very interesting experience-it peels back the little band-aid the covers the giant weeping rash of desperation that all (ok-most) of us suffer from. Of course, it?s useful-for some of us, it?ll crack open a career. But (to quote George Bush, which I try and do as much as possible) make no mistake-we?re all down here dancing about like monkeys, selling our wares. Is this a little bleak? Well, I suppose so, but then again, I am the Morrisey of photography.

Sometimes I?m asked what I hope to get out of a meeting. Honestly? The only thing I?d like to hear is something along the lines of: ?I?ve never seen genius of this importance before in my life-hang on, let me get the curator of MOMA on the horn? That would be great. Or a screaming artgasm ?when harry met sally? style, reviewer white-knuckling the sides of the table.

But I?ll settle for a group show in Nebraska.

Now, don?t get me wrong, I?ve had a good time, and I?ve had some lovely conversations with some people who seemed (at the time) interested. I also met some really great photographers (red Sonja and death reyes-shout out to my peeps!)

We all ask each other how it?s going, and it?s a question I find very hard to answer. Some people liked my work, others, not so much. You really don?t have any clue. It can take a week, a month, or a few years.


Justine Reyes
Last day at Fotofest. Trying to summarize this experience seems like an extremely daunting task at the moment. I am exhausted. Being a first timer I guess I didn?t quite know what to expect. For only four days a lot is packed in. I met with ten reviewers today alone and then did an open portfolio night.

On the good side I have gotten to know some really lovely people, talented photographers and critical thinkers. It has been fun looking at people?s work and getting feedback on my own.

On the bad side there is at times this odd competitive/aggressive energy that I naively wasn?t expecting to encounter.

All in all I am glad I got to come and be a part of it although I don?t think I will be able to process this experience fully until after I return home and escape the vortex that is Fotofest.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/04/tales-from-fotofest.html

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BAMart Silent Auction

Untitled (Yellow Dress) © Amy Stein
A new image from my Halloween in Harlem series is included in the 6th Annual BAMart Silent Auction. The bidding is open now and runs through this Sunday. If you are in New York you understand how important the Brooklyn Academy of Music is to the cultural landscape of the city. If you don't live in New York, just know it's a great cause and there is some top notch art available in the auction.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/03/bamart-silent-auction.html

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The Exhibition Lab

© Dreamboats Collective

Recently, there has been a lot of renewed interest in joint endeavors within photography world. Collectives like Piece of Cake and the Dreamboat Collective have been formed to deepen community and support for their members. Lots of people are discussing their work together and it's helping to rewrite the rules of the art world.

The collective spirit is not limited to photographers; dealers have come together to produce shows and form collective groups as well. Sasha Wolf and Michael Foley have joined forces to create The Exhibition Lab, a study center for people interested in understanding and improving their photography. It's exciting to see people you like and respect putting their necks out to support photographers.

Next weekend the Ex Lab hosts it's first portfolio review. There's a blockbuster lineup including folks from The New Yorker, Harpers, New York Magazine, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Aperture, plus stellar galleries like Yancey Richardson and Andrea Meislin. I'm scheduled to review portfolios as well, but this list is so impressive I'm tempted to sign up myself. Do not miss this opportunity.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/06/exhibition-lab.html

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Dennis Hopper RIP

Double Standards, 1961 © Dennis Hopper
Dennis Hopper's contribution to acting and cinema was singular. He was also a very talented photographer whose body work stands head and shoulders above most celebrity-come-photographers.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/05/dennis-hopper-rip.html

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A Few Questions for Chris Verene


© Chris Verene, 2007

I?ve been familiar with Chris Verene?s photographs since I started graduate school at the School of Visual Arts in 2006. Chris was a critique teacher there, and although I never had the chance to study with him I was always curious about his highly saturated, unsettling and poignant images of his extended family. Chris has been photographing his relatives in Galesburg, Illinois for 26 years. His approach to depicting his family is tender and humorous and often disturbing. His style is distinctive; marked by his use of fill flash, a square film format and the addition of neatly handlettered text surrounding the image.

His exhibition, Family, is currently showing at Postmasters Gallery in Chelsea until October 16. Last week I had a chance to see the show, which features over 41 images densely packed into two large rooms, and to browse the handsome new book of the same name published by Twin Palms. I asked Chris if he would be up for a quick interview. I was very happy when he agreed.

AMY STEIN: I?m interested in your relationship with your family. In particular with the members of your extended family in your images. Are you close? How do you deal with the distance that comes with the repeated act of photographing your family, of placing yourself in the role of observer. Or does the act of photographing them bring you closer?

CHRIS VERENE: I'm very close with my family, pictured and not pictured. As an only child, I clung to my cousins like siblings, and we still are very connected. I do not work as an 'observer,' that is your job as the audience. I am relating the stories from their source, our family, town, and neighbors out to the world at large. I think that the act of photographing makes me close with only the people who really enjoy the photography-- the people who time and again ask for pictures, and compel me to tell those stories.

© Chris Verene, 2002

AS: Your images are accompanied by handwritten text, which gives them context and deepens the narrative of the series. It also mimics the conventions of the family photo album, which is almost extinct. Can you talk about the role of text in your work?

CV: The text is like signing your name on a letter or document. It's one's own writing, and it guarantees that one stands behind what is written. I struggle with the writing every time-- it is hard to do, very permanent, and must be done on every single piece throughout my history. It is the best I can do, but often looks imperfect. It also probably keeps me outside of some curatorial worlds, it's perhaps too weird, too personal, too off-beat in a cool Chelsea world of photo --filled with the slick conceptual object-photos of Roe Ethridge, Oliver Boberg, Sarah Charlesworth, Gursky, etc.

The handwritten text is a rule-- I almost always do it, and I can't escape my thoughts. One key to understanding the text is that it's usually like you said, Amy, it's like a family album-- it tells us why a picture was taken at that exact moment, it tells what was thought to be the story's end at that moment or other key fact that was in our minds when I came to make a picture.

AS: I read somewhere that you were inspired by Arbus. For me your work is reminiscent of photographers who explore family and rural life Nick Wapplington, Shelby Lee Adams and Larry Fink. Can you talk about some of your photographic inspirations?

CV: Well, Arbus was a book I took out of my parents' locked bookshelf at elementary school age. Waplington has not been an influence, but it was encouraging to see that people worldwide accepted him as an artist. Shelby Lee Adams is an influence, as is Emmet Gowin, and Larry was my teacher for 5 great days at a workshop. He's a GREAT teacher, and I like his rule wherein any level of student can study with him, even beginners. I'd say that Nan Goldin's work was not an influence, but when I saw her book in a store (my first exposure to her) I was amazed that people would accept such snapshots as art-- it encouraged me to know that the language of a small flash camera and everyday moments were high art, because that's what I was already doing in the 1980's.

© Chris Verene, 2005

AS: Some of your images comment directly on the diminishing choices of people living in smaller, economically challenged communities like Galesburg. For example, your cousin Cindy and her husband lost their jobs when the Maytag local factory closed down. There was a time in our country where you could comment about economic hardship without it seeming like an overtly political statement. Today, in this hyper-polarized climate that's harder to do. Did you intend these images to be overtly political?

CV: Naw, it's just a sad fact. I am a documentary artist, so I just have facts to show. The North American Free Trade Agreement meant that Maytag could make their fridges about 10 feet across the Mexican border, and make so much more money, because the people in Mexico will work for a lot less money, and the safety restrictions are very shallow across the border--which also is good for corporations' profits. For Candi and Craig, who both worked at the factory, it meant a carefully balanced life of two working parents with young children was dumped quickly for corporate cash. Galesburg workers were suicidal. Their pensions were dumped, their dreams wasted. My grandfather was cheated out of his railroad pension through similar corporate tricks. It's not politics, it's corporate greed and shifty accounting. I could go on-- my cousin worked for Wal-Mart for 20 years and still has no benefits, they keep scheduling her for 38 hours per week-- she's 'freelance'-- but when Wal-Mart started to carry groceries, she was forced to sign a non-compete clause, which meant she had to quit her other job bagging groceries-- because that breaks the non-compete clause... I could go on...

© Chris Verene, 2004

AS: I knew your Family series was a long term project, but I had no idea that you had been photographing for 26 years. That sort of long term commitment and relationship to your subject reminds me of Doug Dubois, who?s also photographed his family for decades.

CV: Yes, Doug is a good friend of mine, but his pictures are elaborately staged theater, which he makes to look effortless. I much prefer Doug's personal family theater to Crewdson's theater of actors.

© Chris Verene, 2007

AS: What are the challenges and rewards of focusing on one subject for such an extended period of time?

CV: Well, it's all I know. I don't really know what it would be to do someone else's family, or some other such story. I have photographed some special people on assignment for magazines, for example I did a Newsweek cover story on men with Chronic Depression. That's just a few hours with a person.

© Chris Verene, 2006

AS: You?re an educator as well and an artist. Can you talk about balancing those two aspects of your career?

CV: The balance part is just a matter of putting enough hours in the day!! I do love teaching at State University/Westchester Community College-- it's great, and the students are often from a very socially and/or economically disadvantaged background. it is similar to my time spent with teenagers in Galesburg.

© Chris Verene, 2006

AS: What, ultimately, would you like us you understand about family and place by looking at your images?

CV: Ahhh- I don't know what to say! I do hope people will spend some time looking at 50 or more pictures and really look at it before they go too far on their own. I also think reading my essay and my father's essay in the new book are required reading to understand the work.

Source: http://amysteinphoto.blogspot.com/2010/09/few-questions-for-chris-verene.html

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