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Future Of The Street (In B/W & Color)

Photo: Philip-Lorca diCorcia

Stating that street photography (that generalized, all encompassing term which is more misleading than identifying) is passe, is not unlike stating that portraiture is dead, or landscape, or... The term "street photography" can, in fact, encompass portraiture (candid or otherwise), (urban) landscape, or those often surreal juxtapositions and "decisive moments" that only occur in crowded, chaotic urban environments.

These shows attest to all the above, and while street photography in all its variations has long been dethroned from defining and encompassing the vanguard of photographic art- it will continue to help define our humanity, history and culture... and be limited (like any other art form) only by the creativity of its practitioners.

PS- It's also refreshing to see how a certain blogger now attests to having little preference as to B&W or color- it wasn't that long ago when he stated that he didn't much care for B&W "except in extreme cases." Perhaps as he evolves he may even develop a certain fondness for art wherever its made, even when it passes him on the street.

Truly Humbling...

Over 100 billion galaxies (each with millions of solar systems totaling untold trillions of planets- more planets than the grains of sand on our own earth) in our universe (which may, in fact, be part of a mulitiverse). Astronomers by their own admission can't even account for 90% of what makes up our known universe. And yet, many of these "learned" men of science will look you straight in the eye and proclaim that we are the best and the brightest in all of it...

Two Outta Three...

Bill Jay- RIP

Coming upon a plethora of bound back issues of Creative Camera magazine (after only being exposed to the commercial rags) in the library stacks of my community college was an unparalleled revelation (art photography in magazines!?) of near other worldly delights to these then young eyes back in the seventies (when you could count the photographic art galleries in NYC on one hand).

You can read Bill Jay's seminal On Being A Photographer online...

Jackanory To The Left...

The Jackanorizer, Andrew Hetherington, will be in San (don't call it Frisco) Francisco this Thursday at the MacDaddy store @ 1 Stockton St., 7pm- where he will regale us with his world wide, photographic travails.

In the second half he will lead the town hall discussion on the benefits of socialized health care...

We Bring Fear...

Charles Bowden's essay on the war we never won, and continue to lose so much closer to home.

"They arrested a homeless man in a shelter for being homeless."

Yeah... I know-- you can't make it up. (via Boing Boing)

More American cities, according to the report, are enacting and enforcing laws against "the indigent."

Mitch Epstein- Granta

Mitch Epstein has a nice selection from his American Power series in Granta issue #107. He also has a small essay on what it was like photographing that subject in these recent times of increased "security" and paranoia- including the time he was stopped for carrying a missile launcher. Yup, you guessed it- a tripod...

Milton Rogovin

Hope you caught the piece on Milton Rogovin at LENS...

Remnants Of The Ice Age

Scenes of relative solitude are exceedingly harder to find anywhere in New York these days...

This Modern World

THE COVE

You can argue all you want about whether photojournalism and/or documentary film making still have the power to change anything, anything at all. Meanwhile, those on the front line will continue to get the job done and then hopefully proceed to somehow coax the best from humanity.

The makers of The Cove have already succeeded in stopping the Japanese from feeding their children tainted dolphin meat, and now pray the movie's release can save the dolphins themselves...

Bruce Haley

5. The editors of the major magazines really don’t give a rat’s ass about the latest war and famine in the hinterlands of East BurkinaTimorLanka... you’ll never get an assignment to cover this unless Leonardo DiCaprio becomes a rebel commander and Tommy Hilfiger designs his battle fatigues....

I was reading Utne Reader at the library when I came across an article with a list citing Bruce Haley's words of wisdom concerning life and war photography- mostly how the latter can affect the former. As I've mentioned before- how does anyone come anywhere near taking even a technically proficient photo with bullets, shrapnel and body parts flying all about, let alone create the occasional "art" photo? All I know is that if I had ever tried to play war photographer, I'd have been the guy who gets the first round to the head as soon as he stepped outside the bar, the foxhole, the...

But as absorbing as his war imagery may be (and it is), the work that most fascinates me is his other worldly Disfigured Landscapes (even more so if I ever get to see the actual prints rather than these measly two inch facsimiles). What a testament to man's legacy- an in your face photographic record of how man has tortured, maimed and single handedly executed not only his fellow man, but the very planet that fed, nurtured and gave birth to him...

Murderous, Blackwater Bastards

Let's hope we can (at the very least) nail these arrogant, murderous, Blackwater bastards. And let's see what kind of (corporate) media attention it draws...

La Porte, Indiana- Trailer

First the book, now the movie!

LaPorte, Indiana Trailer from Joe Beshenkovsky on Vimeo.

The 21 Looniest Legislators

Anger Has Its Place

Got that right!

Int'l Exposure Awards...

Annie Get Your Gun

Photo: Jill Freedman

Don't like getting my jollies when someone's down and out- but hard feeling sympathy for someone who amassed multiple million dollar properties and all the publicity, work and prestige one could possibly ever dream. Jill Freedman never lived anywhere near as large.

Still, when a third party can actually lay claim to your very images, that does strike a nerve. Although it seems the original plan all along was to buy time, cut the deal- and then raise the drawbridge...

Seeing, Knowing, Trusting, Lying...

“How Can I See What I See, Until I Know What I Know?”

As expected and obvious as the work itself-- one massive, convoluted dump of an excuse! How can we trust what you show, when we can't trust what you say? Now flip it for symmetry-- How can we trust what you say, when we can't trust what you show?