KRIS SANFORD: Through The Lens of Desire

 

Flowered Dresses 

Necklace

Intertwined

I met Kris Sanford (above) at Fotofest 2016 and was so impressed by the presentation of her series Through the Lens of Desire. I'm pleased to see her exhibition opens at the Elizabeth Houston Gallery in New York City June 15th and runs through July 24th, 2016. She will also be giving an Artist Talk and Pride Toast June 23rd from 6-8pm at the Gallery.

  

"Through the Lens of Desire creates implied narratives using snapshots from the 1920s-1950s.  Vernacular photographs from that era were created as private keepsakes and the unselfconscious intimacy they depict feels authentic and relatable.  As modern viewers, we witness personal moments that were never intended to be public.  By purposefully selecting images that picture men together and women together I am creating an imaginary queer past.  I am drawn to the subtle points of contact and the spaces between the figures pictured.  Each gesture or distracted glance holds a story, and it is these stories that reflect my own desire and experiences."

"Relationships, real or imagined, are at the center of this work.  Growing up queer, I searched for a history that spoke to me—included me.  In my family history, there were no couples that mirrored my own intimate relationships.  That didn’t keep me from imagining such couples. This project brings a contemporary rereading to old photographs to address sexuality and relationships in a subtle way. My images are works of fiction, where I project my own dreams onto moments from the past." – Kris Sanford.

 

Through the Lens of Desire / Kris Sanford

 June 15-July 24, 2016

Artist Talk and Pride Toast: June 23rd, 6 to 8pm

  

Elizabeth Houston Gallery

34 East 1st Street

New York, NY

www.krissanford.com

SOHO PHOTO GALLERY: 2015 Juried National Photography Competition Award Winners

First Place

“Entering the Metropolitan Opera (2014)”

Photograph © Paul Kessel

Second Place

“Net” from "Letting My Guard Down" series

Photograph © Yorgos Efthymiadis

3rd Place

“Finding and Losing My Father #3"

Photograph © Mark Rousell

+  +  +

Four Honorable Mentions

“Daughter of a Slave, Timbuktu, Mali”

Photograph © Robert Moran 

“The More That Is Taken Away, Act 1, Year Two, November”

Photograph © Ben Altman

“Watching You” 

Photograph © Sheri Lynn Behr

“Untitled” from the series “You Who Never Arrived"

Photograph © Jennifer McClure

The Soho Photo Gallery
 2015 Juried National Photography Competition

Opening Reception: July 7, 2015, 6–8 pm

Soho Photo Gallery initiated its first juried National Photo Competition in 1995 and it has been an annual event ever since. Each year, the Gallery receives hundreds of entries from photographers all over the United States. I was honored to be this year's juror.

I want to thank everyone who entered the 2015 National Competition for the Soho Photo Gallery. It was a difficult task to edit many great images out, but there were only 40 spaces and over 2000 images. At first glance, I never wavered from my choice of Paul Kessel's somber beauty "Entering The Metropolitan Opera" as the First Place winner. It stayed with me like the atmosphere of a 70's era Winogrand scene. For 2nd Place, I chose Yorgos Efthymiadis’s "Net" from his "Letting My Guard Down" body of work for it's serene, solitary empty space and color. 3rd Place, I was deeply drawn into the unusual landscape by artist Mark Roussel from his series "Finding and Losing My Father." All Honorable Mentions; Ben Altman, Sheri Lynn Behr, Jennifer McClure, and Robert Moran, along with all the photographs accepted into the exhibition, represent my interest and love for fine art photography as well as portraiture, landscape, street and travel work.

National Photography Competition Exhibition

July 7–25, 2015

SOHO PHOTO GALLERY

15 White Street, NY, NY

Special thanks to this year’s sponsor, Archival Methods, for their generous support. View all 40 images here. Soho Photo Gallery was founded in 1971 by a group of New York Times photographers who wanted to create a venue for photography as fine art. They are a 501 (c)(3) non-profit arts organization operated by their member photographers.

SHEN WEI: Invisible Atlas at Flowers Gallery

 Shen Wei, Tear, 2013
Ink on archival pigment print

 Shen Wei, Sarangkot, 2014
Acrylic on archival pigment print

Shen Wei, Mask, 2013
Metallic ink on archival pigment print

Chinese artist Shen Wei series Invisible Atlas is inspired by the Chinese philosophy of Qi - an unseen life force and a method of healing. For Shen Wei, this mysterious vital energy is poetic and seductive. Using his own body and personality as a subject, he envisions the internal and external forces channeling through the body and its surroundings. Drawing from memories of his childhood, as well as religious, historical and mythological imagery, the narrative is interwoven with elements of fantasy. Photographic subjects of the figure, objects and landscape are combined with minimally rendered drawings, where luminous dots, circles, arcs, arrows and waves give tangible form to imagined flows and concentrations of Qi....read more here 

To coincide with his solo exhibition, Shen Wei is also curating a group show Second Thought at Flowers Gallery, featuring work by Shiyuan Liu, Tingwei Li and Peter Glenn Oakley.

Shen Wei: Invisible Atlas to February 28, 2015

Flowers Gallery/NY

529 West 20th Street, NYC

Shen Wei discussing his work with me at Flowers Opening

All images Courtesy of the artist and Flowers Gallery, London / New York 

FOLEY GALLERY: Select Cuts and Alterations

FOLEY GALLERY

Mia Pearlman Installation in Storefront
Paper, India ink, paperclips, tacks

Chris McCaw - Sunburned GSP #672 (Pacific Ocean), 2013
11 x 14 inches Unique gelatin silver print

Mia Pearlman - COEVA, 2014
Paper, India ink, paperclips, tacks

Select Cuts and Alterations brings together more than 20 artists who cut, crumple or crease their materials. Select Cuts was a great success receiving many excellent reviews including The New Yorker.

Foley Gallery invites you to a final celebration for the exhibition on Sunday, January 11, from 2-4pm, with many of the artists attending.

Select Cuts & Alterations

Foley Gallery, 59 Orchard St, NYC

through January 11, 2015

Wednesday - Sunday, 12 - 6

Final Celebration Open to All with the Artists

Sunday, January 11, from 2-4pm

Cal Lane - Untitled, 2008
17 x 13.5 inches. Plasma-Cut Steel Oil Can

SHEILA PINKEL: Folded Paper, Glass Rods

 Folded Paper Pieces © Sheila Pinkel

Folded Paper Pieces © Sheila Pinkel

Glass Rods © Sheila Pinkel

Folded Paper Pieces © Sheila Pinkel

"I realized that if I sculpted photographic paper in the darkroom and then illuminated that sculpture with a one point light source, the planes of the paper would be exposed to differing amounts of light. When I developed that paper it flattened and the image became a two-dimensional representation of the paper when it was three dimensional, or a time-space paradox. As I continued to make paper sculptures in the darkroom the resulting images became less structural and began to reveal more intuitive dimensions of my imagination." – Sheila Pinkel

+  +  +

Higher Pictures will present Folded Paper, Glass Rods, 1974 – 1982, two seminal bodies of cameraless photographic work by artist, writer, and professor emerita Sheila Pinkel. The prints on view evolved from experiments Pinkel began as an MFA student at UCLA. Fascinated by the possibilities of using light to make images without a camera or enlarger, Pinkel studied with a physicist and subsequently conducted rigorous visual experimentation with light phenomena including incandescent, X-Ray, ultraviolet, prismatic and digital sources.

To make Glass Rods and Folded Paper Pieces, Pinkel exposed her compositions—solid glass rods arranged directly onto photosensitive surfaces and sculptures made from sheets of photographic paper—to a brief flash of light from a single light source. From within this seemingly narrow set of parameters come rich and varied studies. In monochrome and candy-colored palettes, some of the glass rods are clearly identifiable, others begin to break down into vibrating woven patterns and further into geometric abstractions, and still others are stretched and warped into melting psychedelic planes. Pinkel found that layering the rods at increasingly perpendicular angles led to greater light refraction, bringing the final photograms closer to what she describes as visual music.

The Folded Paper Pieces are lushly textured trompe l’oeil, pictures that Pinkel calls “time-space paradoxes,” two dimensional representations of the paper as a three dimensional form. When the artist flashes the dimensionalized folded paper with light, planes of paper are exposed to varying degrees, giving the final image its dramatic shading and sense of volume. But developing the print itself requires flattening the sculpture back into a two-dimensional sheet that now holds an image of its own prior form. Distilling her process to the very essentials of photography allows Pinkel to work precisely at the intersection of the medium’s double nature. It reproduces vision and has an endless capacity to defamiliarize it.

Sheila Pinkel: Folded Paper, Glass Rods, 1974 - 1982

January 10 - February 14, 2015

Higher Pictures, 980 Madison Avenue, NYC

Opening: January 10, 2015, 6 - 8pm

SheilaPinkel.com

Photograph © Loretta Ayeroff

Sheila Pinkel was born in Virginia, lives and works in L.A. Over the course of her 40-year career, Pinkel has created a strikingly diverse body of work that encompasses experimental light studies, documentary photography, social and political critique, and public art. Pinkel’s work is held in the collections of numerous museums, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; The Santa Barbara Museum of Art; and the Musée National d’Art Moderne – Centre Pompidou, Paris.

ELLEN JACOB: Waiting Room

 Ellen Jacob's Installation Waiting Room: Kay 

Soho Photo Gallery, NYC

 

Nameplate

Photograph (c) Ellen Jacob

Profile In Bed

Photograph (c) Ellen Jacob

The Queen and the Pope

"Kay loved the royal family and I brought her a solar powered queen who waves." Photograph (c) Ellen Jacob 

The View

Photograph (c) Ellen Jacob  

Waiting Room is the story of Kay’s time at the boundary between life and death and the place where she spent that time.

"Ellen Jacob's highly unusual installation, which I have seen, is a courageous look at how a courageous woman died in a nursing home on New York's Upper West Side. But I think it is also about the fundamental courage required from each of us to sustain our lives in the face of such vast uncertainty and, finally, to wait for the end without losing ourselves in that uncertainty. What I see in this work—in the photos and quotes and reconstructions of the environment—is that Kay remained Kay throughout her waiting." – Kirk Cheyfitz, CEO Story Worldwide

Ellen Jacob: Waiting Room: Kay

September 3-October 2

Soho Photo Gallery, 15 White St, NYC

Artist Reception:
September 4, 6-8pm

Ellen Jacob is the recipient of a Ford Foundation Grant and a Silver Gavel Award from the American Bar Association. Her photography has been featured on the Voice of America, Slate, Huffington Post, The Daily Mail and appeared in Harvard’s Nieman Reports, selected by The Center for Fine Art Photography juried Family show, selected by f-stop documentary juried issue, and been highlighted as a Jen Beckman HotShot Contender. She holds a BFA with honors from Pratt Institute. Ellen exhibits at the Soho Photo Gallery and lives in New York City. read more here

THE ARTIST IN A PROFESSIONAL WORLD: Moderated by David J. Carol

Joe With Fish, Baffin Island, 1997

Photograph David J. Carol

 Boy In Lake, Maine

Photograph David J. Carol

Payton and Rachel, Peabody, Ma. 2011

Photograph Paris Visone

Battle of Antietam, Maryland

Photograph Eliot Dudik

The Artist in a Professional World: 

Three Photographers, Three Perspectives

How does one manage to make a living as a photographer and still stay true to their personal vision? The three photographers, all at different stages in their careers and all taking different paths, have one thing in common. They have never forgotten why they became photographers in the first place, to make pictures for themselves. The panel will include Paris Visone, Eliot Dudik and David J. Carol. Each photographer will present their work and talk about how they balance the commercial and personal aspects of their lives and careers. Following the presentations there will be a panel discussion moderated by David J. Carol that will include a Q&A with the audience. Books of the photographers work will be available for purchase.

PenumbraFoundation.org

April 29, 7:00pm – 8:30pm

RSVP@penumbrafoundation.org 

to reserve your seat here

LANDON NORDEMAN: Canine Kingdom with Curator Elisabeth Biondi

Handler with dog, Ploiesti, Romania, 2012

Photograph by Landon Nordeman

Borzois, 134th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, 2010

Photograph by Landon Nordeman

Standard Poodle, 128th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, 2004

Photograph by Landon Nordeman

Landon Nordeman’s series, “Canine Kingdom,” takes us inside the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, now running for 138 years. To mark the exhibit’s opening (March 12, 7:30pm) at The Half King in New York, Photography Curator Elisabeth Biondi and Nordeman will screen a slideshow, and talk about the stories and context of Landon’s images.

Landon Nordeman began shooting The Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in 2004. The project is ongoing. In addition to photographing personal projects, Nordeman is a contributing photographer for The New Yorker and Saveur. He shoots for commercial and editorial clients around the world. His photographs have been exhibited at the Howard Greenberg Gallery, NYC; The Houston Center of Photography; The Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing; and are in the collection of The Museum of Fine Arts Houston.

Photography curator, Elisabeth Biondi, has influenced all of us through her powerful career at four of the most influential magazines in the world. Biondi joined The New Yorker Magazine as Visuals Editor in 1996, just a couple of years after photography had first been introduced into the 75-year-old magazine. From her background at Geo, Stern, and Vanity Fair, she brought her masterful eye to The New Yorker, helping to create their award winning use of photography.
 

I spoke with Elisabeth about working with Nordeman, her career and her little dog, Boris...read my full piece on L'oeil de la Photographie

 Canine Kingdom
Photographs by Landon Nordeman
March 12, 2014 - May 11, 2014
The Half King 505 West 23rd Street NY

 

Elisabeth Biondi's dog, Boris

Photograph by Matt Leifheit

"I’m definitely a dog person, and always knew that one day, when I did not spend the week in an office, I would have a wire-haired dachshund (Dachshund translates to “badger dog” in German. They were used for hunting badgers in their dens). After I stopped working at The New Yorker, I quickly got little Boris, a wire-haired dachshund, from a kennel in Woodstock. He was one of six born during Wimbledon Week and all the puppies got tennis player's first names. Mine is named after Boris Becker, so of course he had to be mine. He is funny, sweet, and stubborn; loves, children, other dogs and does not have a mean bone in his body." –Photography curator, Elisabeth Biondi

 Read my full piece on L'oeil de la Photographie

Join us. Become a friend of L’Oeil, and give what you can. L’Oeil de la Photographie is yours as well. http://www.loeildelaphotographie.com/en/2014/01/13/we-need-your-support

NY ART BOOK FAIR PS1 MoMA: Self Publish!

 Q13 "Self Publish, Be Happy" Publisher Bruno Ceschel

 http://www.selfpublishbehappy.com

List of Book Publishers showing at the 2013 NY Book Fair

Top; Q13 "Self Publish, Be Happy" Publisher Bruno Ceschel talks Self-Publishing to my SVA students outside; Ceschel with Harry Gould Harvey IV, author of "Canadian Fruit". Center; B13 Pau Wau Publication Founders Andreas Laszlo Konrath and Brian Paul Lamotte. R01 Little Brown Mushroom Books, Alec Soth Publisher.

THE NY ART BOOK FAIR

September 19 – 22,  2013

MoMA PS1

ADOBE LIGHTROOM 5: With Katrin Eismann, Julieanne Kost and Scott Kelby

Image processed with Adobe Lightroom 5 Upright Controls
© 2013 Katrin Eismann. All Rights Reserved

"I am often asked which iPhone apps I use. For Shooting: Camera+, Pure, Bracket Mode, and AvgCamPro. Processing: Pro HDR, Snapseed, PicTapGo. Effects: Afterlight, Rays, Wood Camera, Filterstorm. Sharing: EyeEm and Facebook." –Katrin Eismann

B+H and Adobe® Lightroom® Digital Photography Summit
with Scott Kelby, Julieanne Kost and Katrin Eismann
Jacob Javits Center NYC Mon 6/17 9:30am-5:30pm

Register Here

The Digital Photography Summit is a software and digital technology showcase of the latest trends featuring panel discussions, demonstrations, and surprises from Scott Kelby, Julieanne Kost and Katrin Eismann held at the Javits Center in NYC. RSVP now, this is event is free to the public and you will not want to miss this opportunity for a day-long event celebrating the convergence of software, gear and technology led by three of the most significant voices in digital photography.

The Agenda Includes:
Live Shootout with Scott Kelby
Perfect Workflow for today’s high megapixel advanced DSLR cameras shooting in RAW
Major Software Releases Demonstrated
Latest Technology in Cameras set in a mini trade show
High End Gear giveaways
Special Show Discounts
Gear Trade In-Programs

The Digital Summit will be live streamed for those who cannot attend.  Reserve your reminder for the stream here. Proudly Sponsored by: Adobe,  Canon, Kelby Training, Intel, Elinchrom, Jpegmini, Lexar, Manfrotto, Sigma, Sony,  Squarespace, Teradek,  Tether Tools,  WD, and Westcott. 

Follow the action at #bhdigitalsummit

Katrin Eismann is an internationally recognized artist, author, and educator who has been working with digital imaging tools since 1989. Katrin's extensive teaching and speaking engagements address the latest tools and techniques of digital imaging and the impact they are having upon professional photographers, artists, and educators. She speaks German and English and has taught and presented in Europe, Asia, South America, and throughout North America. Currently Katrin holds the Chair of the Masters Digital Photography Department at the School of Visual Arts in New York City.

Julieanne Kost is Principal Evangelist for Photoshop and Lightrom at Adobe Systems, founder of jkost.com, publisher of the Daily Photoshop and Lightroom Tip (blogs.adobe.com/jkost), host of “The Complete Picture” a bimonthly instructional training program featuring Lightroom and Photoshop on AdobeTV, author of  “Window Seat – The Art of Digital Photography and Creative Thinking” and author of Photoshop CS6 Essential Training with Lynda.com.

Scott Kelby is Editor and Publisher of Photoshop User magazine, Executive Editor and Publisher of Lightroom and Light It magazines, and President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP). He is Training Director for the Adobe Photoshop Seminar Tour and Conference Technical Chair for the Photoshop World Conference & Expo. He’s the co-host of the highly acclaimed weekly videocast The Grid (a photography talk show), and teaches photography, Lightroom, and Photoshop workshops around the world. Scott is an award-winning author of more than 50 books, including The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers and The Lightroom Book for Digital Photographers, and is currently the world’s #1 best-selling author of books on photography.

(Text courtesy B + H PhotoEvents)

SCHEINBAUM + RUSSEK: AIPAD Booth 307

Georgia O'Keeffe, Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, 1968

Photograph by Eliot Porter, Gelatin silver print

Retrato de lo Eterno, 1935

Photograph by Manuel Alvarez Bravo, Gelatin silver print

Scheinbaum & Russek will be exhibiting works by
Ansel Adams
Manuel Alvarez Bravo
Walter Chappell
Harry Callahan
Laura Gilpin
Yousef Karsh
André Kertész
Beaumont Newhall
Arnold Newman
Eliot Porter
Sebastião Salgado
Aaron Siskind
Alfred Stieglitz
Jerry Uelsmann
Minor White

AIPAD

April 4 - April 7

Park Avenue Armory, Park Avenue at 67th Street

REVIEW 2013: ASMP-NY Portfolio Review

  from 2010 ASMP-NY Portfolio Review

Hudson River Photography

 Photograph (c) Joseph Squillante/All Rights Reserved

from 2010 ASMP-NY Portfolio Review

The Innocent. Casualties of the Civil War in Northern Uganda
Photograph (c) Heather McClintock/All Rights Reserved

ASMP NY’s FINE ART PORTFOLIO REVIEW 2013

"For eight years ASMP members have had their fine art photography reviewed by influential members of New York's photography/arts community: gallerists, curators, collectors, publishers and dealers. Recent participating organizations included the International Center of Photography, Center for Photography at Woodstock, Aperture, and New York Foundation for the Arts; galleries included Jen Bekman, Flowers, Howard Greenberg, Steven Kasher, Yossi Milo, and Yancey Richardson; individuals included Elizabeth Avedon, A.D. Coleman, Julie Grahame, and Mary Virginia Swanson."

Tuesday, February 5th, 2013
Calumet Photographic - 22 W. 22nd St. NYC

Details to Sign-Up here

Read more about the 2010 ASMP-NY Portfolio Review