& Photography Blog

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Ingmar Bergman Remembered

There was a beautiful obituary in the NY Times today for Ingmar Bergman. Here is one of several fantastic quotes taken from a 1995 NYT interview as Bergman recalls his childhood memories:

"I also remember being forced to sit in church, listening to a very boring sermon, but it was a very beautiful church, and I loved the music and the light streaming through the windows. I used to sit up in the loft beside the organ, and when there were funerals, I had this marvelous long-shot view of the proceedings, with the coffin and the black drapes, and then later at the graveyard, watching the coffin lowered into the ground. I was never frightened by these sights. I was fascinated."

Read the entire obituary here.

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posted by Allison Grant at 7:22 PM 0 Comments

MCA


Los Guerreros (The Warriors), 2007
By Nuevos Ricos

Zach and I spent a good portion of yesterday at the MCA. We wanted a final look at the "MCA Exposed" exhibition featuring selected photographs from the permanent
collection. It was amazing to see so many great photographs in one
place and we needed a second dose.

There were also many other interesting things up, most notably works titled "Los Guerreros" by an art collaborative called Nuevos Ricos. As part of the exhibition "Escultura Social: A New Generation of Art from Mexico City," "Los Guerreros"
explores a complex subculture of Mexican street gangs that took shape
in response to the 1979 film "The Warriors." Newspaper images of the
gangs are placed directly above stills from the film so you can see the
gang members purposefully using gestural communication and dress to
imitate the film's symbolic visual codes of conduct. True to their
original presentation, the newspaper images are shown in black in
white, the film stills in color.

I am fascinated by subculture's consistent adoption of symbolic dress and
gesture to express a cultural or social division from the norm. This
division is met with a visual and social unification amongst members.
Most famously, early punk rockers tore their clothes and used safety
pins to "mend" the tares in their clothes. The safety pin came to symbolize the broken
lives of punk rockers that were mended through the unity of subculture.

I also liked some pieces by an artist named Dr. Lakra. A former tattoo artist, he now takes vintage posters (mostly pin-ups) from the 40s and 50s and draws tattoos
on the figures that refer to popular culture. You can see some of his
images and read more about his work hereat Kate MacGarry's gallery page.


Frente al Espejo (The Mirror), 2003
By Dr. Lakra

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posted by Allison Grant at 9:11 AM 0 Comments

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Today I ran into Judy Natal and Kelli Connell at the Chicago Green Market. It was so nice to see the faces of dedicated photographers.

Kelli is a new addition to the photo faculty at Columbia College, and will be teaching our graduate seminar along side Babara Kasten. It should be an interesting combo...stay tuned for details.


Daydream by Kelli Connell


Architectural Site #17 by Barbara Kasten

posted by Allison Grant at 11:40 AM 0 Comments

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Photographs are keeping me awake

I can't sleep tonight because visions of a show I saw last year keep running through my head. I saw Greta Pratt's Using History at the Museum of Contemporary Photography and it has been one of those shows that has really stuck with me.

Contemporary American patriotism is a devastatingly humorous thing. One longstanding tradition in patriotic expression is to bring forward a nation's history, and thus its foundation through stories and artifacts. In this series of photographs, Pratt explores connections to history by visiting memorials, museums and reenactment sites and photographing them as they are, tourists and all. By using the experiences of visitors and participants she captures humorous, astonishing and sometimes disgraceful displays of historical recollection and patriotic sentiment. The photographs reveal the fragmented nature of commercialized presentation and its prevailing jurisdiction over historic recounts.

The blatant humor laced with a dark undertone of a patriotic insincerity is what really hit me. Plus the pictures are quite well made. If you haven't see them take a look and if you have, take another.

posted by Allison Grant at 12:38 AM 0 Comments

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Josh Winegar

Here is a piece by a recent grad/friend Josh Winegar. Starting with appropriated photographs of hunters posing next to carcasses they have killed, Josh uses paint to erase out the hunters and then redraws bandages and other details on the remaining image. Although you can not see it in the web reproductions, there is often a bit of transparency in the paint, leaving behind the ghostly image of a hunter standing next to his or her prize. I am fascinated by the power of erasure and the particular way that Josh has used it to allow viewers to create their own vision of an aggressor posing and thus dominating over his or her pray. The ghostly, white background allows me to recall the Abu Ghraib images of aggression and domination (although when creating or recalling an image of domination, to each his own) as a counter point to Josh's clear reference to the peaceful, organic qualities of death and rebirth. It is quite poetic.

Check out more of these great images here.

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posted by Allison Grant at 5:18 PM 0 Comments

Friday, July 13, 2007

John Szarkowski

I have been meaning to write a short note on the unfortunate death of John Szarkowski. This morning I read an interview of Todd Papageorge on Alec Soth's blog. The interview begins with Papageorge discussing his personal relationship with Szarkowski. Since I have never and will never meet Szarkowski, it is interesting to read Papageorge's stories of Szarkowski's unique vision. Take a look if you have the time.

posted by Allison Grant at 7:59 AM 0 Comments

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

BUSY BUSY BUSY

It has been a while since my last post because I have been busy busy busy!

The good news...MY SITE IS NOW UP!!!!
please visit it and let me know what you think - allisongrant.com

The bad news is that I made this picture yesterday morning at sunrise, and I think I am going to need to reshoot with the umbrella out further in the water. (Please excuse the poor image quality, I pulled it from a contact sheet.)


I also went to see Jeff Wall speak last week. He had several interesting ideas about photography, cinematography and artifice and spoke a great deal about the power of constructed images to draw on and pull forward ideas from past images, photographic or otherwise. I was quite disappointed that he didn't address his work from a stand point of social significance. Many of his images, as well as many of the images and artists he draws inspiration from, involve poignant social interaction that seems to have a social significance that Wall simply passed over as unimportant. In spite of this, it was overall a worthwhile trip to The Art Institute.

My new job is going well. Come visit me at The Viet Bistro on Devon. The food is amazing!

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posted by Allison Grant at 12:30 PM 1 Comments

Sunday, July 1, 2007

Nate

My good friend Nate Mathews has been making some great work recently! I have the inside scoop and happen to know that he will be updating his site in the next week, so go take a look. He has been photographing barren institutional architectural spaces in the Chicago area where objects (i.e. plants, benches) have been added to offer visitors a relief from the overwhelming concrete mass of the buildings. Sometimes the images are clever and funny, sometimes they are downright intimidating, but they are all great! Check them out NOW!

posted by Allison Grant at 1:18 PM 1 Comments

Jobs

I need a job, bad! With all of my free time with no money, I am doing all kinds of nice things for people. My dad is an engineer and has a company that develops medical instruments. He has wanted to update his site for a while, so I volunteered to do the job. Here is what I have so far... doesn't his job look fun!

posted by Allison Grant at 1:08 PM 1 Comments