November 3rd - 17th
Many talks including Sydney Ellison, Nona Faustine, Odette England, Marvin Heifermann, Rahim Fortune, Patrice Helmar, + other shows on my mind!
Hi all!
Before I give a round up of events, shows, and viewing material, I wanted to share some takeaway thoughts I had leaving artist Myra Greene’s lecture yesterday at Penumbra Foundation:
We often don’t process interacting with the photograph as a representational object. When we deal with a photograph, we are looking at a representation of a thing, not the thing itself. Greene used the example of Thomas Barrow’s series Cancellations (1981) where we’re confronted with his ice picking on the physical 8x10 negative, instead of simply the landscape to which he photographs.
I want to think about who my, or our, work is for. I’m paraphrasing but Greene said something along the lines of, “Who is all this work for? Maybe it’s just for me talking to myself. I don’t expect you to understand every connection I make.”
I haven’t completely understood the physical value and thing-ness of a photograph. I haven’t fully examined its physical presence. When asked if Greene’s Undertones project— which revisited her earlier series Character Recognition (2007) of wet collodion plates by changing to stained glass as a base and were leaned against a wall on a clear shelf during its Minor Chord (2019) exhibit at PATRON in Chicago, IL— was more of a sculpture and less of a photograph, Greene asked to the degree, “Maybe you just haven’t thought about a photograph operating this way? I’m a 2-D artist.” This brought up a lot of questions of how I’ve never questioned the boundaries I’ve assumed the photograph print to operate in. Greene said she could have framed the glass plates instead of leaning them against the wall, but she didn’t want to. In doing so, the photograph departs its boundaries and becomes more, but still existing in its 2-D shape. The photograph sort of explodes.
I asked a question about what drives her, and she said it’s about asking questions that require making work to resolve. She said the artwork becomes trying things out to see if it works.
Lastly, she said that she’s imbuing value into the photographs through the physical labor it takes to make them. That’s why her My White Friends (2013) series was made so simply and directly with a Hasselblad camera. There’s nothing more to them than its 1/60th of a second exposure (or whatever shutter speed she might have chosen) compared to the hours, days, months it likely took to perfect the wet collodion plates of the details of herself in Character Recognition (2007), and the translation of archival photographs into wet collodion plates that’s displayed currently at The Carnegie's These Things Are Connected group show in Cincinnati, OH.
UPCOMING EVENTS
A Conversation with Sydney Ellison & Featured Artists: If We Never Get Better, Discussion Group at TILT Institute for the Contemporary Image (Online)
Today, 11/3 6pm - 7pm EST
I first learned about Ellison’s work from learning about the “inclusivity, diversity, equity, and advocacy resource hub,” The Photographer’s Green Book where she serves as Curator & Editor-in-Chief. Since then, I’ve run into her at Dashwood Books events or at the Baxter Street Camera Club where she serves as Program Coordinator. Expect a conversation with Ellison “and artists in the exhibition If We Never Get Better. [which includes the great Shala Miller & Clifford Prince King among many more] All are welcome to attend this intimate exchange led by Ellison as she facilitates a discussion that reflects on our shared experiences related to the intersection of health, disability, and art.” If you miss this convo, there’ll be another later— see below. RSVP here. Free.
Nona Faustine Talk, Moderated by Justine Kurland at the Society for Photographic Education Annual Conference (Zoom)
Saturday, 11/5 1pm EST
I remember going through Faustine’s book shortly after it came out in October last year. Her book White Shoes (2021), published by MACK Books, features nude self-portraits— besides a pair of white high-hells— around sites of slave trade dating back in New York City’s disregarded bleak history. The photographs demand our viewership. To buy your Zoom ticket, click here. $25.**
**EDIT: Instead of buying an individual ticket, students can purchase a discounted $20 non-members ticket ($55 for non-students, so you’re better off buying tickets individually) for the entire conference gaining access to both Faustine & England’s talk (see below), here.
Odette England Talk at the Society for Photographic Education Annual Conference (Zoom)
Saturday, 11/5 3:30pm EST
Following Faustine’s lecture, England will be doing another on “photobookishness,” sharing “lots of practical tips, udders, material thinking, cut-ups, behind-the-scenes stuff, and homespun stories of rural life.” I’ve been continuously inspired by England’s soft and emotional black and white photographs. To buy your Zoom ticket, click here. $25.**
**EDIT: Instead of buying an individual ticket, students can purchase a discounted $20 non-members ticket ($55 for non-students, so you’re better off buying tickets individually) for the entire conference gaining access to both England & Faustine’s talk (see above), here.
ICP Talks: Marvin Heiferman at the International Center of Photography (Zoom)
Tuesday, 11/8 6:30pm - 7:30pm EST
If you haven’t started following curator Heiferman’s Instagram @whywelook, you should start now. His photographs are often a reckoning with the memory and left presence of his passed husband Maurice Berger. The posts raise questions about our mortality, and continuing to find beauty and meaning in the most mundane moments; they have truly powerful effects. Expect a discussion on “his work critically engaging with the impact of visual culture on arts, science, and photography and the crucial question of how we see and why we look.” Register for the talk here. Free.
i3 Photo Lecture: Rahim Fortune at the School of Visual Arts (136 W 21st St)
Tuesday, 11/8 7pm - 8:30pm
Part of their on-going photography lecture series, Fortune will be SVA’s next guest. I was fortune enough to see the Oklahoma-born photographer in conversation with Magic Hour podcast host Jordon Weitzman over the NYABF, and see him give a generous and vulnerable talk— I asked one of the last questions about how his work has been perceived by his family— you can find that recording here. The SVA lecture requires RSVP here. Free.
Wavelength: Patrice Helmar at Institute for Contemporary Art (Online)
Tuesday, 11/15 12pm - 1pm
“Wavelength is an online lecture series that is a collaboration between VCUarts, the ICA, and VCUarts Qatar.” I first learned about Helmar from my friend Andy Garcia and Helmar’s Marble Hill Camera Club organizing. Helmar wold later come to my junior photography class taught by artist Bryson Rand, and I came to better learn about their practice. It was clear Helmar was invested in having a real conversation on photography’s power as a tool for artistic expression, and being open to dialogue. I’m looking forward to seeing how their work has adjusted and changed since last seeing them. RSVP here. Free.
A Conversation with Sydney Ellison & Featured Artists, Moderated by Ally Caple: If We Never Get Better, Discussion Group at TILT Institute for the Contemporary Image (Online)
Tuesday, 11/15 6pm - 7pm EST
If you missed the first conversation with The Photographer Green Book Editor-in-Chief & Curator Ellison and the group show artists, you’re in luck for this 2nd rendition, and this time moderated by artist and Director of Public Engagement at The Photographer’s Green Book, Ally Caple. The conversation “will explore the premise of the project and how photography functions as a means to examine the complexities of health/care, illness, and disability. RSVP here. Free.
CURRENT SHOWS
John Ahearn & Rigoberto Torres: Swagger and Tenderness, The South Bronx Portraits at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (1040 Grand Concourse)
On view until 4/30/23
Bernd & Hilla Becher at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (1000 Fifth Avenue)
On view until 11/6
Harry Benson: Moments at Staley Wise Gallery (100 Crosby Street #305)
On view until 11/23
An Expression of Absence: Selections from the Arab Documentary Photography Program at the Magnum Foundation (59 East 4th Street #7W) & the Bronx Documentary Center (614 Courtlandt Ave.)
On view until 12/18
Allen Frame: Whereupon at Gitterman Gallery (3 East 66th Street, 1B)
On view until 11/5
Jill Freedman: A Night at the FDNY Museum at the New York City Fire Museum (278 Spring St.)
On view until 4/2/23
Alex Harsley: A Photography Exhibition at Studio One (59-61 E. 4th St. #3W)
On view until 11/18
Utopian Voyage, Curated by Kay Hickman: Albany Andaluz, Asherde Gil, and Cristina Bartley Dominguez at the Children's Art Carnival (62 Hamiliton Terrace)
On view until 12/1 (by appointment only)
Tommy Kha: Má at Higher Pictures Generation (16 Main Street)
On view until 11/26
Joseph Lawton, Casey Ruble, and David Storey: Faculty Spotlight at Fordham University's Idiko Butler Gallery (113 W 60th St.)
On view until 11/5
Baldwin Lee at Howard Greenberg Gallery (41 East 57th Street)
On view until 11/12
Peter the Dealer, Group Photo Exhibition, Curated by Ian Lewandowski: Chris Bernsten, Kenny Gardner, Rory Hamovit, Thomas Locke Hobbs, Saint Piñero, Taj Reed, and Sarah Stellino at the Herculeus Art Studio Program (25 Park Pl. 3rd Fl.)
On view until 11/9
Xaviera Simmons: Crisis Makes a Book Club at Queens Museum (Flushing Meadows Corona Park)
On view until 3/5/23
HIGHLIGHTS
Continuing what I did last issue, I wanted to highlight some recorded talks. I realized I missed the International Center of Photography’s Spotlight conversation last night between visual activist Zanele Muholi and Thelma Golden, Director and Chief Curator of The Studio Museum in Harlem. So, I thought I could delve deeper into Muholi’s work and artistic process.
Quickly in this 2017 Princeton talk, she shares a powerful foundation of her work: “Participation equals participants, not subjects. I don't work with subjects. Every human being featured in my work contributes to a visual history that speaks to me, that informs a lot of public which might not be members of our LGBTQI community, but wants to gain information, cares, or is curious about what's going on in South Africa.” You’ll see Muholi screen a Human Rights Watch documentary as an introduction to her work, here’s the direct YouTube link.
I’ve also been thinking about Alessandra Sanguinetti’s Some Say Ice (2022) book published by MACK that revisits the site of Michael Lesy’s non-fiction book Wisconsin Death Trip (1973) and the late 19th century eerie photographs by Chales Van Schaik featured in it. Flipping through the book a few days ago in the Strand Bookstore with my friend Alice, I felt Sanguinetti’s use of black and white in the book making me wanting to understand questions about this space that I haven’t even found the language to form and ask. This video seems to be by a local reporter on Sanguinetti’s arrival in the town, and it shows me how a photographer and artist finds her comfort in the space, and through what she tells the reporter, we hear a sort of “field notes” on becoming acquainted with the photographic landscape of inquiry.
Until next time, continue to let me know of upcoming events, talks, screenings, book releases, and whatever you find interesting or wanting to share. Thank you for reading!
Rainer