It’s an old saying, sure, but that doesn’t make it any less true.
I’m 45 now, and that qualifies as middle-aged. (Which means I’ve accrued enough life experience to know a thing or two about human nature, and its foibles.)
Furthermore, without ever intending to, I’ve become an opinion columnist, a political pundit, and a travel writer, in addition to being deeply versed in photography and art.
As I’ve been writing weekly here for so long, in a way, I’ve grown into a more mature, wiser, successful person during the course of this continuing narrative.
I’ve learned so much about the world, through the photographs I’ve viewed at festivals, the books people have sent along, and the trips I’ve taken to most of the great cities in America.
And yet, despite all that, some mistakes, I continue to make.
In particular, I still haven’t accepted that setting a deadline in life when things will get calmer, or easier, or better, never seems to work out well.
That idea, that we can externalize the process of getting that extra bit happier, or more rested, that we can outsource it to some future magical time, is a fool’s errand.
(Which makes me a fool, I know. So much for our reliable, omniscient narrator.)
This year, #2019, has been the most exciting, challenging and exhausting year of my professional life. I ping-ponged around the US, (and even the globe,) and you went along for the ride.
Thanks to my awesome, open-minded editor Rob, we took this column to new places, including straight travel reporting, restaurant reviews, and even film criticism.
Then I produced our Antidote retreats, had a huge museum show, co-designed my book, and ran my first crowd-funding campaign, all while full-time parenting, being a good husband, and volunteering at my children’s’ school.
So I should have known better than to say things like, “As soon as that Kickstarter campaign is over, I’ll get a chance to rest. Once we get to December 7th, things will be easier. I’ll finally have that mythical chance to recharge.”
(Like I said, that kind of thinking never seems to work out the way we’d hope.)
In this case, my daughter got super-sick, so we ended up at the hospital, and she had to be connected to an oxygen tank for nearly a week, because she couldn’t breathe properly.
I became her full-time caretaker during the day, and between that experience, the extra trips to the doctors, and the added medical expenses, my stress level shot through the roof.
All during the week I’d “planned” to chill out.
To be clear, most of the things I poured myself into this year were great, and I’m not trying to complain.
Rather, I want to do you a solid, and suggest that in the coming year, (with all the guaranteed political strife,) you invest in yourself a bit, in particular with self-care.
I know it can seem like a bougie concept, or perhaps New Age, but the truth is, if you don’t take care of yourself, who will? Exercise, classes, new hobbies, travel, walking, cooking, getting together with friends, making art, building community, all these things make us healthier on an on-going basis.
Just this morning, when I almost lost my shit after one extra unexpected stressor, I made a drawing, and called my best friends.
(And I’m writing, so of course my mood has improved.)
Even now, I’ve closed my eyes, and am imagining the calmest place I can think of.
I’m typing with my fucking eyes closed, all so I can conjure visions of the secret chapel at the far end of the crypt.
Say what now?
Part 2: Meet me at the London
Back in the day, I used to have a year-end column about the best work I saw that I hadn’t already written about yet. (I did it for years.)
Instead, I’m going to tell you about the best place I visited this year that I haven’t already written about yet.
After 5 London articles this summer, I hit the wall, and never got around to telling you about St. Brides of Fleet Street, the journalist’s church in London.
On my last day in town, my friend Richard Bram, after a brilliant fish and chips lunch in Limehouse, told me that if I wanted to see the oldest part of the city, (so much had been destroyed,) that Fleet Street was the place to go.
And while it was unintentional that I found it, after a long wander past St Paul’s cathedral, where I heard the bells tolling like a mad hatter, I soon realized I was in the vicinity of Richard’s recommendation.
Just a touch more wandering, and I found St, Brides. (What American isn’t a sucker for an old church, right?)
When I saw stairs heading down, I followed them.
Down into the crypt.
Down into the bowels of the city.
Down into the heart of European history.
(There was signage all around, explaining why the place was famous, and properly ancient, so you can read a bit about it in the photos.)
I walked past head stones, a coffin, and walls built in different centuries. It was quiet, and obviously creepy, but still, I followed the path, deeper underground.
Deeper and deeper.
What would I find?
I’d be lying if I told you I thought such a place existed.
The tiny chapel, when I found it, seemed like a modernist art installation, or the private altar of a stylish Billionaire in Miami Beach.
Anything but what it was; properly Christian, hidden behind ghosts and spirits, buried under one of the oldest cities in the world.
The white walls, the glowing green, the sound of silence.
I sat down on a cushioned bench, and didn’t move.
Transfixed.
If teleportation existed, I’d go there right now. (No doubt.)
I prayed for the journalists out there, for the truth tellers, risking their lives to report on power. And I meditated, reveling in my favorite-new-secret-place.
So listen up, people.
If you can, go there.
If you go, you will thank me.
(I guarantee it.)
Even now, just thinking about it, I feel warm and fuzzy.
So as these will be my last words to you in this crazy #2019, (I’ll be off next week,) I wanted to say thank you for reading along this year.
For following my journey, and for all the kind words so many of you have passed along this year too.
The Art of the Personal Project is a crucial element to let potential buyers see how you think creatively on your own. I am drawn to personal projects that have an interesting vision or that show something I have never seen before. In this thread, I’ll include a link to each personal project with the artist statement so you can see more of the project. Please note: This thread is not affiliated with any company; I’m just featuring projects that I find. Please DO NOT send me your work. I do not take submissions.
American Witches began as a project examining spiritually for the Washington Post Magazine. Deeply reported over the course of a month, photographer and writer Kate Warren set out to examine contemporary witchcraft. Ancient magick and witchcraft practices are experiencing a mainstream resurgence in response to the gender reckoning occurring in American culture. Contemporary witchcraft is intersectional: magick is most commonly practiced by women, people of color, poor communities, and queer people, all of whom have been disempowered by traditional patriarchal religion. From hoodoo practitioners to Amazonian plant medicine tribe to herbalists to vodou priestesses, there are all types of witches practicing across America. Rooted in a spiritual connection to the natural world, witchcraft allows them to connect to their intuition and ancestors, manifest their desires and protect themselves. By showing the breadth and normalcy American witchcraft, practices become demystified, opening a path for greater understanding of these folk spiritual traditions.
APE contributor Suzanne Sease currently works as a consultant for photographers and illustrators around the world. She has been involved in the photography and illustration industry since the mid 80s. After establishing the art buying department at The Martin Agency, then working for Kaplan-Thaler, Capital One, Best Buy and numerous smaller agencies and companies, she decided to be a consultant in 1999. She has a new Twitter feed with helpful marketing information because she believes that marketing should be driven by brand and not by specialty. Follow her at @SuzanneSease. Instagram
Success is more than a matter of your talent. It’s also a matter of doing a better job presenting it. And that is what I do with decades of agency and in-house experience.
Heidi: How much did you shoot for Bike while you were the Photo Director?
Anthony: A big part of my workflow while I was Photo Director was studio work actually. In each issue of Bike Magazine, a fairly large percentage of the pages are gear coverage, and I would shoot all the studio images for those pages. With 8 issues per year, it was a pretty substantial workload, but in a way, it put me in a fortunate position to be selective with the editorial pieces that I shot.
How did being a photographer inform your editing? Being both a photographer and a mountain biker was paramount to being an effective editor for Bike. Understanding the moments that are going to tell an authentic story was an incredibly important part of Bike’s success over the years.
Do you find it easier to edit your own work?
It’s incredibly difficult to edit my own work. It can be really hard to look at images objectively if there were challenges to capturing them. Perhaps an athlete is battling a trick, or your battling weather, light, or just can’t find that magic angle. When you get the image it’s hard not to let the journey of making the photo influence your perception of its worth. It’s much easier to look at a contributor’s work and make those tough decisions I find.
What do you miss about the office life? I miss the collaboration the most. Working with the team at Bike was the most satisfying creative time in my career. Everyone on the team had so much to offer to our creative process, and when we nailed it on a piece, that feeling was hard to beat.
Being on my own and out of the office has given me more time to focus on my creative process. I’m able to shoot work outside of my comfort zone and see how those explorations inform my work.
What do you think photo editors could do better when working with photographers? It’s always been really rewarding when I feel as though I’m being asked to look past the obvious and capture images that will challenge the audience. Knowing that the easy image won’t cut it and that they trust you and the audience to engage the images on a deeper level. That relationship and trust is key to creating meaningful work.
Who printed it?
Paper Chase Press. I fell in love with their folded tabloid posters (thanks to your feed) and knew that’s the route I wanted to go. I liked the folded poster because it allowed a lot of real estate for images but folded up to a size that wouldn’t be obnoxious for the recipient to keep on file (and wouldn’t be a headache for me to mail). I like that the posters lend themselves to be designed as cohesive spreads — this allowed for spread 1 to be a mix of work and spread 2 to focus on one project specifically.
Who designed it? Shelby Maggart, we connected a couple of years ago on a job and since then, we’ve had many opportunities to work together for various clients. This was our first time working on something just for me. I trust her eye and I love the way her brain works. I knew her background in packaging design would be a boon with these posters. I left the image selection up to her but curated the images I wanted her to pick from.
Tell me about the images?
If you’re like me when you’re busy fulfilling client-driven creative you can forget to make work just for you. When 2018 came to a close I realized that 70% of what I’d shot the past two years was animal work…and yes dogs are the best and I enjoy photographing them, but I’d never intended to pigeon-hole myself into a singular specialty. So I made a goal for 2019 to carve out time to make some work for me, to make what I wanted to see — and in the process fill some holes I felt existed in my overall portfolio.
All the images in my promo came from personal projects I shot between March-August 2019 with all-female teams. I challenged myself to create new work in areas I hadn’t played in for a while (kids, fitness, food). I sought out local female-owned small businesses and female creative talent to collaborate with so that the work I was making would have additional use outside of just being portfolio images for myself.
How many did you make?
150
How many times a year do you send out promos?
Up until this fall, I’d never created any kind of promo for my work. I learned a lot through this first promo experience and the process overall feels less daunting now. I’m *hoping* to send out promos twice a year going forward.
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
Totally. It’s a way to further communicate your vibe/what you’re all about and show people what you have to say. I feel that having a tangible representation of your work has more shelf-life than an email campaign or social media.
Now that Thanksgiving is behind us, and Christmas will be here before you know it, most people are ready to wind down a bit.
To slow the pace, bitch about the weather, fantasize about being on a warm beach somewhere, and then begin to plan for 2020.
(You know it’s true.)
Honestly, my ass would have been in coasting mode weeks ago, if it hadn’t been for the (now successful) Kickstarter campaign for my upcoming book, “Extinction Party.”
As for the cold and the gray, I spent the better part of Saturday plotting and planning to drive to a clean, beautiful beach, where we could swim in the warm water, and feel free.
I searched and searched, finally settling on South Padre Island in Texas, on the Gulf Coast next to Mexico, before realizing that a 16 hour drive each way would wash off any bliss imparted by the serene salt water.
(Staycation #2019 instead.)
As for the planning, I think right around now, people begin to look at the calendar in earnest, visualizing the trips they might take in 2020.
One year ends, the next begins.
I know it’s a big lede, but I was building to a point, which is that people often ask me which photo festival they should attend, or which ones are the best?
It happened twice in the past week, and once was a public query on Twitter.
Thomas Patterson, a photographer and writer for PDN, asked me and a few others the following:
As I’m currently in the middle of my series on the Best Work I saw at the Filter Photo Festival, and have said many times that Filter does it right, it seemed like a great way to answer the questions for you ahead of time, in case it helps you book out next year.
So let’s get to it.
Part 2: Which Festival is Best?
I’m going to cut to the chase, and let you down, simultaneously.
There is no “best” festival, though of course I might have a personal favorite.
There are now so many options, in almost every major city, that I think a photographer can base his or her decision on a number of factors. And I will say this, there are several annual festivals that I think are at the top of the heap, and I name-check them all the time.
All three have different strengths, but few weaknesses, and all share some common strategies, with respect to wraparound programming.
I’ve already written that I know the staff at each place, and think they’re amazing people. The three cities are beautiful tourist destinations, with superb leisure activities and incredible food.
Each of the three features lectures, exhibitions, parties, keynote speakers, partnerships with important local museums, and are run by artist-driven non-profit organizations.
They’ve had stability in leadership and staff, and take place in excellent venues, where they remain each year.
(Cohesion and teamwork are important.)
Basically, I’d vouch for all three festivals, strongly. They’re different of course, as Filter has the massive-city-blue-collar vibe, New Orleans is a party-forward city, and Medium is a bit smaller and homier, set in a poolside, SoCal hipster hotel.
I’ve been on gallery tours in both Chicago and New Orleans before, and Medium now does one in Tijuana.
You will get your money’s worth in each place, and that money is going to support a non-profit that gives back massively to its local community.
As to the biennial festivals, I had a good experience at Photolucida in Portland, which I chronicled here this year, and it too has great relationships with its local city. (And amazing food, music, and legal reefer.)
FotoFest, which is coming up this March, is the oldest American portfolio review festival, and I made two of my best friends in the world while attending. (In 2012 and 2016.)
Ironically, though, I think it’s the least social of the festivals I’ve gone to. I love Houston, but the downtown business district, (where FotoFest is held,) is not super-lively in the evenings, and while it’s a great city in which to have a car, parking downtown is expensive.
FotoFest a place to get business done, as you’ll have approximately 20 portfolio reviews, and I know colleagues who go for two sessions each year, as they always make enough money to justify it.
So there’s my two cents.
And just to reiterate, in my copious experience, it’s the partying, the social experiences, the eating and drinking, that really brings people together.
(It’s not an accident, as human beings like working with people they know and like.)
If you get out there, invest the time in broadening your network and making new friends, it will have a positive impact on your life in so many ways.
And with that, we’ll move on to the final piece of today’s puzzle: more of the Best Work I Saw at the Filter Photo Festival in September.
As usual, the artists are in no particular order.
Part 3: The Photographers
Sometimes, a project just jumps off the table at you, often due to technical prowess. And as a teacher and a critic, I typically recommend artists make work about what they’re expert in, or something they’re so curious about that the art practice itself makes them an expert.
With Christoper Barrett, it was an interesting confluence, as he works as a professional architectural photographer in Chicago, and chose an art project that allowed him to put those skills to use.
He began taking walks around his neighborhood, photographing the mishmash of local architectural styles. At the same time, he created a tense, boxed in, claustrophobic view of emo Americana.
The series feels like a snapshot of an empire in Decline, devoid of color. And the formal constructions, super sharpness, and solid tonal range make for a powerful group of pictures.
Speaking of expertise, Colleen Woolpert must have found it strange to tell me her story, given the massive coincidence we shared. She described a rare eye condition called strabismus, in which vision and depth perception can be severely impaired.
Colleen is a twin, and her sister has it, but she does not. (The coincidence is my son has strabismus, and after nearly 10 years of treatment, one surgery, and some strong eye-glasses, he sees really well.)
Apparently, Colleen wanted to help her sister, (as the impairment was believed to be permanent if not fixed in childhood, ) so she built a stereoscopic device to help her sister improve her vision, and it worked!
Then she patented it, and now it’s in pubic use.
You can’t make this shit up!
Her art project uses the stereoscope to depict images of Colleen and her sister, where they blend together into one person. Radical stuff!
Next, we have Mitch Eckert, who’s a professor at Louisville University in Kentucky. I always ask photographers about their background, and then dispense advice accordingly.
Mitch told me he was trained up, and that he thought his work was ready to go, so I was prepared to be a tough critic. Thankfully, I found his work to be cool and a bit exciting.
Normally, I think zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens and museums are too easy as subjects, but Mitch brought a hyper-real compression of space to the game.
His plants, trapped behind glass, sweating, breathing, pushing up against the see-through constraints, feel very compelling as environmental pieces in #2019.
Ruth Adams and I had an editing session, as we discussed how to create solid through-lines, or connection points, via subject matter and style.
Ruth had been shooting in Berlin, and what she first described as being about Jewish cemeteries quickly expanded to include other religions as well, and other cities.
I zeroed in on the images that felt most connected to each other, and encouraged her to keep things tight and make more work. As with Christoper’s project, the tonal range here really is impressive.
Anastasia Davis, in from Pittsburgh, let me know she had studied with good people, and was connected in her community. She also said that she used her work to cope with, or process, her history of panic disorder and depression, which is of course one of art’s highest and best uses.
Anastasia showed me two groups of photographs, both of which were meant to conjure a different emotional experience. And as the images are made separately, and then edited together, it does share much with poetry, vibe-wise.
Really lovely stuff.
Last, but not least, we have James Kuan, whose work caught my eye at the portfolio walk at Filter.
I always make sure to do a quick visit at a festival’s portfolio walk, (always,) because I ALWAYS find cool stuff to show you from people I would not otherwise meet.
In this case, I learned that James is a surgeon based in Seattle, and has studied at PCNW.
This project, about identity, is all about cutting and pasting. Slicing and replacing.
The Art of the Personal Project is a crucial element to let potential buyers see how you think creatively on your own. I am drawn to personal projects that have an interesting vision or that show something I have never seen before. In this thread, I’ll include a link to each personal project with the artist statement so you can see more of the project. Please note: This thread is not affiliated with any company; I’m just featuring projects that I find. Please DO NOT send me your work. I do not take submissions.
Today’s featured artist: Holiday Photo Books as Gifts 2019
APE contributor Suzanne Sease currently works as a consultant for photographers and illustrators around the world. She has been involved in the photography and illustration industry since the mid 80s. After establishing the art buying department at The Martin Agency, then working for Kaplan-Thaler, Capital One, Best Buy and numerous smaller agencies and companies, she decided to be a consultant in 1999. She has a new Twitter feed with helpful marketing information because she believes that marketing should be driven by brand and not by specialty. Follow her at @SuzanneSease. Instagram
Success is more than a matter of your talent. It’s also a matter of doing a better job presenting it. And that is what I do with decades of agency and in-house experience.
Heidi: Were you both involved in photography prior to joining forces? Tracy+David: We’re both former news photojournalists who left our staff photography positions at newspapers almost 10 years ago, and moved to Southern California to begin freelancing. David was formerly an Art Director and Photo Editor at The State Journal-Register in Illinois, before returning to grad school for visual communication through the Knight Fellowship at Ohio University. Following grad school, he started shooting full time as a staff photographer at the Naples Daily News in Florida (a medium-sized paper that was known for its strong tradition of documentary storytelling).
Tracy fell in love with photography in high school, practically living in the darkroom when she wasn’t in the pool (she was a serious competitive swimmer), and beat down the door of the local newspaper in New Haven, Conn., to learn the ropes of photojournalism when she was 16. After college and a number of summer internships at newspapers around the country later, she landed a job at the Naples Daily News where she met David. After a couple of years there, Tracy was offered a position at The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, as a staff photojournalist and sports photographer.
While we love what we do now and haven’t looked back, we’ve always felt that our work as photojournalists was the best bootcamp, where we problem solved all day everyday, learned to be extremely flexible and nimble, and learned to work with people from all different walks of life. We became extremely adept at working in a fast-paced, ever-changing environment, thinking quickly, staying calm in stressful situations, and creating large libraries of images under seemingly impossible deadlines.
Do you both shoot for each project? Yes. We shoot together on almost every project, working as a team to get more images, angles, ideas, etc. Most often, we’re both shooting from different angles simultaneously, capturing essentially double the images and angles that one of us could do on our own. For this reason, we like to work with natural lighting or continuous lighting, if feasible, as it allows us to shoot at the same time. If we’re shooting with strobes or if it works better for a project, we’ll pass a camera back and forth, both directing and working a scene slightly differently to get a wider variety of images, but almost always, we both have a hand in creating images.
Occasionally, if we have an extremely tight schedule or we need to shoot at two locations at once, we’ll both shoot simultaneously on different sets/locations for the same project. In those cases, we aren’t together, per se, but are both shooting at the same time, and know very clearly what we’re trying to accomplish, how everything needs to fit together, and what the end goal is, so we’re still very much working as a team on the project.
Sometimes we’ll do an underwater shoot or a drone shoot, and one person might be underwater shooting images or flying a drone to get an overhead view, while the other is on land shooting from a different angle. We love to work together to photograph a project from multiple angles at once, and really enjoy getting to see the perspective the other person captured.
What are the best aspects of shooting as a team? We’ve developed and share a cohesive vision and style, but we are still individually creative with unique ideas. We love that by having two sets of eyes and two minds working through ideas and projects, we can merge our perspectives together and come up with something greater than what we’d do individually. We (and our clients) also love that we can produce more work in the same amount of time than one of us could do on our own. Together, we push things further, find different angles, and push each other to see and think differently, which results in a better final product.
Are you able to turn off your photographic minds and conversation when you’re not working? Many people often tell us that they couldn’t imagine working full time with their spouse, but now about 9 years into working together, we really couldn’t imagine doing this any other way. Our work is incredibly important to us, and we do find that creating a work/life balance is always a challenge. We pour so much into our work, that we’re often still thinking, talking about, and working on our projects when we’re technically supposed to be off. If we’re on a run or a hike with our dog before or after work, it’s rare that photography or something about the day doesn’t come up. We do make sure we have a number of activities and hobbies we like to do together outside of work as well, which really helps give us some down-time and keeps us connected personally so we aren’t simply business partners. We’re really fortunate that we can spend so much of our time together, and still love being with each other.
Best advice for any photo duo? Find your individual strengths and figure out how to best divide and conquer — especially on the business side of things. We have many overlapping strengths but also different strengths that complement one another, and it took us a few years to understand what these were and how best to utilize them in the office and on set. We realized that we couldn’t both be equally good at everything, and that having each of us focus on developing certain skills that we gravitated towards would make us much stronger as a team. Once we figured this out, we became more productive and efficient, clearer about our roles, and ultimately much better individually and as a team.
Who printed it? How many did you make?
Smartpress in Minneapolis. I like them because they can do short runs, and offer a multiple-version option whereby there’s only one setup but, as was the case here, you can swap out multiple images. So for example here I had 100 cards printed of each of the 6 versions, but instead of charging the (higher) price for 100 cards 6 times over, the charge is just for a 600-card run.
I had a small, targeted list of about 150 creatives that I wanted to send these to, and not all of them really needed to get all 6 cards. So there were some who got all 6, but others who got only 2, 3 or maybe 4, depending on who they were and what kind of work I thought I could potentially get from them.
Who designed it?
I designed these myself.
Tell me about the images?
–The female golfer is an image from a shoot for the Dick’s Sporting Goods/Golf Galaxy golf catalog, which I’ve shot for the past 8 years each December. Even though the shoot is highly produced, we try to shoot everything on-location with natural light, using real people (we cast for low-handicap golfers), as the creatives at DSG and I insist on giving the images a realistic feel–when you’re trying to sell $500 drivers to a demographic that’s extremely educated about the product and the game, you don’t want to fake it because there’s no better way to turn off an audience than by insulting its intelligence.
The image of the kid playing basketball is also for Dick’s Sporting Goods, shot for a Christmas online and print ad showcasing the company’s Techgrip line of products.
–The tennis image is of Kei Nishikori at the 2018 U.S. Open; that year was the first year of the new Louis Armstrong stadium which meant that it provided an opportunity for some new pictures and new spots to shoot from. So I went and scouted it on my first day there, before the tournament started, both for positions and to see what the light did as the day went on. (For scouts, I usually take the SunSeeker app with me and walk around to various spots on and off the court to see where the sun is going to be and what potential there is for shadows, backlighting, etc. Same thing for golf courses I’m seeing for the first time.) It turns out that the way the stadium is oriented, there’s about a 5-minute window as the sun crosses the sky that the shadow from the (open) retractable roof parallels the south baseline in the morning, right about when the first match of the day starts. And within that 5-minute window, there are about 2 minutes where the light is just right, slicing in and hitting the player’s upper body and casting a long shadow, while also rendering everything behind the baseline dark. So I would put myself in a position on the concourse to make this frame during the morning match. But then, of course, you have to have a player serving, who has to be right-handed, on that side of the court, precisely during that 2-minute window, to make the whole thing work. I can’t remember how many times I had to go back before it all came together, but I do know for sure that this was not from the first day of play…
–The Tiger Woods shot was photographed at the Dell Match Play Championship this past March, where I was playing around with some new, silent Sony mirrorless gear so as not to incur the wrath of Mr. Woods.
–The black-and-white image of the charro is from a personal project I’m working on about charreria, a Mexican form of rodeo, as it’s practiced in Austin and San Antonio. I’ve had to take a little hiatus from it just because I haven’t had the time to devote to it lately, but it’s probably the most rewarding personal project I’ve ever done and I’m looking forward to getting back into it next year.
–The gentleman with the flag is Jose Luis Sanchez, a retired Marine sergeant who lost his left leg to an I.E.D. in Iraq. He ran and finished the 2017 Boston Marathon, carrying a pole with the flag he has draped around his back, which was given to him and signed by members of his unit. This was shot for the cover of Competitor Running magazine.
–The pit room portrait is of Leamon Parks at Wilber’s BBQ in Goldsboro, North Carolina, where he had worked for over 40 years. If you follow me on instagram you know that I’m a sucker for barbecue, but I’m even more of a sucker for the atmosphere and light in old-school barbecue joints and love to photograph them, just as personal work. My wife and I were visiting her family in North Carolina, and on our way to see her grandfather’s home town she insisted on taking me to Wilber’s, where she had gone with him as a kid. Without telling me, she told the manager about my interest in places like this, and he invited us to come to the back for a little tour. It was there that I met Leamon and asked if I could make his portrait.
–Zion Williamson is the basketball player. He was the top pick in this year’s draft; every year the NBA brings a large group of rookies together for a pre-season photo and video session, where they move from station to station shooting various portraits, league marketing materials, etc. I was there for Panini America, which holds the trading card license with the NBA, shooting portraits for his rookie card.
–The yoga image and the image of the woman in the blue truck are from personal test sessions.
How many times a year do you send out promos?
Not as often as I should. This was my only effort this year. This leads me to your next question…
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
I think they can be, but I have to be more consistent. I’m shooting for a quarterly effort starting with these, which means my next one should go out in January. I do think that it can be a successful way to get my name and work out there if done regularly.
Recently, my cousin Mike referred to my wife and me as “the last adults.”
(I think he meant it as a compliment.)
He’s 31, and has described in detail the problems that many Millennials face as 2020 approaches.
Between the travesty that is the student loan mess they’re all in, or a job market that went full freelance-independent-contractor-side-hustle when they got out of college, to the fact that certain segments of the economy never recovered after The Great Recession.
My other cousin, who grew up in the same town as I did, (and who’s also about 31,) had 15 (or so) high school friends die from overdoses related to pain killers or heroin.
That’s insane!
Kids who went to the same High School I did, and came from the same background (NYC-suburbs-American-ethnic-professional,) and they died by the thousands.
Because they had access to the pills in their parents’ medicine cabinets, and then later, to the cheap Mexican smack that flooded the country at just the wrong time. (For those kids.)
Add in the Climate Change catastrophe we’re all in, the fact our divided country is about to impeach a President, and that the robots are taking over, and it’s easy to see why some people might be pessimistic about the future.
Millennials in particular.
But it’s not all doom and gloom, is it?
As a father, one who is pre-disposed to look for signs of the positive out there, (Wall-E’s green shoots,) I have some ideas.
Some things are better than they used to be.
This, I know.
Off the top of my head, and as a middle-aged-heterosexual man, (does that make me cis-gender?,) I can point to the drastic improvement in the rights of the LGBTQ community here in America, and in its depictions in popular culture as well.
Before you tell me there is still a long way to go, let’s stipulate that. But at my age, I can remember growing up, and there were really no gay characters on TV at all, and most of mainstream gay America was closeted.
What few instances there were on TV were always unflattering. (Was Don Knott’s “Three’s Company” character, Mr. Furley, secretly gay I wonder?)
When “Will & Grace” came along in 1998, and I saw gay characters on TV who were depicted in positive ways, it was revelatory.
And I’m just speaking as an artist, and a person.
To have representation like that within the community, for the first time, must have been a big deal.
These days, classic LGBTQ shows like “Will & Grace” and “The L-word” are back, rebooted, because things have catapulted so far in twenty years. (Gay marriage, etc.)
Things have come SO far, in fact, that I recently binge-watched the excellent, underworld show “Animal Kingdom” on Amazon Prime, (originally broadcast on TNT,) and was barely surprised to see a plot line about a criminal, gay, SoCal surfer.
Including sex scenes.
When the character Deran Cody, who grew up in a family gang, finally gets ready to come out, (as he was super-conflicted,) his soft-hearted, surfer-bro, thug brothers embrace his sexuality easily.
As does his gangster Mom.
Even better, there’s a scene where one brother looks at some bikini-clad women, nods to Deran and says, “You’re really not into that?”
In reply, he looks at a half-naked-surfer-dude, nods to his brother, and says, “You’re really not into that?”
To me, that was proof that some things in the world are simply better, more open, more accepting, than they used to be.
But isn’t that what art is supposed to do?
Reach into the Zeitgeist, shake things up inside the Collective Unconscious, and come out with something fresh? Something relevant?
A Frankenstein’s monster of answers, wrapped up in the enigma of form and content.
I ask you, having just put down “newflesh,” a recent exhibition catalogue just published by Gnomic Book, curated and edited by Efrem Zelony-Mindell.
This book challenged me, and I want to admit that up front. I admire it, and like it in many ways.
I also have some problems with it.
But that makes sense.
This book represents art of the now.
Made by young people.
(In New York City in particular, but not exclusively.)
I kicked in a bit to the Kickstarter for this book, when I first saw it, because it seemed like a cool project.
And so it is.
When I was offered the chance to review it, I said sure, because I was certain it had to be interesting.
If the work in this book is to be believed, nothing and no one is ever to be “believed” again. Silly humans, using concepts like “truth,” “believe,” and “freedom.”
We robot cyborg overlords have no use for feelings. Flesh is weak, and we use it only to harvest the BRAINS we need to run our cyborg bodies.
Sorry.
Got off track there.
What I meant is, all this work is constructed, in one way or another. (Physically, digitally, or both.)
Some of them are a bit subtle for my taste, symbol-wise, but everything is cut and pasted, chopped and changed.
I loved the erased twin towers, silicon body parts, melting faces, plastic food, apples wearing orange skins, and intertwined bodies.
Taken together, the message is unmissable: in Trump’s America, one of dueling narratives, rather than objective reality, everything is built, even our identity.
That I haven’t mentioned yet that the book is intended to be about Queer identity is probably a strength, because it’s designed to be about rebellion, and challenging the status quo. About that energy that people of a certain age once called “Punk Rock.”
(As an adjective, not a noun.)
Mr. Zelony-Mindell’s writing alludes to identity as fluid, changing, among the young artists of today.
“These works…have many things in common; homosexuality is not one of them. And yet they are totally queer…They allow for imperfections and unfamiliarity. There’s a cleansing ability of clarity in that uncertainty.”
We hear a lot about that in media as well, with respect to Millennials and Gen Z.
Here in the art, we can see it with a lot of literal shrouding, and the layering of objects behind other objects.
Of silhouette and shadow.
My issue, such as it is, is that so much of the work does look alike. And has common roots.
From my pasture here in New Mexico, I can see the network connections between artists studying in the same art schools in New York. Columbia definitely, SVA I’d say, and probably Pratt. (Which now has a photo program built by a Columbia grad, Stephen Frailey, whose work features in the book too.)
I see Yale, I’d venture, and definitely the Charlotte Cotton, “Photography is Magic” school of art.
Moment of truth: I was definitely NOT surprised when she popped up with a letter, mid-way through the book, which used a lot of words to not say very much.
My other biggest takeaway, honestly, is the bleak vibe I got turning the pages.
It’s not a criticism. Let’s be clear.
Rather, it brings us back to where we started today.
If we see this book as a generational mood-ring, as a barometer of the vibe out there, I’d say it’s pessimistic for sure.
Lots of this art was abstracted, which means I have to go on feeling, rather than idea.
By suggestion, rather than direction.
And if the American Empire is indeed on the decline, (of course it is,) and if this generation of Americans will have a lower standard of living than their parents, (seems likely,) and if the planet is rebelling against us at the current moment, (somewhat obvious,) then this is the kind of art young people would make.
Isn’t it?
Where’s Obama with his Hope and Change when you need him?
Bottom Line: An excellent, queer, hyper-current exhibition catalogue from New York
If you’d like to submit a book for potential review, please email me directly at jonathanblaustein@gmail.com. We are interested in presenting books from as wide a range of perspectives as possible.
The Art of the Personal Project is a crucial element to let potential buyers see how you think creatively on your own. I am drawn to personal projects that have an interesting vision or that show something I have never seen before. In this thread, I’ll include a link to each personal project with the artist statement so you can see more of the project. Please note: This thread is not affiliated with any company; I’m just featuring projects that I find. Please DO NOT send me your work. I do not take submissions.
These are the giants whose shoulders serve as the stepping-stone for westerners to become hometown heroes by summiting Everest. Little consideration goes to the climbing Sherpa’s who make sure the conditions are safe. They do the heavy lifting and take on the bulk of the risk. The Sherpa’s are the front line and have lost friends and relatives. The westerners do it for the challenge, thrill, bragging rights, and fame. The Sherpa’s do it because it’s the biggest paycheck available to feed their families.
Dasonam Sherpa 53yrs old Summited 10 times ’97, ’98, ’99, ’02, ’05, ’06 (twice), ’07, ’08, & ’10 Saw the 2012 Khumbu ice fall accident from the Lola side where 16 climbing sherpas died. Decided to retire. Owns 4 yaks and uses them to transport goods for Everest expeditions.Ang Tshering Sherpa 64yrs old Summited 3 times ’96, 2000, & ’01 Started at age 40 “to get rich” Retired in 2004 after having an accident in 2002 where he fell 35m through the ice carrying 9 empty oxygen tanks he was transporting them down to replace.Ang Dorje Sherpa 49yrs old Summited 19 times Was the climbing Sherpa for Rob Hall’s Adventure Cunsultants 1996 Everest expedition in 96 when a storm lead to the deaths of 8 climbers. The story from Everest / Into Thin Air Currently a mechanic in Boise IdahoLakpa Dorjee Sherpa 63yrs old Summited once May 14th 1983 He guided 3 climbers to the summit. The climbers abandoned him at the summit without equipment to get down. All he had was a “crumby old ice axe”. Fell and rolled down about 300m. Lost consciousness and woke up hours later without his goggles or axe, meters from the cliff. Rested 10 mins had some water. couldn’t sleep all night wondering who is going to take care of his parents when he dies, when he woke up he prayed “I’m sorry but thank you for chumulumu for saving my life” (Nepali name for god?) Remained a climbing sherpa on other mountains but refused to ever summit Everest again despite be offered more money. Kept his promise.Kanchha Sherpa “The Living Legend” Age 87 Summited 7 times- ’53, ’63 (twice), & last time in ’71 Last living Climbing Sherpa from Sir Edmund Hillary’s May 29, 1953 climb. The first successful summit of Mount Everest. He was 20yrs old when he snuck out of his parents’ house to meet up with Tensing Norgay in Darjeeling because he heard Tensing “had a job”.
APE contributor Suzanne Sease currently works as a consultant for photographers and illustrators around the world. She has been involved in the photography and illustration industry since the mid 80s. After establishing the art buying department at The Martin Agency, then working for Kaplan-Thaler, Capital One, Best Buy and numerous smaller agencies and companies, she decided to be a consultant in 1999. She has a new Twitter feed with helpful marketing information because she believes that marketing should be driven by brand and not by specialty. Follow her at @SuzanneSease. Instagram
Success is more than a matter of your talent. It’s also a matter of doing a better job presenting it. And that is what I do with decades of agency and in-house experience.
Concept: Corporate lifestyle images of employees at work
Licensing: Collateral use of 30 images in perpetuity
Photographer: Portraiture specialist
Agency: Mid-sized, based in the Midwest
Client: Large law firm
Here is the estimate:
Creative/Licensing Fees: The project started like many others I’ve seen. A law firm needed corporate lifestyle images of their employees at work within their offices. Based on the brief we received, we decided that two shoot days would be necessary to check off all the boxes and to make sure that all the key employees were available to participate. They hoped to license 30 final images, primarily for use on their website and for other collateral purposes. Based on my experience on other similar projects, I anticipated that a fee somewhere between 4-5k/day, or a few hundred dollars per image would be appropriate, despite the perpetual duration requested. I decided to include $4,500/day, or $300/image, to arrive at a creative/licensing fee of $9,000.
Scout/Pre-Production Days: I included $1,000 to account for the photographer’s time to look at the location prior to the shoot, and discuss the project with the agency/client.
Assistants: We wanted to keep a relatively small footprint, and we included one assistant who would play double duty as a digital tech, as well as a second assistant to lend an extra pair of hands for both shoot days.
Hair/Makeup Stylist: We anticipated the need for light hair/makeup styling, and included a stylist for both days.
Equipment: This included the photographer’s camera, grip, and lighting equipment for both days.
Mileage, Parking, Meals, Misc.: We anticipated $35 per person per day for the crew for meals, and included approximately $100/day for mileage, parking, and unforeseen expenses that might arise.
First Edit for Client Review: This included the photographer’s time to do an initial edit through everything captured, and provide a gallery of content for the client to review.
Color Correction, File Cleanup, and Delivery of 30 Selects by FTP: We based this on $50/image for the light post-production that the photographer would perform on the selected images.
Feedback: The agency was receptive to the fees/expenses and told us that there was a chance this project could potentially grow in scope, but they needed to continue the conversation with their client. About two months later, they finally got back in touch to inform us that they wanted to expand the project to include five cities. Additionally, rather than corporate lifestyle images, the creative scope shifted to focus more on environmental portraits of individual employees, and there were 353 employees collectively in each of the five different cities/offices. While it wasn’t completely dialed in, we acquired a rough breakdown of approximately how many people were in each office and developed a plan for ten shoot days. Five days would be at a location local to the photographer, and the rest of the shoot days would be at a mix of locations, a few of which required a bit of travel.
Here was the revised estimate we sent:
We included a breakdown of subjects in each city along with an itinerary to ensure we were on the same page with the agency regarding the approach for the project. Since the scope changed to individual portraits, I thought that each image might be a bit less valuable than evergreen corporate lifestyle shots, and there was less of a chance they’d use a portrait of a lower-level employee as the face of any larger marketing campaigns. I decided to go with $100/image totaling $35,300, which also broke down to just over $3,500/day, and I felt this was reasonable given the additional fees the photographer would make for their travel days, equipment and post-production time.
For the crew, I broke out separate prices for travel days and shoot days for the first assistant/digital tech, who would be traveling with the photographer. We anticipated hiring local second assistants in each market, and while the plan was the same for the hair/makeup stylist, we included a slightly higher rate for them for a shoot in a larger market that would demand a higher fee for such a role. We kept equipment charges modest compared to the first estimate since the photographer owned his gear, and used Kayak.com to estimate travel expenses. For post-production, we brought the per image fee down from $50 to $25 for the color correction and file cleanup.
After reviewing the estimate, the agency let us know that they wanted to add back in the corporate lifestyle shots, along with some group photos of staff and detail shots of the office environments as well. However, they only wanted to do this at their headquarters where most of their staff was, and focus solely on the individual portraits at the other locations. We submitted the following revised estimate:
In order to accomplish the new project scope, we felt that we would need two additional days at their headquarters, which was the location local to the photographer. Additionally, we needed to account for 24 additional images. While I discussed pushing the fee higher with the photographer, I also wanted to stick around the $3,500/day mark even though I felt the value of these additional 24 images was higher than the individual headshots. We also wanted to include a slight discount in return for a commitment to hiring the photographer for so many days. Ultimately, we landed on $42,500 as a creative/licensing fee, which was based on a candid conversation with our agency contact on what would be palatable to the client.
Additionally, we were asked to remove the hair/makeup styling, and were informed that they had hoped for us to stay around an 80k bottom line. We removed the styling, dropped equipment down a bit, and came down even further on the post-production on a per-image basis (while still including what we felt was appropriate overall for the time dedicated to retouching).
The project was awarded, and the shoot went off without a hitch.
If you have any questions, or if you need help estimating or producing a project, please give us a call at 610.260.0200 or reach out. We’re available to help with any and all pricing and negotiating needs—from small stock sales to large ad campaigns.
Heidi: How has your relationship with nature informed your photography?
Austin: Hmmm, that’s an interesting one…I don’t think I’ve ever considered that question before. I have always enjoyed nature more as a participant than a viewer – climbing, skiing, trail running through a landscape rather than just sightseeing. Moving through remote and wild landscapes fills me with wild elation and awe and a heightened sense of the joy of being alive. As a result, most of my imagery captures not merely incredible landscapes, but often people interacting with those landscapes in meaningful ways. I think this helps give a sense of scale to my photos, and it also provides viewers with a more accessible portal through which to imagine them in these spaces.
Were there any difficulties capturing these images?
None of these images were particularly difficult to capture, as I took a fairly documentary approach to the trip and didn’t try to force or create any moments or events that weren’t already happening. I think that the only part that would have been difficult for most people/photographers was feeling completely comfortable in a rugged mountain environment and having the skills and fitness to move swiftly and confidently through it. I’ve spent much of the last decade of my life in alpine areas far more technical and scary than what we experienced in The Refuge, and so luckily for me I felt at home running across uneven talus or soloing ahead on snowy ridgelines.
How long did you wait in place before the animals looked at/smelled you?
Every day of this trip we had to move 15-20 miles over rough terrain, so we never had any time to stop and really wait for the wildlife. This was a bit of a disappointment for me, as I ideally would have scouted where certain animals spent their time and set up some sort of blind to hide behind. As it was I largely just had to react as quick as possible whenever we happened to come across caribou or other animals. I captured the image of the wolf and of those caribou probably only 30 minutes apart. We had just finished descending out of the McCall Glacier Valley and were entering the Coastal Plain where the tundra flattens out and runs north for 50 miles to the Arctic Ocean. It was a cold, windy, foggy day, and we took refuge in a dry creek bed in order to get out of the wind and eat some lunch. We didn’t take note of the fact that while the depression sheltered us from the wind, it also blocked our view of the surrounding landscape. As we sipped down hot soup, Tommy’s eyes suddenly went wide and he half-shouted, “Holy shit. There is a HUGE wolf right behind you!” For a split second I thought he was joking, but I could see the seriousness in his face and quickly whipped my head around to see a large gray wolf only ten feet away. It bounded back a few paces at our movement, and then stopped and stared at us from 20ft away. Having never been so close to an apex predator, I was a little frightened and not sure what to think, but we immediately realized that its posture was calm and relaxed. It was merely curious, not aggressive. I gingerly reached for my camera, switched lenses as quick as I could, and snapped a few frames before it trotted off into the mist. My guess is that the wolf smelled us/the food we had cooked for lunch. We made sure to never lose sight of our surroundings after that.
When you shot the sweeping vista, what ran through your mind?
In moments like this, I often have two distinct trains of thought running through my mind. In the presence of such monumental natural beauty and gigantic scale, I remember thinking that I couldn’t believe how wild and wonderful the landscape was, and how lucky we were to be able to see it from such a vantage. But because I was there to document and take photos, I also spent much of that time thinking about the technical particulars of composing and making images – What to include in the frame? What to exclude? Where to ask the pilot to turn? To tilt the wings to give me a better angle? Did the wind outside the cockpit window shift the focus ring? These thoughts and questions probably occupied a much larger portion of my mind. (This naturally leads me into your next question…)
How often do you put the camera down and simply look?
I think it is nearly impossible to truly appreciate and witness an event or moment while simultaneously trying to document it to the best of your abilities. The natural conflict that thus arises, at least for me, is that if I want to really experience what is happening in front of me I need to put my camera down, turn off the technical side of my mind, and simply appreciate what’s playing out before my eyes. I’ve certainly missed shots doing this, but I have more meaningful memories as a result. One of the most difficult aspects of a trip such as this is developing an expert feel for when it’s really important to keep the camera out and keep pressing the shutter, and when it’s ok to just stop and stare. I think that only comes through hard won experience.
What is are some of the unseen efforts behind these photos that the viewer couldn’t even imagine?
It is difficult, if not impossible, to do a great job of documenting mountain sports and culture unless you are simultaneously participating in the action at hand. Many of my favorite or “best” images come from trips and experiences where you simply could not have a staged shoot, set up a studio, or have a dozen supporting members helping with all the necessary tasks besides composing and making the images. It’s usually just me and the people in the shot, and I’m often tied in to the other end of their rope. This brings a palpable authenticity and rawness to the photos, but it requires serious motivation and drive to keep pulling out the camera even when there’s myriad other things that need to be done – coil ropes, boil water, break down camp, keep hiking, climb the next pitch, etc.
After more than 24 hours on the move, and finally in a zone safe enough from falling debris above to take off his helmet, Chris Mutzel takes a short break to soak in the first rays of dawn after bailing off of the route Exocet on Aguja Stanhardt. Argentine Patagonia.
If there’s one thing that ties a lot of my favorite images together it is that they usually capture moments where I wanted nothing more than to keep my camera in its case and deal with those other things instead. For example, in the sunrise photo where my friend Chris Mutzel stands in front of the Fitz Roy massif as wind whips the rope off the glacier between us, we had been on the move for more than 24 hours, it was bitterly cold out, and ice crystals stung my face like a sandblaster. All I wanted was to bury my chin into my hood and keep trudging along. But I could see that the dawn light was some of the most amazing I’d ever witnessed, and so I called out and asked Chris to stop for 30 seconds or so. We made the image and kept hiking.
Sam Seward gets ready to bed down for the night as the moon rises through wildfire smoke over the Tiedemann Glacier, Waddington Range, BC.
Or in the basecamp photo where my friend Sam Seward is in his tent above the Tiedemann Glacier as the moon rises behind, we had been awake since before dawn and on the move all day. We were descending off a climb on nearby Mt. Waddington, and we’d had an accident where Sam was nearly killed by rockfall. In the end all was OK, but we’d spent hours that afternoon bandaging his wounds and I felt completely depleted mentally, physically, and emotionally as darkness finally fell across the landscape. But as I headed to my tent to pass out in glorious slumber I saw the moonrise and knew that if I waited 30-60 minutes the light would be incredible. And so I dug out my camera and a tripod, set it up, composed the shot, and waited. It would have felt amazing to simply go to sleep and get the rest I desperately needed, but I am so glad I didn’t. The reality is that the hardest part is simply making sure that the camera is in your hands. After that comes all the easy stuff.
Chris Mutzel climbs the runout and rime-covered first pitch of Exocet on Aguja Stanhardt. The pitch can sometimes be fat alpine ice, but we found it in lean condition, requiring balance, precision, and a cool head to tiptoe up tiny granite edges and small ice blobs in boots and crampons. Argentine Patagonia.
Who designed it?
Me! I wanted a more interactive design than a flat postcard and decided on a barrel rolling tri-fold pretty early. I keep a number of photos standing by that I wanted to feature, so when I had the sudden idea for a somewhat minimalist style collage I was able to finish the design in a couple days. I played with laying out mini-groupings based on a combination of both subject matter and color scheme.
Tell me about the images?
The images are a combination of personal work, portfolio building, and client work. They’re all personal favorites and all but one were shot within the last year. The opening silhouette shot is perhaps one of my absolute favorites from a concept shoot this summer with my friend Claire, incorporating stylized posing with her surfboard for a less traditional lifestyle shoot in dramatic sunset light. The first grouping you see upon opening the tri-fold includes client work for a regatta and a boat builder, plus one of my favorite wave shots from swimming in the surf this past spring. The second feature panel is for the boatbuilder again, from a lifestyle shoot we completed in Palm Beach that I’m very proud of. On the very inside is another feature shot from a portfolio fitness shoot with my friend Eliza this past summer. She’s a bodybuilder with personality to boot, and this shot captured her persona perfectly. Lastly is another small grouping of shots, all personal work, including hiking in Acadia National Park, lifestyle on the beach before surfing with my friend Abby, and a delicate flower detail I just photographed in the parking lot of a motel while visiting my brother in California but I absolutely love the soft aesthetic of it. Together they make a much more feminine little snapshot of my portfolio, and in combination with the other ocean or lifestyle shots, both client and personal work, this whole mailer captures my most work from this year very well.
How many did you make?
I send out about 100-120, so I’ll print 150 and use whatever leftovers as takeaways at in-person events like art festivals, lectures, and client meetings. I’ve been using vellum envelopes to give a sneak preview of the photos but still protecting the work during mailing. I do all the assembly and mailing out myself — including accidentally putting the return label and stamps on backward for half the batch one very groggy morning, but hopefully it shows I’m only human hahah!
How many times a year do you send out promos?
The goal is quarterly, but I’m still developing my marketing budget and schedule. The past two years I’ve done biannual — one in the first quarter of the year, and one in the third quarter.
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
Yes. They are more personal and targeted than my email list, and even though my design covers a broad range of portfolio work as opposed to a singular project, it can still highlight my creative aesthetic and composition across photographic genres. I actually got a call from a new client within a month of a promo mailer that ended up with a commissioned assignment and will hopefully result in a successful long term partnership. When I asked how the client found me, she said my mailer (even though she had been on my email list for a year). She found it very thoughtful and recognized that I was specifically targeting brands I wanted to work with.
I’m writing on Thanksgiving, you’re reading on Black Friday, and these are highly-loaded days in America.
In their honor, today, we’re doing a proper examination of these perilous, political times in the United States and China, Earth’s dueling super-powers.
For my American analysis, you already know I’ve got the goods, as I’ve been spewing on about American politics since Rob gave me this platform. (Or, more accurately, since Thanksgiving 2011.)
With respect to China, I’ve got a BA in History from Duke, I studied Chinese art history at the undergrad and graduate levels, taught elements of its art history at the college level, watched more Hong Kong action films than I could ever count, learned bits about Buddhism, and studied Chinese martial arts as well.
(Tai Chi, Kung Fu, and I’m familiar with Qi Gong.)
Finally, on the subject of my Chinese street cred, I wrote an article here in 2011, after artist Ai Weiwei was unjustly kidnapped and imprisoned by the Chinese government, that was highly critical of China’s rulers.
(I called them assholes.)
After we published, I battled Chinese government trolls in the comment section for a few hours, which Rob and I still talk about. (And we wondered, will they return today?)
This time, though, I’m going to sit down in the nuance.
This will NOT be a story in which I only call the Chinese government to task, condescending in my moral superiority, confident I know better.
Not today.
Rather, we’re going to look at the bigger picture.
Because China in #2019 is as impossible to ignore, (and as good at generating headlines,) as Donald J. Trump.
And that’s saying something!
In preparation for this article, I read almost everything I could the last two weeks, and encountered some excellent journalism in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and this amazing piece by the ICIJ that focuses on the second major leak coming out of China in the past month.
But even more impressive, (I think,) is that we’re also going to offer you some actual, unpublished, hot-off-the-presses documentary photography, straight from the front lines in Hong Kong, which has been roiled by massive protests this year.
My Antidote student, Hillary Johnson, has strong ties to the martial arts community in Hong Kong, and has spent a significant amount of time there over many years.
She recently put together a small Go Fund me campaign to raise money to get to Hong Kong to document the protest movement, and just got back.
These photographs are current, is what I’m saying.
And she both knows the city, and has deep ties there.
The Hong Kong protests are only part of what I want to discuss, but it’s exciting to be able to share Hillary’s work while it’s all happening.
Photo from the 7th floor of the Eaton Hotel that sits right at the intersection where the battle took place at Nathan Rd and Gascoigne Rd. Flowing in and out of the intersection like a murmuration of birds, throughout the day and night of fighting with the police, the protesters worked together tirelessly and with great courage to keep the police at bay. It seemed clear they had studied military history and tactics, particularly Roman battle techniques. They made a phalanx at the barrier and inched towards the police under cover of umbrellas which protected them from the tear gas. They were finally driven out by police around 3 or 4 am.On November 18th protesters used anything they could find to make barricades during the battle that went on for more than 24 hours at Nathan Rd and Gascoigne Rd. They pulled bricks from sidewalks and broke them in half, bamboo from scaffolding, street signs, anything they could get their hands on was immediately transformed into a weapon, shield or barrier. The sound of things being dismantled was a relentless, unearthly tapping of brick against brick, metal against metal.
Part 2. Understanding China
When I wrote the Ai Weiwei article, I rememberer mentioning the movie “Hero,” and how it had chilled me to hear the phrase “Our Land,” and then see Jet Li’s character (spoiler alert) give up his life to allow an Emperor to rule a united China.
I thought it meant they were coming for us, (which they kind of are, but more on that later,) but in the ensuing years, I’ve come to see the film differently.
What I now know of Chinese history is that, as long as it is, the periods of Chinese unity led to prosperity and relative peace.
But when smaller powers were jostling within, in a country as big as China, with a historically huge population, wars broke out, and tens of millions of people died.
(This happened a lot.)
In the late 19th Century, most recently, the Taiping Rebellion killed an estimated 60-70 million people.
And that was an uprising against the Qing Dynasty, a weak power that conquered “China” from Manchuria, in the Far North.
There was also the time when the Mongols defeated China and ruled in the Southern Song Dynasty, in the 13th Century.
The pride of the dominant Han was damaged then too.
Fast forward again, and China in the Qing Dynasty was so underpowered that England carved it up, during the Opium wars, imposing the drug on the country, and taking territory, like Hong Kong.
When the Qing Dynasty finally collapsed, just before World War I, the Japanese came in as conquerors, and from then though World War II, (featuring things like the Rape of Nanjing,) China was humiliated by a neighbor, and again millions of people died.
Next, there was the violence during the Communist Revolution, when Mao Zedong took over, which led to the partition of China and Taiwan. (Which China does not recognize.)
(Even in a united China, under Mao, lots of people died, back in the day.)
So here we are in #2019, and China is now united, but with the resources of a mega-power, due to its embrace of Western Capitalism.
The leadership under the unapologetic dictatorship, (more on that later,) consistently stresses the value of a united, powerful China, and its citizens, many of whom have left poverty for the middle class, (or outright wealth,) appreciate the stability.
Xi Jinping, China’s power-hungry ruler, stepped in at this time of unprecedented prosperity, and decided China was ready to embrace its role as a Superpower, rather than cloak it, as had been the case since Deng Xiaoping.
So now Xi has an axe to grind with the Europeans, the Japanese, and the Americans.
(Russia, with whom it shares a border, is a natural rival as well, but certainly they have things in common too.)
Xi also lived through watching his father get taken down, and reeducated, so he has a chip on his shoulder there as well.
Given all I’ve written so far, are we really surprised that a guy who had the rules re-written so he can be dictator-for-life would claim some rocks in the South China Sea, engage in a huge trade war with a super-power, lock up and torture 1 million Muslim minorities in concentration camps, or try to take Hong Kong’s (partial) democracy in plain view of the world?
Part 3: The War on Terror
After 9/11, the United States of America started two ground wars, one in Afghanistan, and the other in Iraq.
(One is still ongoing, and the other wrapped up under President Obama, but we sent troops back in country this Fall.)
After the attacks that killed 2000+ Americans, and cost untold billions, travel in airports changed forever. Privacy laws changed, (remember the Patriot Act?,) and though George W. Bush admirably argued against it, Anti-Muslim sentiment in this country increased.
Overall, the US spent TRILLIONS of dollars on those Middle-Eastern wars, killed tens of thousands of people, and locked some up indefinitely in Guantanamo Bay too.
Today, in #2019, we are currently running our own detention (or concentration) camps for illegal immigrants, depending on your preferred term.
Children get sexually abused there, or taken from their parents forever.
They sleep on cold concrete floors, and are denied hygiene and occasionally health care.
We also incarcerate millions of Americans for a drug war that is destroying our neighbor, Mexico, and a massive percentage of our overcrowded prison population is comprised of people of color.
Plus, our police, (at least in Dallas,) now shoot African-American people in their homes, while they’re playing video games, or eating ice cream.
You really can’t make this shit up, but doesn’t make it any less tragic.
Honestly, the only thing I like about Vladimir Putin is that he’s always calling us out for our hypocrisy.
We’ve taken territory.
We’ve removed governments.
We’ve meddled in elections.
On this, he’s not wrong.
Can we really look at what China is doing with the (mostly) Uighur population in Xinjiang and say we’re that much better than they are at the moment?
The Uighurs were killing Han Chinese, in terrorist attacks in 2009 and 2014, and then Xi Jinping said make it stop.
He said, use the power of the Dictatorship to make it stop.
And so they did.
They built camps from scratch, increased facial recognition surveillance, locked up 1 million people, torturing them, threatening their free relatives to stay quiet, and went about brainwashing the Islam and Uighur out of them.
All since 2017!!!
And again, I ask, in this age of Trump, with our camps, and our history of locking up the Japanese in World War II, slavery, and the genocide of Native America, are we so sure we’re superior? .
We did lots of torture in those CIA black sites during the War on Terror, in addition to waterboarding, sound and light torture, sleep deprivation, and many other goodies.
No wonder we’re all getting headaches from the complexity of #2019.
Part 4: Defending Democracy
I take my freedom of speech very seriously. (As you know.)
I’m thankful to Rob Haggart, my amazing editor, for supporting those rights for the last 9.5 years, and for paying me to share my opinion with you.
He has never censored or edited me, in all these years.
Not once.
And when I suggested this column, he said go for it!
Because I’ve been thinking a lot about China’s threat to our free speech lately.
As Xi flexes his muscles, (and all these countries become interdependent,) like with anything else, might makes right. It’s why Pakistan and other Muslim countries stay silent as China jails and tortures other Muslims in Xinjiang.
They’re addicted to Chinese money, and the customer, (and boss) is always right.
So I was immediately concerned the second I read that China had come down so hard on Houston Rockets GM Darryl Morey’s Pro-Hong-Kong-protestor tweet back in October.
Mr. Morey had only retweeted a generic message of support from his personal account, and it literally turned into an international incident overnight.
I cannot overstate how big a deal it became, both to China, the NBA, and US-Chinese relations.
Joe Tsai, an Alibaba founder, and new owner of my beloved Brooklyn Nets, wrote a long, open letter on Facebook echoing some of the history I mentioned in Part 1, and calling the protestors separatists. (Ironically, he’s Taiwanese, and was educated in the US.)
Chinese power has come into America, and apparently pressed for Mr. Morey to be fired.
Several times in the aftermath, China made clear in writing that it believes free speech does NOT include criticizing its government, and that it also now feels that practice should not be limited within its national borders.
People outside China, workers within the American Capitalist system, should have their freedom of expression limited, says the People’s Republic of China.
If you’re not a little concerned by that, I think you should be.
And I told all of that to Hillary Johnson, my intrepid student, before she left to support the Hong Kong democracy movement this month.
I told her Xi Jinping was willing to do anything to win.
That these protestors did not stand a chance.
That it would be dangerous.
She said she knew all these things, and was determined to go anyway. She wanted to be there with David, against Goliath.
I told her I admired the hell out of her bravery, and that I’d support her as I could.
The photographs Hillary made, over the course of a week+ in Hong Kong in November 2019, are her vision of a community she, (and I) desperately appreciate. (Or a part of her vision. She had hardrive drama, so this is only a small sample of what she shot.)
China came along earlier this year, and wanted to expand its power to extradite anyone from Hong Kong to the mainland judicial system.
Hong Kong’s citizens, especially the young, realized this was not a power-grab, but a complete takeover.
If it had succeeded, if Carrie Lam, (the puppet) had gotten her way, then any freedom would have evaporated.
You say the wrong thing, and you can all-of-a-sudden end up locked up forever in a Chinese political prison.
It would be the same implicit threat hanging over folks in Beijing, Shanghai, or Shenzhen. (Because the mainland Chinese made a devil’s bargain, of wealth and security for human rights and freedom.)
Here in the United States, we have, for most of our history, preferenced the latter at all costs.
Do we still?
Trump wants to be President for life.
He jokes about it all the time.
The dictators Putin, Xi, and Erdogan are his friends.
And now he’s about to face an impeachment trial, with an election coming up next year.
Where does it all end?
I have no idea.
But the Hong Kong protestors forced China to back down on the extradition law, and just supported the pro-democracy movement in local elections.
What happens next?
Again, I have no idea.
Happy Black Friday!
A nurse who must remain anonymous, photographed on November 18th during a battle between protesters and police for the intersection of Nathan Rd and Gascoigne Rd in the Jordan neighborhood in Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR. She volunteered to care for protesters overcome by teargas or suffering from other injuries. The police shot a mix of tear gas canisters, rubber bullets as well as live rounds directly at protesters.The mother of the young protester who both must remain anonymous pose for a portrait holding a copy of Apple Daily, a pro-democracy magazine. This page features a heroic painting of the protesters by @harcourtromanticist. They are a rare example of a family stronger together now than before. Many parents have disowned their children for being involved in the protests.Anonymous young woman. She is a college student and her boyfriend is a front line protester. She said, “I am not as brave as him but I want to help so I am learning first aid, so I can help them when they go to the front line.” She was inside the Prince Edward MTR station when the police locked the station down, trapping riders and innocent people for over an hour while triad thugs, dressed in all black so they could look like protesters, came in and beat ordinary people, (who were not protesters,) indiscriminately with blunt instruments and batons.A family of a front line protester. He is just 21 and lives with his mother and grandmother. His mother worked at Police headquarters for 11 years. In the beginning of the movement, she and her mother didn’t believe the stories about police brutality and were against the son protesting. It almost split the family apart. They finally came to see the stories were true and though she worries about him every time he goes out she supports the movement and feels that in her job she can keep an eye on things and know what is really going on.This woman so fears the police that this is the only we she could be photographed for publication. Because of her work, so many people know her, some of them police, it was completely unsafe to show her face or photograph her any recognizable place that could be identified. Her husband could not be photographed at all for fear of reprisals.These three gentlemen are part of a confederation of labor unions representing different industries. The two wearing masks have been deeply involved in the movement. To show their faces would put them at risk of arrest and imprisonment. Thousands of people have already been arrested and there are reports of intense police brutality including beatings, arrest and rape. Of the election, one from the Cross Sector Resistance said, “It showed that the people will not submit to pandering or terrorism, but recognize that human rights are non-negotiable.”This man is an organizer and labor leader in Hong Kong. He said, “The Chinese government has already seen my face, so I’m already dead! Let’s do one photo facing away from the camera anyway.” The five raised fingers stands for 5 demands and not one less. He sees labor issues as being inextricably tied to fundamental concepts of freedoms embodied in the five demands and the pro-democracy movement.
The Art of the Personal Project is a crucial element to let potential buyers see how you think creatively on your own. I am drawn to personal projects that have an interesting vision or that show something I have never seen before. In this thread, I’ll include a link to each personal project with the artist statement so you can see more of the project. Please note: This thread is not affiliated with any company; I’m just featuring projects that I find. Please DO NOT send me your work. I do not take submissions.
How to hold the power of light in a dark time in my binational bicultural region?
For the past 20 years I’ve been photographing tender moments in my beloved frontera as they fade away. Beyond the politics, strong woman figure, activist, the rituals that Fronterizos still embrace-I try not to force the gentlest moment of an image. As I look back at my work, I have come to understand that to stay grounded and out of this darkness we must remain in search of the light.
APE contributor Suzanne Sease currently works as a consultant for photographers and illustrators around the world. She has been involved in the photography and illustration industry since the mid 80s. After establishing the art buying department at The Martin Agency, then working for Kaplan-Thaler, Capital One, Best Buy and numerous smaller agencies and companies, she decided to be a consultant in 1999. She has a new Twitter feed with helpful marketing information because she believes that marketing should be driven by brand and not by specialty. Follow her at @SuzanneSease. Instagram
Success is more than a matter of your talent. It’s also a matter of doing a better job presenting it. And that is what I do with decades of agency and in-house experience.
Note: Arctic Refuge image (spread one), wolf image (top right spread two); caribou image (left page spread five) photographed by Austin Siadak and will be posted in Part 2 next week Tuesday Dec 3rd.
Heidi: The Gwich’in tribe harvest the land and animals they are spiritually connected to, how did that unfold for you on this trip? Keri: When I went to Arctic Village to document the Porcupine caribou harvest, I went in with locals Jewels Gilbert and Brennan Firth in mid-August, a time when the caribou are usually starting to migrate through. However, with climate change, the migration patterns have become unpredictable. I ended up being in the village 2 weeks before the herd started to migrate through. There was still a lot going on in the village. Lives revolve around harvesting food, medicine, fixing and building things and preparing for winter. It was peak season for blueberries. My first evening, I got invited to go pick blueberries and here I thought we would be gone for a couple of hours, we were out until 3 a.m., under the Arctic sun. That is what we did every night. We would prep dinner then go into the woods, pick blueberries, take a break for moose soup, play games with the kids, then continue until the berry harvest ended and the caribou came. The Gwich’in live off the land, this is how they sustain their culture and identity from the caribou, moose, fish, and berries.
Was the harvest difficult to witness?
When the Porcupine caribou did start to migrate through, I wasn’t sure how I would handle the harvest, being a former vegetarian for 10 years and having only witnessed the death of an animal once. I found it to be a peaceful experience to watch someone with a deep spiritual connection harvest an animal. I did put my camera down a couple of times to simply watch. It was beautiful to witness someone with so much respect for an animal harvest and handle it. You could feel the love and happiness. They always thank the creator and animal for the food that nourishes their body, mind, and spirit. They also use every part of the caribou, the only part they leave is the stomach, which Jewels says, you have to leave something for the land and other animals – wolves, fox, ravens – they are hungry too.
Since this was the first time Jeffery and Lexine were in the city, what was their reaction? Since so much of the work the Gwich’in do to fight for their way of life involves traveling on trips across the country and the world to educate people about the importance of protecting the Arctic Refuge, I wanted to cover that as well. Bernadette Demientieff, executive director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee, is a seasoned traveler but likes to bring other Gwich’in on these trips. This trip she brought her daughter, Lexine, 11, and traditional Gwich’in hunter Jeffery John from Venetie. This was Lexine and Jeffery’s first time to a big city, their first time on long plane rides, and Jeffery’s first time out of Alaska.
Jeffery was constantly surprised by the number of people living in Washington D.C. It was something he couldn’t wrap his head around. He asked multiple times throughout the four-day trip, “So how many people live here? Wow, that many.” Mind you, he comes from a village in rural Alaska with a population of around 180.
How did they react to the lack of nature? On trips like this to Washington D.C., they get no nature. It is a full day of travel, then straight into preparation, then back to back meetings and press conferences, then home. It’s non-stop. I think if Jeffery had been there any longer than four days he would have gone crazy. I remember being in Sierra Club’s office with him, which is on the 8th floor, and he looked at the windows and said, “How do you open the windows?” I told him you can’t, and he said shaking his head, “Well how do people get fresh air in here?” At one point he looked at the people working in the high rise building across the street and said, “So all those people are working inside like that with no fresh air for 8 hours a day?” He seemed to be in constant surprise and would give me looks like I don’t understand why people live like this.
What was overarching narrative arc for this frontline community? I wanted to focus on the Gwich’in people and their way of life. I think a lot of work that comes out about protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge focuses on the environmental and adventurous aspect, not about the people living on the frontlines. To the Gwich’in this is a human rights issue, their identity and food are tied to the land. Oil and gas development would destroy their sacred land and food security. I wanted to show they aren’t what many would consider activists or environmentalists, they are fighting for the right to live the way their ancestors have since time immemorial.
What struck you the most about their fight?
An important part of the story are the sacrifices the Gwich’in make for this fight. So much of the work they do is traveling across the country and the world to educate others about the importance of protecting the Arctic Refuge and the Gwich’in way of life. They make huge personal, financial, and family sacrifices to fight for their people and future generations. One that can be rewarding, but also very emotional and draining.
Let’s remember, these sacrifices aren’t just made by the Gwich’in, this is happening to all indigenous and frontline communities across the world, having to fight for their human rights in 2019.
Who printed it? Rolling Press in Brooklyn! In addition to being a green printer, they were great to work with, putting up with a number of annoying revisions from me.
Who designed it?
I did, though I heavily cribbed from a few of my favorite promos on this site…
Tell me about the images?
I made a lot of work this year I was super proud of, so I wanted to make a promo that celebrated that. After a long time trying to figure out what makes me tick as a photog, I’m finally crystallizing around portraits (my original love) and documentary, so I built this promo as a two-cover reversible booklet to emphasize that these are two complementary sides of my personality. The portraits are mostly of performers—I went to school for acting, so they’re my favorite—who are coming up in the scene but not quite yet household names. That’s something of an extension of a self-published book project I did back in 2013. I’m especially proud of the Ben Sinclair shots. This was the second time I photographed him—the first was back when I was making the book, and High Maintenance was just a little web series, and now it’s on HBO (and wonderful as ever). On the Documentary side, I think it reflects my loves of travel and unique, specialized situations (I especially like odd equipment, like you might find in a greenhouse or state fair). The Las Fallas story is my favorite there—I took the initiative to plan a trip to Spain to photograph it and Culture Trip picked it up and helped turn it into an award-winning story.
How many did you make?
50!
How many times a year do you send out promos?
I admittedly am not the most dedicated or successful marketer, but about once a year I make an attempt. This has probably been my most successful, though, and will definitely encourage me to make more going forward!
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
I think so! I’ve tried the email-campaign thing and they just feel so spammy. Not helped by the fact that they’re frequently picked up by spam filters, and all the tips they give you on how to get around them just make your messages sound gimmicky. With a printed promo, I try to make something I’d be happy to have on my desk; I really want to feel like I’m giving a gift to these editors, or I’m just going to be too self-conscious to even try.
It must be muscle memory, as words normally flow from my brain to my fingers, like wet snow dropping from a gray sky.
Then, we get to this time of year, when the days are shorter, the light is less intense, and the column gets more difficult.
Especially as I’m spent, having just finished a run of 8 big trips in 8 months.
It ended a few days ago, when we returned from a family Bar Mitzvah in Boulder. (Partying with the same extended family for the third time this year.)
It was both exhausting and perfunctory, which is an odd combination.
(And if my cousins are reading this, apologies, you threw a great shindig.)
Rather, the joy and surprise of such family reunion-type-events lie in the typical time-gap between them: people change, and have new stories to tell.
By the third get-together in a year, it’s only natural that people have run through their prime “life-story” material, and the conversations get a bit stale.
What I found, though, is that it’s not always the big, dramatic moments that burn their way into memory. Or that are even the most pleasurable, necessarily.
I told my kids about, and then actively noticed, the random, seemingly-meaningless-in-between moments that can come to feel important in a family bonding narrative.
Like the time we were sprinting though an underground parking garage, the four of us, desperate not to be late for (always boring) Temple, and I heard our shoes clicking on the concrete as I looked at my daughter and smiled.
Or the four of us huddled over a few plates of Thai noodles, sucking up the city-food-goodness, while the mountains and shopping malls of Boulder looked on beyond the fifth floor, hotel windows.
It’s not always the glamour, I’ve found, that pulls us out of our respective reveries, and helps us revel in the moment.
Right now, I’m actually thinking of a perfect moment in Chicago, back in September, when I visited for the Filter Photo Festival.
If you’ve been reading this year, you know I used food, architecture, and travel as methods of inspiration, rather than just photographs, paintings and sculptures.
As an artist, I’ve done more writing, drawing and installation work lately than I have photography.
(Each step in our creative journey is different, and things change over time.)
But rather than repeating my old patterns in Chicago, (as I discussed last week,) I went to Pilsen to have a Kung Fu lesson with a great teacher in town.
It took two subway trains and a bus to get there, and wouldn’t you know, but that’s where one of those little moments managed to find me.
On the bus heading North.
I was late, (again,) but this time, I’d texted Sifu to give him a heads up, and I was assured it was no drama. (So I settled in for the ride.)
By the time I got to that bus, though, I was ready to be there.
It wasn’t a long journey, only a mile, and I’d normally walk, but again, I was late, and didn’t know where I was going.
So after the third or fourth bus stop in a row, I was properly impatient, and must have had a sour look on my face.
Then the fifth stop was the doozy.
An elderly Latino man got on the bus, walking very slowly. He had on a dapper hat, (not a fedora, more short and peaked,) a sharp outfit, and these glittery, oversized sunglasses.
(If Elton John had ever looked as good in his sunglasses as this guy did, I’d be surprised.)
I noticed him immediately, and then time stopped.
Literally.
Because the man had his bus ticket in his wallet, in his back pocket, but he couldn’t get it out to save his life.
I watched as his hand slowly tried to work the wallet back and forth, bit by bit hoping it would slide out from its overstuffed home.
He stood there, motionless, but for the little bit his arm and hand moved, as they fruitlessly tried to access his bus pass.
30 seconds went by.
Then a minute.
I was transfixed.
90 seconds, and finally he had progress.
The last bit was easier than you might think, he paid his fare, then came and sat down near me.
It was like I was in the presence of a proper showman, a rock star from a previous era, and I’d watched him in a mini-life movie, right there on the bus in Chicago.
I tell you this story, today, while I’m fighting off the winter blues, because as much as I’m thrilled to be facing a 4 month travel break, to recharge and restore…sometimes we do need to get out of our own little worlds to realize how big it is out there.
In the best case, art can help us do that too.
It’s the reason people like these portfolio review articles, I think, because it allows you to see so many different viewpoints and perspectives in each piece.
And at every festival I go to, the range of photographic work I see is as broad as Lake Michigan.
So here were are, speak of the devil, in Part 2 of “The Best Work I Saw at the Filter Photo Festival.”
As usual, the artists are in no particular order.
We’ll begin today with one of my favorite Chicago photographers, Yvette Marie Dostatni. We met at a festival a few years ago, and I loved her quirky, funny, and definitely absurd series, “The Conventioneers,” which I wrote about at the time.
Yvette and I stayed in touch, and I admit I’m a big fan of her work. But when I saw her at Photolucida this past Spring, I didn’t love some of what she showed me, and gave her a tough critique.
In the follow up, Yvette told me about a project she’d done visiting Indiana, where her family comes from, which she thought I might like.
(Boy, did I.)
As I didn’t get to feature Yvette in my Portland series, and she’s both Chicago through-and-through, and a former Filter participant, I thought it would be perfect to include her in this series.
I admired Thomas Brasch’s intention in his work immediately, as he described his desire to make healing, positive work out of terrorism against humanity.
Not an easy goal, to be sure.
He described an intensive digital process through which photographs taken at or near the scene of mass shootings were digitally manipulated into mandala-like creations.
I liked some more than others, but as I got to look at them consecutively, I got a sense of the good juju coming off of them. I’m actually showing a large selection below, because it creates a pretty cool sensation.
Thomas and I had a great chat about how such restrictions, (on process and form/shape,) which originally inspire us, eventually can be constraining, so it’s good to stay fluid.
Like Margaret LeJeune last week, I had one of “those” chats with Nina Riggio. The one where I explain why I think one project falls short, only to have the artist show me, with the next series in the box, that they had it all sorted already.
In Nina’s case, she had a documentary photo project about some Venus flytrap poachers in North Carolina that felt very “parachute journalism” to me, despite her passion.
I asked about things more personal, or connected to her life experience, and she brought out these images of Tesla factory workers who live in their vehicles.
As Nina had already told me she is based in a van, the intersection was powerful. I’ve written a lot about the West Coast, (and perhaps American) homelessness epidemic, and this is a really intriguing, poignant and visceral way to convey a part of the story.
Next, we’ve got Ruth Lauer Manenti, from the Catskills in NY, whom I met early on the first day of the festival. Ruth is a great example of what I wrote earlier, as she told me she was trained in painting and drawing, but had come to photography when she inherited an old large format camera.
Much as I’m currently using my photo skills to learn how to draw, (seeing is seeing,) Ruth figured out her own way of communicating photographically.
It’s spare, Zen, and very, very beautiful.
Love it!
Sam Scoggins is back in the column, as likely the first person to be featured twice, with different work, from two different festivals in the same year.
(Quite the achievement, if you think about it.)
After Photolucida, I published Sam’s black and white documentary photographs of Upstate NY night time party creatures. Then, he went on to have success with a artificial, digital landscape project.
But in Chicago, I noted him toting around a huge box of prints, but couldn’t see what they were. During the portfolio walk on Saturday night, based on their size and the edges that stuck out, I found that Sam had also been working on a cyanotype series as well.
Talk about prolific!
There are two groups, featuring endangered native species toned in oil, and then an invasive species bunch as well, all from near his home.
What a talented guy.
Native species plants
Invasive plants
Finally, we have Sarah Pfohl, who is a photo professor in Indianapolis.
Sara told me that she was working on a very a personal documentary series on her family’s property in Upstate New York, as she did not expect to ever inherit it.
For her, the place represented home, but Sara felt there was limited amount of time that she’d be able to access it, and those feelings.
So her work amounted to memory-creation and capture, but also a quiet elegy to the death of her childhood, in a way. It’s a sad place to leave you, today, but then again, it’s November, with all the sad light.
