I sometimes wonder how much room there is for careful debate and an effort to understand what happens around us – positions and outrage are usually quite fixed. Recently, I have been looking out for photographic work that attempts to complicate seemingly simplistic arguments or binary oppositions through approach and practice. This review is the […]
Archival projects rarely offer a great conceptual rigor, in my opinion. As a collector of vernacular photography for over thirty years, I am often at pains to parse through projects that employ archival material, as I frequently feel that they are unfamiliar with the tropes associated with the material. I frequently struggle similarly when those […]
I have just returned from a workshop trip from São Paulo, Brazil, a vertiginous and bustling city. My experience in returning from the city has been marked by an extended rumination on my experiences there. I am still processing the city, its architecture, and its artists whom I was very fortunate to meet in […]
I do not know much about the war in Ukraine, despite living in a country that borders it. I don’t know much about it as the fog of war hangs heavily, like a thick, void-like curtain over the whole mess. The principal idea is clear. Russia has invaded its neighbor and, in doing so, […]
The legacy of intergenerational trauma is complicated to untangle. What we pass onto others and try to shield them from is often at odds with the need to unburden the experiences and traumas that have been suffered. It sags in our heart like a loose sock sliding down an ankle, a rock in the shoe, […]
What we do not talk about, dare to concern ourselves with, or pay much attention to are the men who fall through the cracks toward the end. We are happy to discuss the problems associated with masculine behaviour. Yet, we can’t imagine a discussion about men left wandering by their own devices or by […]
I am incredibly biased as I write this. I share a close connection with the artist Pieter Hugo through our Nearest Truth workshop programming. Although it might seem counterintuitive to the points I will raise subsequently, I have had a chance to hear Pieter talk about his work in detail, with all the challenging […]
If you happened to attend the 2009 NY Art Book Fair, you might have come across Gregory Halpern’s Omaha Sketchbook on the table of J&L Books. This early version was rough and unassuming, printed on a laser printer and spiral-bound, its pages made from cheap white paper with small contact prints affixed throughout. The images […]
Observational photography. Intrepid photography. Itinerant Photography. How does one deal with and parse out the general economy of images when abroad, away from home? What is home for a photographer who has moved from place to place over the 21st Century? There is an argument regarding the intrepid photographer, one that covers the ground, […]
Othering, debated through the discourse of reading the camera as a difference machine, seems at the crux of much of photography’s woes. Challenged by the notion that the machine is neutral in its observational and technical ability, the authorship and cultural means of producing images are undergoing a fruitful re-assessment of its terms to represent, […]
I am relatively new to Jochen Lempert’s work, or at least his books. I was aware of his book Phenomena from 2013, which seems a favorite among his fans and commands a decent price at auction. I tend to note these things to argue with or argue against about a book’s “weight” amongst the bevy […]
When I received a copy of Michael Brodie’s new book Failing, I knew it would take me a while to organize my feelings towards it. Some thoughts take time to settle from a place of instinctive fondness and sentimentality, especially when you feel so strongly connected to someone’s previous work. As for many of us, my […]