This Month's Spam

This carpet bombed the photo/art buying community this morning. I'm waiting to see if anyone expresses discontent over The Girlfriends....of course I welcome all opinions.

Left Space / BW

It Starts With A Blank Canvas

Stylist Shannon Amos with the 8 x 10 wall, 10/27/09

Love and Art From Italy

Wonderful print from Dreaming Bollywood by Italian photographer Massimo Sordi arrived in the mail yesterday. Part of a print trade we worked out, though I couldn't have been more excited by how powerful the image is as a print. It is luscious and melancholy...all at the same time. See more of Massimo's work HERE.

The Girlfriends

The end of the busy week. I tried to pull something from every day to post...just as a challenge. Sometimes it was boring.....so sorry everyone...sometimes it was kinda interesting.
Yesterday we found ourselves surrounded by this slice of American History and felt the need to share it with ya' all. Note the calendar on the last shot is literally a give-a-way for a meat market.

Thumbsucker / Sleepwalker

TS/SW, 2009

Dream Team Capitola

Veronica Sjoen Hair and Makeup Stylst sits in.

Sz motivating the talent

T.A stretching

Clothing Stylist Micah Bishop

Best Western Capitola

Carpet in Meeting Room at The Best Western Capitola By The Sea, 10/09

This Week

It is a busy week this week, so I'll either post not at all...or I'll post something every day.

We Got The Neutron Bomb

Photographing Family: Phillip Toledano, Doug DuBois, Elizabeth Flemming, Jack Radcliffe, David Newsom, Tierney Gearon, Dona Schwartz and TA.
Curated by Aline Smithson for Too Much Chocolate.

It's an insightful grouping on the genre, and the essay's bring it all together. Interesting quote from myself, I think I was addressing the idea of exploitation and how I wrestle with it and embrace it:

If your subject is your kid, access is rarely the problem- everything you need is right in front of you. Being the Dad and then trying to let go of that role and then try to collaborate with my son… oh that is the problem. What will I do to get the photograph? What license will I give him? What line will I cross myself to make the image happen, only to then switch over and be the Dad moments later when the shoot is over?

Here we are re-creating an accident together. Here we are wrapping him in rubber bands….something he did already but this time in just the right light. Is he consenting to this stuff? I showed this work to a friend who responded “ Photographers always claim to be collaborating with their subjects. The truth is we are willing to do anything to get what we want from them. We’ll steal what we can as quickly as we can or pay any price after that if the stealing doesn’t work. You know that is true.” I didn’t disagree.

But with Echolilia, I feel my son is a co-conspirator- he knows we need to make these images.

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Toledano's work even better than I remember it being. It buries everything in it's wake. Tierney and Dubois are Gods incarnate. Newsom I actually met a few years back at a book fair in LA...he is like a handsome actor and insightful photographer...enough to make everyone jealous. Tethered delivers the goods...and Jack and Dona's work is new to me and carries that punch of the unknown I always enjoy wrestling with. See it, read it HERE.

Last Exit To Brooklyn

The Kids Are Alright at the home of private collector Travis Ruse in the Dining Room Gallery in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The images are part of the permanent collection and will be on display indefinitely.
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Prints courtesy of Gabe at Greenberg Editions in NYC.

Peter Duesberg for Newsweek

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I've photographed Peter Duesberg twice over the past decade and every time it is an empowering experience. Now 72, he is the subject of the story The World's Most Reviled Genius in this week's Newsweek Magazine. I was comforted to see the word genius thrown in there...his spirit and intellect is so apparent whenever you spend time with him. He is physically striking and stylish always: yellow pants, green shirt and white hair. And there is no question to me he knows exactly what he is doing and his place in science is absolutely his choosing. We all need someone to be counter intuitive...we need someone to question us, don't we?

The spread of the story with this very curious hexagon treatment that puzzled the p.e. and myself is below... and read the story HERE.

My Hometown Part 3

Jumping Jacks, Scotia N.Y. circa 1991

I found these prints while digging thru stuff for the lecture last week. I always knew that Schenectady, N.Y. was a great place to photograph. I remember watching the Peter Bogdanovich film The Last Picture Show when I was in high school with all the great b&w cinematography and telling my parents " that movie looks like here...now". I think they just laughed.

Shoporama, Rotterdam N.Y. circa 1991



My Grandmother's House, Mt. Pleasant, N.Y. circa 1991

Every Element

A friend of my son's drew this and gave it to him at school.
It's got every Halloween element crammed into it all at the same time, which is why I love it.

Thank You

Just want to say thank you for everyone who came out to the APA lecture on Thursday.
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Always feels good to have people who I totally don't know come up and say hello and let me know they are following the blog and aware of whatever it is I'm up to. It always feels good to be noticed! I wish I wrote every one's name down to send Thank You cards, ya know?

Co-incidently photographer Irving Penn had died that morning at the age of 92 and the blogosphere was filled with tales of Penn's life and work. I was never able to grasp Penn's work...it just never spoke to me, but I respected how the man and his work was admired by others. Lots of public losses this summer and it was curious to see how everyone dealt with this in this facebook blogspeed culture we are in: Jim Carroll, Michael Jackson, and now this founding father of photography Irving Penn.

All of this is on my mind as I turn on my computer and note that A.H. wrote an eloquent piece on WTJ? promoting the lecture. It was so generous in spirit I felt it was my birthday or something. One line stuck in my head:

... there is one thing we can be certain of, there will be a lot of love in the room. Oh and yes as he likes to do he will most probably solve all the problems of contemporary photography singlehandedly right there from the stage.

The second line was a joke, but the first line ...that was the one that stuck in my head. I send A.H. a note thanking him for the kind words. He responds:

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where was all this blog/facebook love for Irving Penn when he was alive?
that why I giveth now
whats the point when you are f'ing dead?

So simple and so well stated.

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It was great to see friends old and new at the lecture. Notable of course was my photography prof from PSU Ken Graves and his wife Eva Lipmann, Joshua Deaner in town for his first place award in the Photography Book Now / BLURB celebration and the grand prize winner for the best question Pamela Palma. OMG...so many pals: Shannon Amos, Heidi Yoder, TB, Brian Holliday, Suzy Poling, Winni Wintermeyer, Jeff Kausch, Max Fallon, Emily Merril, Mark Richards, Michael Winoker, Gerry Gropp, Peggi-jane Jeung, Shane O'Neill, Gabriela Hasbun, Lara Hata, David Bornfriend, Justin Bowen, Caren Alpert, omg...I can't even name everyone. But thank you.

Lecture 10/8/09, Apple SF

3 minute introduction of TA Lecture, 10/8/09

25 Minutes of un-edited TA lecture, 10/8/09

Tonight, October 8th 2009

notes to myself, 10/09

Ok....come on over to the Apple Store at One Stockton in SF tonight at 7:00!

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Lots of good people and special guests in the audience...the hip factor is going to be off the chain, the collective i.q. of the room is gonna be unmeasurable. Oh....don't get too excited...its only an hour.

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Then people hanging at this bar called Johnny Foley's Irish Pub, 243 O'Farrell St, walking distance from the lecture. I'll be there for a bit but then you all can party without me.

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A Friend Of Mine Shoots Another Friend of Mine

Max Gerber photographs Mr. ILikeToTellStories himself Jonathan Saunders, 9/16/09

Action Shot

Beautiful day in S.F. for photographer and Art Academy student Justin Bowen to come on a shoot for Caren Alpert's Editorial Photography class. J.B. sent forth this snap that just looked so testosterone and macho ( for me ) that I had to run it.

Echolilia Slide Test, @ Apple in SF

Remember...October 8th at 7:00 pm...Brooke Embry of Tidepool Reps flying in....Apple Store in the theatre on the 2nd Floor...One Stockton Street in SF...Free to an intelligent photo literate audience, as always...

Nonfunctioning Periscope

I Never Thought I'd Run A Comic Strip

From Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis.