Me and My Mamiya

Fausta Facciponte: Reliable Now Open at Cambridge Galleries in Cambridge

2010-01-22T07:01:00.007-05:00

Fausta Facciponte: Reliable
January 16-March 14, 2010

Reliable marks Fausta Facciponte’s second solo exhibition of large format photographic close-ups of doll’s faces. The artist uses digital photography as a means of reclaiming these common childhood playthings, many of which have been found second-hand or purchased on eBay. Each image has been constructed out of dozens of individual photos that have been digitally stitched together to capture the fine detail of each doll's expression, their individual quirks and personalities. At first glance these images appear cheerful and bright, but they also call to mind historical mourning and memorial photographs, which often focused on children as their subject. If these luminous images suggest an aspect of childhood innocence, then they also seize upon the haunting quality of innocence lost.

Fausta Facciponte is a photographer based in Mississauga, Ontario, who uses both traditional film-based and modern digital processes in her work. Her photography has been exhibited in Canada, the United States and Japan. She received her Honours Bachelor of Arts from the University of Toronto in 1990, and has been the recipient of various awards including: the Toronto Image Works Award, the Talens Bursary Award, and the D.L. Stevenson & Sons Artists Award. In 2008, she was the recipient of an Ontario Arts Council grant. Her work is in the permanent collections of the McMaster Museum of Art, Art Gallery of Peel, Sheridan College Collection, and in various private collections. Fausta Facciponte is represented by the Stephen Bulger Gallery in Toronto.

Fausta Facciponte, Peter, 2009, Digital photograph, archival pigment ink face mounted on plexiglas. Courtesy of Stephen Bulger Gallery.

www.cambridgegalleries.ca

Canadian Artist Eamon Mac Mahon at Eye Buy Art in Toronto

2010-01-22T06:56:00.008-05:00

New Images By Canadian Artist Eamon Mac Mahon

Welcome art collectors into this new decade brimming with optimism. The air is a-sparkle with goodness and to celebrate we bring you our next artist Canadian Eamon Mac Mahon, whose work is the visual counterpart to this optimistic new decade and a perfect way to breathe light into your January.

Dare we say, these images remind us of one of the most famous living artists of all time, Gerhard Richter, who paints from the photographs he has taken. We think Eamon does the reverse, painting these images using his camera. They are universal and hard to place in any particular period of time, somehow capturing a gesture of nature that is both quiet and powerful. Such is the mystery of this wonderful world we live in.

News
We launched one month ago and since then have shipped art by emerging photographers across Canada, to the US, Belgium, the UK and Mexico. Thank you to our first collectors. Our enormous gratitude also to Seth Godin for the wonderful endorsement “thanking us for what we do” and to the team at Daily Candy, Fashion Magazine, Vitamin Daily and Design Edge for your great coverage. Also, make sure to check out EYE BUY ARTist Mark Kasumovic's solo exhibition at Toronto Image Works Gallery until January 30th. What NOW Magazine lists as "a must-see show" for 2010!

EYE BUY ART is the sister organization to the Toronto-based Flash Forward, an annual competition that showcases the future of photography and is considered to be one of the most important emerging art incubators in the world. 10% of the proceeds from each sale will go towards funding for the recently announced Flash Forward Festival.

About US
EYE BUY ART is a carefully curated online art gallery that represents an exciting new generation of emerging photographers from Canada, the UK and the US, and offers limited edition photographs at prices that start at $25 each. EYE BUY ART is the sister organization to the Toronto-based Flash Forward, an annual competition that showcases the future of photography and is considered to be one of the most important emerging art incubators in the world. 10% of the proceeds from each sale will go towards funding for the recently announced Flash Forward Festival.

www.eyebuyart.com

Guido Mocafico at Hamiltons Gallery in London

2010-01-22T06:43:00.002-05:00

Beautiful Fictions - International Symposium in Toronto

2010-01-22T00:20:00.004-05:00

Beautiful Fictions
International Symposium

Saturday, January 23, 2010, 10 AM – 4 PM
Baillie Court, Art Gallery of Ontario

Dan Adler I Geneviève Cadieux I Axel Hütte I Karen Irvine I Nicolaus Schafhausen I Lorna Simpson I Michael Snow

Engage with some of the world’s most influential artists working with photography today. Explore how the transition from darkroom to digital has changed both the nature and status of photography and our relationship to the physical world.

Artists will discuss their work in dialogue with leading curators and theorists.

This is the first in a series of three photography events at the AGO. Watch for dates in February for talks by Jeff Wall and Thomas Ruff.

AGO Members $40
General Public $50 | Students $25

www.ago.net/symposium

Christopher Thomas: New York Sleeps at Fifty One Fine Art Photography in Belguim

2010-01-19T14:30:00.008-05:00

January 22 – March 6, 2010
Christopher Thomas: New York Sleeps

Fifty One Fine Art Photography is pleased to announce the upcoming exhibition of the German photographer Christopher Thomas.

The desolateness which is so profoundly present in Christopher Thomas’ images of New York has a surprising impact. These pictures are quite opposed to our expectations of this turbulent metropolis. The urban landscape may be familiar, but this is not the city that most of us know and experience. For example the image ‘Grand Central Terminal II’, once the largest train station in the world when completed in 1913, now appears totally abandoned. Thomas erases the profane and quotidian in favor of the “eternal” or timeless. This transformation of lively urban zones is particularly evident in Christopher Thomas’ photographs of Times Square, one of the icons of urban turbulence. The long exposure times erase the constantly changing lights of the advertisments, and reduces this mecca of commerce to it’s essence. The city seems to hold its breath; hectic activity is transformed into methaphysical emptiness. The lack of passers-by who usually populate the city means that our perception is no longer distracted but concentrated instead on the city’s “casing”: its architecture and streets. The city is reduced to its essential and bare architectural form. As if, at this moment when night borders day, Thomas could uncover its essence.

Born in Munich in 1961, Thomas has received many international awards for commercial photography. He has worked for magazines as Geo, Stern, Merian, and the Süddeutsche Zeitung Magazin and produced numerous photo essays. As an alternative to such commissioned works, which usually have to satisfy the guidelines and expectations of his clients, the photographer begant to shoot views of cities on his own initiative in order to – as he puts it – “get back to the roots”. He started to capture the architecture in his native city, Munich. This work resulted in the series ‘Münchner Elegien’ (Munich Elegies), exhibited in 2005 at the Fotomuseum München (with publication by Schirmer/Mosel, Munich, with which he became known as an artist. Travelling back and forth between Munich and New York, Christopher Thomas began photographing this series in 2001, but made most of his images over the past two years.

The book ‘New York Sleeps’ published by Prestel Publishing, recently won the Deutschen Fotobuchpreis in Silber 2010.

FIFTY ONE FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY

www.gallery51.com

Sammy Baloji - Vues de Likasi now open at Contact Gallery in Toronto

2010-01-19T14:27:00.005-05:00

Sammy Baloji - Vues de Likasi
January 14 - March 14, 2010

CONTACT launches the new year with Vues de Likasi, a solo exhibition by Congolese photographer Sammy Baloji in the CONTACT GALLERY.

Baloji’s photographic and sound installation analyzes contemporary African identity through the ethnography, architecture, and urban landscape of Likasi. The photographs of the reconstructed streetscape, with its obvious signs of a civilization built before, during, and after the Belgian colonial period, reveal the artist’s interest in the daily life of Congolese people. As a result of the strict government ban on photographing public buildings, Vues de Likasi is a rare depiction of the city’s cultural and industrial legacies, Encircling the gallery, Baloji’s 55 meter long assembled panorama of images documents the city’s past within the day-to-day activity of the present, revealing a complex portrait of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

>p> Sammy Baloji was born in 1978 and lives in Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo. His work has been exhibited extensively in Africa and in Europe, including the Musée du Quai Branly, Paris and the Royal Museum for Central Africa, Tervuren, Belgium. Baloji was recently featured in CAPE07, Cape Town, Le Tarmac de la Villette, Paris, Rencontres africaines de la photographie, Mali and le Mois de la Photo, Montreal. A traveling exhibition of his work is currently in preparation by the Museum for African Art, New York. He was a finalist for the Prix Pictet in 2009, a recipient of the Prince Claus Award in 2008 and received two awards at the 2007 African Photography Biennial in Bamako, Mali. Baloji is represented by Axis Gallery, New York.

CONTACT would like to thank Gaëlle Morel and Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal for their assistance in making this exhibition possible and gratefully acknowledges the support of Scotiabank, the Government of Canada's Economic Action Plan and Celebrate Ontario.

CONTACT fosters and celebrates the art and profession of photography with an annual month-long festival in May and newly initiated year-round programming in the gallery.

www.contactphoto.com

O Canada Now Showing at Stephen Bulger Gallery and Free Saturday Afternoon Screenings at Camera in Toronto

2010-01-19T14:22:00.009-05:00

O CANADA
A Group Exhibition

January 23 - February 27, 2010

Made by famous photographers, as well as photographers unknown, these vintage photographs cover a wide range of topics and offer a visual history of Canada spanning nearly 150 years.

Coming at a time when modes of recording have drastically changed, this exhibition offers a trove of analogue representations of the land, the people and the events that have shaped Canada’s history.

Photographer Unknown, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, circa 1911

3:00PM - Free Saturday Afternoon Screenings at Camera

January 23
GOIN' DOWN THE ROAD

Dir. Donald Shebib (CA, 1970) 90 mins

January 30
C.R.A.Z.Y.

Dir. Jean-Marc Vallée (CA, 2005) 127 mins

February 6
I'VE HEARD THE MERMAIDS SINGING

Dir. Patricia Rozema (CA, 1987) 81 mins

February 13
THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD

Dir. Guy Maddin (CA, 2003) 100 mins

February 20
THE SWEET HEREAFTER

Dir. Atom Egoyan (CA, 1997) 112 mins

February 27
ONE WEEK

Dir. Michael McGowan (CA, 2008) 94 mins

Jeff Harris: Constructions of Identity 11 Years, One Photograph A Day

2010-01-06T17:31:00.033-05:00

Jeff Harris: Constructions of Identity
11 Years, One Photograph A Day

Jeff Harris is an artist living and working in Toronto, Canada.

Harris is a 36-year-old, average guy living, like some of us, a relatively ordinary life. When he is not making art Harris works as a commercial photographer, following the entertainment, culture, and fashion beat.

He is an active outdoorsman: swimming, snowboarding, canoeing and kayaking are just some of the sports and leisure activities that he enjoys. Harris has on occasion been known to cut a hole through the ice just to take a cold dip. His interests go well beyond sports; he is an avid fan of pop culture and music. Harris was once a drummer in a band. He also likes to garden and spends a lot of time communing with nature.

Harris has an abundance of friends and is part of a close-knit family. Every summer he volunteers at a kid’s cancer camp and has done so for seventeen years.

He is smart, savvy, and keenly aware of everything around him. Harris also has a great sense of humour and sports a positive outlook on life.

In November 2008 Harris was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. He has spent much of 2009 undergoing radiation, surgery and is still in rehabilitation in the hopes of walking again. His life has changed tremendously. Yet when you look back on his life he is not a quitter nor would he ever want someone to pity him. He takes this setback in stride and manages to still maintain his humour.

Harris lives life to its fullest, at least until recently. He has created an extraordinary body of work spanning eleven years with no concrete plans to discontinue it. On the last day of 2009 Harris amassed 4,018 images of himself. Every day Harris has either taken a few photographs or depending on his situation, asked a family member, friend, or colleague, or when the need or opportunity arises, a stranger or a celebrity. Roughly one quarter of the images are by others. That’s a mere 1,000 compared to the rest of the images. From a few photographs taken on any given day Harris selects one for his series.

Harris is committed to using 35mm film; he uses a simple point and shoot camera. He has already spent a considerable sum on film and processing, scanning and uploading of images, and maintaining his website—roughly figured at $20,000 for the past eleven years. This figure does not include the huge sum of $30,000 he paid with the aid of sponsors to have large-scale panels printed, rental of display stands, and a galleria rental for an exhibition during the 2009 Contact Toronto Photography Festival.

Some may see his project as only a classic case of pure narcissism and self-conceit but it is not wholly that; Harris’s work also embodies the universal. Every day he constructs his identity in a new configuration. In turn, viewers are invested in constructing their own version of Harris’s identity. It sounds easy but with more than 4,000 images to look at and depending on the time one invests, it will soon be apparent that one is looking at a huge jigsaw puzzle. Every few images raise more questions, underscoring the complexities of the artist.

Harris also invites us into his life by moving the personal to the public arena. This is not that far removed from today’s public sphere of camera phones and recorders, and security cameras on streets and in public buildings. In putting aside our own bias towards those that focus exclusively on themselves, we can readily identify with most of the images. Beware though; Harris is so highly selective of the images he chooses to display that it almost seems one-sided. Other than a few photographs prior to his having cancer viewers will see only a few photographs that show signs of what is often perceived as negative emotions. Viewers are not privy to his anger or frustration that he may sometimes feel, and there is only one image in which we see obvious emotional pain on his face. Despite this viewers can, through his eyes, remember their own journey through aging, the births and deaths they have witnessed, and the years spent watching someone grow up, including themselves. Or they will remember something as simple as their own cuts, bruises and sprains that they have experienced. Viewers know what it is like to be lost in their own thoughts, to be alone versus being together with a loved one, family or friends. At its worst his work will remind viewers of the things or people they lack in their lives or further still those who do not have the power to make changes in their lives.

Many viewers will wonder if the work is staged. Definitely. Many other artists whose primary style is documentary have also staged their work. For example, Walker Evans documentary work was often labeled as “staged documents” because of its closely cropped framing and straight-on views. It is inconceivable that a premeditated self-portrait can be shot without the artist first setting up the camera and tripod. Harris has expressed that he wants every image to be unique and makes every attempt to not seem repetitive. This then raises the question as to how far he will go out of his way to take a photograph. In one image Harris is on an icy lake adjacent to open water. Will he put himself in danger for the sake of a photograph? In the end only viewers can truly decide whether some images seem plausible from one day to the next and others set-up for the desire to keep images unique.

Harris makes ample use of photography techniques. He occupies space in and out of the frame, fills the frame completely or disappears in something far greater than he. He explores the relationship between figure and ground. Harris also makes good use of unusual camera angles. He frequently poses himself within rich, colourful environments and uses hard and soft light to create an ambiance to each image. Harris also relies on a lot of available light rather than using a flash. Whether he is in the private realm of his bedroom, a large arena or vast outdoor panorama, he creates a visual dialogue between the space he inhabits and the space he frequents or chances upon.

Harris considers all of his images as self-portraits; even the images taken by and attributed to others. Other than a few images Harris directs the cameraperson to frame it a certain way. Harris has become a master at self-portraiture. The images shot by others and those taken by Harris are difficult to identify. At the beginning of the series Harris had a lot of difficulty with framing, light exposure, and focusing the camera. During the first two years some of the images of himself are more banal then others and convey a sense of not taking the project seriously enough or having little direction. Things began to change significantly in 2001 and by 2002 his perseverance paid off. His work became sophisticated, mature and incredibly seductive.

It is not difficult to figure out the artists that Harris most admires: Martin Parr, William Eggelston and Lee Friedlander. Both Eggelston and Parr are masters of colour photography. Parr looks to the people inhabiting local areas around him to photograph, always managing to catch a glimpse of something funny. Eggelston’s lyrical photographs sizzle with colour and are unusual in subject matter. He takes the banal flotsam and jetsam of life to a level in which most people rarely consider looking at. Friedlander is well known for his self-portraits as shadows or reflected in mirrors and storefronts.

As mentioned previously Harris organized a large exhibition of his work for the May 2009 Contact Toronto Photography Festival. The exhibition 3,653 Self-portraits was visited by hundreds of people. Situated in a large galleria at Brookfield Place in Toronto it spanned well over 400 running feet. Each image was 4” X 6” and displayed chronologically in grids.

There are times when an artist could use the advice of others or distance himself enough to consider more than one way to display the work and in this case the artist could have also selected single images and enlarged them, then displayed them as either single images or in groups. In the future and due to the amount of photographs, Harris needs to consider other options such as: decreasing the size of the images in the grids, selectively displaying some of the work in a given year rather than showing every single photograph or not show the photographs chronologically. It is not really necessary to show the images in this way as most images do not have continuity from one day to the next. Harris also needs to break away partially from the grid format and display some of the work into groups or as single images. Another possibility is to display images in conjunction with some of the observations made in this essay. As well it would be desirable to set-up a computer to look at images more intimately online.

Thousands have visited Harris’s website. It is easy to browse through singular images or by year or month. It is a large archive and depending on the time you spend looking at each photograph it takes anywhere between six and ten hours to look at all of the images. Harris has also included a journal, a place where browsers can write about a day that was important to them. In turn Harris posts their stories with matching photographs that he took on those days, providing that those days are not already taken. A part of the website seems unusual and unnecessary. Harris provides links to other Jeff Harris’ around the world.

Harris has created a unique body of work. He has invited us to share his world, albeit superficially. He purposely avoids including the darker side of himself. As well not all photographs are equal to each other; some do require text whereas others speak for themselves. Other than an excellent photo essay of his journey with cancer there is very little continuity between images. This sends a lot of mixed messages and may cause some viewers to barely look at his site. Another thing that Harris needs to strongly consider is the length of the project. By extending the project it will either become more solid as he ages or the project will become stale and more superficial in his attempt to make each image unique.

To view his work visit www.jeffharris.org. To see more of Harris' work please visit the post for July 25, 2010.

If you have comments or questions or would like me to forward any feedback to Jeff Harris please email pikeart@gmail.com. Please remember to include ‘Me and My Mamiya’ in the subject heading so that it does not end up in my spam box. Return soon as I have several more posts about the work of Jeff Harris.

Ryan Van Der Hout - Light and Objecthood Opens at Ryerson Gallery on January 7, 2010 in Toronto

2010-01-05T19:10:00.006-05:00

Ryan Van Der Hout: Light and Objecthood

January 6 - February 6, 2010
Opening Reception: Thursday, January 7, 5-8 pm

Gallery Hours: Wednesday to Saturday, 12 to 5 pm

Light and Objecthood, an installation by artist Ryan Van Der Hout, distills photography to its most essential elements: light, photographic paper, and the action of the artist. Van der Hout creates gestural lines and forms through the direct reaction of light on photographic paper, establishing the photograph as pure surface, rather than a window into a new world. Through his elemental use of the medium, Van Der Hout reveals to the viewer the nature of the medium itself. Light & Objecthood was shown recently at Art Mûr Gallery during Montreal's Mois de la Photo in September 2009.

Ryan Van Der Hout is a graduate of Ryerson University's Photography program, and has exhibited in Toronto, Montreal and New York. His works have been featured in major Toronto events, including Scotia Bank Nuit Blanche, Toronto International Art Fair, and CONTACT Photography Festival, and he was chosen several times for Artscape's Emerging Artist Showcase of the 15 best Toronto-based artists under 25. His works can be seen in public and in private collections in Canada and the United States. For more information, please visit www.ryanvanderhout.com.

http://www.ryersongallery.ca/home.html

Curators and Artists: It's Time To Start Thinking About Submissions to Gallery 44s 2010-2011 Calendar - Deadline March 1, 2010

2010-01-05T18:37:00.020-05:00

Call for Submissions from Artists - Deadline March 1, 2010

Gallery 44 views photography within the larger context of contemporary artistic practices and relevant cultural issues in Canadian society. Please submit:

1. A maximum of twenty slides or digital images (CD must be readable on MAC OSX) representing a recent body of work or a specific project. Digital images should be: RGB, jpeg format no larger than 1024 x 768 pixels at 300 dpi. They should be numbered 01 to 20 (01_tree, 02_house, 03_car etc.) Slides must be: numbered and marked with the artist's name and a red dot in the lower left corner. GALLERY 44 DOES NOT ACCEPT ORIGINAL ARTWORK.
2. A slide or CD list indicating title, year, medium and dimensions.

3. An artist's statement or other written description.

4. A physical description of the proposed exhibition, including the number of works, the space required and any unusual installation requirements.

5. A curriculum vitae, resume or biography.

6. A self-addressed envelope (SASE) with sufficient return postage. Without an SASE we will not return submission packages and will dispose of submission materials appropriately.

Artists are paid in accordance with the CARFAC Fee Schedule.

______________________________________________________________

Vitrine Exhibition Cases - Deadline March 1, 2010

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography has gained an additional venue with its three new vitrines. Located in the 401 Richmond Building, just outside the glass-walled entrance of Gallery 44 in a large corridor,two of the three 4' square cases have a viewing distance of 6 feet. The first of these cases opens onto a corner space opposite the gallery with approximately 7 feet of viewing distance. Between each is a space of approximately 1 metre. The walls of the hallway are exposed brick, painted white; the floor is varnished wood. These vitrines can also be used as light boxes, illuminating images from behind. Gallery 44 is seeking works executed for, or adapted to, a space such as this, with its contained character, sequential layout, and shallow (8”) depth. With electical outlets available, works containing elements such as sound may also be considered.

Please submit:

1. A maximum of twenty slides or digital images (CD must be readable on MAC OSX) representing a recent body of work or a specific project. Digital images should be: RGB, jpeg format no larger than 1024 x 768 pixels at 300 dpi. They should be numbered 01 to 20 (01_tree, 02_house, 03_car etc.) Slides must be: numbered and marked with the artist's name and a red dot in the lower left corner. GALLERY 44 DOES NOT ACCEPT ORIGINAL ARTWORK.

2. A slide or CD list indicating title, year, medium, dimensions.

3. An artist statement.

4. A description of the proposed site specific project for the vitrines, including the number of works and how they will be installed in each vitrine.

5. A recent curriculum vitae.

6. A self-addressed envelope (SASE) with sufficient return postage. Without an SASE we will not return submission packages and will dispose of submission materials appropriately.

Artists will be paid a fee.

______________________________________________________________

Call for Submissions from Curators - Deadline March 1, 2010

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography is a non-profit artist-run centre committed to the advancement of photographic art. We encourage the submission of exhibition proposals from emerging, mid-career and established curators for exhibitions of photographic work which is innovative in the application of photographic materials and in the examination of subject matter. Gallery 44 views photography within the larger context of contemporary artistic practices and relevant cultural issues in Canadian society.

Please submit:

1. A maximum of twenty slides or digital images (CD must be readable on MAC OSX) representing a recent body of work or a specific project. Digital images should be: RGB, jpeg format no larger than 1024 x 768 pixels at 300 dpi. They should be numbered 01 to 20 (01_tree, 02_house, 03_car etc.) Slides must be: numbered and marked with the artist's name and a red dot in the lower left corner. GALLERY 44 DOES NOT ACCEPT ORIGINAL ARTWORK.
2. A slide or CD list indicating title, year, medium and dimensions.

3. A curatorial statement.

4. A physical description of the proposed exhibition, including the number of works, the space required and any unusual installation requirements.

5. Curricula vitae, resumes or biographies of the artist(s) and curator.

6. A self-addressed envelope (SASE) with sufficient return postage. Without an SASE we will not return submission packages and will dispose of submission materials appropriately.

Gallery 44 welcomes the opportunity to collaborate with other arts and community organizations. Please contact us to discuss your project.

Artists are paid in accordance with the CARFAC Fee Schedule.

Gallery 44 will take reasonable care with submission materials; however, we cannot accept responsibility for damage or loss to original photographic prints.

Gallery 44 does not accept submissions by fax or email.

www.gallery44.org

Winter 2010 Upcoming Workshops at Gallery 44 in Toronto

2010-01-05T18:31:00.008-05:00

UPCOMING WORKSHOPS AT GALLERY 44

To Register or for more information contact sojin@gallery44.org or visit our website at www.gallery44.org

Digital Printing
Bob Carnie of Elevator Photographic Lab

Saturday January 30 and Sunday January 31, 10am - 5pm

Cost: $280/ $260 (members)

In this two-day workshop, Bob Carnie from Elevator Lab covers the essential steps to produce quality digital photographs. This workshop is geared towards photographers at beginner to intermediate Photoshop level. Participants will work on laptops (set up to external monitors) to achieve a photographic image with the best possible quality. During the course of the workshop, the instructor will cover calibration and paper profiles; how to set up a workstation to maximize workflow; colour neutralization, and colour theory; contrast and density; effective sharpening tools; dodging and burning; as well as adjusting final colour and contrast. After the first session, participants will send their files to be printed at Elevator Lab. The second session will be focused on evaluating the prints retouching them to make further improvements. Participants might also work on a new image on the second day. Students will leave with TWO 20x30 Lambda Fuji Crystal Archival print courtesy of Fuji and Elevator Lab.

Van Dyke
Sally Ayre

Saturday, February 6, 10am to 5pm

Cost: $180/ $160 (members)

Go back in time with this workshop and experience one of the earliest photographic printing processes. Van Dyke is a non-silver process that can be combined or used independently to create distinctive brown toned imagery on materials such as silk or art papers. This hands-on workshop with Sally Ayre will teach proper coating, exposing, and developing techniques for Van Dyke.

Self-promotion for the artist/curator
Bridget Indelicato

Tuesday, February 9, 6pm to 9pm 6pm to 9pm

Cost: $70/ $60 (members)

This workshop is geared towards artists and curators in all stages of their careers that want to learn professional and creative ways to promote upcoming exhibitions and events. Participants will learn effective press release writing for the general public, the art community and the media. Tips on how to maximize the Internet for marketing and promotions will also be covered. At the end of the workshop, you will walk away with a helpful resource list that includes online and print marketing services.

Portraiture, Narrative, and Intimacy
Meera Margaret Singh

Saturday, February 20 and Saturday, February 27, 12pm to 3pm

Cost: $140/ $130

Instructor and artist, Meera Margaret Singh’s work often deals with the idea of Intimacy through portraiture. This two-day workshop will examine the process of making conceptual work from the original idea to its conception. During the first session, participants will engage in a discourse around ‘intimacy’: What does it mean? How have other artists used this notion to create work? What are the challenges of working with such a layered concept? How can one transform a concept into a work of art?

Based on the discussion during the first session, participants will be asked to photograph and create work, which will be reviewed the following week. The sharing of individual’s work will create an atmosphere that would parallel the concept of the workshop creating an intimate form of discussion and critique on the idea of intimacy.

Intermediate Black and White
Ruth Kaplan

Sunday, February 21 and Sunday, February 28, 10am to 4pm

Cost: $320/$300 (members)

The Intermediate Black and White Workshop is designed for those with some basic darkroom experience looking to learn more advanced and archival techniques in the darkroom. It is also ideal for photographers who need a refresher on archival printing. Participants must provide their own fiber-based paper, up to 16” x 20” in size. They also have to option to print with R.C. paper. Instructor, Ruth Kaplan will cover techniques and challenges of printing, from enlarger and tray processing to the final wash and print flattening. The Basic Black and White workshop is recommended prior to taking this workshop but not mandatory based on participants’ experience.

Curation 101
Jennifer Long

Wednesday, February 24, 6pm to 9pm

Cost: $70/ $60 (members)

This workshop will provide learners with the essential steps necessary to envision and coordinate a curatorial project. Instructor, Jennifer Long will guide the participants with the research tools, roles, responsibilities and time lines required to initiate a curated exhibition. Through examples of her own curatorial projects, Long will present how to put together a strong conceptual base for a project as well as the organizational tools necessary to curate a successful exhibition.

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography
401 Richmond Street West, Suite 120

info@gallery44.org
www.gallery44.org

Gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday 11 AM – 5 PM

Visit Gallery 44's Online Database of Artists and Exhibitions

www.gallery44database.org

Natural Artifice: Elinor Whidden and 12 Point Buck Opens at Gallery 44 on January 8, 2010 in Toronto

2010-01-05T18:23:00.012-05:00

Natural Artifice
Elinor Whidden and 12 Point Buck

January 8 – February 13, 2010
Opening reception: Friday, January 8, 6 - 9 pm

Artists’ talk: Friday, January 8, 6 pm

Gallery 44 begins the year 2010 with a distinctly Canadian exhibition called Natural Artifice, featuring photography and installation by Toronto artist Elinor Whidden, paired with video projection and print-based landscape dioramas by 12 Point Buck, a collaborative duo from Lethbridge, Alberta. These artists construct wry imagery to emphasize the disconnections between our representation of nature, our experience of nature, and nature itself.

Elinor Whidden considers the notion of progress by likening the promises of today’s off-road automobile advertising to those of the Canada’s Western Frontier when the fur trade first blazed its trails into the wilderness. Her photo series Ford EXPLORER captures Whidden’s car-carrying performances in which she endeavours to use car parts as survival tools in the wilds of Northern Ontario.

12 Point Buck comprises artists Leila Armstrong and Chai Duncan, who play with pop depictions of wildlife in their art to highlight the artifice of such representations, which make wild animals look cute and cuddly, and essential ecosystems appear trivial. This incongruity is portrayed in their video projection Deer Me, which follows a creature in a deer mask and wolf skin coat as it carries itself awkwardly through the coulees of an Albertan terrain.

Dayna McLeod in her essay on the exhibitions writes, “We have boiled down the natural world into simplified terms that permit the exploitation of the land and mediate our experience of what is nature.” For Danya McLeod’s full essay from the exhibition’s accompanying catalog, please visit www.gallery44.org

Elinor Whidden received a BA in Canadian/Environmental Studies from Trent University, a BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and a MFA from the State University of New York in Buffalo. She has exhibited throughout North America, recently showing work in Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Buffalo, NY.

12 POINT BUCK has been working collaboratively for two years. They have shown their work at the Toronto Urban Film Festival, Parlour in Lethbridge and worked in situ at the Southern Alberta Art Gallery. Chai Duncan holds an MFA from the University of Saskatchewan and is currently on staff at the University of Lethbridge. Leila Armstrong acquired an MA in Media Studies from Concordia University and went on to do doctoral studies in communications at Simon Fraser University.

Elinor Whidden’s, Georgian Bay from the series Ford EXPLORER, c-print 76 x 114 cm, 2009
12 POINT BUCK, Deer Me (production still), 2008

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography is a non-profit artist-run centre committed to the advancement of photographic art. Founded in 1979, the centre consists of a gallery, resource centre, and production facilities. Gallery 44 is supported by its members and patrons, the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Toronto Arts Council.

401 Richmond Street West, Suite 120

www.gallery44.org

Flash Forward 2010 Deadline Extended to January 17, 2010

2010-01-01T09:26:00.003-05:00

As has sometimes happened in previous years, so many people tried to submit all at once on the day of the deadline that some of them could not get through, or experienced random errors. Additionally, the submission system apparently started putting up the message that submissions were closed a few hours early, due to an error in the time zone settings on the server.

In order to ease the crunch and allow everyone who has been trying to submit to get their work in, the deadline has been extended to January 17, 2010. This should allow the remaining submissions to be spread over a longer time and ease the load on the server, but if you still encounter any sort of trouble, please e-mail support@magentafoundation.org and let us know.

Those of you considering submitting now have a little over two more weeks in which to do it. But we very strongly recommend not waiting until the 17th to submit - having so many people wait until the last day was largely what caused the problems people were experiencing!

Mark Kasumovic: I Can Hear You Humming Opens on January 7 at Toronto Image Works

2010-01-01T09:04:00.002-05:00

January 7 - 30, 2010
Mark Kasumovic: I Can Hear You Humming

Opening January 7, 5-7PM

I Can Hear You Humming, is a very stunning series of colour photographs that follows a network of power lines dispersed throughout our cities and countryside, offering both an interruption to the natural landscape and a view of these giant towers often invisible to us.

Please join us at the Opening Event and meet the artist. For further information please contact Bernice Lyons at gallery@torontoimageworks.com

Every Day Heroes Film Competition

2009-12-02T12:30:00.008-05:00

Earth Day Canada - Every Day Heroes Film Competition

All filmmakers, young and old, established and aspiring, are invited to submit 90-second silent videos to the Every Day Heroes Film Competition.

Enthusiastic. Remarkable. Inspiring. These are just a few words that describe the individuals and groups across Canada that are doing amazing things to reduce their impact on the environment in large and small ways. They’ve taken the three R’s and made it a way of life. They’re every day heroes whose stories need to be told.

Finalists will have their videos screened in Ivanhoe Cambridge Shopping Malls across Canada, on the Onestop Network of 270 monitors on the subway platforms of the Toronto Transit Commission, as well as hosted on Earth Day Canada’s website and YouTube channel.

Prizes will be awarded in three categories:
Best of ‘Under 18’ years of age—13 inch MacBook Pro

Best of ‘18 and Over’—13 inch MacBook Pro

Best of Competition—Two economy airline tickets to any destination in North America with two nights hotel accommodation and two tickets to the Earth Day Canada Gala, including travel to Toronto and hotel accommodation for the nights of June 8th and 9th, 2010.

Inspire Canada this Earth Day. Tell the story of your every day environmental hero and their dedication to supporting a healthier environment.

The deadline for submissions is March 1, 2010.

Visit www.earthday.ca/film for more details and submission form.

Co-produced by Earth Day Canada, Onestop Media Group and Art for Commuters

Call for Submissions - Singapore International Photography Festival

2009-12-01T23:46:00.014-05:00

In 2008, Singapore International Photography Festival attracted a whopping 6,600 public submissions of photographic work from photographers around the world. 12% of the total submissions were the most outstanding prints, which were shortlisted and exhibited across Singapore. The submissions were not restricted to any fixed subject or theme but selected works were grouped according to various themes by the Festival’s four curators.

Now, the 2nd SIPF 2010 commences with two categories for open call. The open-ended theme category continues with the purpose of unearthing new works and talents. This year’s festival incorporates a brand new themed category titled, ‘HUMAN: NATURE’ to address universal concerns faced by the world. The duality in the theme can be freely interpreted either as ‘Human Nature’ or ‘Human & Nature’. The ‘colon’ represents a relationship and a balanced ratio between Human and Nature. Thematically, this category is an ambitious call for creative interpretation on HUMAN: NATURE.

SIPF 2010 prides itself to be the platform for Southeast Asian photographers to showcase their photography works alongside their international counterparts. For the first time, a solo exhibition will be dedicated to a prominent Southeast Asian (SEA) photographer and audience can expect a showcase highlight of a prominent SEA photographer each biennale.

SIPF programmes and exhibitions will stretch over 30 days from 10th Oct 2010 onwards. Besides the crucial SEA Emerging Artist series for professionals, SIPF continues to broaden the public appreciation for photography with free public talks, seminar, forum and more.

Please be reminded that the deadline for open call submission is 31 March 2010.

Hurry! Closes December 7, 2009! Call for Entries - Crisis and Opportunity: Documenting The Global Recession

2009-12-01T23:13:00.005-05:00

Deadline for entries: December 7, 2009

In the spirit of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) of the New Deal in the 1930s, when photographers documented the hardship and proposed solutions, SocialDocumentary.net (SDN) is issuing a Call for Entries. We are looking for photo essays that provide insight into how ordinary citizens around the world are coping during these new “hard times” and how individuals, companies, industries, family businesses, communities, and governments are responding to the crisis.

We encourage a broad definition of the global recession. Suggested stories include those of people losing their jobs, homes, and health benefits; or the effects on vulnerable communities in conflict zones, global climate change; or how the UN’s millennium goals in economic development and health improvement have been stalled by lack of resources. We are also interested in how people and governments are working to overcome these challenges in creative ways such as agricultural development; wind, solar and other alternative energies; public health programs to stop the spread of disease; or technological innovations to reduce greenhouse gases and dependence on oil. These are just examples. We welcome new stories and approaches to documenting this important topic. If photographers are not sure if their stories fit into our definition of the global recession, they are encouraged to inquire at info@socialdocumentary.net.

Prizes

First Place: One photographer will be awarded:

A $1,500 cash prize.
Exhibition of their work in a group show with other winners at powerHouse Arena in Brooklyn, NY, from February 15 to March14, 2010. SDN to pay for all reproduction, and hanging fees.
Invitation to participate on a panel discussion at the opening night reception at powerHouse Arena on February 16, 2010. (photographer will need to cover their travel expenses).
Exhibit featured in exhibition catalog printed by Meridian Printing, the leading printer of photography books in North America.
A featured exhibit on the SDN home page for two weeks and features in email spotlights.
A LowePro Vertex 300 AW backpack.

Honorable Mention: Three photographers will be awarded:

Exhibition of some of their winning work at powerHouse Arena in Brooklyn, NY in a group show from February 15-March 14, 2010. SDN to pay for all reproduction, and hanging fees.
Exhibit included in exhibition catalog.
Winning work featured on the website of SocialDocumentary.net and in email spotlights.
A LowePro Fastpack 350 backpack.

First Place and Honorable Mention exhibits will be published in a catalog that will be available for sale at powerHouse books, launched at the opening reception on February 16, 2010. Competition winners will each receive five complimentary copies.

The People's Choice Awards
This award is based on total number of viewers to a competition entry. Photographers can promote their sites through their own websites, their Facebook page, Twitter, and other sources so that their total number of viewers is increased.

First Place: People's Choice Award. Adobe Photoshop Extended, for Mac or Windows
Second Place: People's Choice Award: Adobe Lightroom 2, for Mac or Windows

Entry Fees

$35 for one exhibit entry of 6 – 36 images.

A limited number of partial scholarships are available for residents of developing countries. To apply, photographer must first have or create a free membership with SocialDocumentary.net. Send request to scholarship@socialdocumentary.net with name, email address used for membership, your country of residence and your country of citizenship. All requests for discounts must be submitted by November 15, 2009, and exhibits must be submitted by November 22. Expatriates from developed countries living in a developing country are not eligible for scholarships.

All fees must be paid using a credit card on the SDN website. International credit cards are accepted. All entry submissions and fees are final and non-refundable.

All entries are automatically and simultaneously submitted for exhibition on the SocialDocumentary.net website and must follow all rules and regulations regarding exhibits on SDN. See SDN website for further information on fees. www.socialdocumentary.net

Exhibits on SocialDocumentary.net need to be approved before going live (click here for more information). In the event that an entry to the Call for Entries is not accepted for the SDN website, the photographer may make changes to their exhibit and re-submit, at no additional cost, up until the entry deadline.

Photographers can submit multiple contest entries but individual photographs may only be submitted for one entry.

All entries will be viewable to the public on the SDN site.

Entry Requirements

All entries must have between 6 and 36 photographs related to a specific story about the global recession, have an abstract to provide context (150 words maximum) and captions to accompany the photographs. Photographer may also submit additional text about the situation being documented, a bio, and information on organizations working with affected communities.

Only the first 9 images, captions, and abstract will be review by judges, but photographer can submit up to 36 images that will be part of their online exhibit.

Photographs must have been taken after January 1, 2008.

All work must be submitted via the SocialDocumentary.net website at http://www.socialdocumentary.net.

All contest entries must be accompanied by full name of the photographer and contact information, including email address and phone number. Minimum of six images is required with abstract and captions.

Winning entries must be able to provide within 7 days of award announcement digital files of at least 3000 pixels in one dimension. Exact specifications on providing digital files for exhibition will be provided at a later date.

All entries and communications from entrants must be in the English language.

Printing and Mounting of Exhibits

SocialDocumentary.net will cover all costs associated with printing and mounting of photographs for the exhibition at powerHouse Arena.

Traveling Exhibition

SocialDocumentary.net is making plans to bring the exhibit to the Gage Gallery at Roosevelt University in Chicago in the fall of 2010 and is negotiating other locations as well.

Judges

SDN reserves the right to use alternate judges if necessary. The decision of judges is final. Judges will give equal attention to the photographs and the text. Judges will review up to 9 images for any entry.

Lori Grinker
Lori Grinker began her photographic career in 1981 while a student at Parsons School of Design when Inside Sports published her photo-essay about a young boxer as its cover story. During that time she met another young boxer, 13 year-old Mike Tyson, who she documented for the following decade. Since then, in addition to her reportage of events such as the destruction of the World Trade Center, she has delved into several long-term projects, and published two books: The Invisible Thread: A Portrait of Jewish American Women (Jewish Publication Society, 1989, 6 editions), and Afterwar: Veterans from a World in Conflict (de.MO, 2004).

Published in major magazines, her work has earned international recognition, garnering a World Press Photo Foundation Prize, an Open Society Institute Distribution grant, a W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund fellowship, the Ernst Hass Grant, The Santa Fe Center for Photography Project Grant, and a Hasselblad Foundation Grant, among others. Her photographs have been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions around the world and are in many private and museum collections including: The International Center of Photography (ICP), The Jewish Museum in New York City, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Between editorial assignments, commercial jobs (represented by MEO Represents), and personal projects, Grinker lectures, teaches workshops, and is on the faculty of the ICP in New York City. She is represented by the Nailya Alexander Gallery in New York and has been a member of Contact Press Images since 1988. Grinker is on the advisory committee of SocialDocumentary.net.
www.lorigrinker.com

Ed Kashi
Ed Kashi is a photojournalist, filmmaker and educator dedicated to documenting the social and political issues that define our times.

Kashi’s images have been published and exhibited worldwide. His innovative approach to photography and filmmaking produced the Iraqi Kurdistan Flipbook. Using stills in a moving image format, this creative and thought-provoking form of visual storytelling has been shown in many film festivals and as part of a series of exhibitions on the Iraq War at The George Eastman House.

An eight-year personal project completed in 2003, Aging in America: The Years Ahead, created a traveling exhibition, an award-winning documentary film, a website and a book which was named one of the best photo books of 2003 by American Photo. Along with numerous awards, including honors from Pictures of the Year International, World Press Foundation, Communication Arts and American Photography, Kashi’s editorial assignments and personal projects have generated four books. In 2008, his latest books will be published, both by powerHouse Books; Curse of the Black Gold: 50 Years of Oil in the Niger Delta and Three.

“Ed Kashi is intelligent, brave and compassionate. He always understands the nuances of his subjects. He fearlessly goes where few would venture. And he sympathetically captures the soul of each situation. Ed is one of the best of a new breed of photojournalistic artists.” David Griffin, Director of Photography, National Geographic

Kashi is on the advisory committee of SocialDocumentary.net.
www.edkashi.com

Lucian Perkins
Lucian Perkins, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in biology. He later studied photography with Garry Winogrand. In 1997, he received an internship at the Washington Post, where he worked as a staff photographer for 27 years. He received the “Newspaper Photographer of the Year” by the National Press Photographers Association in 1994 for a portfolio that includes projects in Russia and a behind-the-scenes look at the New York fashion shows. In 1995, with Post reporter Leon Dash, he won a Pulitzer Prize for their four-year study on the effects of poverty on three generations of a Washington, DC family through the eyes of their family’s matriarch Rosa Lee Cunningham.

In 1996 he was awarded the World Press Photo of the Year for his photograph of a young boy in war-torn Chechnya. In 2000, Perkins won another Pulitzer Prize along with two colleagues at the Post for their coverage of the Kosovo conflict. While at the Post, Perkins covered major international events, including Russia since 1988, the wars in the former Yugoslavia, the Palestinian uprising in the West Bank, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has also chronicled local and national events throughout the US. In October 1998, Chronicle Books published his first book, Runway Madness.
www.lucianperkins.com

Shahidul Alam
Shahidul Alam was born in 1955 in Dhaka, Bangladesh. He studied and taught chemistry in London where he obtained a PhD from the University of London.

He started photographing in 1980 and was awarded the Harvey Harris Trophy for being judged the best photographer of the year by the London Arts Council and became the President of the Bangladesh Photographic Society, where he served for three terms.

In 1989, he set up Drik picture library and Pathshala: South Asian Institute of Photography. He is also a director of Chobi Mela, the festival of photography in Asia. He was a jury member of numerous competitions including World Press Photo, where he has been a judge on four occasions and he was the first person of colour to chair the international jury in World Press Photo.

Awarded the Andrea Frank Foundation Award and the Howard Chapnick Award in 1998, he has also been awarded the Honorary Fellowships of the Bangladesh Photographic Society and later, the Royal Photographic Society in 2001, for his contribution to photography.

He is on the advisory board for the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund and the National Geographic Society. He is visiting professor of Sunderland University in the UK and Regent's Lecturer at UCLA in the US. Alam is the founder and chairman of Majority World, a global community interest initiative formed to provide a platform for indigenous photographers, photographic agencies, and image collections from the majority world to gain access to global image markets.
http://shahidul.wordpress.com/

Craig Cohen
Craig Cohen is Executive Publisher of powerHouse Books, NY.
www.powerhousebooks.com

Whitney Johnson
Photo Editor, The New Yorker Magazine

Eligibility

Contest is open to all professional and amateur US and international photographers. SDN staff, volunteer, advisory committee members, judges, and their families are not eligible to enter the competition.

Winner Notification

Winners will be contacted by phone and email by December 16, 2009.
Tax liability in connection with any Prize is the responsibility of the winners.

Important Dates

Entries accepted on SDN website: September 15, 2009
Entries deadline: December 7, 2009
Judging: December 10-13, 2009
Winners Announced: December 16, 2009
Opening reception & panel discussion: Tuesday, February 16, 2010
New York Exhibition: powerHouse Arena, February 15-March 14, 2010
Chicago Exhibition: Gage Gallery at Roosevelt University, September - December, 2010. These dates may be subject to change.

Use Rights

All entrants and winners retain copyright of their work. By submission for jurying, photographers whose images are chosen grant SDN a royalty-free license to use their images for the purpose of subsequent display on the SDN site or in SDN promotional materials. Entries grant SDN the right to use their name for promotion in any medium including radio, newspapers, publications, television, videotape, and/or distribution over the internet. Samples of the winning work will be released to the press for promotional purposes. Photographers grant use of their images as stated without further contact or compensation from SDN other than the prizes listed above. Photographer’s credit will be provided with all use. Winners grant SDN the right to use the work in a related exhibition gallery book and in a possible traveling exhibition.

Print Sales

Winning photographers must provide a list of work and sale price. For the first exhibition at powerHouse Arena, February 15-March 14, 2009, sales of prints will be split 40% to photographer, 40% to powerHouse, 20% to SDN. Sales are arranged through powerHouse and the work sold will be the exact work on the wall. SDN will pay the photographers. Other sizes can be negotiated with buyer. SDN pays for the printing and mounting of the work for first exhibition. Arrange of sale of work at other exhibit locations to be determined.

Release

Entrant acknowledges that SDN may not be held liable for any loss, damages, or injury associated with this contest. Entrant agrees to indemnify SDN for all costs, damages and attorney fees resulting from any third party claims, including copyright infringement, arising from entrant’s participation.

SDN reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to disqualify any entrant that fails to comply with contest rules and guidelines. This Contest is void where prohibited by law.

About SDN

SocialDocumentary.net (SDN) uses the power of photography to promote global awareness. SDN members include photographers, NGOs, journalists, editors, and students who create and explore documentary websites investigating critical issues facing the world today. Recent exhibits have explored oil workers in the Niger River Delta, male sex workers in India, Central American immigrant women during their journey north, and Iraqi and Afghan refugees in Greece.

Questions? Email us at info@socialdocumentary.net.

C/O Berlin Talents Competition 2010: Me, Myself and the Others

2009-11-30T21:36:00.019-05:00

Since its inception in 2000, C/O Berlin International Forum For Visual Dialogues has firmly established itself within the cultural landscape of Berlin-Mitte, near Museum Island and the government district.

Through the energies and commitment of its three founders - photographer Stephan Erfurt, designer Marc Naroska, and architect Ingo Pott - a singular institution in Germany has been created, presenting a cultural program of international stature and quality.

In 2000 square meters of exhibition space at the former Postfuhramt (Old Post Office), C/O Berlin exhibits the work of international photographers including Martin Parr, Annie Leibovitz, Rene Burri, James Nachtwey, Anton Corbijn, and Karl Lagerfeld, whose exclusively planned solo shows have affirmed C/O Berlin's conceptional competence and high standards.

A program of guided tours, lectures, and artist talks provides more in-depth insights into different aspects of each exhibition's subject matter and perspectives.

Talents Competition 2010: Me, Myself and the Others

Who can apply?
Photographers and art critics up to the age of 35.

Topic of Talents 2010
The annual topic for 2010 is “Me, Myself and the Others.” Only samples of work dealing with this topic will be considered by the jury.

How do I apply?

As a photographer
1. Fill out the online form

2. Transfer the entry fee of €20 to the following account:
Bank: Berliner Volksbank
Recipient: C/O's e.V.
Account number: 7214040004
Bank code: 100 900 00
------------------------------
IBAN: DE 32 1009 0000 7214 040004
BIC: BEVODEBB

All bank transfer and commission costs must be borne by the payer.

3. Send a maximum of 15 samples of work in printed form (no larger than A4, please no originals!) as well as a project description (no more than one A4 page) to the following address:

C/O Berlin
Re.: “Talents 2010”
Auguststraße 5a
10117 Berlin
Germany

Materials can only be returned if a self-addressed stamped envelope is included with the submission. Submissions for which no entry fee has been received by December 31, 2009, unfortunately cannot be taken into consideration.

As an art critic
Art critics should submit several writing samples on topics in the areas of art history, photography, design, or architecture, as well as a resume to the address above. There is no entry fee.

Application deadline?
The deadline for photographers is December 31, 2009 (data of postmark). Art critics are welcome to apply at all times.

Who decides on the winners?
In the spring of each year, a jury of experts selects four of the submitted portfolios for the following year. The jury’s decision is final. There is no appeal procedure.

Ryerson Gallery Holiday Show and Sale in Toronto

2009-11-29T18:22:00.007-05:00

Ryerson Gallery Holiday Show and Sale

Silent Auction, Preview and Bidding
November 21 to December 10

Bids close at 5 PM, Thursday, December 10

Gala Reception, Draw and Awards
Thursday, December 3, 6 - 10 PM

Announcing the 2009 Give Us Your Best Shot Winner
Selected by Bonnie Rubenstein, Artistic Director

CONTACT Toronto Photography Festival

Book Launch: Emergence
Celebrating thirty years of emerging artists!

Co-published by Gallery 44 and Ryerson University

Winning bids: payment and pick-up of works
December 11 and 12, noon to 5 PM at Ryerson Gallery

Ryerson Gallery thanks all its sponsors:

Adina Photo and Custom Frames I Canadian Art Magazine I ColourGenics I Downtown Camera I Dufflets I Elpro I Gallery 44 I Gallery TPW I PFACS - Ryerson University I Pikto I Prefix Photo I Scaramouche / Morden Yolles I School of Image Arts I Steam Whistle I Stephen Bulger Gallery I Studio of Edward Burtynsky I Toronto Black and White I Toronto Image Works

Gallery Hours: Wednesday - Saturday, 12 - 5 PM

80 Spadina Ave., Suite 305, Toronto ON M5V 2J4

www.ryersongallery.ca

The Malcolmson Collection at Presentation House Gallery in North Vancouver

2009-11-29T17:50:00.010-05:00

The Malcolmson Collection
Until December 20, 2009

On exhibit at Presentation House Gallery is a selection of photographs from one of Canada's most unique and significant art collections, shown for the first time in a public gallery. Over the past twenty-five years Ann and Harry Malcolmson, who live in Toronto, have assembled a rare collection of vintage photographs that span the history of the medium. After a long period of collecting contemporary art, they were gradually drawn to early twentieth-century experimental photography, and then began to investigate nineteenth-century material before expanding into classic modernist and contemporary works. This exhibition selected from over two-hundred photographs offers a rare opportunity to witness the scope and depth of this remarkable collection, that reveals the scholarship, intuitions and passions of the collectors.

The exhibition features iconic as well as anonymous images that underscore the Malcolmson’s interest in experimental approaches to the medium, from Fox Talbot to Robert Frank. The beginnings of photography is represented by salted paper prints from paper negatives of the mid-1840s and twenty-first century photography, by several of Vancouver’s most notable contemporary artists. This range of images draws links between the earliest innovations in the medium to those of today; for instance, Gustave Le Gray’s 1850s seascape produced from two negatives precedes the collage techniques of modernist photography that continue in digital practices. While alluding to historical developments and stylistic periods, the exhibition knits together images from diverse contexts, genres and time frames. The significance of photography as both an artistic practice and mode of perception is considered in relation to its profound impact on visual culture and social history. Many of the nineteenth-century images resulted from commissions for empirical records of significant events and social conditions evident in the pictures of archeological and urban sites. In the twentieth century, more fragmented and prosaic views of the world dominate.

Photography as an act of drawing with light is made palpable throughout the exhibition, from the long exposures that fail to still the breath of a subject, to photograms that record movements of light on paper, to a film montage of moving reflections. Human figures often appear veiled and immaterial, as if apparitions. The surrealist impulse to conflate mind and body and to evoke psychic space is expressed in the bodily distortions of the many phantasmagoric figurative works. A grouping of portraits evolves from stiff formal portraiture of sitters posing in conscious self-portrayal to an increasing focus on isolated gestures and fleeting moments of someone caught offguard. While associated with naturalism, the artificial spatial effect of photographic optics evident in the condensed spaces and surface details of the nineteenth-century landscapes becomes more pronounced in the skewed and montaged perspectives called for by the chaotic energies and visual dynamics of modern cities. Abstraction and visuality itself as subject matter are prevalent threads in the exhibition.

The exhibition reveals how developments in camera and print technologies impacted “the new vision.” The unique character of each vintage print emphasizes the very materiality of photographs—their physical surfaces, the patinas of aging and accidents of chemicals interacting with paper. These visual effects emphasize the mysterious, elusive qualities of photographic images as traces of a moment in time and the strong poetic and elegiac mood in The Malcolmson Collection. A vitrine of publication materials offers clues to the importance of the book form, especially albums and portfolios, to the history of the medium.

Presentation House Gallery
333 Chesterfield Avenue North Vancouver BC V7M 3G9

www.presentationhousegall.com

Gallery 44 Celebrates Its 30th Anniversary with the Book Launch of "Emergence: Contemporary Canadian Photography", Party, and Exhibition

2009-11-29T16:22:00.005-05:00

Gallery 44’s 30th Anniversary Events on December 3, 2009 from 6 -10pm:

Cake Cutting at 7:30pm I Raise a glass to the first 30 years with DJ Siquemu!
Wall to Wall | 3oth Anniversary Edition Exhibition and Sale of Photographs Dating From 1979 to 2009 by Gallery 44 Members and Friends

On Until December 19

A NEW PUBLICATION FROM GALLERY 44 ON CANADIAN CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY

Emergence: Contemporary Canadian Photography
Co-published by Gallery 44 and Ryerson University

124 Pages | 5 Essays | Works by 30 Artists | 84 colour reproductions | $23.95

What emerges in the development of an image, in looking at a work of art, in the expansion of an artist’s career or practice?

To mark its 30 years of commitment to the advancement of photographic art in Canada Gallery 44 has produced a book of Canadian contemporary photography on the subject of emergence. The book is comprised of original essays by esteemed Canadian writers, curators and artists. Each writer was invited to explore the concept of emergence with reference to the work of artists who have exhibited at Gallery 44. These artists were in turn asked to choose the work of an emerging Canadian photographic artist to be published along side their own work in the book. This book is a major contribution to the discourse on contemporary photography, showing a broad-spectrum of photo-based work contextualized by engaging and informative texts. Emergence will appeal to artists, educators, students, curators, critics and any serious devotee to contemporary art.

Editor Sarah Parsons, in her introduction, speaks of “the important conceptual connection between photography, visibility and emergence”, as well as photography’s “more literal and technical relationship to emergence” this is a connection which each writer explores from a unique perspective in relation to select photographic artists.

Cover Image: Michael Taglieri, t for Thomson, from Wearing a raincoat in case it begins to rain, 2007

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography

http://www.gallery44.org

Prefix Photo: Call for Submissions from Photographers and Writers

2009-11-29T14:38:00.007-05:00

Call for Submissions from Photographers
Prefix Photo encourages submissions of new or previously unpublished photography for editorial consideration. Submissions should include visual support material in the form of digital files, 35mm slides, transparencies, work prints, laser prints, etc.; a written description of the work, if available; and a curriculum vitae of the artist. The number of images submitted remains at the discretion of the artist, with a recommended maximum of 20. Submissions are accepted on an ongoing basis and are reviewed twice annually: January 15 and July 15. Please send submissions to:

Tamara Toledo
Prefix Photo

124 - 401 Richmond Street West

Toronto, Ontario

M5V 3A8

Mailed support materials will not be returned unless accompanied by a self-addressed envelope with return postage or equivalent. Prefix Photo also accepts submissions by email to tamara@prefix.ca. Please follow the digital submission requirements below.

Proposals from young and emerging artists and from artists from all cultural and regional communities of Canada are particularly encouraged.

Digital Submission Requirements

72 dpi resolution I Maximum size of 1024 x 768 pixels I Files should be no larger than 500K I RGB format I Name each image file with your name, surname, the number and the title I Please send only up to 20 images

Call for Submissions from Writers
Prefix Photo encourages submissions of writer's outlines for new critical essays of 3000-4000 words in length, but does not consider completed manuscripts for publication. Outlines should be no more than 250 words in length, and may be supported by one or two previously published texts. Outlines are accepted at any time, but should be submitted at least six months in advance of a projected publication date. If accepted for publication, the deadline for the submission of the completed essay is approximately three months in advance of an issue's release. Prior to publication, writers will be consulted regarding editorial revisions and writer's fee. Please note that, in addition to critical essays, Prefix Photo also reviews proposals for literary features of 600-800 words. Submission materials will not be returned unless accompanied by a self-addressed envelope with return postage or equivalent.

For more information on the submissions process, please contact Tamara Toledo, Production Manager, T: 416-591-0357, E: tamara@prefix.ca.

Available Now - Prefix Photo 20: Archival Legacies

2009-11-29T14:06:00.012-05:00

Prefix Photo 20: Archival Legacies

Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art is pleased to announce the release of the twentieth issue of Prefix Photo magazine. As the magazine embarks on its tenth-anniversary year, editor Scott McLeod addresses the theme of “archival legacies,” as follows: “This issue directs our gaze toward the vast array of physical materials that are archived in order to preserve our multiple histories. The archive – and the uses to which the archive can be put – facilitate the envisioning and elaboration of these sometimes competing, sometimes complementary histories. In this way, history is not left to languish in the past, but becomes available to be recuperated and animated not only in, but as the present.”

These thoughts resonate strongly with the works of the artists and writers represented within the magazine, as follows:

Monika Kin Gagnon expands on the notion of “posthumous collaboration,” considering books and archives as material traces and triggers of memory, in an essay that is part homage, part letter to Gagnon’s late friend, poet and curator Nancy Shaw.

Jacob Korczynski presents a reading of the Pride Records series by Houston–based artist Jamal Cyrus. Korczynski interprets the series through the lens of the “cut,” as Cyrus slices through historical images via collage and through official histories via the rupture of fiction.

Jordan Troeller writes on the object-based photography of New York–based artist Zoe Leonard, responding to current discussions on digitalization and photography. She argues that far too much weight has been given to describing technology and far too little to examining its social and political effects.

Sudhatri Murthy, in her literary feature “Simple Time,” reflects upon a snapshot that mediates her unique experience – intimately connected and yet outside – of mothering twin boys.

Other contributors include Barbara Balfour, Rose Bouthillier, Neil Cummings and Marysia Lewandowska, Kyla Mallett, Stephen G. Rhodes, Gabor Szilasi, and more.

While quantities last.

Subscribe to Prefix Photo now and receive a free designer tote bag exclusive to Prefix Photo subscribers. Offer expires January 31, 2010

Prefix Photo is published by Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art, a registered charitable organization that fosters the appreciation and understanding of contemporary photography, media and digital arts. Prefix Photo is available by subscription and in fine bookstores and newsstands in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Portugal, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Singapore and China.

For their assistance with the release party held for issue 20 in Toronto, Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art gratefully acknowledges its Supporting Sponsor Steam Whistle Brewing and its Official Catering Sponsor à la Carte Kitchen.

Prefix Photo is published with the assistance of its staff, volunteers and patrons, as well as the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts. Prefix Photo also acknowledges the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Magazine Fund toward its editorial and production costs. The Ontario Arts Council is an agency of the Government of Ontario.

www.prefix.ca

Jock Sturges at Stephen Bulger Gallery in Toronto

2009-11-29T10:10:00.003-05:00

Call for Entries - 3rd Annual International Juried Plastic Camera Show

2009-11-29T00:21:00.011-05:00

3rd Annual International Juried Plastic Camera Show
Deadline for submissions - January 5, 2010

Located in San Francisco, RayKo Photo Centers competition is open to artists working with plastic cameras with plastic lenses. The more obsolete, flawed, and lo-tech, the better. Images should be taken with cameras with limited controls, such as Diana, Holga, Lubitel, Lomo, Banner, and Ansco. Beautiful prints from less-than-gorgeous cameras – that’s what we’re looking for!

"Best of Show" receives a $250 cash prize. There are also four additional juror awards: honorable mentions receive plastic cameras of your choosing.

Submission guidelines
Complete submission form I A non-refundable entry fee of $25 I Check or money order payable to RayKo Photo Center I Limit of 5 images per person I CD entries must be jpegs I Save files with artist’s last name and title of image I Contact information should be on the CD and CD case I Please note that any work deemed misrepresented by its CD will be declined I SASE or adequate postage for notification and return of CD, if desired I Late submissions or substitute images will not be hung

RayKo Photo Center
c/o Plastic Camera Show

428 Third Street

San Francisco, CA 94107

Submission of Accepted Work
The work must be framed or mounted with a wire affixed and ready to hang. No saw tooth hangers, please. Entries will be handled with the greatest care, however, RayKo assumes no liability for work on its premises. All works selected for exhibition must be for sale. RayKo will retain 40% commission on all work sold, so please price your work accordingly. Please note that images selected for the show may be used for promotion of the exhibition.

Eligibility
All work must be original and completed within the past five years. Works previously shown at RayKo are not eligible.

January 5, 2010 - Deadline for submissions
January 13 - Notification of juried results

February 20 - Deadline for shipped works

February 26 6-8pm - Opening reception

February 26 – April 17 - Exhibition on view

May 2 - Unsold works shipped by RayKo Photo Center

To download the submission form please visit
http://raykophoto.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/3rd-annual-plastic-camera-call-4-entries.pdf

Call for Entries - Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day & 3rd Annual Juried Pinhole Show

2009-11-28T23:39:00.013-05:00

Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day & 3rd Annual Juried Pinhole Show
Deadline for submissions: March 7, 2010

“Best in Show” will receive a cash prize of $250 and there are also four additional juror awards

Located in San Francisco, RayKo Photo Center will be hosting an exhibition of pinhole photography in their main gallery. This is an open call for photographic work taken with a pinhole camera. Artists selected for exhibition will be encouraged to participate in the artist’s reception and Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day on April 25th between 12-5pm. RayKo will be offering free image uploads onto the WPPD website, supplies for making pinhole images, and displays of pinhole cameras.

Submission Guidelines
Images must be made with a pinhole camera I There is a non-refundable entry fee of $25 I Check or money order should be made out to RayKo Photo Center I No Cash or Credit Cards I Limit of 5 images per person I CD entries must be jpegs I Save files with artist’s last name and title of image I Make sure contact information is on the CD and CD case and individual slides I Please note that any work deemed misrepresented by its CD or slide will be declined I Completed submission form I SASE or adequate postage for notification and return of CD or slides, if desired I Late submissions or substitute images will not be hung

RayKo Photo Center
c/o Pinhole Photography Show

428 Third Street

San Francisco, CA 94107

Submission of Accepted Work
The work must be framed or mounted with a wire affixed and ready to hang. NO saw tooth hangers, please. Entries will be handled with the greatest care, however, RayKo assumes no liability for work on its premises. All works selected for exhibition must be for sale. RayKo will retain 40% commission on all work sold, so please price your work accordingly. Please note that images selected for the show may be used for promotion of the exhibition.

March 7, 2010 - Deadline for submissions
March 13 - Notification of juried results

April 19 - Delivery of accepted work

April 25, 12-5pm - Opening reception

April 25 – May 31 - Exhibition on view

June 1 - June 3 - Pick up of hand-delivered work

June 20 - Unsold works shipped by RayKo Photo Center

To download the submission form please visit
http://raykophoto.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/pinhole-call-for-entries.pdf

Paolo Ventura at Hasted Hunt Gallery in New York

2009-11-18T00:22:00.019-05:00

PAOLO VENTURA: WINTER STORIES
December 10, 2009 - January 23, 2010 at Hasted Hunt Gallery

Ventura's Winter Stories is an imaginative series of photographs depicting scenes from the memory bank of a fictional circus performer as he looks back on his life. A master of narrative staged photography, Ventura brings his imagined stories to life by building three-dimensional sets in miniature. Winter Stories also reveals the drawings and watercolors that Ventura uses as a starting point for his stories, as well as the handmade album of Polaroids that Ventura uses to guide the building of his elaborate sets.

Ventura used his tabletop constructions to poignant effect in his previous series, “War Souvenir” (2005), in which he mined his own memories of stories he was told by his grandmother to re-create the atmosphere of ravaged Italy during World War II. Those images were conceived not only in their evocation of iconic documentary photographs and actual war events, but also of impressions of loss or sacrifice. The latest pictures rely on a common bank of imagery, too- Fellini films, for example, or shadowy Brassai- like shots of postwar Paris- but also on a shared sense of childlike wonder. In one image, the viewer becomes part of a crowd of onlookers gazing up at a tightrope walker executing an impressive feat of balance. In the photograph that greeted viewers when they walked into the gallery, a melancholy clown stands on a wooden chair, arms wide open, as if in welcome to the artist’s old-world fantasy.

Ventura, who honed his ability to create fictional worlds during a career as a fashion photographer, has here conjoined scenes of a small Italian town where a carnival has stopped. It could be the 1940s or the ‘50s. All the men wear hats and heavy overcoats, and the carnival itself is something out of another era. The level of detail-the tiny apples strewn in the grass, the snow-covered shoes of the clown, leaves collecting on a damp street- is extraordinary. But it wouldn’t carry the work if the images weren’t so atmospheric and artfully composed, or if they didn’t suggest so many narrative layers. In one photograph, a man poses as a pilot in a painted airplane on a false façade, the kind of thing that’s a fixture at fairs and carnivals still. In another, the painted airplane sits empty, a camera on a tripod in front of it, and the photographer, slumped in a chair, waits for customers. At the gallery, the actual doll-sized façade itself framed and hung on the wall, a bit of evidence that grounded Ventura’s fictional “memories” in constructed reality.

http://www.hastedhunt.com/home.php

Andrew Moore: Detroit at Yancey Richardson Gallery in New York

2009-11-17T23:58:00.016-05:00

ANDREW MOORE: DETROIT
November 5, 2009 - January 9, 2010 at Yancey Richardson Gallery

Yancey Richardson Gallery is pleased to present Detroit, the gallery!s fifth solo show by New York-based photographer Andrew Moore. The exhibition, the result of seven trips made to Detroit over the past two years, continues Moore's use of architecture as a way to explore themes of history, culture and time. As the artist states: “ My interests have always laid at the busy intersections of history, particularly at those locations where multiple tangents of time overlap and tangle… Detroit is more than a story of physical decline, decay and transformation; it is a city where the distortion of time is inventing new symbols for the America of the future.”

Moore's Detroit series will be the subject of a traveling solo exhibition in 2010, originating at the Akron Art Museum and accompanied by a monograph Detroit: Disassembled with an essay by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and Detroit native Philip Levine.

Several of the gallery exhibition's photographs are characterized by a hint of Surrealism, with things jarringly out of place or come alive. The ruined ornamental architecture of a former movie palace, the UA Theater, suggests the fantastic labyrinthine structures of Piranesi, an early influence on the Surrealists. In a photograph of what was once Henry Ford's elegant executive offices at the Model T headquarters, a carpeted floor ripples with an incongruous landscape of brilliant green moss. In an abandoned burned school Moore photographed a melted clock whose face bears the inscription National Time. The photograph serves as an ironic comment on the country!s economic debacle while referring directly to the melting clock in Salvador Dali's painting The Persistence of Memory. As Moore states, “Detroit is more than a story of physical decline, decay and transformation; it is a city where the distortion of time is inventing new symbols for the America of the future.”

Moore's previous projects include colonial and modernist Havana, the war damaged buildings of Sarajevo, post-Cold War Russia, the old theaters of New York's 42nd Street and the consumer-laden vertical landscape of the new Times Square.

Model T Headquarters, Detroit, Michigan, 2008
Palace Theater, Gary, Indiana, 2008

http://www.yanceyrichardson.com/

Michael Wolf and Barbara Crane at Aperture Gallery in New York

2009-11-17T22:41:00.021-05:00

MICHAEL WOLF: THE TRANSPARENT CITY
BARBARA CRANE: PRIVATE VIEWS

November 7, 2009 - January 21, 2010 at Aperture Gallery

Aperture Gallery is pleased to present two simultaneous exhibitions exploring the city of Chicago from different vantage points and periods in history. While Michael Wolf’s large-scale color photographs of downtown Chicago’s buildings and their inhabitants examine public versus private space in the context of 21st-century urban life, Barbara Crane’s intimate Polaroids from the 1980s hone in on private human gestures performed in public at Chicago’s summer festivals. Both bodies of work reveal private moments that were intended to go unnoticed, each eliciting very different visceral responses from the viewer while evoking the voyeurism that permeates our culture today.

Michael Wolf: The Transparent City
 Chicago, like many of the world’s great urban centers, has recently undergone a surge in new construction, grafting a new layer of architectural experimentation onto those of past eras. Bringing his unique perspective on changing urban environments to a city renowned for its architecture, Michael Wolf chose to photograph Chicago’s central downtown area, focusing specifically on issues of voyeurism and the contemporary urban landscape in flux. His first body of work to address an American city, Michael Wolf: The Transparent City opened at the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College Chicago (MoCP), in November 2008. The show at Aperture marks the second U.S. venue for the exhibition. The work, which is accompanied by a book of the same title copublished by Aperture and MoCP last fall, was created as part of the Chicago-based U.S. Equities Realty Artist-in-Residence Program, in collaboration with MoCP.

Whereas Wolf’s prior series concentrated on the “architecture of density,” this most recent work invites the viewer to examine the transparency and fluidity of the new American cityscape. Juxtaposing humanizing details within the surrounding geometry of the urban landscape, fragments of everyday life—digitally distorted and hyper-enlarged—are snatched surreptitiously via telephoto lenses. Think Edward Hopper meets Blade Runner. In Michael Wolf: The Transparent City, Wolf’s work resonates with all the formalism of the constructed, architectural work for which he is known, and emphasizes his ongoing engagement with the idea of how modern life unfolds within the framework of the ever-growing contemporary city.

Michael Wolf (born in Munich, 1954) grew up in the United States. Wolf attended UC Berkeley, and later studied with Otto Steinert at the University of Essen in Germany. Two previous books—Sitting in China (2002) and Hong Kong: front door/back door (2005)—feature his much-acclaimed photographs of China. Wolf lives and works in Hong Kong and Paris.

Barbara Crane: Private Views
In the early 1980s, photographer Barbara Crane embarked on a photographic project shot during Chicago’s various summer festivals. Armed with a Super Speed Graphic camera and Polaroid film, Crane waded in close to the revelers and focused on capturing the details of clothing and hairstyles, but most importantly, gesture. The images are tightly cropped and terrifically alive, viscerally bringing us into the crush of people eating, drinking, and enjoying the crowd dynamic—an incredible inventory of private gestures performed in public spaces.

The collective effect of the images in Barbara Crane: Private Views is mesmerizing and intensely compelling, creating a palpable sensuality from image to image—an astonishing document, not of a particular event or personality, but of something far less tangible: the public expression of euphoria. Barbara Crane: Private Views is a celebration of the classic 1980s Polaroid snapshot with an experimental flair; Crane’s mixture of natural light and flash combined with her use of Polaroid film highlights the primary colors of ’80s fashion, which still feels hip and contemporary today. An accompanying book of the same title was published by Aperture in the spring 2009.

Barbara Crane (born in Chicago, 1928) is a celebrated American photographer known for her extraordinary commitment to experimentation and innovation, especially in exploring the themes of the human form and the urban landscape. Crane studied art history at Mills College, completing her BA at New York University in 1950. She returned to Chicago and enrolled in the Institute of Design’s graduate photography program, studying with luminaries including Aaron Siskind. Her work has been the subject of six retrospective surveys and more than seventy-six one-person exhibitions. Crane is professor emeritus of photography at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is represented by Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago; Higher Pictures, New York; and Galerie Françoise Paviot, Paris.

http://www.aperture.org/gallery/

Maarten Wetsema at Van Kranendonk in the Netherlands

2009-11-17T00:00:00.011-05:00

MAARTEN WETSEMA : OVATIE
November 29, 2009 - January, 14, 2010 at Van Kranendonk

Maarten Wetsema's images are of dogs photographed in her studio or a dog owners home. They are captured in such a way that the surrounding elements seem to tell us something about the dog and its' personality. Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always with the utmost respect for the animal.

http://www.maartenwetsema.nl/
http://www.vankranendonk.nl/index.html

Matthias Bruggmann at Galerie Polaris in Paris

2009-11-16T23:58:00.015-05:00

MATTHIAS BRUGGMANN
November 14 - December 22, 2009 at Galerie Polaris

"My work is an attempt at a repurposing of classical photographic dogma by its intersection with art history and semiotics : the images, which are taken in conflict situations with photojournalistic tools function both as a photographic representation of an event and as a photographic representation of photojournalism.

The final objective is always substantiation of theoretical conjectures, for example, the validity of the decisive instant or whether using codes which challenge the viewer intellectually to generate an emotional reaction is more valid than forcing an emotional link to generate an intellectual reaction." - Matthias Bruggmann from Saatchi Online

http://www.boring.ch/matt/
http://www.galeriepolaris.com/

Simone Nieweg: Garden/Constructions at Galerie m Bochum in Bochum, Germany

2009-11-16T23:56:00.007-05:00

SIMONE NIEWEG: GARDEN/CONSTRUCTIONS
November 13th 2009 - February 13th 2010 at Galerie m Bochum

From 13 November 2009 to 13 February 2010, Galerie m Bochum is presenting an exhibition of never-before-published landscape photographs by Simone Nieweg (*1962 Bielefeld). Nieweg lives and works in Düsseldorf, where she studied at the Art Academy and was a master student of Bernd Becher. Gardens as well as field, forest and meadow landscapes are the subjects she has been focusing on since 1986 or 1990, resulting in a kind of long-term study. The present exhibition centers on large-format color photographs showing garden structures such as sheds, greenhouses and trellises. Also on view are recent landscapes shot in northeastern France that herald a new pictorial vocabulary within the artist’s oeuvre.

On prolonged forays through gardens and fields, Simone Nieweg develops intimate knowledge of her motifs. She returns again and again to certain spots in order to find just the right conditions for her shot. On the matte lens of her large-format camera, the image appears upside down – an important abstracting moment in which Nieweg is able to balance out perspectival distortions, choose the desired degree of detail and lend the overall picture order and structure. Her concentrated gaze uncovers the aesthetic situation within the organic fabric before her, something Nieweg calls the “perfect coincidence.” She then converts the reality she sees into a composition in which structures, lines and colors shape the image. And yet a tension nevertheless remains between the structured composition of the photo and the relative anarchy of the gardens and landscapes depicted.

The large-format works show largely improvised miniature architectures whose materials are just as diverse as the plant life itself. What continually comes to the fore in Nieweg’s photographs are the parallels between manmade objects and nature, such as in “Glasshouse with steel lattice” (2004), where the ramification of the branches in the background is echoed by the arched roof of the glasshouse. At the same time, we feel a sense of harmonious dichotomy: in terms of content, between the rusting provisional structures and the living greenery, and compositionally with the weighing of horizontals and diagonals, of frontal and tilted viewpoints, of surface and detail.

Nieweg avoids any clichéd associations, picturesque motifs or narrative elements in her landscape pictures. Her works focus our gaze instead on the two-dimensional image, without however estranging us from nature. The pictorial planes are hallmarked by a visual fecundity that comes from the earth, the vegetation, the geographic situation, the climate and from the human hand that has shaped the scene. Materiality, color and surface structure evoke a very specific texture. Ultimately, what the photographs of Simone Nieweg convey is an overwhelming impression of timeless serenity and harmony.

http://www.m-bochum.de/mbochum_en.php

Delphine Balley: Deux Series Inedites 2008 - 2009 at Galerie Réverbère in Lyon

2009-11-16T23:54:00.015-05:00

DELPHINE BALLEY: DEUX SERIES INEDITES, 2008 - 2009
Until November 21, 2009 at Galerie Réverbère in Lyon

I was born in Romans on May 7. I live and work in Lyon. After studying at the French National School of Photography in Arles, I moved back to Lyon in 1999, near my parents' house in Saint Laurent en Royans in the Drôme.

In 2002, I began to work on a series of photos in my mother's cupboards, in the family home... and exhibited the results for the first time at the "9bis" gallery in Saint Etienne. After a lengthy persuasion session over Sunday chicken and chips—and even though my parents were still sober—they agreed to pose for me without me needing to chop their heads off.

Armed with this crucial permit, I showed portraits of them in 2003 at the exhibition entitled Jeunisme (organised by the FRAC Champagne-Ardenne), then at the Centre of Photography in Lectoure, and finally at the De Visu gallery in Marseille. Everyone back home in Saint Laurent en Royans seemed pleased… so I continued with my photos, extending the family album to include the rest of the Balley family.

Being fond of stories, I also take part in La Collection Louche, a magazine that uses monographs to present "objects and their history, giving them a chance to enjoy a brief spell back in the limelight, to present and explain the person they incarnate…", extract from the back cover of Louche 3: Dossier Gaëtan Barthélémy, Nov. 2005, text by François Beaune.

http://www.galerielereverbere.com/exposition.php

Masters of Photography at Fifty One Fine Art Gallery in Antwerp, Belgium

2009-11-16T23:51:00.015-05:00

MASTERS OF PHOTOGRAPHY
UNTIL JANUARY 16, 2010 at Fifty One Fine Art Gallery in Antwerp, Belgium

William Klein I Irving Penn I Frank Horvat I Robert Frank I Seydou Keita I Malick Sidibé I Hiroshi Sugimoto I Arnold Newman I Richard Avedon I Cindy Sherman I Diane Arbus I Lee Friedlander I Stephen Shore I Gary Winogrand I Duane Michals I Ray K. Metzker I Saul Leiter I Harry Callahan

We all carry a vast visual library of images engraved in our heads: one could refer to it as a ‘Musée Imaginaire’ as André Malraux called it. Thanks to photography, we are able to create a visual and virtual museum. We collect artworks from their photographic reproductions in various artbooks and magazines and visualize them in our private museum. Some artistic photographs have become iconic images in this way, carried preciously in our mind and head. These are the well-known photographs from the masters of the 20th and 21st century photography; all of them pioneering and groundbreaking photographers, the medium’s innovators and pioneers.

With the exhibition ‘Masters of Photography’, Fifty One Fine Art Photography is pleased to showcase an important selection of these significant photographers. Irving Penn, Robert Frank, Lee Friedlander, Seydou Keita, Arnold Newman, Richard Avedon and Cindy Sherman, amongst others, are some of the masters we will honour. Our perspective and selection will be mostly personal within the realm of commonly accepted genres and highlighting names.

Masters of portraiture like Arnold Newman, Seydou Keita and Malick Sidibé will be on show next to documentary photography from William Klein and Robert Frank, and more contemporary genres as the film still photographs of Cindy Sherman.

Moreover, this celebration of photographic masters is appropiately announcing the ten-year celebration of the gallery in 2010, which will culminate in a unique birthday event during Summer 2010.

Images: Seydou Keita I DuaneMichals I Gary Winogrand I Hiroshi Sugimoto I Diane Arbus

http://www.gallery51.com/index.php

Jalal Sepehr at Galerie Ester Woerdehoff in Paris

2009-11-16T23:49:00.012-05:00

JALAL SEPEHR: WATER AND PERSIAN RUGS
December 9, 2009 - February 10, 2010 at Galerie Esther Woerdehoff in Paris

Iranian photographer Jalal Sepehr was recently awarded the 2009 edition of the 'Prix de la Photographie, Paris' in France.

Jalal Sepehr began photography at an art institute in Tokyo and works in advertising, industrial, and nature & wild life Photography. He is a member of the Canadian Association for Photographic Art (CAPA), the Advertising & Industrial Association of Iran and the Iranian Hunting & Nature Association.

Sepehr has held numerous exhibitions in Iran, Bulgaria, Iraq, Slovakia and Canada.

The 'Prix de la Photographie, Paris' (Px3) aims to promote the appreciation of photography, to discover emerging talents, and introduce photographers from around the world to the artistic community of Paris.

http://www.ewgalerie.com/INDEX.html

Milton Rogovin at Danziger Projects in New York

2009-11-16T23:46:00.014-05:00

MILTON ROGOVIN: IN CELEBRATION OF HIS 100TH BIRTHDAY
December 17, 2009 - January 16, 2010 at Danziger Projects

 Social documentary photographer Milton Rogovin, now 99 years old, has been likened to the great social documentary photographers of the 19th and 20th Centuries, Lewis Hine and Jacob Riis. His photographs are in the Library of Congress, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Center for Creative Photography and other distinguished institutions around the world. His work speaks of the humanity of working people, the poor and the forgotten ones.

Milton Rogovin, now ninety-seven years old, has dedicated his life's work - as an optometrist, a political activist, and a photographer - to enabling people to see more clearly. Born in New York in 1909, Rogovin was radicalized by the widespread deprivations he witnessed during the Depression and dedicated himself to working for social and economic justice. After military service during the Second World War he began practice as an optometrist in Buffalo, New York. He and his wife Anne were politically active, engaging in union organizing and voter registration in Buffalo's African-American community. In 1957 he was called before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, or HUAC, and after refusing to testify was dubbed "Buffalo's Number One Communist." Much of his optometry clientele vanished, and with his increased free time he turned to photography as a way to speak about social inequities. Still, he maintained his optometry practice until he was nearly seventy years old.

Milton Rogovin's story is not the story of a lone artist. Rather, it encompasses the dynamics of a relationship and a family. It was Anne - teacher, author, and ardent activist - who held the family together when, following her husband's summoned appearance before HUAC, his optometric practice was devastated and their children were shunned. And, though she herself had a demanding job as a teacher, when he continued to work at his office during the day and in his basement darkroom in the evening, she was their children's primary caregiver. She opened doors into people's lives and made it possible for Milton to walk through these doors with his camera. She did not simply accompany her husband on his photographic forays; she was the instigator of many of his projects, his constant organizer, and his persistent publicist, bringing his photographs to the attention of writers, museum curators, and publishers. Throughout their sixty-one years of marriage they shared ideas and political commitments as loving comrades-- Anne died in 2003.

Rogovin's story is also about community-- various communities in Buffalo, where he has lived and worked for most of his life, and where he photographed working and poor people, people at work and at home, and people out of work, for nearly fifty years-- and communities in other parts of the world, where he photographed workers and their families. His story is entwined with that of many other people, particularly those of the U.S. political left, people advocating for fundamental change in the distribution and enactment of power in this country.

And his story is also part of the larger story of the history of social documentary photography. Milton Rogovin is heir to a tradition of social documentary photography that came of age in the climate of liberal social reform that characterized the Progressive Era. This was when nineteenth and early twentieth century sociologists such as Jacob Riis (1849-1914) and Lewis Hine (1874-1940) took up the camera or enlisted the services of contemporary photographers to add credibility to their studies. While a number of cultural critics and activist artists are critical of the reformist perspective that has shaped the historical trajectory and discourse of documentary photography, Rogovin himself would argue that while social documentary photographers share the aim of inciting their viewers to awareness, their perspectives in fact vary-- from visions of social reform that ameliorates the conditions of social ills to a more radical critique of the social structures that produce these conditions.

In his autobiographical writing and in presentations on his development as a social documentary photographer, Milton Rogovin emphasizes his own awakening to this country's gross social inequities and his formation of an understanding of their causes during the Great Depression of the 1930s. This was an era in which photographers, like other artists, regarded themselves as cultural workers, utilizing a variety of expressive media in the service of social consciousness. Accordingly Rogovin names as vital influences photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971) and social documentary photographers such as Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) and Walker Evans (1903-1975), whose best known photographs were made under the auspices of various federal agencies, particularly the Resettlement and Farm Security Administrations, established by the Roosevelt Administration's New Deal during the 1930s. For many people, these Farm Security Administration photographs represent the pinnacle of social documentary photography; the culmination of the early twentieth century vision of photography's potential to serve the cause of progressive reform.

When Rogovin returned to Buffalo following three years of service in the U.S. Armed Forces during the Second World War, he and his brother established an optometric practice together. Milton and Anne Rogovin had three children, and continued their political work. But with the onset of the Cold War they found themselves under increasing surveillance for political activities which, along with Rogovin's volunteer service as literature director for the local branch of the Communist Party, were deemed dangerous by the U.S. government.

Milton Rogovin was summoned and appeared before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) in Buffalo on October 4, 1957. Refusing to answer the questions put to him other than his name and occupation, he was proclaimed the "Top Red in Buffalo" by that day's Buffalo Evening News. His appearance before HUAC was an excruciating experience, and it had devastating repercussions - on his optometry practice, his family, and his friends. Neighbors kept track of who visited the Rogovin house. Neighborhood children were warned against playing with "the Rogovin children." Friends and other associates were afraid to greet them openly on the street. Though Milton and his brother kept their optometry office open, many of their patients, fearing accusations of guilt by association, went elsewhere. Anne Rogovin refused to sign the Loyalty Oath required for teachers in the Buffalo public schools and went to work in Buffalo's suburbs for the Board of Cooperative Education as a Special Education teacher; she later became a recognized leader in this field as an educator and a writer.

"But as it turned out," Rogovin has said, "There was also a positive result to all these attacks." In 1957 he was invited by his friend William H. Tallmadge, a professor of music at State University College in Buffalo, to accompany Tallmadge while he made sound recordings at a Holiness Church in Buffalo's African American community and to make photographs of the church services. "I readily accepted my friend's offer," he said, "since I felt that once again I could speak out about the problems of the poor, but this time through my photography." After three months Tallmadge had completed his recordings; Rogovin continued to photograph in Buffalo's various storefront churches for three years.

In the summer of 1962, when the Storefront Church series was completed, Milton and Anne Rogovin traveled to West Virginia and eastern Kentucky to photograph miners and mining communities. They returned to Appalachia each summer through 1971; Milton photographed miners and their families, and the landscape devastated by strip-mining. They also recorded interviews with some of the miners. Anne's role on these trips was crucial, for she initiated conversations with the women of these mining communities and, as a couple, she and her husband would be invited into their homes. "I often wonder why they let me go into their houses," Rogovin recalls. "I guess there was something about Anne and me, we didn't look threatening to them."

Rogovin went on to photograph residents of Buffalo's East Side, the neighborhood surrounding the Storefront Churches; Native Americans in Buffalo and on the nearby reserves; working and poor people of Buffalo's Lower West Side-- in a series that spans more than thirty years; steelworkers in Buffalo; and miners in Scotland, Cuba, Mexico, France, Czechoslovakia, Spain, Germany, Zimbabwe, and China, and, again, in Appalachia. His "Working People" and "Family of Miners" images pair photographs of workers at work and at home, visual manifestations of the fullness of people's lives and of the specificities and complexities of gender, ethnicity, and class in particular locations and at particular historical moments.

What is critically important is that while Rogovin recognizes the impact of social conditions and is unfailingly critical of the social and economic structures that impose and maintain these conditions, his photographs are not portrayals of abject victimization. Nor does he romanticize or heroize his subjects. Rather, he seeks to convey the effects of material reality on his subjects and how people live their lives in relation to social conditions. He is not satisfied with a one-dimensional portrayal of a subject, and his photographs defy simplistic interpretation, instead suggesting questions - about individual lives, communal circumstances, and the social and economic structures that shape these circumstances. Aware of his presence-- Rogovin unfailingly asks his subjects' permission before making a photograph - his subjects engage the camera and the photographer. Accordingly, there is a sense of connection, whether momentary or extending through years or even decades, in these photographs.

Milton Rogovin has dedicated his life's work to enabling people to see more clearly- as an optometrist, a political activist, and a photographer. He offers the following advice to those just beginning their life's work: "You must believe in what you are doing. When you run into problems you must keep plugging away and keep doing it. It is never easy. My slogan is 'Never give up!'" His work demonstrates an abiding respect for the humanity of his subjects, awareness of how people's circumstances and surroundings have an impact on their lives, and consciousness-- even, at times, astonishment-- at the resilience of human beings as he makes visible that which might otherwise remain unseen.

Note: this essay is excerpted from Melanie Herzog's book, Milton Rogovin: The Making of a Social Documentary Photographer, published by the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, Arizona and the University of Washington Press (2006).

http://www.miltonrogovin.com/home.php
http://www.danzigerprojects.com/

Upcoming Exhibitions at the Australian Centre for Photography

2009-11-16T23:45:00.016-05:00

Upcoming Exhibitions at the Australian Centre for Photography in Paddington

Montalbetti And Campbell: The Sensualists in Gallery 1 and 2
November 27, 2009 - January 23, 2010

If Botticelli were alive today he'd be working for Vogue - Peter Ustinov

In a lush, immersive feast for the senses the creative duo of Denis Montalbetti and Gay Campbell present a stunning array of personal and commissioned work. With a taste for the baroque their images are marked by a rich visual complexity subtly laced with a darker sensuality. In this exhibition the works are staged in a series of installations styled by Cassandra Scott-Finn, creating a fairytale journey through the imagination of two of Australia's most celebrated photographers.

Multi-award-winning masters of the studio and of postproduction, Montalbetti and Campbell harness the full potential of digital technology to create images with a nonetheless timeless quality. With a practice that spans commercial editorial and fine art, they remind us that many of the artists of the past created their greatest works to commission and for a purpose.

Images © Montalbetti and Campbell

Simon Harsent: Melt in Gallery 3
November 28, 2009 - December 13, 2010

Simon Harsent's Melt begins with images of massive icebergs as they enter Greenland's Disco Bay from the Ilulissat Icefjord and ends off the East coast of Newfoundland. This is an area known as Iceberg Alley and is where, in 1912, the Titanic met its fate. By the time they reach Newfoundland the icebergs have travelled hundreds of miles, and have been so battered that they are little more than a broken spectre of their former selves.

Seeing them first in their austere grandeur and then, later, dissolving into the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, is both awe-inspiring and humbling: a metamorphosis that endows each iceberg with a lifespan, a story and a personality.

Simon Harsent was born in England and currently divides his time between Australia and the USA. He has exhibited internationally and has received a number of prestigious awards for his photographic work.

Image © Simon Harsent

Now And When in Gallery 4
November 27 - December 13, 2009

ACP is developing a major new social inclusion program. We are delighted to present here photographs from an early research trial, which ACP ran in partnership with the Salvation Army's Oasis Youth Support Network in Surry Hills. The participants were young people struggling to re-engage with the community in positive ways.

http://www.acp.org.au/

The Searchers: Sasha Bezzubov and Jessica Sucher at Daniel Cooney Fine Art in New York

2009-11-16T23:42:00.015-05:00

SASHA BEZZUBOV AND JESSICA SUCHER: THE SEARCHERS
Until December 23, 2009 at Daniel Cooney Fine Art

The photographs in The Searchers look at various aspects of Western spiritual tourism in India. India has long had a vast, loosely organized industry in Spiritual training made up of Utopian communities, yoga centers, meditation retreats, Gurus both Indian and Western, and a massive circuit of festivals, pilgrimage sites and places of worship. This landscape of spiritual (and social) possibility, along with exotic surroundings and low costs draws large numbers of Western seekers who come for a week or a lifetime.

The Searchers builds on our previous work The Gringo Project (Sasha Bezzubov, 1997-2003) and Expats and Natives(Sasha Bezzubov and Jessica Sucher, 2002-2005) by addressing the population of young Western travelers visiting the developing world, their relationship with their host country, and what this means within the larger questions of history, economy, race, and idealism.

The Searchers consists of several distinct series (ranging in genre from portraiture to landscape to abstraction), which compliment and inform one another. Believing that no one stylistic approach could accommodate this multi-layered subject, we formed several responses - from somber to humorous, from visually driven to conceptually structured. Using 4x5 and 5x7 view cameras, we photographed transient seekers and lifetime converts, architecture in the communities they found, and the spiritual practices they engage in.

http://www.sashabezzubov.com/index.php
http://www.danielcooneyfineart.com/index.html

Exhibitions at Bruce Silverstein Gallery in New York

2009-11-16T23:22:00.019-05:00

Yao Lau: New Landscapes
Until December 12, 2009 at Bruce Silverstein Gallery in New York

Bruce Silverstein Gallery is pleased to announce the first New York exhibition by Chinese artist Yao Lu. The artist has created a thoughtful and timely series inspired by traditional Chinese paintings entitled New Landscapes in which mounds of garbage covered in green protective nets are assembled and reworked by computer to create images of rural mountain landscapes shrouded in the mist. Lying somewhere between painting and photography, and between the past and the present, Yao Lu's work speaks of the radical mutations affecting nature in China as it is subjected to rampant urbanization and the ecological threats that endanger the environment.

According to Lu, “Today China is developing dramatically and many things are under constant construction. Meanwhile many things have disappeared and continue to disappear. The rubbish dumps covered with the 'shield', a green netting, are a ubiquitous phenomenon in China.”

Born in 1967 in Beijing, Yao Lu attended Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA). Lu’s work has rarely been seen in the West, except at the Fotofest Biennial in 2008, and the "Space and Transportation" exhibition in Graz, Austria in 1997. He won the 2008 Paris Photo BMW Prize for contemporary photography. His work has been shown in numerous festivals and collective exhibitions around China: Lianzhou International Photo Festival 2007, New China Occidentalism – China Contemporary Art in Beijing in 2006, Pingyao International Photography Festival in 2004. Currently, Lu lives and works in Beijing.

Aaron Siskind Foundation: Constructions
Until December 12, 2009 at Bruce Silverstein Gallery in New York

Photographer and educator Aaron Siskind holds a preeminent place in the history of American photography. Beginning his photographic career in the 1930’s as a social documentarian with the New York Photo League, he ultimately radicalized the medium by emphasizing the photograph as an abstract form of expression and an aesthetic end in itself. As the sole photographic member of the American Abstract Expressionist movement, Aaron Siskind is regarded as one of the most influential photographic-based artists of the 20th century.

Siskind taught in New York City's public schools for 25 years before becoming recognized as a photographer and then a gifted pioneer of photographic education. His vision and methods have and will continue to inspire and instruct future generations of artists and teachers.

The Aaron Siskind Foundation maintains this legacy by providing annual grants which “encourage and celebrate artistic achievement in contemporary photography by supporting the creative endeavors of individual artists working in still-photography and photography-based media.

John Wood: Collages, 1955 - 2006
Until December 12, 2009 at Bruce Silverstein Gallery in New York

John Wood is known as an artist’s artist. He is one of the pre-eminent artists and educators of our time. A master of processes from straight photography, collage, cliché verre, solarization, mixed media, offset lithography to drawing. He has an incredible ability to work decisively across a variety of media with ease. Wood spent 35 years teaching photography and printmaking at the School of Art and Design at Alfred University in Alfred New York. His teaching, his art making, and his life are intricately entwined, each reinforcing the other.

Born in California in 1922, John Wood’s early childhood was marked by the effects of the Depression. His family made frequent moves, as his father sought better employment. While in third grade, John began taking drawing classes at the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, New York for several years. In 1941 he volunteered for the Army Air Corps, where he trained as a B-17 pilot.

By 1950 John Wood was determined to study art and design. He subsequently trained as a visual designer and photographer at the Institute of Design in Chicago, John Wood’s work freely moves between conceptual and visual exploration. He loves to draw, the way some people love to read.

He has exhibited extensively and his work can be found in most major collections. John Wood’s exhibitions are noted for their breadth and strength. His work refuses to be shoehorned into one style. At a time, when specialization in art was the norm, he exhibited work in photography, drawing, printmaking and artist’s books. His unique books especially bring the power of his ideas into a cohesive whole.

This exhibition represents a survey of his collage work from the 1950s through 2006. Currently, John Wood lives in Baltimore, Maryland with his wife, Laurie Snyder who teaches photography at the Maryland Institute College of Art. They migrate each summer to their home and studio in Ithaca, New York.

Bruce Silverstein /20: On View: selections from the gallery
Until December 12, 2009 at Bruce Silverstein Gallery in New York

Jesse Chehak

Joel-Peter Witkin

Ernst Haas

http://www.brucesilverstein.com/index.php

2009 Nokia Mobifest in Toronto

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Nokia Mobifest Toronto Fourth Annual Festival shines a spotlight on the world’s best made-for-mobile films
November 17, 2009

Nokia Mobifest Toronto, Canada’s premier made-for-mobile film festival, will present more than 35 films & videos under 90 seconds, from nearly 20 different countries on November 17th, 2009 at the Revue Cinema at 7pm. The festival screening will offer attendees the opportunity to view a variety of exceptional made-for-mobile-platform films, including 2 competitive series - the official festival selections and the completed Toronto Made-For-Mobile Challenge films; plus 2 showcase series - World Tour 2009 highlight films and a sneak peak of 2 Athletes in Motion (AIM) films.

Along with this year’s official selections, the November 17th event will screen completed works from the first-ever Toronto Made-For-Mobile Challenge. The inaugural competition saw Nokia Mobifest Toronto select five of the city’s most promising filmmakers and challenge them to produce, shoot and edit a 90-second, Toronto-themed made-for-mobile film in 24 hours. Participating filmmakers were the first in Canada to use the soon-to-be-released N86 8MP phone from Nokia – an exciting new device boasting an 8-megapixel camera with ultra-wide angle Carl Zeiss optics. The challenge winner will be announced at the screening and be presented with a $2,500 cash prize, generously donated by the City of Toronto.

The fourth annual event will also screen a sneak preview of two films from the Athletes in Motion (AIM) project, including a film directed by Jason Priestly featuring World Champion Downhill Skier, Jan Hudec. The special series of 2-minute vignettes featuring Canadian athletes was commissioned by CTV Bravo!FACT for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games.

As part of the mobile World Tour in 2009, the festival will also screen films hailing from the Hong Kong Mobile Film Festival, The Netherlands Viva la Focus festival and Spain’s Mofilm festival. Nokia Mobifest Toronto is one of ten International mobile film festival World Tour members – a reciprocal deal that sees notable mobile fests from around the world spotlight each other’s strongest submissions.

Nokia Mobifest Toronto founder, Duncan Kennedy, enthuses, “The proliferation of the mobile screen is undeniable. With more than 500 million video-capable mobile devices globally, the mobile platform is now the largest video and film distribution platform since the television. As usability and image technology improves, mobile video will continue to attract creative minds, increasing the quality and breadth of content offerings. We are so pleased that Nokia continues to demonstrate their unwavering support for the creative community; consistently offering unique opportunities for forward-thinking filmmakers to be recognized and excel in this rapidly growing arena.”

All official festival selections are eligible to win in one of three Nokia Mobifest Toronto award categories. The first award, Shot on Mobile, will go to the entry that best exemplifies compelling and creative content specifically shot using mobile technology. The festival’s second award will be given out to the top Animation entry, and the final honour will be awarded to the winner of the prestigious Best of Festival prize: an award that includes a one week trip for two to the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, California—plus $2,000 cash. An esteemed industry jury will select the award winners by screening each submission on a Nokia device.

www.mobifest.net

Robyn McCallum: Patrimony at Pikto Gallery in Toronto

2009-11-16T23:00:00.007-05:00

Robyn McCallum: Patrimony
Until December 11, 2009 at Pikto Gallery

"The reinterpretation of well known works has long been a tradition in fine art, rooted in the renaissance artists' varying versions of such iconic images as the Last Supper or Madonna and Child. Operating within a more modern context, the images in this series similarly represent the appropriation and re-contextualiztion of art, in particular classical western paintings.

This series employs more "modern" representations of women to recreate famous paintings from throughout art history. In doing so it illuminates the through-line of female representation that exists art historically: from early fine art paintings to the pop cultural images of the 20th century. Using magazine 'pin-ups' to represent the more modern woman is itself a significant selection, in that these were images unabashedly created with the aim of sexual excitement. However, one cannot ignore the relationship between these representations of women and the equally objectifying nature of the historical paintings being re-contextualized. Many of the high art paintings created throughout history were done so as pornography in an era preceding film, photography and the Internet. It is only through the passage of time that "high art" and its acquired status has succeeded in distancing itself from this fact".

Distillery District, 55 Mill St. Bldg. 59-103, Toronto

http://www.pikto.com

Exhbitions Until January 23, 2010 at York Quay Centre in Toronto

2009-11-16T22:02:00.034-05:00

Hinterlands: Fastwürms I Sky Glabush I Diana Thorneycroft I Colette Urban - Curated by Patrick Mahon
Until January 3, 2010 at York Quay Centre at Harbourfront Centre

The exhibition Hinterlands takes as its focus the works of five contemporary Canadian artists (Fastwürms are two) who mine the potential of distant and “unseen” places as zones of myth-making that encourage psychological disclosure. Each of the four projects represented in the exhibition is predicated on the notion of a place partially understood to be “out there” that betrays a readiness to be encountered as strangely familiar. Through painting (Glabush), photography (Fastwürms, Thorneycroft), and video and performance-installation (Urban), the artists of Hinterlands bring the periphery to the centre, maintaining a fascination for the particular and the psychologically charged qualities of places that are just beyond the reach of everyday experience. The artists of Hinterlands propose our re-consideration of the potential of “lost” zones to be engaged for the purposes of play, psychological speculation, and cultural and environmental criticism. – Patrick Mahon

Colette Urban, BARE, 2008 Performance
Diana Thorneycroft, Group of Seven Awkward Moments (Lake and Mountains with Double-double), 2008

Kalle Kataila: Landscapes and Contemplations
Until January 3, 2010

Kalle Kataila's photographic series captures the experience of being present in a moment and observing the landscape in stillness. Being part of the landscape that we interconnect can lead us to explore our relationship and understanding with the environment around us. Landscapes help us to reflect on our role as humans in the ever-changing diversity of our planet’s landscapes.

Kataila seizes moments of contemplation. A landscape shows nature in all its varied beauty, but also our ability to shape it in a harmonious and sustainable way. Landscapes also reveal the impacts of our acts that might not always be positive. The relationship between man and landscape is constantly redefining itself as man builds and changes his surroundings and the climate.

The challenge is to preserve the beauty of the natural world, and to alter it wisely. Increasing awareness of climate change and the ongoing financial crisis pushes us to more closely consider our impacts, and underlines a responsibility to take care of the environment and landscape that we are creating for future generations.

There is the opportunity to pause, carefully observe and consider what we want to see on the horizon.

Kalle Kataila (b.1978 Helsinki) is an artist currently based in Helsinki, Finland. Kataila's work is based around concepts of landscape, awareness and personal stories. He has exhibited with artists from The Helsinki School at Paris Photo, Art Forum Berlin, École des Beaux-Arts, Paris and the Finnish Museum of Photography, Helsinki. Kataila's works are in art collections at the Helsinki City Art Museum and the Finnish State Art Gallery as well as in several private and corporate collections in Europe and in the United States.

Kalle Kataila, Contemplation Lapland, 2007 from the series Landscapes and Contemplations

Directed North: Garett Walker: Sledhead I Eamon Mac Mahon
Until January 3, 2010

Two artists present two unique photo-based series of works that seek out communities in the northern wilderness.

Garett Walker | Sledheads

Beyond the urban centres of southern Ontario, beyond the sprawling suburban communities, and up into the rural north, the landscape changes as does the climate. The wilderness opens up in its natural state and envelops the smaller and more isolated communities. The snowmobile was born out of this topography. These “chariots of the north” serve as a functional transportation vehicle for individuals and communities living in more remote and snowbound places across Quebec, Ontario, Northern Michigan and beyond.

I had heard about a vintage snowmobile rally in Eganville and it piqued my curiosity. With a growing interest in documenting regional cultural festivals in Canada, and as an outsider to snowmobile culture, I made my way northeast towards the Ottawa Valley. I’ve been documenting some of the lesser known Canadian cultural festivals, celebrations, and rituals of the present. In documenting a diverse range of smaller regions, communities, and individuals, I am attempting to construct an understanding of my own relationship to the multifarious notion of Canadian identity.

I have been documenting regional cultural events that are seldom seen outside their locales. These events are traditions that are important in building and maintaining regional communities in different places across Canada. As a country, Canada spans 9,984,670 square kilometres, making it the largest country in the western hemisphere. Its culture is as diverse as its geography, and so it is not so strange for me to feel like a foreigner inside the country I call home. This is one of the reasons why I wish to bring these activities into focus and share them with a larger public in hopes of including these hidden treasures in a larger picture of how we as Canadians view Canada.

Garett Walker completed his BFA in Photography and is currently working on his MFA in Documentary Media Studies at Ryerson University. He is an active participant in the Toronto arts community and has been the recipient of many private and public artistic development grants, which help to fund his ongoing work. Various private collectors and public institutions in Canada collect his work. Walker lives and works in Toronto.

Garett Walker, part of the series Sledheads

Eamon Mac Mahon

Since 2004, Toronto-based photographer Eamon Mac Mahon has spent up to three months of each year working in the wilderness of northwestern Canada and Alaska. These slow journeys via bush plane have allowed him to intimately photograph remote landlocked communities, and the vast areas of uninhabited land surrounding them. His work has appeared in various publications including the Walrus, National Geographic, W and New York Magazine, as well as exhibition spaces such as The Power Plant, The Detroit Institute of the Arts, the Griffin Museum of Photography in Boston and Higher Pictures NYC. Mac Mahon also spends much of his time creating video projections for stage productions, short films and documentaries.

Eamon Mac Mahon, from the series Landlocked: Living room, Uranium City, Saskatchewan

Visual Arts at York Quay at http://www.harbourfrontcentre.com/

Will Kwan: Multi-Lateral at Justina M. Barnicke Gallery in Toronto

2009-11-16T21:48:00.007-05:00

WILL KWAN: MULTI-LATERAL
November 12 - December 20, 2009 at Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Hart House, University of Toronto

Curated by Barbara Fischer

Multi-lateral is the first major solo exhibition of Toronto-based artist Will Kwan. Born in Hong Kong in 1978, Kwan’s work examines diverse cultural practices as impacted or resurrected in the flows of historical and contemporary economic relations. Involving intensive research and collaboration, the works presented in the exhibition map patterns and traces of colonialism as they persist within the global economy.

Will Kwan’s work often takes the form of searing iconographic formats. The exhibition includes Flame Test (2009), a series of flags imprinted with images of burning flags culled from the international press, installed in the Great Hall at Hart House. Inside the gallery, the artist has installed a large spiraling neon sign using NATO phonetic code, while a series of clocks indicate the local time in mostly obscure, but critical and hyper-specialized manufacturing centers of the global economy (Toyota City, Kibera, Halawa Heights and others) the way a wall behind hotel desks offers travelers the current time in Paris, London, Tokyo and New York.

Visually powerful, through photography, earth art, performance, and video, Kwan’s work often focuses on types of exchanges fostered within the multi-national banking system. For instance, Endless Prosperity, Eternal Accumulation (2009), presents a monumental series of photographic images of eighty varieties of hongbao—commonly known in North America as Chinese red envelopes. Containing money, and offered during festivities and social occasions, this Chinese cultural form has been appropriated by transnational financial corporations in North America, the European Union, East Asia and China for circulation to Chinese clientele. The envelopes suspend corporate insignia with the crenulated finery of chinoiserie consumed in both art historical and colonial references. Examinations of encounters between cultural identities are here staged through items that navigate the decorum of financial transactions with the graphic imagination of cultural history.

Will Kwan received his MFA from Columbia University, New York (2004), and was a research fellow at the Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht, The Netherlands (2005-2006). His work has been presented at P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center, New York (2005); the 50th Venice Biennale, Venice (2003); the Montreal Biennale, Montreal (2007); Duolun Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai (2006); Zendai Museum of Modern Art, Shanghai (2007); Art in General, New York (2004); The Power Plant, Toronto (2008); CAC, Vilnius (2003); the Polish National Museum, Poznan (2007); and Cittadellarte-Fondazione Pistoletto, Biella (2004). Kwan is currently a Lecturer in Sculpture and Art Theory in the Department of Studio Art at the University of Toronto Scarborough and a graduate faculty member in the Masters of Visual Studies Program at the University of Toronto.

Will Kwan, Flame Test, 2009. Courtesy of the Artist.

http://www.jmbgallery.ca

Jeff Thomas: Home/land & Security at Render in Waterloo

2009-11-16T21:31:00.009-05:00

Home/land & Security: A project by Jeff Thomas commissioned by Render
Until February 13, 2010

Opening reception, roundtable discussion and video screenings: Saturday, November 21
1 - 4pm at Render, University of Waterloo main campus

6 - 9pm at Waterloo Architecture, Cambridge

With Home/land & Security, artist and curator Jeff Thomas offers a distinct response to the land disputes that have erupted along Ontario’s Grand River valley on land defined as the Haldimand Tract. Initially developed out of a consideration of the ongoing conflict between members of the Six Nations and building developers in the town of Caledonia, Thomas’s project has expanded to embrace broader concepts of home and security and to explore the divisions between native and non-native communities. Commissioned by RENDER, the project embodies a hybrid artist/curator approach, with Thomas producing a new body of work that forms the basis of a dialogue with other artists. Thomas’s goal is to encourage cross-cultural dialogue and a deeper understanding of the history of the region.

The Six Nations were granted the Haldimand Tract by the British crown in 1784 following the American Revolution. Originally encompassing all of the land six miles back from each shore of the Grand River, the tract was reduced over the years through land transfers (many disputed) and government intervention, leaving the Six Nations with only a small reserve located between Brantford and Caledonia. Challenges to the loss of land have been ongoing since the late 18th century, however, in recent years these have become more high profile and confrontational with the recent standoff at the Douglas Estates near Caledonia being a prime example. Much of the original Haldimand Tract is now the site of established towns and cities, including Waterloo, Kitchener and Cambridge (RENDER’s primary programming region), and areas of these communities are the focus of additional land disputes.

Home/land & Security includes new works by Barry Ace, Sara Angelucci, Mary Anne Barkhouse, Michael Belmore, Ron Benner, Rosalie Favell, Lorraine Gilbert, Jamelie Hassan, Pat Hess, Penny McCann, Wanda Nanibush, Shelley Niro, Bear Thomas and Eric Walker, along with works by Jeff Thomas and archival images from Six Nations. Home/land & Security is a major programming initiative for Render. It represents a considered extension of Render’s interdisciplinary research approach and further expands on the critical links between the university and surrounding community by engaging with a complex issue that will actively define the future of the region.

In addition to the exhibition in Render’s gallery space on the main campus of the University of Waterloo, works will also be installed at Waterloo Architecture and at the Grand House in Cambridge. Home/land and Security has received the support of The Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.

Image: Jeff Thomas, The Delegate posed along the Grand River, Waterloo, Ontario, 2009. GPS: N43 21.452 W80 19.002. Courtesy of the artist.

www.render.uwaterloo.ca

Melissa Ann Pinney at Alan Klotz Gallery in New York

2009-11-16T19:32:00.013-05:00

MELISSA ANN PINNEY
November 12 – December 20, 2009 at Alan Klotz Gallery

Melissa Ann Pinney received a 1999 Guggenheim Fellowship for her photographs of American women and girls. This project became the book, Regarding Emma: Photographs of American Women and Girls, published in 2003 by the Center for American Places in partnership with Columbia College Chicago.

In her foreword to Regarding Emma Pinney states that: "The photographs in this book are based on my experiences growing up. Raised as a Catholic with five brothers and two sisters, I learned early on that girls had to fight for most everything: to get and keep one's share, for credit and recognition, to state one's view of things. When I found the courage to articulate my views, it was by way of wordless photographs that depict precisely what has often been considered insignificant in the domestic, social or cultural sphere. The pictures in this series look ahead to older women, then back to girlhood to see how our dreams and expectations of women are made visible; how feminine identity is constructed, taught and communicated between mothers and daughters."

Of her recent work Pinney has written: "My photographs are grounded in attentive observation of the world. I have come to understand that such mindfulness is rewarded by pictures more authentic and more mysterious than any I might have imagined beforehand ¾or manipulated in PhotoShop afterward. Family life , centered around my eleven year-old daughter, Emma, and my husband, Roger; Emma's friends; and the seldom- portrayed relationship of father and daughter; is my subject. A sense of place is essential to my way of seeing.

It is easy to take the familiar for granted and tempting to look to another place or culture for a fresh and more thrilling view. The challenge of working in depth and over many years with the familiar is to find the emblematic, to see with fresh eyes that which surrounds one day to day. I remain intrigued by ritual, the qualities of light and water and the passage of time."

In addition to the 1999 Guggenheim Fellowship, Pinney received a NEA in 1987 and Illinois Arts Council Grants in 1989 and 1987, among other awards. Pinney's photographs are included in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago, The Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. She received her Master of Fine Arts degree in 1988 from the University of Illinois at Chicago, following her BA in photography from Columbia College Chicago in 1977.

Melissa Ann Pinney has taught at Columbia College Chicago since 1984. She lives in Evanston, Illinois, with her husband and daughter. Pinney's photographs have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, DoubleTake, the Chicago Tribune, Ms. and U.S. News and World Report.

Lake Michigan, August, 2009
Emma, Reflected, 2009

Washington Park, Chicago (Three Girls in Shower), 2000

http://www.klotzgallery.com/index.php

Bruce Davidson: Five Decades at Bryce Wolkowitz and Howard Greenberg Galleries

2009-11-16T19:16:00.012-05:00

Bruce Davidson: Five Decades
Until December 19, 2009 at Bryce Wolkowitz and Howard Greenberg Galleries

Five Decades celebrates the fifty year career of Bruce Davidson with representative works from many of the artists essays. Photographs from Circus (1958), Brooklyn Gang (1959), Time of Change (1961) Los Angeles (1964) Subway (1980) as well as recent images are on display.

The exhibition at Howard Greenberg Gallery, entitled East 100th Street is a recreation of the Museum of Modern Art’s groundbreaking 1970 exhibition of forty-two highly regarded Bruce Davidson photographs curated by John Szarkowski.

505 West 24th Street, New York
http://www.brycewolkowitz.com/www/

41 East 57th Street, New York
http://www.howardgreenberg.com/

Laura Letinsky: To Want for Nothing at Brancolini Grimaldi in Rome

2009-11-16T18:36:00.018-05:00

Laura Letinsky: To Want for Nothing at Brancolini Grimaldi in Rome
Until December 13, 2009

The gallery has the pleasure to announce a new project of Laura Letinsky’s work, which has been commissioned on site in Rome, Italy. During one month this past spring, the Canadian artist photographed tabletops in historic and elegant Roman palazzi. These new still lives will be presented in an exhibition of Laura Letinsky’s work, alongside other recent projects: “The Dog and the Wolf” and “Fall”.

Laura Letinsky's elegiac photographs of detritus on a table-top are both elegantly prosaic and art historically resonant in their reference to Dutch vanitas still life painting of the Seventeenth Century.

This dialogue with painting is an important aspect Letinsky's photographs. As the artist has explained:

"It's so important for me that the photographs hover between being painterly - in the sense of light, colour, composition and plasticity - and being insistently photographic. They're photographs on photographic paper; they're made with the camera, they aren't digital effects. I'm really interested in the plasticity of photography and the way one reads it - like 'How can that be possible? That must be digital!' But no, it's not digital. Photography is like painting; it's an incredibly plastic medium."

Ranging from domestic setting to studio staging, Letinsky's still lifes are both everyday and infused with significance. Lyrical and formal, the subjects are dissolved by light, often set off against white walls and table cloths.

I explore formal relationships between ripeness and decay, delicacy and awkwardness, control and haphazardness, waste and plentitude, pleasure and sustenance.

Laura Letinsky is a Professor and Chair at the University of Chicago, Department of Visual Arts. Museum and gallery exhibitions include Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa; Casino Luxembourg; Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York; Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Nederlands Foto Institute; and The Renaissance Society, Chicago. Collections include the Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Publications include Now, Again, Galerie Kusseneers, 2005, Hardly More Than Ever, The Renaissance Society, 2004, Eating Architecture, MIT Press, 2004, Blink, Phaidon Press, 2002, and Venus Inferred, University of Chicago Press, 2000. She is represented by Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York.

Recent shows include To Say It Isn’t So, Yancey Richardson Gallery, NY, Dirty Pretty Things, Brancolini-Grimaldi Gallery, Rome, Italy, Interiority, Hales Gallery, London, and Allusive Moments, Rena Branstein Gallery, San Francisco, CA. Letinsky received her B.F.A. from the University of Manitoba in 1986 and her MFA from Yale University 1991. She has received support from the Richard Driehaus Foundation, the Illinois Arts Council, the Anonymous Was A Woman Foundation, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, and the Canada and the Manitoba Arts Council. yanceyrichardson.com

http://www.brancolinigrimaldi.com/

Massimo Vitali: Landscape with Figures 2 at Bonni Benrubi Gallery in New York

2009-11-16T18:25:00.010-05:00

Massimo Vitali: Landscape with Figures 2
December 3, 2009 - February 27, 2010 at Bonni Benrubi Gallery in New York

Bonni Benrubi Gallery

Bonni Benrubi Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of new work by Massimo Vitali, LANDSCAPE with FIGURES 2. The exhibition will present recent photographs from Italy, Turkey and Croatia. From a vantage point high above a scene, Vitali’s large-scale color images capture a surreal, sometimes voyeuristic view of the landscape that is often inhabited by carefree figures, such as sunbathers on a beach or tourists on holiday. His vistas allow the viewer to reflect on the rituals of modern leisure as captured by his large format camera. Oblivious to his presence, the people in Vitali’s images offer a wealth and depth of narrative action, allowing the viewer to discover reality in unexpected ways. His panoramic view of an amphitheatre in ruins in Turkey, while almost devoid of modern-day tourists, evokes the temporal nature of human existence, evidence of leisure rites of times past. Massimo Vitali began his career as a photojournalist and in 1994 went on to pursue his own vision. His work is represented in major public and private collections around the world and has been the subject of several monographs and museum retrospectives. This is his fourth solo exhibition at Bonni Benrubi Gallery.

Massimo Vitali, Scala dei Turchi Island, Sicily (2009)

http://www.bonnibenrubi.com/index.html

MARKO VUOKOLA: THE SEVENTH WAVE AT GALERIE ANHAVA IN HELSINKI

2009-11-16T18:11:00.006-05:00

Until November 22, 2009

MARKO VUOKOLA: THE SEVENTH WAVE

Galerie Anhava

"The works of The Seventh Wave are pairs of photographs each with precisely the same cropping and angle of view… The camera is on a tripod. I first take one photograph, and after a while another. I have wanted to vary the interval, keeping it "unscientific" and even indefinite. Anything between two seconds and six hours can pass between the moments when the pictures were taken."

"In some of the pairs, the difference can be seen easily, while in others it is less obvious. Even in the blink of an eye, many atoms will revolve, a grasshopper can leap, and a glimmer of light can change place."

This was how Marko Vuokola (born 1967) described the works of The Seventh Wave in 2007. By that time, the subjects of the images had ranged from Finnish sea and lake scenes to the grounds of Versailles, the earth and skies of Texas, and an Audi dealership in Helsinki's Herttoniemi suburb. Since then, the series has been expanded with images of paradise islands in Vietnam, an urban landscape and the window of a Finnish apartment building.

A characteristic feature of Marko Vuokola's work is that he takes large numbers of pictures, which he then sorts, selects and rejects until only one pair, almost perfect, remains of each "theme".

Marko Vuokola's art is at once grand – addressing the major basic issues of life – and restrained. It is demanding and enduring, similar only to itself. Since 1989, Marko Vuokola's work has been in dozens of exhibitions in Finland, Scandinavia, other European countries, and in the United States, Australia and Asia. He held his first solo exhibition at Galerie Anhava in 1992.

Mannerheiminaukio 3 00100 Helsinki,  Finland

http://www.anhava.com/

MICHAEL KENNA AT CAMERA OBSCURA IN PARIS

2009-11-16T17:16:00.008-05:00

Until November 28, 2009

MICHAEL KENNA: NEW YORK AND NEW WORKS

Galerie Camera Obscura

“Getting photographs is not the most important thing. For me, it’s the act of photographing. It’s enlightening, therapeutic and satisfying, because the very process forces me to connect with the world. When you make four-hour exposures in the middle of the night, you inevitably slow down and begin to observe and appreciate more what’s going on around you. In our fast-paced, modern world, it’s a luxury to be able to watch stars move across the sky"

Michael Kenna is widely considered the foremost landscape photographer of his generation. With a career spanning thirty years and exhibitions worldwide, Kenna continues his quest to capture beauty in his work. Rather than banal documents of everyday life, he offers us an alternative view: a combination of peace, harmony and balance. In our increasingly turbulent times, this is a welcome respite, offering us a more poetic reality, suggesting a slower pace and a more meditative approach to the world around us.

Often working at dawn or during the night, Kenna is best known as an artist who explores and illuminates the effect that human civilisation has on the natural world, recording the sculptural evidence and traces that man leaves behind. Here we see for the first time in many years his unique expression of some of the great cities of the developed world. Even here he has managed to find peace, tranquility and beauty amongst the hustle and bustle of daily life, giving us the unusual experience of a city such as New York with mere traces of human presence.

“Considered together, his images leave a striking impression that vastly different locations have been rendered as if they were all empty theatrical sets. Kenna transforms a place into a stage, on which all the drama of human life can be imagined”(Mark Johnstone).

Michael Kenna was born in 1953 in Widnes, Lancashire, in the industrial northwest of England, giving him an empathy for industry and the working environment which he returned to in his later photographic works. He studied at the Banbury School of Art and the London College of Printing, graduating with distinction in 1976. It was in this year that he first encountered Bill Brandt, who became one of his major influences; Kenna also cites as influences the European masters Atget, Emerson, Giacomelli and Sudek as well as the Americans Callahan, Sheeler and Steiglitz. All these photographers have clearly informed and inspired his vision.

In London, Michael undertook advertising photography while pursuing his personal work - photographing the landscape. In 1977, he moved to San Francisco. There he met Ruth Bernhard and became her assistant and photographic printmaker for eight years. Since then, Kenna has photographed in Europe, Asia, Russia, and through the Americas from Brazil to Canada, often returning to the same locations and revisiting recurring themes: an indeterminate time of day or night, a visual structure which emphasises harmonious or contrasting forms, and an enveloping aura of suffuse light or atmospheric mist.

The subject of over 20 books and hundreds of solo exhibitions worldwide, Kenna’s exquisitely crafted prints are also included in museum collections at The National Gallery, Washington, D.C.; The Art Institute of Chicago; The Biblioteque Nationale, Paris; Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, Arizona, ; George Eastman House, Rochester, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Maison Europeenne de la Photographie, Paris; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Tokyo Fuji Art Museum, Tokyo; The Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague; and The Victoria and Albert Museum, London to name but a few. In 2001, Michael Kenna was made a Chevalier in the Order of Arts and Letters by the Ministry of Culture in France.

Greenhouse, Study 1, Rubeshibe, Hokkaido, Japan, 2004
Brooklyn Bridge, Study 4, New York City, USA, 2000

Paolo's Beeswax Dog, 1995

268 Bvd Raspail, Paris

http://www.galeriecameraobscura.fr/#

PARIS PHOTO 2009 NOVEMBER 19 - 22, 2009

2009-11-16T00:57:00.003-05:00

PARIS PHOTO 2009

89 galleries and 13 publishers from 23 countries I 31 first-time exhibitors I 7 new countries will be represented (Iran, Lebanon, Morocco, Portugal, Russia, Tunisia , UAE) I 75% of the participants are non French I 38,000 visitors expected I 500 international photographers

SELECTION COMMITTEE

Guido Costa, Turin I Howard Greenberg, New York I Edwynn Houk, New York I Tim Jefferies, Hamiltons, London I Priska Pasquer, Cologne I Françoise Paviot, Paris I Timothy Persons, Taik Gallery, Helsinki I Renos Xippas, Paris/Athens

PARTICIPATING GALLERIES AND PUBLISHERS

798 Photo Gallery I Antiquariaat L. van Paddenburgh I Aperture I Assar Art Gallery I B21 Gallery I Base Gallery I baudoin lebon I Bernard Quaritch I Bernheimer Fine Art Photography I Bonni Benrubi Gallery I bookshop M I Brancolini Grimaldi I Bruce Silverstein Gallery I Camera Obscura I Caprice Horn I Cokkie Snoei I Daniel Blau Photography I Denis Ozanne I DNA I Dominique Fiat I Edwynn Houk I Eric Franck Fine Art I Esther Woerdehoff I Fifty One Fine Art Photography I Filigranes Editions I Flatland I FOIL GALLERY I Forma Galleria I Françoise Paviot I G/P I Galeria Fúcares I Galeria Toni Tàpies I Galerie 127 I Galerie Anhavagalerie du jour agnès b. I Galerie El Marsa I Galerie m Bochum I galerie michèle chomette I Galerie RX I Galerie van Kranendonk I Galleri Bo Bjerggaard I Goodman Gallery I Guido Costa Projects I Hamiltons I Hans P. Kraus, Jr., Inc. I Harper's Books I Hatje Cantz I Howard Greenberg I Johannes FaberJuana de Aizpuru I Keumsan Gallery I Kuckei + Kuckei I Kudlek van der Grinten I La B.A.N.K I La Fábrica Galería I Laurence Miller I Le RéverbèreLes filles du calvaire I Librairie 213 I Lumière des Roses I Magnum Gallery I Martin Asbæk Gallery I Max Estrella I MEM I Michael Hoppen Gallery I Michael Stevenson I Motive Gallery I Nusser & Baumgart I Obsis I Patricia Dorfmann I Pente 10 I Phaidon Press Limited I Pobeda Gallery I Polaris I Priska Pasquer I Purdy Hicks I Robert Hershkowitz Ltd I Robert Klein Gallery I Robert Koch Gallery I Robert Mann I Robert Morat I Schaden.com I Selma Feriani Gallery I Serge Plantureux I Sfeir-Semler I Silk Road I Steidl I TaiK I Tanit I TARO NASU I The Empty Quarter Gallery I The Photographers' Gallery I Thessa Herold I Tissato Nakahara I Toluca I TORCH Gallery I Van Zoetendaal I Vintage Gallery I Vu' la Galerie I Woodfinch Rare Books I Xippas I Yancey Richardson

Arab and Iranian Photography
In 2009, Paris Photo turns the spotlight on photographic work from the Arab countries and Iran in what is an unprecedented exploration of the practice in this part of the world. While photography arrived in the region in the 19th Century, it is at the turn of the present century that it became the preferred mode of expression on what is today a rich, diverse and autonomous contemporary art scene.

The project is curated by Catherine David who was responsible for Documenta X in Kassel in 1997 as well as numerous exhibitions and publications on Middle Eastern artistic expression.

CONFERENCE

6:30pm - 8pm
Thursday, November 19, 2009

”Spotlight on the Arab and Iranian scene “ round-table discussion, as part of the IMA’s “Jeudi de l’IMA” conference programme. Catherine David, guest curator for Paris Photo 2009, will lead a discussion with invited artists from the Middle East on the major characteristics of the contemporary Arab and Iranian scene.

Invited guests are: Yasser Alwan (photographer, Cairo), Yto Barrada (photographer, Tangier), Bahman Jalali (photographer, Iran), Walid Raad (Lebanese artist, teacher at Cooper Union NY, member of the Arab Image Foundation in Beirut), Maria Golia, author of Cairo, City of Sand (2004) and Photography and Egypt (to be published on January 2010).

Institut du Monde Arabe, 1 rue des Fossés Saint-Bernard, Place Mohamed V – 75005 Paris

12 noon - 1pm
Friday, November 20, 2009

Mirjam Brusius (University of Cambridge, The British Library): Persia, Photography and Prestige. Nasser Al-Din Shah (r. 1848-1896) and the early advancement of a new medium in the Middle East.

Why did photography arrive in Iran only a few years after it was invented? How did photography prove useful to the Shah and how did it help him to gain internal and international prestige? Why did many Europeans come to Persia in the 19th century to take photographs? The talk will explore some of the earliest examples of Iranian photography from the Golestan Palace, Tehran.

Project Room

6 pm - 7 pm
Friday, November 20, 2009

Image Foundation: Presentation of the Arab Image Foundation's limited edition portfolio no.1 in the presence of Martin Parr and the members of the AIF.

Central Exhibition Space

4pm - 6pm
Saturday, November 21, 2009

Talk with photographer Roger Ballen

Project Room

4pm - 5:30pm
Sunday, November 22, 2009

Bamako Encounters 2009: Presentation of the 8th African Photography Biennal by Art Directors Michket Krifa and Laura SErani as well as Sophie Renaud, Director of the Department for artistic exchange and cooperation of Culturesfrance.

Project Room

Paris Photo was created in 1997 by Rik Gadella, a Dutch publisher and soon became the world’s first photography fair. In 2002, Paris Photo was taken over by Reed Expositions France which owns and organises the event.

Since 2001, Paris Photo highlights a specific foreign scene:

2009: Arab and Iranian Photography I Catherine David, curator
2008: Japan I Mariko Takeuchi, curator

2007: Italy I Walter Guadagnini, curator

2006: The Nordic Countries I Andrea Holzer, curator

2005: Spain I Rosa Olivares, curator
2004: Switzerland I Nicolas Trembley, curator

2003: Mexico I Olivier Debroise, curator

2002: The Netherlands

2001: Germany

2000: Corporate Collections

1999: Fashion and Photography

IMAGES

Holly Andres
The Red Purse, 2008 from the series: Sparrow Lane. Robert Mann Gallery, New York

Reza Aramesh
Action 51: Kerem Shalom, Israel - February 17, 2008. Palestinian prisoners sit blindfolded on the ground after they were captured by Israeli soldiers. B21 Gallery, Dubai

Jessica Backhaus
What Still Remains "Marlon Brando", circa 2006. Robert Morat Galerie, Hamburg

http://www.parisphoto.fr/

PETER BREG: HOSTAGE: THE 1979 CRISIS IN IRAN AT IX GALLERY UNTIL NOVEMBER 28TH

2009-11-15T18:22:00.004-05:00

November 4 – 28, 2009

PETER BREGG
HOSTAGE: THE 1979 CRISIS IN IRAN

Images were taken by CP Photojournalist Peter Bregg during the 444 days that 52 United States Embassy staff were held hostage in Iran. This exhibit marks the 30th anniversary of the crisis that started it.

11 Davies Ave. # 303

www.ixgallery.ca

IT WILL ALL BE DIFFERENT: MING WONG AND JIN-ME YOON AT TRINITY SQUARE VIDEO

2009-11-15T18:12:00.005-05:00

November 12 - December 12, 2009

IT WILL ALL BE DIFFERENT: MING WONG AND JIN-ME YOON AT TRINITY SQUARE VIDEO

Reel Asian and TSV are pleased to present the work of two renowned artists, Berlin/Singapore-based Ming Wong and Vancouver’s Jin-me Yoon. Central to the works of both Wong and Yoon is the conflict between body and place—a conflict that is represented by the exchange between the artists’ bodies and the transitional spaces into which they insert themselves.

In Angst Essen / Eat Fear, Ming Wong plays all the characters in a densely layered restaging of Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (Angst essen Seele auf), Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s seminal film about love between cultural outsiders. Using green-screen compositing, Wong is able to appear on screen as both Ali, a young Moroccan immigrant worker, and Emmi, a German cleaning woman – as well as all the secondary characters.

In a pivotal moment from the original film, Emmi and Ali are refused service at an outdoor café. The couple imagines a “somewhere”— a place of reprieve that, when visited together, will alter the reality at hand. “When we get back,” Emmi says, “it will all be different.” With his recreation of this scene, Wong suffers the same indignation: the alienation is echoed as his own race and gender are inserted into the narrative. His redoubled return to this material assures difference.

Jin-me Yoon’s performance-based video series, As It Is Becoming (Beppu, Japan), features the artist, clad in black, crawling on the streets of Japan like an alien creature or a wounded soldier. These rigorous actions evoke scenes of evasion or survival combat techniques. Her body moves through Kannawa District’s urban renewal, through a former U.S. army base converted into a park, and across an atomic treatment centre. Yoon’s odd physical feats do not fit here. The contrast of her clothing against the landscape makes it seem as though she was composited atop the scene, hovering about its surface. Exploring the conflict between her body and these places is twinned with her identity as a Korean-Canadian foreign to Japan. Yoon’s haunting work creates a new, uneasy space for us to consider ideas of identity and nationalism.

Ming Wong lives and works in Berlin and Singapore. He represented Singapore at the 2009 Venice Biennale where he received a Special Mention for his solo exhibition, “Life of Imitation.”

Jin-Me Yoon lives and works in Vancouver and teaches at the School for the Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University. She has exhibited extensively nationally and internationally and was shortlisted for the 2009 Grange Prize. She is represented by the Catriona Jeffries Gallery, Vancouver.

Reel Asian thanks the Japan Foundation for its support.

401 Richmond Street West, Suite 376, Toronto

www.trinitysquarevideo.com

Jennifer Montgomery: Canadian Premiere of Deliver in Toronto

2009-11-14T20:47:00.008-05:00

The Images Festival presents a special double feature!

Deliver by Jennifer Montgomery (Canadian Premiere!)
Deliverance by John Boorman (35mm archival print!)

One night only!
Thursday December 3, 2009, 7 & 9 PM

Innis Town Hall, University of Toronto

2 Sussex Avenue (St. George Station)

Advance tickets: 10$, 15$ for both // Day of tickets: 12$, 20$ for both

Deliver by Jennifer Montgomery takes John Boorman’s classic 1972 film Deliverance and remakes it with an all-female cast. Shooting in the Catskills of New York rather than Appalachian Georgia, the film includes experimental filmmakers and academics (Peggy Ahwesh, Jacqueline Goss, Meredith Root, Dani Levanthal, Su Friedrich and Montgomery herself) playing mirages of themselves—urban artists looking to unplug in the unspoiled wilderness. Montgomery follows John Boorman's original movie and James Dickey's original book closely, as the gender inversion complicates hegemonic notions of nature, power and sexual violence, all on a stretch of river coincidentally called The Beaverkill.

For Deliver’s Canadian premiere, the Images Festival is presenting Montgomery’s film in a special double feature with Boorman’s original screening from a rare 35mm archival print!

7 PM: Deliver (Jennifer Montgomery, 2008, HD video, 98 minutes)
9 PM: Deliverance (John Boorman, 1972, 35mm Cinemascope, 110 minutes)

Advance tickets available NOW at the following locations:
Online at http://www.imagesfestival.com/store (PayPal or credit cards NO service charges!)

Queen Video, 480 Bloor Street West, east of Bathurst (Cash, Credit, Debit)

Toronto Women’s Bookstore, 73 Harbord @ Spadina (Cash, Credit, Debit)

Jennifer Montgomery's films include Notes on the Death of Kodachrome (2006), Along the Highway (2005), Threads of Belonging (2004), Transitional Objects (2000), Troika (1998), Art For Teachers of Children (1995), I, a Lamb (1992), Age 12: Love With a Little L (1990), and Home Avenue (1989). These films range from experimental essays to experimental features and are distributed by Zeitgeist Films, Women Make Movies and Video Data Bank.

Montgomery's works have shown at many international festivals, as well as venues including the Museum of Modern Art (NYC), Film Forum (NYC), the Gene Siskel Film Center (Chicago), the ICA (London), the Walker Arts Center (Minneapolis), and the Whitney Museum (NYC). She has been the recipient of grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Mary Nohl Established Artist Fellowship, the Jerome Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Wisconsin Arts Board, and Art Matters. She was twice nominated for the IFPÂ’s Independent Spirit Award.

She lives in Chicago and is an Assistant Professor in the Moving Image area at University of Illinois at Chicago's School of Art & Design.

"Like a generation of viewers, I was profoundly affected by Deliverance. But I have always been troubled by the hegemonic structures of gender proposed by Boorman and Dickey. Hence, my version is played by women: myself, Peggy Ahwesh, Jackie Goss, Su Friedrich, and Meredith Root, all experimental filmmakers who work as academics. While faithful to our respective male characters, we also play ourselves. Provocative questions arise through these filters of similarity and difference. My film's title, Deliver, refers to the re-birthing experience of surviving extreme physical challenges, the product-obsessed nature of the film industry, and, of course, the fact that it is only women who can, biologically, truly deliver. The lines between bathos and pathos become dangerously blurred. It is the aim of this film to pose critical questions about the gendering of nature, homosocial sexual violence, and the act of filmmaking itself." - J.M.

The Images Festival is the largest festival in North America for experimental and independent moving image culture, showcasing the innovative edge of international contemporary media art both on and off the screen. From Super-8 and hand-tinted celluloid to the latest video art, Images has presented thousands of films and media based projects since 1988. Images is committed to an expanded concept of film and video practice: alongside film and video screenings, the festival presents groundbreaking live performances, media art installations in galleries across the GTA and new media projects by many renowned Canadian and international artists. We go out of our way and over the edge to provide Toronto with an annual extravaganza of image making. Attended by more than 30,000 people each year, Toronto's 2nd oldest film festival is a critical forum for the independent media arts in Canada and around the world and provides artists with a supportive and professional forum in which to present their projects.

http://www.imagesfestival.com/

Trent Parke: Please Step Quietly Everyone Can Hear You in Paddington, Australia

2009-10-29T15:48:00.019-04:00

TRENT PARKE
PLEASE STEP QUIETLY EVERYONE CAN HEAR YOU

October 28 - November 28, 2009 at Stills Gallery

This year Magnum photographer Trent Parke, one of Australia's best-known and most original photographers, was commissioned by Sydney Opera House, as an artist in residence, to shoot behind the scenes. With his characteristic originality and imagination Parke takes us with him backstage. Working amidst the darkness, with strictly choreographed logistics, bizarre props and long hours, he captures, with frankness and affection a side of Sydney Opera House few of us have ever seen. The images that have resulted from this exciting collaboration will be on show in complementary exhibitions at Sydney Opera House and at Stills Gallery.

Whilst it is an architectural masterpiece and Australian icon, it is easy to forget that for some, Sydney Opera House is also a workplace. Behind the architectural statement, the grand operas and the thousands of tourists, there are electricians setting up lights, stage-hands moving props, opera singers eating lunch in the greenroom and people waiting to let the final curtain fall.

Parke's eye is drawn to the many details that may, ordinarily, be overlooked. The electric blues and oranges, kilometres of cabling, lines of tape and graphic arrows present a beautiful, if baffling (for the uninitiated) picture. We see wigs without actors, blood-stained props from tragedies, walls grafittied over years of waiting and the intestinal ducts of air conditioning. His wonderfully observant images capture layers of life and time that have accumulated over the years.

All those who visit Sydney Opera House will be able to view the free outdoor exhibition on the Forecourt from 22 October until February 2010. It will be a great opportunity for visitors to see both the inside and the outside of the house at the same time.

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Trent Parke, the first Australian to become a Full Member of the renowned photographers' cooperative Magnum Photo Agency, is considered one of the most innovative and challenging young photographers of his generation. Whilst working as a press photojournalist during the first years of his career, he received numerous national and international awards, including five Gold Lenses from the International Olympic Committee, World Press Photo Awards in 1999, 2000 and in 2005.

His latest and much-anticipated body of work - The Christmas Tree Bucket, is humour of the blackest hue. In a dazzling display of virtuoso storytelling Parke snaps the family ritual of Christmas with the in-laws and builds a gritty gothic tale of a nightmare lurking in the suburban shadows. Operatic in its vision and darkly satirical in its style, The Bucket is a photographic masterpiece destined for cult status. In 2008, The Christmas Tree Bucket was launched at The Australian Centre for Photography and was also premiered at ParisPhoto by Stills Gallery.

Welcome to Nowhere, which was included in Magnum's 60th Anniversary show New Blood, and exhibited at Stills Gallery in 2007, firmly establishes his ability to work with spectacular results in colour as well as his signature powerful black and white. Following the series Coming Soon, an exploration of urban spaces in colour, Welcome to Nowhere focuses on Australian backwaters, shot on medium format film to maintain fine detail even when printed large-scale. With Welcome To Nowhere Parke continues to create arresting tableaus that are magical in the stories they tell. Often absent of human presence the strong colours and formal composition, convey a stillness with surreal affect. Conversely, the humorous Man Vomiting testifies to Parke's ability to capture unforeseen moments of human behaviour, or in the case of the iconic Sharkbay WA, it is a bizarre gang of emus who seem to think they own the town.

The Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, acquired a selection of works from Welcome To Nowhere in 2007. This is a wonderful addition to the institutions he is held in, which include the National Gallery of Victoria, Gold Coast City Art Gallery, Art Gallery of NSW, and the National Gallery of Australia.

In 2003 Parke was awarded the prestigious international W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography for his series Minutes to Midnight. Parke documented his journey around Australia over a two-year period, examining 'the current and changing state of the Australian nation'. Capturing the mood of a still young and emerging nation, Parke examined the disjuncture between the perception of the Australian 'way of life', with its nostalgia and romanticism, and the more complex reality. Minutes to Midnight was exhibited for the first time at the Australian Centre for Photography as part of the Sydney Arts Festival in 2005. Works from the series were also included in the 2005 Noorderlicht Traces and Omens Photo Festival in the Netherlands and were featured by Magnum at Paris Photo in November 2005. In 2006 The National Gallery acquired Parke's thirty-piece suite of Minutes to Midnight. The suite was included in the Australian Art Gallery's exhibition Shoot: Five Australian Photographers in Focus and more recently (2009), was part of the Children's Gallery at the NGA.

Parke's Dream/Life & Beyond, exhibited in 2001 at Stills Gallery, presented a city seemingly peopled with spirits and shrouded in the mythical. The play of light and shade, individuals and crowds, reality and dream, elevates his works beyond the documentary. His book, Dream/Life, was awarded second place in the 2000 American Picture of the Year awards for photography books.

During 2000, Parke collaborated with Narelle Autio to exhibit The Seventh Wave at Stills Gallery. Their powerful and lyrical images of bathers captured the drama and otherworldliness that lies beneath the surface of the water.

The Seventh Wave and Dream/Life were exhibited in 2004 at Ariel Meyerowitz Gallery in New York, and at Foto Freo in Western Australia. In 2003, works from The Seventh Wave were selected to be part of the Summer Life exhibition at Alice Austin House Museum in Long Island, New York.

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STILLS is a leading Australian gallery with a focus on contemporary photography and multimedia art. The gallery, established in 1991, is housed in a converted warehouse with a large exhibition and printroom space in Paddington, Sydney's main gallery precinct. STILLS represents both emerging and established artists, and has a long history of fostering artists who work at the forefront of contemporary photo media practice. The gallery's annual program consists of nine exhibitions, and an extensive collection of works held in the stockroom can be viewed by appointment. STILLS also organises artist talks throughout the year to promote discussion and understanding of the exhibited work.

36 Gosbell Street, Paddington, Australia

http://www.stillsgallery.com.au/

Me-Take: Christian Thompson, Dianne Jones and Tony Albert at Perth Centre for Photography in Perth, Australia

2009-10-29T15:36:00.012-04:00

ME-TAKE: CHRISTIAN THOMPSON, DIANNE JONES AND TONY ALBERT
October 31 – December 13, 2009 at Perth Centre for Photography

Curated by Eva Fernandez

Bringing together the work of Christian Thompson, Dianne Jones and Tony Albert, this exhibition focuses on self-representation which examines, challenges and subverts notions of Indigenous representations.

Christian Thompson, 'untitled' 'Black Gum-2'

PCP’s focus is on promoting all forms of photo media in Western Australia, particularly new photography and emerging talent. The program features over 15 exhibitions a year, with solo or group shows from emerging and established artists as well as touring shows from interstates and overseas. For photographers interested in developing their skills, PCP offers workshops focusing on basic camera techniques and digital programs.

PCP organises discussions about photography and has created the IRIS Award, a national prize for contemporary portraiture and the CLIP Award, a national prize for contemporary landscape photography. PCP has established strong links with Universities and TAFE Colleges offering students a chance to broaden their view of Australia-wide and international photography.

Perth Centre for Photography
91 Brisbane St. Perth, Australia

http://pcp.org.au/

SIMRYN GILL: INLAND AT CENTRE FOR CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY IN AUSTRALIA

2009-10-29T12:00:00.013-04:00

SIMRYN GILL: INLAND
October 10 - December 13, 2009

Simryn Gill: Inland is a survey of photography and takes place in a photography gallery. It is important to declare at the outset, that while photography forms a significant and wondrous part of her practice, Simryn Gill does not consider herself a photographer; “For me, the taking of photographs is another tool in my bag of strategies, in that awkward pursuit of coherence we sometimes call art”.1 Simryn Gill: Inland embraces this conundrum as an entry point for considering Gill’s photography, and how photography might function more broadly as a way of engaging with the world.

Seven major series wind almost chronologically through the gallery—in this first survey of Gill’s photography—following a path, quite literally, from outside to inside, from found in nature to found in culture and back. Commencing with three series located outdoors, Forest (1996–1998), Rampant (1999) and Vegetation (1999), the survey moves to Gill’s sweeping interior series Dalam (2001). On the cusp of outside and inside is Power station (2004), which makes a curious and visceral analogy between the interior of her childhood home in Port Dickson, Malaysia and the interior of an adjacent power station. Like a medieval Book of Hours, the hand-sized concertina work Distance (2003–2009) is an attempt by Gill to convey the interior of her home in Marrickville, Sydney to someone residing outside Australia.

Gill’s most recent work Inland (2009), commissioned for this survey and photographed during a road trip from northern New South Wales to South Australia and across the bight to Western Australia, is at the heart of the exhibition. Gill’s only moving image work, Vessel (2004), commissioned for SBS Television, closes the exhibition’s journey with the almost imperceptible passage of a small fishing vessel across the horizon. To ground the exhibition, or perhaps to oversee our journey, one image is selected from Gill’s highly regarded series, A small town at the turn of the century (1999–2000).

Seeking an understanding of the politics of place informs her recent series. Inland confounds what is normally expected from photographs of Australia’s interior and eschews decorous landscapes, vast horizons or smiling rugged people, for modest interiors of homes. Indeed there are no people present, only the houses they have inhabited as evidence of their subjectivity.

Inland consists in piles of small jewel-like Cibachrome and black and white prints sitting on a table for viewers to peruse, heightening the provisional nature of its description, leaving open-ended the question of what can be known through photographic representation.

Presented by Centre for Contemporary Photography and Melbourne International Arts Festival, Simryn Gill: Inland is curated by Naomi Cass. Selections from Simryn Gill: Inland will tour to five regional Victorian venues in 2010 and 2011 with NETS Victoria and support from Melbourne International Arts Festival.

Centre for Contemporary Photography
404 George St, Fitzroy

Victoria 3065, Australia

http://www.ccp.org.au/

EXHIBITIONS FOR HIRE: THE AUSTRALIAN CENTRE FOR PHOTOGRAPHY

2009-10-29T11:16:00.017-04:00

I would like to see these exhibitions in Toronto. One of the bonuses of writing a blog is finding other artists that interest me. I admit I am selective; I don't post about every show that I have come across. The following exhibitions display the uncanny and humorous side of life. The exhibitions are available for touring. Information is available online.

The Australian Centre for Photography always has one or two exhibitions that interests me. I highly recommend visiting the site. I have provided information below about the centre.

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PIETER HUGO: NOLLYWOOD

The Nigerian film industry is the third largest film industry in the world, releasing between 500 and 1000 movies every year. Low budget, violent and excessive, most Nollywood productions take just 10 days to make, yet they are wildly popular in the lucrative African VCD market - an average film sells 50,000 copies. Nollywood movies now outsell Hollywood films in Nigeria and many other African countries.

For this series of portraits, Pieter Hugo collaborated with Nollywood actors to recreate the stereotypical scenarios that characterise their productions. His assortment of characters includes mummies, satanic demons and decomposing corpses, casually posing in the backlots of Enugu. With an eye for the absurd, he pays tribute to a unique industry that has stood up to the giants of the entertainment industry and come out on top.

Accompanying this exhibition will be a selection of Nollywood movie trailers in Gallery 2.

Images courtesy of Michael Stevenson, Cape Town and Yossi Milo, New York

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THE CHRISTMAS TREE BUCKET: TRENT PARKE'S FAMILY ALBUM

"It was there - while staring into that bright red bucket, vomiting every hour on the hour for fifteen hours straight - that I started to think how strange families, suburbia, life, vomit and, in particular, Christmas really was..." Trent Parke

So began Trent Parke's latest and much-anticipated new body of work. The Christmas Tree Bucket is humour of the blackest hue. In a dazzling display of virtuoso storytelling Parke snaps the family rituals of Christmas with the in-laws and builds a gritty gothic tale of a nightmare lurking in the suburban shadows. Operatic in its vision and darkly satirical in its style, The Christmas Tree Bucket is a photographic masterpiece destined for cult status. World premiere.

Trent Parke is represented by Magnum Photos, London, and Stills Gallery, Sydney

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GLENN SLOGGETT: CHEAPER AND DEEPER

There is a dark and off-colour humour at work in Glenn Sloggett's photographs of suburban Australia. Devoid of people, we read the signs and traces of suburban life in his images of dereliction, failed aspiration and abject domesticity. However, these are not pictures of disgust, but a sort of affection. He articulates that quintessential Australian trait, the ability to find the last glimmer of optimism in the midst of inevitable failure.

Glenn Sloggett's offbeat humour and uniquely Australian take on life are sure to be a hit with audiences across the country.

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The Australian Centre for Photography (ACP) is the country's leading arts centre for the exhibition and publication of, and education in photo-based practice. It is also the longest running contemporary art space in Australia, with over 35 years of exhibiting experience.

ACP exhibitions have played an important role in identifying and promoting the major artists of Australian photography as well as supporting new practitioners who have, over time, become mainstream national figures. The ACP initiated the first major retrospectives of work by photographers such as Max Dupain, Olive Cotton and Merv Bishop, and organised the early public displays of photographs by Bill Henson, Tracey Moffatt, William Yang and Trent Parke. The Centre has also presented works by international photo-artists such as Bernd & Hilla Becher, Manuel Alvarez Bravo, Larry Clark, Joan Fontcuberta, Nan Goldin, Roni Horn, George Platt Lynes, Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Duane Michals, Pierre Molinier, Erwin Olaf, Martin Parr, Man Ray, Cindy Sherman, Wolfgang Tillmans and William Wegman.

Increasingly new media have become another focus for the centre. These technologies have not only transformed the commercial photographic industry, but have contributed to a total redefinition of 'the photographic' and the relationship of art and popular culture. The ACP sees its role as facilitating the development of a vocabulary to understand the impact and potential of these technological and cultural changes and to engage the public through both exhibition and education programs.

The ACP is committed to showing Australian photomedia art alongside international work. It also promotes Australian photography overseas through exhibition and artist exchanges, publication and advocacy of Australian work to foreign curators. Touring exhibitions generated by the ACP have travelled to North America, Europe and South and East Asia. The bulk of the Centre's touring exhibitions, however, are shown in regional art galleries, contemporary art spaces, libraries and community venues all over Australia and in New Zealand.

In 1983 the Australian Centre for Photography launched Photofile - Australia's first publicly funded journal of photography. The publication is a vehicle for national debate and new writing around photography. Photofile has developed into a significant Australian magazine with both national and international content. It remains Australia's leading photomedia art magazine. Photofile is published three times a year. It provides representation, promotion and analysis of current practices in Australian photomedia art, ranging from documentary through to new digital technologies and including non-narrative film, video and computer-based work. Coverage is structured around provocative articles, portfolios of artists' work, short opinion pieces and reviews. Photofile is committed to critical writing that is historically and theoretically informed, presented in a stimulating and accessible way.

The Australian Centre for Photography also publishes catalogues and guides for many of its exhibitions. In 2002 it published Photographica Australis, a catalogue surveying the work of 18 Australian photomedia artists to accompany an exhibition of the same name shown at Sala de Exposiciones del Canal de Isabel II, Madrid for ARCO and subsequently touring. In 2003 the book was reformatted for an Asian market to accompany a revised version of the exhibition which, over the next two years, toured to the National Gallery of Thailand, Singapore Art Museum, 11th Asian Art Biennale, Bangladesh and the Taipei Fine Arts Museum.

The ACP is a not-for-profit organisation, funded jointly by the Australia Council, the Federal Government's arts funding and advisory body, and Arts New South Wales. Since 2004 it has also been in receipt of a major new grant under the Visual Arts and Craft Strategy (a joint Federal, State and Territory initiative) recognising its leading role and international reputation. The ACP earns half of its own revenue from non-government sources.

257 Oxford Street, Paddington NSW 2021

http://www.acp.org.au/

JAN PEACOCK: PLAY/BYPLAY AT QUEEN SPECIFIC IN TORONTO

2009-10-28T13:56:00.010-04:00

Jan Peacock: Play/Byplay
November 2 – December 8, 2009

QueenSpecific
next to Dufflet Pastries at 787 Queen St. West, Toronto)

Play/Byplay is two screens, two views, two actions – one observed, the other performed. The observed action is two magpies at play in a tree, passing a twig back and forth to one another. The performed action, the “byplay” carried on beside the main action, is an animation of the artist’s hands recorded on a scanner, enacting this observed dance, calculating distance and orientation to mimic the motion of the birds.

Jan Peacock works primarily in video and installation, and has exhibited widely throughout Canada, the U.S., Europe and Japan. Her work is found in international public and private collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Ludwig Museum in Köln. She has worked under numerous Canada Council grants and her work has received awards at the Atlantic Film & Video Festival, the Chicago International Film & Video Festival, and the Atlanta Film & Video Festival.

Jan Peacock is a recipient of the Bell Canada Award and the Canada Council Medal for her contribution to the field of video. She lives in Halifax, where she teaches at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design.

CAMERA AND STEPHEN BULGER GALLERY: FREE SATURDAY AFTERNOON SCREENINGS

2009-10-28T00:06:00.010-04:00

Lieux Mêmes

3:00PM - OCTOBER 31

CHEMIN DE CENDRES
Dir. Bertrand Carrière (Canada: 2009) 9 min. 40 sec.

PASSCHENDAELE
Dir. Paul Gross (Canada: 2008) 114 min.

3PM - NOVEMBER 7

CHEMIN DE CENDRES
Dir. Bertrand Carrière (Canada: 2009) 9 min. 40 sec.

THE BLUE MAX
Dir. John Guillermin (UK: 1966) 156 min.

3PM - NOVEMBER 14

CHEMIN DE CENDRES
Dir. Bertrand Carrière (Canada: 2009) 9 min. 40 sec.

A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT
Dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet (France: 2004) 133 min.

3PM - NOVEMBER 21

CHEMIN DE CENDRES
Dir. Bertrand Carrière (Canada: 2009) 9 min. 40 sec.

GALLIPOLI
Dir. Peter Weir (Australia: 1981) 110 min.

www.stephenbulgergallery.com

ALISON S.M. KOBAYASHI: THE SEVEN INCH FALL AT BLACKWOOD GALLERY

2009-10-27T18:50:00.009-04:00

Alison S.M. Kobayashi: The Seven Inch Fall (2009)
BLACKWOOD GALLERY PRESENTS THE BILLBOARD COMMISSION 2009

Until May 1, 2010
South Building Bernie Miller Billboard/Lightbox, UTM campus

Every Fall the Blackwood Gallery commissions an artist to produce a work for the Bernie Miller Lightbox, a billboard sized (268.0 cm x 176.5 cm, 108" x 72") venue installed on the outside of the South Building. The commissioned work stays throughout the school year. In the summer, the Lightbox displays the original work by Bernie Miller, 5-Minute Mirror (2001), which inaugurated the site.

Alison S.M. Kobayashi is an identity contortionist. In her work, Kobayashi incarnates a panoply of personas that are both studiously and playfully rendered. She strides a tense line between portraiture and caricature which presents a palpable commentary on the strictures our identities are continually subjected to. In each performance (usually made specifically for video), she synthesizes both the nuances as well as the stereotypes of each of the characters she embodies. Back and forth from finesse to crudity.

In The Seven Inch Fall, commissioned by the Blackwood Gallery in connection with its Fall 2009 exhibitions exploring notions of gravity, Kobayashi draws from the experience of her own recent graduation from the Art & Art History Program at UTM. To compose the image the artist references specific components of three films: Sandra Bullock in Miss Congeniality, Disney's Alice in Wonderland, Powell and Pressburger's 1948 classic The Red Shoes. The latter is particularly germane as a latent theme of the film is the fraught relation between apprentice and mentor, novice and veteran, teacher and student. Kobayashi is also playfully addressing the recurring scenario found in romantic comedies where, in her words, “a character turns heads with confidence and sex appeal in her stride, but suddenly, heels wobble, balance is lost, and she comes tumbling down from the film's pedestal of feminine perfection.”

The provocative image stages a fall which derails the reception of her diploma. The diploma is held in suspense by an anonymous man, an abstracted personification of authority. The final act of graduation is put on hold. Will she ever graduate? Does she actually want to? Perhaps the answer to those questions lies in the incongruous elements of the image—the movement of the face versus the rigid pose of the legs. The paradox of a still fall. The perplexing red shoes with their implausible angles further heighten the tone of ambiguity pervading the work. In other words, the image does not provide an answer, rather it poses a critical set of questions. Prominent amongst them is the specter of failure that is brought to the fore within an institution whose maxim espouses success. While accomplishments are undeniably laudable, the artist seems to unabashedly embrace an alternate scenario to the one where a diploma is the end goal. What could be the fallout from such a dissident position? - Christof Migone, Director/Curator

Alison S. M. Kobayashi is a visual artist working in video, performance, installation and drawing. She was born and raised in Mississauga and is currently working in Toronto. Her interest in found narratives resulted in two video works, From Alex To Alex and Dan Carter. Finding a lost letter in the first case, and a discarded answering machine tape in the second, Kobayashi imagines identities for each person mentioned in the narrative and then performs all the roles herself. In 2006 she won the TSV Artistic Vision Award for Best Local Short Film at the Toronto Reel Asian Film Festival and in 2007 was awarded the Mississauga Arts Award for Best Emerging Artist. Her films have been shown in Canada, the U.S. and Hong Kong.

For more information, including the artist statement please visit:

http://www.blackwoodgallery.ca/Blackwood_billboardcommissionTheSevenInchFall.html

ART FOR COMMUTERS

2009-10-27T00:40:00.009-04:00

Art for Commuters calls for Proposals or Expressions of Interest for CONTACT 2010

DEADLINE - DECEMBER 1, 2009

Art for Commuters exhibits slideshows on the network of over 270 Onestop LCD screens on TTC subway platforms to an audience of over 1 million daily commuters. This unique project venue will be an official public installation for the CONTACT Toronto Photography Festival to present site-specific work that explores the thematic focus of the 2010 festival Pervasive Influence.

In this era of instant information the widespread dissemination of images is stimulating sweeping, unprecedented change in the ways we communicate. Art for Commuters seeks proposals or expressions of Interest from artists and photographers whose work examines connections between mass media, advertising, art and photography. This includes images that utilize the codes of advertising, the language of consumerism, the stylization of marketing campaigns or the force of propaganda to reflect the emotional and political impact of photographic images and their effect on society and culture.

Project details: Images will be broadcast on subway platforms from May 1-31, 2010. Slideshows 30 or 60 seconds in durations will screen once every 10 minutes all day. The content of the slideshows can change either once or twice a day for up to 1 week. You can propose the number of related, or sequential, slideshows that your project requires. These would then play out over a number of days (up to one week), depending on the project’s needs.

The artist/photographer’s name and the title of their work will be displayed beside the slideshow whenever it is aired. All slideshows will also be presented on the website, and will be made available online from the day they screen on the TTC. The project will be prominently featured as a Public Installation within the festival.

Submissions must include: 5-10 sample images; image information sheet; bio or CV including contact information; artist statement that includes either a specific project proposal or a more general expression of interest that explains how your work addresses the theme Pervasive Influence.

Email your submission by December 1, 2009 to Sharon Switzer: contact@art4commuters.com

Produced by Art for Commuters, Onestop Media Group in partnership with the CONTACT Toronto Photography Festival. For more information on Contacting Toronto and details on CONTACT 2010 please visit our websites:

www.contactingtoronto.ca
www.contactphoto.com

BETRAND CARRIERE: LIEUX MEMES AT STEPHEN BULGER GALLERY

2009-10-27T00:31:00.008-04:00

Bertrand Carrière: Lieux Mêmes
October 31 - November 21, 2009

The gallery is pleased to announce its fifth exhibition of work by Bertrand Carrière. In “Lieux Mêmes”, Carrière retraces the footsteps of an unknown World War I photographer introduced to him through a photo album he discovered by chance.

In 2005, Bertrand Carrière (b. Ottawa, Canada, 1957) and historian Guth Desprez started to investigate the deeper history surrounding the found photo album. They travelled to Europe, with the photo album as their guide, in order to retrace the path of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. By photographing the locations in the soldier’s images, Carrière explores the themes of memory and history through the changing landscape. They visited the long list of places marked by the horrendous battles of The Great War: the Somme in Picardy, Artois in the North Pas-de-Calais and up to the vast fields of Flanders in Belgium. Carrière’s photographs document the sites which appear in the soldier’s album along with others on the Western Front, offering a contemporary view approximately 90 years after the infamous events, which continue to stigmatize these locations to this very day. The incredible light of the regions of northern France and the flatness of the land helps Carrière build a sens e of mystery. The photographs initiate dialogue about how the landscape was affected and the ways in which it has recovered. It is not only what is there or the evidence that remains, but also what is not there and the evidence of what no longer exists.

Carrière actively exhibits and publishes his work across Canada and in Europe. He has published four photographic books, which include Témoin de l’ombre (1995); Voyage à domicile (1997); Signes de jour (2002) and Dieppe, Landscapes and installations (2006) with Les 400 Coups. He also teaches photography at André-Laurendeau College in Montréal. Carrière’s work can be found in many prominent collections, including the Bibliothèque Nationale de Paris, Paris; Cinémathèque Québécoise, Montréal; Canadian Centre of Architecture, Montréal; Canadian War Museum, Ottawa; Collection du Prêt d’œuvres d’art, Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Québec; Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa; Encontros da Imagem, Braga, Portugal; Pôle Image de Haute-Normandie, Rouen, France; Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris; Canadian Council Art Bank, Ottawa; amongst many others.

www.stephenbulgergallery.com

LIVING TIME: TEHCHING HSIEH AND GUIDO VAN DER WERVE AT DHC/ART

2009-10-26T23:13:00.010-04:00

DHC/ART presents DHC SESSION Living Time: Tehching Hsieh and Guido van der Werve
October 16 - November 22, 2009

DHC/ART Foundation for Contemporary Art, is pleased to present DHC SESSION, a new compact autumn programming initiative comprising an exhibition, evening event series, in-gallery reading lounge and education projects. The curatorial focus is on presenting artworks and events within an annually changing and pedagogical framework that offers various paths for reflection and research on the work of artists, and is designed for visitors who want to make further explorations into contemporary art.

The inaugural DHC SESSION exhibition, Living Time, brings together selected documentation of renowned Taiwanese-American performance artist Tehching Hsieh’s One Year Performances and the films of young Dutch artist, Guido van der Werve. Time used as a material by both artists provides a vast thematic space in which they explore how time is felt and experienced and its role as the linchpin of human existence. Living Time is the Canadian premiere for Tehching’s Hsieh’s documentation and the works of Guido van der Werve.

Living Time presents a selection of documentation from two of Tehching Hsieh’s life and art-melding One Year Performances. In One Year Performance 1980-1981, the artist, dressed in a pale grey worker uniform, punches a time clock in his studio every hour on the hour for one year. For One Year Performance 1981- 1982, Tehching Hsieh lives outside for one year in New York City. The documentation presented in Living Time includes photographs, paper documents and films. Tehching Hsieh was born in 1950 in Nan-Chou, Taiwan and currently lives in Brooklyn. Beginning in the late seventies, Tehching Hsieh made five One Year Performances and one thirteen-year plan. The singularity of mission and endurance required in the performances heralded a radical approach to contemporary art. His performances achieved critical acclaim during this period. With his last two performances he retreated from the art world. His meticulous film, photographic and paper documentation of his performances has been presented internationally since 2000. Extensive installations of his documentation were presented at the MoMA and Guggenheim, New York in 2009. Website: www.one-year-performance.com

The exhibition also includes two films by Guido van der Werve. In nummer acht : everything is going to be alright (2007), the artist films himself walking slowly across the ice-covered Bothnian Gulf of Finland followed by an enormous icebreaker. And in nummer negen, : the day I didn’t turn with the world (2007), the time-lapse photography shows the artist standing at the North Pole for 24 hours and turning against time. Born in Papendracht, Netherlands in 1977 and now a resident of New York, NY, Guido van der Werve pursued studies in industrial design, archaeology, music composition and Russian language and literature at several universities in the Netherlands before creating his first video-documented performances around 2000. Since that time he has created a variety of works, including a series of films and videos and a musical composition titled by number in chronological order two to twelve. He has had recent solo exhibitions at La Maison Rouge, Paris and the Kunsthalle, Basel. He recently presented his new work, nummer twaalf (2009) at the MoMA, New York and will participate in Performa 09. Website: www.roofvogel.org

TOP IMAGE: Guido van der Werve, nummer negen, the day I didn't turn with the world, 8'48" time-lapse photography to HD video, the Geopgraphic North Pole 2007. Image by Ben Geraerts
BOTTOM IMAGE: Tehching Hsieh, One Year Performance 1981-1982, Life Image. Photograph by Tehching Hsieh. © 1982 Tehching Hsieh, New York

451 St-Jean Street (corner of Notre-Dame in Old Montreal) Montreal

www.dhc-art.org

WAR AT A DISTANCE AT GALLERY TPW

2009-10-26T22:07:00.009-04:00

WAR AT A DISTANCE
Stephen Andrews, Richard Johnson, Allyson Mitchell, Andrew Moodie, Greg Nelson, Suzanne Opton, Louie Palu, Adam Pettle, Jason Sherman, Francesco Simeti, and Graeme Smith

October 24 - November 21, 2009

Gallery TPW is pleased to present War at a Distance. A group exhibition of diverse works by both Canadian and international artists, War at a Distance explores practices of representation implicated in how Canadians are struggling to make sense of the war in Afghanistan. While war has always been mediated through image and narrative, new technologies and forms of documentary and artistic practice are continuing to alter the range of impressions available to a civic culture. Representations of the Afghan conflict have appeared in forms as diverse as contemporary art practice, television news reportage, documentary film, radio docudrama, personal YouTube videos, illustrated blogs and social media platforms. This new cultural landscape is embroiled in setting the terms for public conversations about Canada’s on-going involvement in a conflict that is taking place within a culture very different from our own. Blurring distinctions between art and journalism, documentary practice and aesthetics, galleries and broadcast media, war artists and combatant-diarists, The War at a Distance exhibition looks at the mediation of war and grapples with questions that emerge when artistic and journalistic forms are brought into relation.

Thursday, November 12, 2009, 7PM
Artist’s Lecture: Suzanne Opton

Ryerson University, Library Building, Room 72

Thursday, November 19, 7pm
Moderator: Sara Matthews, Assistant Professor in Culture and Conflict in the Department of Global Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University. Her work explores the affective difficulties of teaching and learning from traumatic historical events. Her current research considers how contemporary Canadian war artists are responding to Canada's mission in Afghanistan.

Matthews will begin the evening with a discussion of soldier-made YouTube videos as a viewing experience that disrupts the safety of critical or aestheticized distance.

Louie Palu, image detail from the series Zhari-Panjwai: Dispatches from Afghanistan, 2007

56 Ossington Avenue, Toronto

www.gallerytpw.ca

ANNIE ONYI CHEUNG: MI AT FLEISHMAN GALLERY

2009-10-26T21:54:00.007-04:00

Annie Onyi Cheung: Mi
October 16 - November 20, 2009

Fleishman Gallery

Annie Onyi Cheung's work in time-based and three-dimensional media explores themes of memory, identity, shame and vulnerability, as well as generational and cultural difference. She is drawn to concepts that can be investigated through experiential environments, unravelling imagery and narratives, and bridging gaps between disparate perspectives. Her art manifests as combinations of performance, video and installation.

The exhibition, Mi, includes a wall-mounted paper grid which documents calligraphy practice of elementary-level traditional Chinese vocabulary and family vernacular, examining each character's construction and pronunciation. The video component, Untitled (She Me), features a dream-like narrative that is projected as a continuous loop. The video, presented as a triptych, attempts to reveal the various manifestations of femininity that compete within certain social structures such as family, gender and nationality. The video contains no dialogue, instead opting to communicate through a vernacular of gesture to find relationships between tradition, gender and identity. The subtitle, ‘She-Me' refers both to the phonetic Chinese pronunciation of ‘wash rice' as well as the self-reflective quality of the video's world of interiors.

The installation will also be accompanied by a third element, a performance piece to take place during the opening reception. The live performance featuring both the artist and her mother, will further explore the complicated and conflicting notions of femininity and womanhood that influence and inform the artist's relationships with her mother and with her cultures.

Annie Onyi Cheung is a recent graduate of Art History and Studio Art from the University of Toronto.

79a Harbord Street,Toronto

www.fleishmangallery.blogspot.com

www.onyi-ajar.com

SU RYNARD: APPLES AT PAUL PETRO CONTEMPORARY ART

2009-10-26T21:49:00.007-04:00

Su Rynard: Apples
October 16 - November 14, 2009

Paul Petro Contemporary Art

Over 7500 different kinds of apples (malus domestica) are known to exist, but only a few are grown today. Each cultivar has it's own characteristics, and it's own name. I was intrigued by the names of apples that have all but disappeared – names such as Maidens Blush, Primate, Duchess, Snow, Wealthy and decided to document apple orchards on the older surviving farms around the perimeter of the city of Toronto. Journeys to this fray of urbanity lead me to discover another interesting series of names -- street names in housing developments and industrial areas named after the apples and orchards that once grew there.

The resulting dual projection piece juxtaposes two culturally constructed landscapes, the suburban and the agricultural, asking the viewer to consider how we live in the natural world. The lost cultivar names found on street signs draw attention to our dwindling biodiversity, yet naming is often a way to remember -- an act of commemoration. In this way, the apple names re-purposed as street names create a kind of pastoral history, evoking an image of what once existed, to market what now stands in its place.

Su Rynard works across a range of approaches: dramatic, experimental, documentary and installation. Her short video 'Signal' (3 min. 1993) marked the beginning of a trajectory where she began to look to science as a departure point for artistic inquiry. Her most recent feature-length film 'Kardia' - an exploration of the heart as soul and psyche, (85 min. 2005) completes this cycle. 'Kardia' was the recipient of the prestigious Alfred P. Sloan Prize. Su Rynard’s video’s have been exhibited in galleries including The National Galley of Canada and The Museum of Modern Art in New York. Her short films and video’s have screened at film festivals such as the Toronto International Film Festival, Rotterdam International Film Festival and the Biennial of Moving Images Geneva.

Apples (malus domestica) is the third work in a trilogy of video installations including Bug Girl (2003) and Bear (2006). In different ways, these three works explore our cultural relationship to the natural world.

980 Queen St West, Toronto

www.paulpetro.com

surynard@ca.inter.net | www.kardiathefilm.com

DIANA THORNEYCROFT: THE CANADIAN MARTYRDOM SERIES AT OTTAWA SCHOOL OF ART

2009-10-26T19:57:00.011-04:00

Diana Thorneycroft: The Canadiana Martyrdom Series
OTTAWA SCHOOL OF ART - MAIN GALLERY

October 15 - November 22, 2009

The OSA is pleased to present Winnipeg artist Diana Thorneycroft and her work “The Canadiana Martyrdom Series” as this year’s visiting artist from October 15 to November 22, 2009. In addition to continuing the annual visiting artist tradition, the OSA will be launching its first ever online exhibition catalogue for members of the public to have broader access to viewing the Series and providing feedback to the artist.

Image: Martyrdom of the Great One, The Canadiana Martyrdom Series, 2005

35 George St. Ottawa, ON

www.artottawa.ca

www.martyrdom.ca

WILLIE DOHERTY: PASSAGES AT PREFIX UNTIL NOVEMBER 28, 2009

2009-10-26T19:54:00.007-04:00

Willie Doherty: Passages
September 24 - November 28, 2009

Curated by Scott McLeod
Presented by Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art

Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art is proud to present Passages, an exhibition of photo and video works by acclaimed Northern Ireland artist, Willie Doherty. Curated by Scott McLeod, this exhibition represents the artist’s first solo exhibition in a Canadian public art gallery in thirteen years.

Commissioned by the Fruitmarket Gallery in Edinburgh, Scotland, and receiving its North American premiere at Prefix, Doherty’s video installation Buried (2009) explores themes of personal and collective memory, repression and loss while maintaining his characteristic concern for specificity of place. The exhibition also includes a selection of large, colour photographs that contrast the bucolic landscapes of Northern Ireland with a dark uneasiness, manifested through a series of roadblocks, barriers and traces of past violence.

Opening with an expansive, peaceful scene of a lakeside clearing, Buried depicts what appears at first glance to be an entirely natural, unspoiled setting. As the camera moves forward along a wooded path, remnants from past human activities are gradually revealed: a rope, latex gloves, a piece of fabric, wire tied to a tree. Each item becomes a tiny trace of some unknown, unknowable episode. Eventually the viewer is completely immersed in a dense, dark woodland, peering through a thick web of branches upon the glowing embers of a fire. With no explicit textual information to provide an explanation of events, it is the unknowable yet physically present narrative of the past, its sense of menace heightened by the inclusion of non-diegetic sounds, that provides the work with a chilling, unsettled atmosphere.

Created prior to Buried, the photographs in the exhibition demonstrate Doherty’s ongoing interest in nearly abstracting the traces of human presence in the landscape and provide an engaging complement to his most recent video installation. In Buried, the viewer only has access to fleeting glimpses of the traces of a traumatic past, traces that still mark the landscape. In the earlier photographs, those traces are writ large, to the extent that their mystery and sense of foreboding stem as much from the barely discernable objects depicted as from the works’ compelling titles and insistent contrasts of light and dark. Taken together, both the video installation and the photographs speak to the political history of Northern Ireland and its legacy of violence, a legacy that permeates both the landscape and the collective memory of its people.

Willie Doherty was born in Derry, Northern Ireland, where he currently lives and works. His work in photography and film and video installation addresses problems of representation, territoriality and surveillance. As a child, he witnessed Bloody Sunday in Derry, and many of his works deal with the politics and rhetoric of identity, particularly in his native Northern Ireland. Since the mid-1990s, his work has received wide international recognition. Doherty represented Northern Ireland, to great acclaim, at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007 and has participated in the biennial exhibitions of Berlin, Istanbul, São Paulo and Sydney, among others. In recent years, he has received solo exhibitions at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (Dublin), De Appel (Amsterdam) and the Dallas Museum of Art. Doherty was twice nominated for the Turner Prize, in 2003 and 1994. Willie Doherty is represented by Alexander and Bonin (New York).

Scott McLeod is a writer, curator and arts administrator. His work focuses on contemporary practices, with a specialization in photography, media and digital art. Since 2000, he has been the director and curator of Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art, where he also serves as editor and publisher of Prefix Photo magazine. McLeod is a member of IKT, the International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art.

Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art is a public art gallery and arts publishing house based in Toronto. A registered charitable organization, Prefix fosters the appreciation and understanding of contemporary photography, media and digital art. Recently, Prefix launched a new division, Prefix Press, and released its first book, Milk and Melancholy by Kenneth Hayes.

Prefix gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Toronto Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art
401 Richmond Street West, Suite 124, Toronto

www.prefix.ca

BLACKFLASH - FALL 2009 ISSUE NOW AVAILABLE

2009-10-26T19:50:00.007-04:00

BLACKFLASH: PHOTOGRAPHY AND NEW MEDIA ART

www.BlackFlash.ca

MAGENTA FOUNDATION - CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS FOR EMERGING PHOTOGRAPHERS IN CAN., US, AND THE UK

2009-10-26T19:40:00.010-04:00

FLASH FORWARD 2010

The Magenta Foundation is pleased to announce year six of its Emerging Photographers exchange with BIG NEWS. The annual competition is now the bi-annual Flash Forward Festival, starting in October 2010. The annual Flash Forward competition will continue to take place each year, complemented by the larger bi-annual Flash Forward Festival every other year.

This is an open call for submissions. All photographers in Canada, the UK and the US, 34 years of age and under, may submit. Competition Prizing Has Increased, and the Bright Spark Award winner will receive $5,000. As in the past, all competition Winners and Honourable Mentions will be published. 2010 FF selected winners will be published as part of the festival catalogue. This year's group exhibition will take place as part of the Flash Forward Festival's nightly events.

JURORS FOR 2010:

CANADA: Liz Ikiriko - Photo Editor, Toronto Life Magazine; Daniel Espeset, photo-eye Magazine; Myrabelle Charlebois - Photo Editor, enRoute Magazine; Erin Elder - Manager, Business Development, Digital Media, The Globe and Mail

UK: Lorna Mary - Company Manager, Rhubarb-Rhubarb Festival; Chris Littlewood - Photography Coordinator, Flowers East Gallery; Simon Bainbridge, British Journal of Photography, London; Aaron Schuman - Director/Editor, Seesaw Magazine

US: Andy Adams - Editor/Publisher, Flak Photo; Amanda Maddox - Assistant Curator of Photography and Media Arts at the Corcoran Gallery of Art; Susan Bright - Independent art writer and curator based in NY

DEADLINE: THURSDAY, DECEMBER 31, 2009

FOR MORE INFORMATION AND SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS VISIT THE FOLLOWING:

www.magentafoundation.org/submissions/ff2010

KATY MCCORMICK: THE PHILOSOPHER'S GARDEN - STILL/CHOREOGRAPHY NOW AT TIW

2009-10-26T19:30:00.006-04:00

Examining Kew Gardens and Le Désert de Retz, two noted eighteenth-century romantic gardens, this exhibition of colour photographs focuses on the miniature architectural monuments also known as follies. Referencing past civilizations and the philosophies they represent, the folly serves as a locus of contemplation within the garden complex.

Conceived within the larger constellation of design elements: paths, plantings, ponds, etc., the folly is a representation of social and historical ideas rather than a site of shelter. Dispersed throughout garden grounds, they are read at the pace of a walker, inviting an active engagement with the dynamics of light, space, and time, as integral aspects of philosophical reflection. Apart from their philosophical and ideological functions, the gardens these photographs represent are also complex spatial schemes laid out in the interest of pleasure and discovery for all who visit them. Engaging with concepts reaching back to the Greeks, they serve to occupy the senses in the present.

Katy McCormick's photography deals with the relationships between landscape architecture, its histories and the way we perceive representations of space and time.

Her solo exhibitions have appeared in Toronto at G+Galleries, the Premiere Dance Theatre, Alliance Française Gallery, Gallery TPW, The Photo Passage, and Jamie Kennedy at the ROM, and elsewhere at The Photographer's Gallery, Saskatoon, The Other Gallery, Banff, and at Espace VOX and the Eleanor London Public Library, in Montréal.

ERYN FOSTER, JOHN VAN DER WOUDE AND BRENT LEWIN EXHIBITIONS OPEN OCTOBER 23 AT GALLERY 44

2009-10-15T18:39:00.016-04:00

OCTOBER 23 - NOVEMBER 28, 2009
OPENING RECEPTION: FRIDAY, OCTOBER 23, 6 - 9PM

THE ARTISTS WILL BE AT THE OPENING AND WILL GIVE A BRIEF TALK AT 6PM

MAIN GALLERY
Google Earth: Eryn Foster and John van der Woude

From the first aerial photograph made by Nadar in 1858 to the first fully illuminated view of planet Earth taken by the crew of Apollo 17 in 1972 to the release of Google Earth 3.0 in 2005, our access to views of the Earth has increased exponentially. In their exhibition at Gallery 44, Eryn Foster and John van der Woude demonstrate what can be done with the visual information made publicly available today by Google Earth.

In Eryn Foster’s animation, Flight Simulation, aerial perspectives of the landscape coalesce into the abstract renderings and discontinuous movements of computer-generated images. Flight Simulation thus brings to our attention the sociological distance we have traversed from being airplanes passengers to being “virtual navigators”—as Foster refers to the users of Google Earth—and how this “developed” perspective affects our relationship to the Earth.

John van der Woude’s series of photographs, Airports—composites of satellite images downloaded from Google Earth—show us in astonishing detail the nine busiest airports in the world. Van der Woude refers to the airport as “a metaphor for the ultimate strength and weakness of contemporary life”. Beyond their formal beauty, his images immediately bring to mind issues of accessibility in an age when populous locations are prime terrorist targets.

Eryn Foster is an interdisciplinary artist who currently lives and works in Halifax, Nova Scotia. John van der Woude is a photographic and new media artist who currently lives and works in Montreal.

VITRINES
Brent Lewin: Waste Not, Want Not

The images in the series Want Not, Waste Not were photographed at various tipping floors and material recovery facilities in the greater Toronto area. The images have a simple message: humans produce a lot of waste, and it does not disappear when it's left at the curb for pick-up.

Brent Lewin is a self-taught photographer whose work has been published in several magazines including National Geographic.

An exhibition catalogue accompanies the exhibitions. It can also be read online at http://www.gallery44.org

Gallery 44 is located at 401 Richmond Street West, Suite 120, Toronto.

EDWARD BURTYNSKY: OIL

2009-10-03T20:33:00.021-04:00

OCTOBER 8 - 31
THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART, WASHINGTON, DC

The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC has organized the travelling exhibition, Oil, by renowned Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky. Beginning with the host institution the exhibition will travel internationally until 2012.

The artist spent a decade exploring the subject of oil. Burtynsky traveled internationally to chronicle the production, distribution, and use of this critical fuel. In addition to revealing the rarely-seen mechanics of its manufacture, Burtynksy photographs the effects of oil on our lives, depicting landscapes altered by its extraction from the earth and by the cities and suburban sprawl generated around its use. He also addresses the coming "end of oil," as we confront its rising cost and dwindling availability. This exhibition, premiering in the capital city of the United States in Fall 2009, represents a look at one of the most important subjects of our time by one of the most respected and recognized contemporary photographers in the world.

Recycling #2, Chittagong, Bangladesh, 2001

Burtynsky's photographs, printed at large scale, render his subjects with transfixing clarity of detail. His extensive exploration is organized thematically: aerial views of oil fields, the architecture of massive refineries, highway interchanges ribboning across the landscape, and motorculture aficionados at automotive events. In considering the consequences of oil use, the artist has photographed a series of arresting landscapes: derelict oil derricks, vistas of junked vehicles, recycling yards, and mammoth oil-tanker shipbreaking operations. Edward Burtynsky: Oil promises to be the definitive photographic documentation of this much debated subject.

Oil Fields #19a, Belridge, California, USA, 2003

Consisting of approximately 55 color landscapes, Edward Burtynsky: Oil will encompass a kind of modern-day “lifecycle” of the energy source that has shaped the modern world. The project will feature many new works, most never-before-exhibited. A major catalogue, published by acclaimed German publisher Steidl, will accompany the exhibition.

Edward Burtynsky: Oil is made possible with the generous support of Scotiabank Group.

www.corcoran.org

OCTOBER 8 - 31
NICHOLAS METIVIER GALLERY, TORONTO, ON

This exhibition is in conjunction with Oil at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington from October 3 to December 13. It also features photographic works from the same project.

www.metiviergallery.com

The following galleries are also or will be hosting an exhibition of Oil.

HASTED HUNT KRAEUTLER, NY
OCTOBER 1 - NOVEMBER 21

hastedhunt.com

ADAMSON GALLERY, WASHINGTON, DC
OCTOBER 15 - NOVEMBER 21

www.adamsongallery.com

TORCH GALLERY, AMSTERDAM
DECEMBER 2009

www.torchgallery.com

Edward Burtynsky is one of Canada’s most respected photographers. His color photographs of industrially transformed landscapes are in the collections of several major museums around the world, including the National Gallery of Canada, the Biblioteque Nationale in Paris, and the Museum of Modern Art and Guggenheim Museum in New York. Born in 1955 of Ukranian heritage in St. Catherines, Ontario, Burtynsky is a graduate of Ryerson University and Niagara College. His father worked on an automobile production line at a General Motors plant in his hometown; Burtynksy credits this experience as his earliest exposure to the subject of industry, and oil in particular. Burtynsky’s exhibitions include Manufactured Landscapes (2003); Before the Flood (2003); Burtynsky – China (2005); and Edward Burtynsky – Quarries (2006), all of which have traveled extensively to venues in Canada, the United States, Europe, and Asia. Among many other honors, in 2007 Burtynsky was awarded the prestigious title Officer of the Order of Canada.

Edward Burtynsky is represented by Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto; Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York; Flowers East, London; Paul Kuhn Gallery, Calgary; Art 45, Montreal; Galeria Toni Tapies, Barcelona; and Galerie Stefan Röpke, Koln.

www.edwardburtynsky.com

SARA ANGELUCCI: REGULAR 8

2009-10-03T10:15:00.023-04:00

I have an admission to make: I am a procrastinator. Immediately following the May 2009 Contact Toronto Photography Festival I had intended to write a review about Sara Angelucci’s exhibition Regular 8. Well here it is. I deeply apologize to the artist for my shortcomings.

For the past ten years Angelucci has been investigating the relationship between still and moving images. Angelucci is after all a photography and video artist. She also harbors a love and fascination for home movies and family snapshots. In viewing Angelucci’s body of work one might think she lives far too much in the past; instead she reflects on and reconstructs the past in her current work, knowing fully that the past is fleeting and memory is at best a composition of the mundane and the extraordinary.

Digby Neck, Chromogenic Print, 29.5" x 85 3/4", 2000

The constancy in Angelucci’s body of work is remarkable and bears mentioning. The fact that she is always changing from still image making to moving images is very significant to the Regular 8 series. In Angelucci’s early work she created photographs as if they were fragments of moving images. Sometimes she used cheap toy cameras that did not advance well from frame to frame (Digby Neck) or she used a professional camera, then carefully overlapped negatives in the printing process (She Crossed the Sea #1).

She Crossed the Sea #1 , Chromogenic print 25.5" x 54.5"

Work prior to Regular 8 relied on Angelucci’s family photographs and home movies to explore the fragility of memory, the loss one feels, and the inability to capture the essence of the past. One of the projects that I like is Stillness. Angelucci states that “…[in] Making use of vintage family photographs, Stillness turns to them as sources of evidence, seeking clues in tiny isolated fragments of glances, hand gestures, clothing details, etc. These black and white fragments are paired with details of landscape images recently taken on visits to the rural landscape surrounding my ancestral village. The still within the still—to which Stillness refers evokes not only a sense of searching for clues and evidence, but also the mystery, which descends upon these images with the passing of time.

#4 Stillness (magnolia #2), Chromogenic print, 30" x 40"

In Stillness, a fleeting glance, frozen gesture or landscape detail, evokes the desire to connect with lost persons, a particular locality, and a broken lineage.“

It is clear in Angelucci’s work that in delving into the past, we become less sure of our own memories. Despite our looking at family snapshots we can’t fully connect with the person in the picture; instead we are left with an irrefutable longing.

Using vintage Super 8 home movies as a starting point Angelucci also examines the relationships of time, family, and memory in several videos that she completed in 2000 and 2003. Unfortunately I can’t show them here but they can be seen on Angelucci’s website. Drawing images from home movies and combining with new video footage In a Hundred “is framed by a child counting to one-hundred who becomes the keeper of time, the metronome reminding us of its relentless march forward… The visual imagery weaves a pattern of time travel which moves inevitably forward but one which carries the past with it. Underlying this obsession with time is an examination of the family via three generations of women; the child counting as the youngest, the video maker as the middle and the video maker's memory (via the Super 8 footage), the past.”

Regular 8 (Dog), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

Angelucci also produced the video Snow, a catalyst for the Regular 8 series. Snow “is comprised of a series of film segments taken from the last few seconds of a variety of Super 8 family films. The short scenes in Snow were selected because they still contained the "white dots" which suddenly appear, float over and obliterate the scene. (These dots are literally holes in the film created by Kodak as an identifying tagging system). Although there is nothing remarkable in these ordinary scenes of family life, the video becomes a series of endings strung together forever suspending the narrative. The dots obliterate the last clues of the story; each scene viewed in brief isolation, a small gesture of loss.” In Snow we find film fragments of actual people; in Regular 8 people are actors. In staging scenes of family occasions Angelucci is making an extraordinary departure from her earlier projects.

Regular 8 (Cocktails), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

In Regular 8, Angelucci’s carefully arranged and stunningly staged colour photographs --resembling snippets of 8mm films-- portray middle-class family occasions and outings from the 1950s era: idealized, yet plausible scenes of a family touring Niagara Falls, an outdoor wedding party, a baptism, three people drinking cocktails, a family skating on a pond. In the post WWII era, almost everyone was upwardly mobile. This was the era of the automobile, the onset of highways and the beginning of that dreaded blight, suburbia, now problems to today’s urban centres and the cause of massive pollution.

Standard 8 mm also referred to as Regular 8mm was introduced by Kodak during the Great Depression. Few could afford the camera and film to make home movies. By the end of WWII though, those who could afford to buy fancy automobiles and new houses, could also easily afford a Regular 8 camera to preserve family gatherings and engagements. (Home movie making became even more popular and affordably accessible to a larger audience when Super 8mm was introduced in 1965.)

Regular 8 (Niagara Falls), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

Regular 8 photographs are comprised of elements or clues that suggest the whole: people are clothed in 1950s costumes; scenes are located in places that do not hint at anything contemporary (a 1950’s apartment building in Fountain, a park adjacent to an old church in Pigeons, a 1920s-30s style room suggesting a lounge in Cocktails) ; photographs are meant to look like regular 8mm film segments; white dots that represent the last few seconds of a film; and that the white dots are not mechanized but selectively placed by Angelucci in a post-shooting digital manipulation.

Regular 8 (Fountain), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

Photographs are either shown with three frames and a full image in the mid-section or four frames and two full images in the mid-section. The photographs are clear and polished; it is not necessary that they look scratchy like a real film for that would simply be a copy of a film segment rather than an art photograph. Each photograph is the last vestige of an occasion or outing, the white puncture-like dots signaling the end of a home movie. Angelucci is not interested in frames untainted by punch holes for that would mean that there was more narrative to come. Instead “The white dots… seemed abrupt, incomplete and merciless. Home movies represent the memories of us at our best, happiest, most polished and special. They evoke something we wanted to hold close forever. Of course we never can, and that immanent ending brings to light the painful beauty of the ephemeral nature of our lives.”

Regular 8 (Skaters), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

Are the dots too literal? Yes and no. Should the images be without white dots, it would still be obvious that as stills rather than blow-ups of actual films that they are already ruptures in the narratives. The white dots signal the end of a film; will viewers understand what the white dots represent, especially without a didactic panel or artist statement accompanying the images hung in a gallery? Whether the dots are there or not viewers can only surmise what is in front of them. On the other hand the dots mar the image of a perfectly staged scene. One cannot look at the scenes without being somewhat annoyed by the dots floating in the image. In this way the artist clearly suggests that within the polished images lies a certain superficial reality of families in the 1950’s.

Regular 8 (Wedding), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

Despite my admiration and liking of Regular 8 I am disappointed that the artist was not more aggressive with the placement of dots. Other than Niagara Falls in which, the young child and woman on the right is half obliterated by the dots, the others have dots that selectively avoid people. The Kodak punch-hole tagging system is mechanized. It easily erases someone’s head or someone blowing out the candles on their birthday cake, whereas Angelucci seemed unable to let go of the sacredness of a staged scene. In Skating the dots encircle the pond, leaving the scene of people skating almost unscathed and in Wedding two dots float above two women’s heads. If we compare it to the video Snow in which actual films are spliced together and freeze some of these frames dots in some instances obliterate heads and other major parts of an event (example, baptism). This is far more plausible. Angelucci has, in creating perfectly rendered scenes been far too cautious.

Regular 8 (Baptism), Chromogenic print, 40 x 42 inches, 2009

That being said Regular 8 is one of the best exhibitions that I have seen in a long time. Angelucci is one of those rare artists that has an excellent portfolio of work throughout her career. I strongly suggest that readers spend some time viewing her work online at www.sara-angelucci.ca or click on the link in the right column.

Sara Angelucci is represented by Wynick/Tuck Gallery. The exhibition took place from May 9 - 30 during the Contact Toronto Photography Festival.

LE MOIS DE LA PHOTO À MONTRÉAL STILL ON UNTIL OCTOBER 10

2009-09-21T23:14:00.015-04:00

11TH PRESENTATION: THE SPACES OF THE IMAGE

Over the past thirty years, photography has been integrated into the field of contemporary art through the work of numerous artists whose practices bring images together with scenographic experiences. The 11th presentation of Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal will explore the questions of mechanisms and staging, perceived as essential keys to reading the different photographic projects presented in recent years. Due to the range of possibilities –– the technical diversity of film and digital cameras, formats, printing procedures, and the many alternatives offered in terms of museography and occupation of the space –– photographers are increasingly called upon to become aware of their relationship with the exhibition. Production methods and viewing modalities, as integral parts of projects, exert a direct influence on the aesthetic of images. Enlargement and monumentalization of prints, slide projection, in situ conception, the making of objects and machines, visual and audio mise en scène –– for each approach there is a corresponding pragmatic use of display techniques that determines the form and meaning of the images shown.

The Spaces of the Image was developed by French Guest Curator Gaëlle Morel. The event features 24 solo exhibitions and public space interventions in a variety of different sites throughout the city. Artists from 13 countries explore the question of mechanisms and staging in contemporary photography.

A publication accompanying the Festival, The Spaces of the Image, is edited by Gaëlle Morel and brings together new and original contributions by art historians and critics interested in scenographic issues. Lavishly illustrated with the works of the participating artists, this bilingual reference book is available in bookstores and in several exhibition sites during the event.

Artists include:
Kutluğ Ataman (Turkey) • Sammy Baloji (Democratic Republic of Congo) • Yael Bartana (Israel/the Netherlands) • Robert Burley (Canada) • Jim Campbell (USA) • Pascal Convert (France) • Luc Courchesne (Canada) • Michael Flomen (Canada) • Jeff Guess (USA/France) • Joana Hadjithomas & Khalil Joreige (Lebanon/France) • Alfredo Jaar (Chile/USA) • Emmanuelle Léonard (Canada) • Yveline Loiseur (France) • Shelley Miller (Canada) • Oscar Muñoz (Colombia) • Cheryl Pagurek (Canada) • Alain Paiement (Canada) • Pavel Pavlov (Canada) • Anne Ramsden (Canada) • David Rokeby (Canada) • Zineb Sedira (France/UK) • Beat Streuli (Switzerland) • Pierre Tremblay (Canada) • Yang Zhenzhong (China)

Exhibition Sites:
Canadian Centre for Architecture • Darling Foundry • Galerie B-312 • Galerie de l’UQAM • Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Concordia University • Les Ateliers Jean Brillant • MAI (Montréal, arts interculturels) • Maison de la culture du Plateau-Mont-Royal • Maison de la culture Frontenac • SBC Gallery of Contemporary Art • VOX, centre de l’image contemporaine

Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal is an international biennale of contemporary photography. In 1989, to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the invention of photography, VOX, centre de diffusion de la photographie, presented the first Mois de la Photo à Montréal, which included more than 60 exhibitions as well as a large number of related activities. This original event was a catalyst, creating a gathering place, unprecedented in the Montreal and Canadian artistic community, and served as an inspiration for transforming Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal into a biennale –– one that, under the auspices of VOX, produced seven events between 1989 and 2001.

In September 2002, Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal became an autonomous not-for-profit corporation and its charitable status was obtained in 2006. The change in administration was accompanied by a shift in the artistic direction: for each presentation of the event, the appointment of a new Guest Curator with a new theme lends to each biennale a singular artistic and theoretical orientation. This artistic formula was proven successful for the 2003, 2005 and 2007 events.

About the image:
Alain Paiement, a Montreal based photographer, is exhibiting his latest work Arrangements d’après nature at The Darling Foundry in collaboration with Mois de la Photo. The impressive space of the gallery hosts Paiement’s gigantic photomontages perfectly. You can step back and enjoy the full experience and then get right up close and catch all the details. The piece, shown above, is of a husband’s collection of taxidermy animals and hunting trophies and is hung directly in front of the wife’s collection of silverware and porcelain dolls. Paiement’s attention to detail is amazing, the distorted vantage point feels awkward and the sizes of the works are overwhelming. All this adds up to some pretty impressive work.

www.moisdelaphoto.com

FREE SCREENINGS AT CAMERA BAR/STEPHEN BULGER GALLERY

2009-09-17T12:22:00.009-04:00

FREE SATURDAY AFTERNOONS SCREENINGS AT CAMERA/3PM

OBSESSION:

SEPTEMBER 19 - GILDA
Dir. Charles Vidor (USA, 1946) 110 mins

Just arrived in Argentina, small-time crooked gambler Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford) is saved from a gunman by sinister Ballin Mundson (George Macready), who later makes Johnny his right-hand man. But their friendship based on mutual lack of scruples becomes strained when Mundson returns from a trip with a wife: the supremely desirable Gilda (Rita Hayworth), whom Johnny once knew and has now learned to hate. The relationship between Johnny and Gilda, a battlefield of warring emotions, becomes even more bizarre once Mundson disappears.

OCTOBER 3 - BORN TO KILL
Dir. Robert Wise (USA, 1947) 92 mins

In Reno a man kills a girl he likes and her boyfriend out of jealousy; it may not be the first time. A woman whose divorce has just come through finds the bodies but decides not to become involved. The two meet next day on the train to San Francisco unaware of this link between them. They are attracted to each other, and the relationship survives his marriage to her half-sister for money and status. It even survives the woman discovering that he was the murderer, though she may not realise how easily someone who has killed this way before can do so again.

OCTOBER 10 - REBECCA
Dir. Alfred Hitchcock (USA, 1940) 130 mins

A shy ladies' companion, staying in Monte Carlo with her stuffy employer, meets the wealthy Maxim de Winter. She and Max fall in love, marry and return to Manderlay, his large country estate in Cornwall. Max is still troubled by the death of his first wife, Rebecca, in a boating accident the year before. The second Mrs. de Winter clashes with the housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers, and discovers that Rebecca still has a strange hold on everyone at Manderlay.

OCTOBER 17 - CLASH BY NIGHT
Dir. Fritz Lang (Sweden, 1952) 105 mins

The bitter and cynical Mae Doyle returns to the fishing village where she was raised after deceptive loves and life in New York. She meets her brother, the fisherman Joe Doyle, and he lodges her in his home. Mae is courted by Jerry D'Amato, a good and naive man that owns the boat where Joe works, and he introduces his brutal friend Earl Pfeiffer, who works as theater's projectionist and is cheated by his wife. She does not like Earl and his jokes, but Jerry considers him his friend and they frequently see each other. Mae decides to accept the proposal of Jerry and they get married and one year later they have a baby girl. When the wife of Earl leaves him, he becomes depressed and Mae, who is bored with her loveless marriage, has an affair with him.

OCTOBER - LAURA
Dir. Otto Preminger (USA, 1944) 88 mins

Detective Mark McPherson investigates the killing of Laura, found dead on her apartment floor before the movie starts. McPherson builds a mental picture of the dead girl from the suspects whom he interviews. He is helped by the striking painting of the late lamented Laura hanging on her apartment wall. But who would have wanted to kill a girl with whom every man she met seemed to fall in love? To make matters worse, McPherson finds himself falling under her spell too. Then one night, halfway through his investigations, something seriously bizarre happens to make him re-think the whole case.

PLOT SUMMARIES COPIED FROM imdb.com

camerabar.ca

1026 Queen Street West, Toronto
T 416.504.0575 bulgergallery.com