Monday, April 29, 2024

More recent books, mainly Avedon

If you've been following along, you know that photography books have been a big part of my reading over the last little while. 

Photographs 1946 2004 by Richard Avedon. Lots of portraits, mostly against a white or neutral background. They're amazing. Some are famous, both people and photos. 

What's funny, is there is a 2 page spread where Richard and Lee (scroll down a bit) photographed each other. The Lee photo of Richard fascinates me. He is posed with his huge (by today's standards) view camera and his three assistants. Other books about photographers mention assistants, but rarely mention their names. I always wonder what happened to the assistant. Do they move on to a job as a Walmart greeter? Become a famous photographer in their own right? Bask in the reflected fame by embarking on a lecture series talking about their time with the photographer? 

And for those wondering, why the heck does a photographer need an assistant, let alone 3 of them, allow me a digression. Take a look at that view camera. It's huge, taking what I believe is an 8 x 10 inch (INCH!!) negative. No older photographer wants to carry that and the required tripod around. Having an assistant deal with the mechanics of preparing the camera and negative, getting the desired focus, and holding reflectors or shades to control the light, allows the photographer to focus on the interaction with the subject. I watched a documentary about one photographer, using a particular camera. They would work with the subject, capturing photo after photo, and then without looking hand the camera to an assistant, who would hand them another camera loaded and ready to go. In the background there were people managing lights, reflectors, fans, hair, makeup, and any other props that might be needed.

It should be noted that during a recent corporate head shot session, even though I'm using a comparatively tiny camera and natural light, found an assistant (hi Michelle!) to be invaluable. She was a second set of eyes to make sure clothing and hair were flattering. It's much less intimidating for the model, especially women, to have someone other than the male photographer arranging hair and clothing, and helping with the poses.

I've gone through this book several times, looking at the portraits, wondering how he did some of them. I aspire to be able to do portraits this good.


Performance, by Richard Avedon. Richard loved theatre. Loved it! He travelled to see specific plays, and sometimes attended multiple performances of the same show. These photos are all of theatre or cinema people, some posed, some informal. Many of them are posed in ways that express their outsized performance personalities. It's a master class on posing, and catching that moment when the subject is perfect.


Self Portrait Photographs by Lee Friedlander. I cannot remember now where I heard about him. While he was an innovative photographer exploring the social landscape, these particular photos didn't do anything for me. I suspect that were he not a famous photographer, nobody would consider the photos to be worthy of any particular notice. Or maybe that's just me being a philistine.

There's a joke in photography circles. How do you become a famous photographer? Answer, become famous in another field, like acting or entertainment, or have the connections to famous people, and then take up photography.

In 1979 he paid Madonna $25 for a photo session before she was famous. One of those images sold for nearly $40K in 2009, and it certainly wouldn't have happened if she was a nobody. I just wonder how much Lee got, and how much the gallery or auction house got. I doubt Madonna got any of it.
 

Enlightenment Now, by Steven Pinker. The world isn't as bad as you think. Really. He dives into the way things are now, compared to the past, like health, sustenance, wealth, inequality, peace, safety, terrorism, quality of life, you get the idea. Yes, there are still problems, but it's much, much better than it used to be. 

Cranky old geezers like me can remember people smoking anywhere and everywhere and how disgusting that was, cars being deathtraps where human shish kabob was a common outcome, and only a few channels on a fuzzy TV. Talk to people of my parent's generation, about a time before the polio vaccine or penicillin. Or think of a time just out of living memory, where millions upon millions died in a futile war, and even more from Spanish Flu. We know better now. It wasn't so long ago that we lived in a world where parents could bury half their children, and being pregnant was quite literally a death threat.

It's not exactly an easy read. There's a ton of data and lots of charts. It's hard to express how much better things are now, but he tries. Part of the problem is that if you try to tell someone else about the progress we've made, they often don't believe it. They're too wrapped up in the here and now, and lack a historical context.


Oh, and last thing. Is "SpiesAreUs" reading this? They left a cryptic comment that I'm not sure about. If you're a real person let me know and I'll hit publish. 

Of the Day
Driftwood (NZ)

Yukon

Film (new)
On the way downtown for the +15 walk.


Michelle X2
This is what happens when you don't keep track of camera orientation between rolls.


The mood I asked her to present is a haughty high paid model between photos, tired, bored, and cold.



Tuesday, April 16, 2024

I know better, I really do

No, not taking the snow tires off the car. That's next week. These.


I put them down stairs; not even on the shelf stored away, just near the bottom of the stairs in the basement so we aren't tripping over them near the front door. And what happens? We go from this, yesterday, 15th.








To this, the 16th. Same trees.









The rabbits are out looking for tulips. Linda put up the protective netting.


And a macro serendipity of the chain ring on Estela, my fondly remembered road bike.


Of the Day
Driftwood (NZ)

Yukon

Film (new)
A few from a +15 window. More here if you like that sort of thing.


Michelle X2

and a serendipity from Yukon.



Saturday, April 13, 2024

An unboxing!

The book arrived early, several days early, to my surprise. This book. Our book. Black, White, and Red.


It's the story of our collaboration a few weeks ago. As soon as I saw the photos on screen I knew I wanted something more permanent than a blog. In case you've forgotten, there's two of them. Mine. Hers. I wanted to do a book about the session. Here is Michelle unboxing our copies.






We're both really pleased how the book turned out! The photos pop off the paper as much as they popped off the screen. 

I'm now starting to think about what our next collaboration will look like. 

In other news, we're still in fake spring. None the less, Linda has started garden cleanup because plants are growing. The weather forecast says there's a chance of flurries early next week.



In the periodic reminder department, if you want an email notification that I've blogged on either of my blogs, just ask via an email to keith@nucleus.com, or a comment on the blog with your email address.

Of the Day
Driftwood (NZ)
This is a wonderful chunk of driftwood on Parapara beach. At least I think it was that one. Certainly along Golden Bay. I was quite charmed by the sign, and could easily imagine kids of all ages playing on it. 


And a 2017 Yukon serendipity.


Yukon

Film (new)

Michelle X2


Wednesday, April 10, 2024

Recent books

 Here's what I've been reading lately, in date order.

Gene Smith's Sink, by Sam Stephenson. 
Gene was a prominent editorial photographer. He was also one weird dude. Not surprisingly, this is one weird book. Some of the time I didn't know if I was coming or going. I occasionally wonder what will happen to my photos and books when I die, and what some hypothetical biographer would think of them as they try to piece my life together. But Gene recorded a great deal of his life on tape. The biographer listened to those tapes and figured out who some of the people involved were and explored some of the associations. To say he lead an unusual life is a vast understatement. His death certificate says "stroke", but "everything" is probably a more accurate word.


Sh!tWent Down by James Fell.
There are 365 one page history snippets highlighting what happened on one day of various years. Some quite recent, and some a long time ago. There's a particular word usually expressed as the F bomb. If you don't like that word, don't even pick up the book. Don't even think about it. I'm pretty sure there is not one single page without an F bomb. Often there are many of them. His political opinions slant decidedly anti-conservative, and he lays into Trump with vim and vigour. I'm pretty sure that Trump is in Fell's top 10 list of worst humans ever.

Almost all the essays are good, given the viewpoint, but reading a bunch at a time is a bit much. This is better read as the flyleaf on a daily calendar.


The Invention of Yesterday by Tamim Ansary.
This is a wonderful surprise. I thought it was going to be a more literary effort, talking about how stories spread from one culture to another. It sort of does, but it mainly presents and overall view of what was happening in various places at the same time, and how the effects rippled from place to place. Extremely readable.


The Perfect Shot.
Blah. Don't bother. Typical tourist photos, all over baked.


Buddha by Michael Kenna.
Photos of various Buddha statues throughout south east Asia. A few other photos. Not much more to be said. I wanted a book of his landscapes, but this is what the library had.


Niagara, by Alec Soth.
I didn't get it. Maybe there's a story there. Or not.


Slow Horses by Mick Herron.
We found the show on Prime or Apple+, totally by accident. I'd been looking at something else, and clicked on the info thingie that tells you what other shows an actor was in. I picked Gary Oldman and saw this. Watched a preview and was hooked. We binged all of it, totally relishing all the great lines that Oldman delivers. 

Surprisingly enough, the show follows the book pretty closely, and even better, captures the atmosphere of the book really well.


Centennial by Irving Penn.
There's a lot to unpack here. This is a big heavy book. I had to prop it on the arm of the chair. Over a very long career he captured images for a variety of industries, and it can be hard to organize it. This book groups like with like. 

His portrait work really resonated with me. Somehow he captured something of the person in a plain setting. The small trades photos are fascinating, capturing a time when you could tell a person's trade from the clothes they wore, because the clothes were practical. 

These are not airbrushed lush photos with artful lighting and extravagant backgrounds. One series of photos wedged the subject into a tight V shaped setting. I can't help but think they would feel very constricted in there. It reminded me, in an oppositional way, of Rainbow Revolution by Magnus Hastings. (my review here.) I look at the photos and wonder how he set up the lighting. 

I'm also reminded of writing advice from The Elements of Style, that a sentence should have no unnecessary words, and a paragraph no unnecessary sentences. Penn's portraits are a study in the necessary.

The Vogue fashion stuff was hit and miss, mainly because I'm not a fashion kind of guy. Some of his other work is decidedly a miss. I can't imagine what prompted him to take photos of cigar and cigarette butts. Some would now deem his ethnographic portraits to be exploitive.

The still life photos are different. Flowers in full colour. Stuff found in the street, aside from cigar butts. Packaging. Random stuff. All with superb composition, if I'm to believe the text. Frankly, I'm still struggling with composition, why one photo is well composed and another is not, and the subtle gradation between them. 

Then there was the advertising, which is different again. This guy had "style" out the ying yang, but one of the reasons he worked so much and so long, is that he worked hard at it. He was trying new things, pushing the boundaries, aiming for perfection.

One of his struggles was to break free of the shackles of previous work. All too often the clients wanted more of the same, and he wanted to move on to something different, to try new techniques. That really resonates with me, and is part of my current thinking about photography. 

I've been on lots of tours where we get taken interesting places and the group has some amount of time to make photographs. The problem, of course, is how much time. At any random place there's  going to be someone who wouldn't have stopped, and probably at the same place is someone that it's just killing them to pack up the camera and get back in the van. I've been both of those.

All too often the photos end up looking the same. I want to try to create interesting photos that express my view of the world. Something that is becoming more important to me is that whatever value my photos have as art, it's actually my work. Not AI generated. I'd rather produce a competent 'there I was and this is what I saw' photo of a time and place, than dress up such a photo with an AI generated drama sky, and punched up colour to get likes on Instagram. Not that I'm on Instagram any more.

To sum up, this is one of the best photography books I've read. Even if I didn't like some of the photos, they're interesting to look at, and think about the process that went into creating them. 



A Notebook at Random by Irving Penn.
Some of these images are in the previous book. What's interesting is some of the notebook sketches he did to plan the image, or to sell it to a client.

Of the Day
Driftwood (NZ)

Yukon

Film (new)
The state of the fridge back in January.



Michelle X2