Photographers

Mallory Morrison: Fog

Los Angeles-based Mallory Morrison's beautiful underwater dancers are photographed so delightfully. Mallory was a dancer herself for many years.

She shoots fashion in this style as well as making fine art prints. Let yourself float away!

All images © Mallory Morrison

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Luciano and Ficca: All Work and No Play

All work and no play... © Davide Luciano. Styling by Claudia Ficca

The dynamic duo of creative food styling and photography, Davide Luciano and Claudia Ficca, have done it again.*

If these references are lost on you, decipher them here.

All images © Davide Luciano. Styling by Claudia Ficca

*They always do it. Don't take my word for it, go and enjoy yourself.

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Kirill Kovalenko: Beach Sequence pt. 3

Kirill Kovalenko made these images on the beach in Crimea over the last year - a complicated time for the Republic. Kirill talks about how "...there is the feeling of a lack of time, as if all those people to come and do what they do solely by inertia or habit. Has already clearly left a past, unknown future, but this all goes on, as if there were no first and second, neither before nor after. What really want these people from life? for the sake of what they live?"

Exploring how people relax during times of such conflict, Kirill has a mischievous eye.

All images © Kirill Kovalenko

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A. Retina Stewart: The Underground Project

Imagine my surprise when, upon arriving at Thierry Goldberg Gallery in NYC's lower east side to meet my fellow judge for the Parson's BFA graduate show, it turns out to be Vince Aletti, photography critic for the New Yorker Magazine. After I got over my intimidation, I was thrilled and humbled to chat with Mr. Aletti about the more than 60 graduating artists' work, and even more thrilled when we were in agreement about much of the work on show.

We nominated our winners and each selected a Juror's Choice - mine is A. Retina Stewart. (Her fabulous real name!)

A. Retina Stewart is Houston-born, now living and working in New York. Her short documentary is a classic; it explores the lives of underground hip hop musicians, their goals and personal endeavors. Stewart highlights the young men's struggles against the pressure to be hyper-masculine and portray a young-black-male stereotype.

"Selling drugs is NOT part of our culture. That's the situation we were put in. If we could have went to Yale, we would have. People move drugs into our streets. We are survivors. We didn't get the same opportunities... we made it work."

Genesis Iver, 2014

Carpe D, 2014

Frank McFly, 2014

Jevon Doe, 2014

"Male African-American hip hop musicians are notoriously perceived to uphold hypermasculine standards; which creates a commercialized persona. Through an intimate interview in each artist's bedroom, Stewart explores them on a more dimensional and nuanced level, delving into their ambitions, insecurities, and fears." A. Retina Stewart

Josh, 2015

Frank McFly, 2015

Donteze, 2015

All images © A. Retina Stewart

In a piece on Afropunk, Stewart proudly, rightfully states "I have mastered the art of finding gold within people, and that's a jewel that school can't teach."

Follow Stewart on Instagram: _arstewart

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Jan Cook: Chromoskedasic Painting

Jan Cook was purveying her photographic wares at the portfolio walk during PhotoLucida last month. I stopped in my tracks to explore her wild-looking prints and enjoyed a really fun few minutes chatting with Jan and her husband and son. Wonderful people. I had never heard of this chromoskedasic alternative process before - the prints were gorgeous. Here's the deal for any other ignorami:

"In this body of work I am using chromoskedasic painting to produce unique gelatin silver prints. The photographs are manipulated with chemistry during the black and white development process. This creates a range of subtle colors as well as a silvering out of the photographic paper. The process can be unpredictable and difficult to control as you canʼt see the effects of the chemistry until after the marks develop. It does not allow for the same kind of detail as traditional painting."

"Manipulating photographs allows me to work with several elements that are interesting to me, making marks on paper, altering a photographic image and integrating another medium into the surface of the print. Visually, I am interested in pushing the boundary between where the photographic image begins and ends."

All images © Jan Cook

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Rohit Saha: What Remains

India-based Rohit Saha sent in these photographs taken after the recent, massive earthquake in Nepal along with his own stirring poem.

Donations to the Nepal effort will need to continue. I support Médecins Sans Frontières, and Kids of Kathmandu.

I can't explain how it feels.

It's dark here.

I had no idea what an earthquake does to a place.

Thousands of bodies are being burnt, the sky is filled with smoke.The air smells of death, of an unimaginable devastation that has come upon Nepal.

Bhaktapur, the ancient Durbar square, one of the Unesco world heritage sites have been completely devastated.The smell of the place, the coldness with little mountains of rubbles. A broken comb, a pack of cards and a phone just popped out from the rubble.

Just overheard from the brave rescue teams that a four month baby was found alive after 4 days. Hope. 

I am staying beside the crematorium ground, near the Pashupati temple. Mass cremations are grim, any death is.

Millions of people have been left homeless, stranded without a roof. Relief camps have sheltered thousands of people, trying to live through the tough times, together. They have nothing but their family and many don't even have that.That fear is still there,but still they manage to laugh.

Sankhu, a small village uphill from Kathmandu is lost. Most of the houses in this picturesque hamlet are gone.

What remains?

Family photographs on the wall and cupboards. Empty sofas and tarpaulin walls of relief camps. Sniffer dogs and international rescue teams try to bring out the dead from under the rubbles. They found a woman, dead in her courtyard, buried under her own house. I saw her face before they covered it, and wrapped her in a white plastic sheet. I could see her face. I won't ever forget.

Nepal is holding herself strong and beautiful.

Life is the most precious thing.

If you don't stay then nothing stays. What remains? - Rohit Saha, May 2015

All images © Rohit Saha

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Steve Pyke: Faces Of Our Time

In 1971, Yousuf Karsh published a book of his portraits titled "Faces of Our Time" (University of Toronto Press). It included his iconic, intimate photographs of John F. Kennedy, Helen Keller, Albert Schweitzer, Ravi Shankar, Tennessee Williams, and many more. Anyone who is familiar with Karsh will know that the success of his portraits resulted from his respect for, and knowledge of, his subjects. When photographers have a good amount of time with their subject, so much more is revealed in the resulting portrait as a connection is made. When a photographer has to grab 2 minutes in a bland hotel room, they get nothing but a flat record of some face.

Steve Pyke is a brilliant man, wonderful photographer, still-young and -prolific veteran artist. His new book, "Faces of Our Time," will be filled with his own intimate and iconic portraits made over the last 35 years. From Quentin Crisp, to Gabriel Garcia Marquez, to Hugo Chavez, Pyke has made his own mark with the luminaries of the 20th century.

Help get this book of photos and stories published through Unbound. You get the e-book for only £10!

News, Photographers | Permalink |

Sultan Al Rubayq: Tafeet

Fantastic series from Sultan Al Rubayq, from Saudi Arabia, who is graduating from the MFA in Photography program at the New York Film Academy this spring. I am thrilled to share his images from his thesis project.

"Tafeet" is a game of car-drifting that sort of looks like fun but is obviously highly dangerous. According to Sultan, although it is illegal "It is still rampant in the public roads in my country and that means it continues to create reasons for people to die in accidents, whether the drifters or just mere spectators. My sole purpose in showing this documentary is to be a medium of exposing the dangers and threats of this to innocent victims."

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Erika Plummer: Aurora Borealis, Lower 48

Photolucida would prove to be the portfolio review event everyone claims it to be when before even reaching the hotel, I was already talking to a fabulous photographer - one of the many lovely volunteers who dedicated a whole lot of time to looking after us all. Based in Portland, Oregon, Erika Plummer is a multi-talented portrait and landscape photographer, who lit up while telling me how she got into chasing the Aurora Borealis - and I lit up when she sent me the pics!

"I saw them the first time in 1998 while camping MI and have been in pursuit ever after. The onset of DSLR cameras and the advancement of high ISO capabilities have made it easier to capture on our sensors what we can't see with our naked eye. The colors are there, the lights are dancing and our cameras prove it."

"These images from Montana, however, I saw very easily without my camera and that makes it more wonderful. There are a handful of us insane photographers who will drive hundreds of miles looking for clear dark skies and a chance to catch the very elusive Aurora. When she makes her appearance it's worth every failed trip."

These images were all made in Montana on April 16th, 2015 about 100 miles north of Billings in an unincorporated area called Ingomar. © Erika Plummer

"If you are ever in one of the United States that border Canada, and it's a clear dark night, point your camera North and see what happens."

I plan to!

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Tabitha Soren: Fantasy Life

Tabitha Soren has spent a dozen years delving into the realm of American baseball, exploring tradition, success, and failure. Using the tin type process to photograph some of the live action, she gives a nod to the history of both that process and baseball itself - coming to popularity at around the same time in US history. Embedding herself in the drafts, she uncovered the truth behind the glamour - that a small percentage ever make it to the Big League.

"FANTASY LIFE is a series that explores the fantasies that define America: Manifest destiny, the romantic idea of the restless wanderer, the hopeful idea that failure is just a step on the road to success, the notion that the pursuit of fame and fortune is also the pursuit of happiness, the belief that to secure one's identity, one must seek to stand apart from the community."

"Out of the thousands of players that are drafted into Major League Baseball each year, only a tiny percentage - about 6% - go on to play in 'The Show,' the big-pay, high-stakes galaxy of thirty teams that we all know, love and hate."

"Some of my subjects became well known, respected players at the highest level of the game. Some left baseball to pursue less glamorous work, such as selling insurance and coal mining. Some have struggled with poverty - even homelessness. But the common thread among them all is that they had a shot, and they literally put their bodies on the line for the sake of the game."

It is very hard to do this deep project justice online, so you can go see it now at Kopeikin Gallery in LA, through June 6, 2015. The live exhibition includes:

A mixture of C prints and Selenium toned Gelatin Silver prints;

A wall of memorabilia from the 23 players I followed for 11 years (everything from kindergarten age baseball cards to arthroscopic x rays from knee surgeries);

A wall of comparison portraits showing that only 5 of the 21 subjects made it to the major leagues;

Tintypes of action shots from games;

Two sculptural elements: a vitrine of 40 bone spurs (many taken out of the players during surgery to improve their game) and an acrylic 4 foot high tower of shelled peanuts, with 6% of the peanuts at the top painted gold.

Amazing!