16.4.15
12.3.15
Andy Goldsworthy: In the Studio
TateShots explores how Goldsworthy uses materials to explore our connection with nature
If you like this, take a look at Rivers and Tides, a documentary about Andy Goldsworthy and his work.
11.3.15
Stanley2 – A Photographic Exhibition by Helen Taylor
Stanley, County Durham · 14 March - 14 April 2015
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| Photograph: Helen Taylor |
Stanley2 – a photographic exhibition by Helen Taylor
Civic Hall Stanley, Front Street, Stanley, County Durham, DH9 0NA
14 March to 14 April 2015
Scenes of unreality and mind-bending perspectives will be on display next month at the first solo exhibition by North East photographer Helen Taylor.
Entitled Stanley2, the exhibition will feature a series of stunning ‘multiple exposures’ - achieved without using Photoshop or digital editing – and taken exclusively on Helen’s 35mm Holga 135BC analogue camera.
Multiple exposures, a technique used to superimpose two or more images into one, has been adopted by Helen to document her hometown of Stanley, County Durham, while presenting a beautifully atmospheric ‘ghost world’ where the lines between what is real and what is not are blurred.
Helen decided to study photography at Newcastle College in 2012 after a lifelong passion with the medium.
She says: “One of my favourite modules at college was working with 35mm film cameras and darkroom processes. After completing my diploma, I continued experimenting with analogue cameras and, in particular, the possibilities of double and multiple exposures. I took the series of photos for this exhibition in my home town of Stanley and in the surrounding area. I wanted to draw peoples’ attention to things that they may otherwise walk past without really noticing.”
In an era of digital photography, Helen is passionate about the unique qualities of film and the effects that it can be used to create.
“What excites me about film photography is the mechanical and chemical processes that have to take place in order to create your image,” Helen says. “We live in a world where photography is available on demand and has become, in a sense, quite a throwaway medium.
“Using a film camera means you don’t have a playback screen to review your images immediately and you have to take the time to compose your shot. Being restricted to 24 shots on a roll makes you more selective in choosing subjects and waiting for a film to develop brings anticipation and surprise back into photography.”
Helen, who owns a collection of more than 50 vintage cameras, both analogue and digital, adds: “I took these photos with a Holga 135BC camera which is a very basic plastic camera (even the lens is plastic). It’s sometimes called a ‘toy camera’. The key feature is that the film advance allows you to take multiple exposures.
“I find the results I get from this camera are dramatically different from anything digital. My technique is to take the first image the right way up and then without winding on the film advance, turn the camera upside down and take it again.
“The resulting photos have a delicate quality and the multiple exposures melt into each other with no distinct edges of where one ends and the other begins. There is no Photoshop or digital editing involved in any of these images, all of the effects are achieved in camera when the photo is taken.”
Helen Taylor’s first solo exhibition of her work – Stanley2 – takes place at Civic Hall Stanley, Front Street, Stanley, County Durham, DH9 0NA, from 14 March to 14 April 2015. Tel – 01207 299110
For more information go to: www.helentaylorphotos.com or www.civichallstanley.co.uk
27.12.14
Gerhard Richter's Desk
A still taken from Corinna Belz's documentary
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Find Gerhard Richter Painting on Amazon: US | UK
Also at A Piece of Monologue:
26.12.14
Blue Note: Uncompromising Expression: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939
A beautiful, fully-illustrated history of the legendary jazz label
From Thames & Hudson, what promises to be a fantastic (and beautiful) new book celebrating the pioneering jazz label, Blue Note Records: 'Released to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the coolest and best- known label in jazz, this book celebrates over seven decades of extraordinary music from a company that has stayed true to its founders commitment to Uncompromising Expression. Tracing the evolution of jazz from the boogie- woogie and swing of the 1930s, through bebop, funk and fusion, to the eclectic mix Blue Note releases today, the book also narrates a complex social history from the persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany to the developments in music and technology in the late 20th century. Blue Note is not only known as the purveyor of extraordinary jazz but is also famous as an arbiter of cool. The photography of co-founder Francis Wolff and the cover designs of Reid Miles were integral to the labels success and this highly illustrated, landmark publication featuring the very best photographs, covers, and ephemera from the archives, including never-before-published material commemorates Blue Notes momentous contribution to jazz, to art and design as well as to revolutionizing the music business.'
Find on Amazon: US | UK
Also at A Piece of Monologue:
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| ABlue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
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| Blue Note: Uncompromising Vision: The Finest in Jazz Since 1939 |
Find on Amazon: US | UK
Also at A Piece of Monologue:
16.12.14
Michael Stipe on Douglas Coupland and 9/11
Former REM frontman reflects on the images that haunt America
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With a small, powerful set of images, Douglas Coupland actually manages to playfully (how did he pull that off?) remind us of our collective 9/11 moment – the act that unzippered the 21st century in most of the world, and changed my notion of home and safety forever. Coupland’s at first seemingly Op Art paintings are just black dots – abstract, weirdly familiar. But then you look at them on your iPhone (because you’re going to take a pic and post it … this is 2014, after all) and you have the ahhhhhhh moment when a chill runs down your spine and you realise that it’s them: the jumpers. It’s him: the boogeyman. Doug offers us the choice to either see or not see these deeply internalised images. Having that choice is what enables us to survive from day to day without going nuts.
His images also remind me that nobody really knows how to look downtown any more without feeling, in some way, conflicted. Every time I see the Freedom Tower, I think of “freedom fries” – the term coined when the US wanted to invade Iraq, and France objected. Anything attached to the word “French” in the US was then relabelled with the word “freedom”: freedom toast, freedom fries, freedom kiss, for fuck’s sake. French wine was banned, French people were spat upon, their heads in photographs replaced with heads of weasels. Forget the Statue of Liberty and where it came from. It was a disastrous response—a horrid turn on the formerly leftist act of boycotting as protest. I’ve never been more embarrassed by my country, (except when we re-elected George W Bush and Dick Cheney). I largely blame the media for this egregious abuse of power and influence.
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| Michael Stipe |
The Freedom Tower was meant to inspire patriotism and instead embodies the darker sides of nationalism. The 9/11 attacks and the Bush administration’s response, buoyed by the media, and our shock at having finally been direct victims of terrorism, paved the way for a whole new take on “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” There was no longer any need to explain or publicly debate militaristic power, or the police state mindset. To do so was to be the opposite of a patriot. [Read More]
7.9.14
The Photography of Vivian Maier
An unknown artist who chronicled post-1945 America
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
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| Photograph: Vivian Maier |
"Honestly, my reaction when this process started was, oh, they're doing a movie on my crazy nanny who I never really liked," says Joe Matthews. The nanny's name was Vivian Maier, and she looked after Joe, his sister Sarah and brother Clark in the Chicago suburbs for three years in the 1980s.
The family knew that Maier was unusual and that she took a lot of photographs. Her attic bedroom was kept locked and packed full of boxes and newspapers. Joe's mother, Linda, says that she hired Maier, who was in her 50s, because she wanted someone she could respect as an equal: "I liked Viv because she spoke her mind so I knew what I was dealing with. We could disagree. I could say, 'No, I don't like doing things that way.' I thought she made a good partner."
But neither Linda Matthews nor any of the other families Maier worked for dreamed that soon after her death in 2009, their former nanny would be hailed as a key figure in 20th-century American photography. "The first time I saw her picture on television, I was stunned," says Linda. "I knew she was talented but it's astonishing what she made of it. Who could have imagined she could have left so much behind?" [Read More]
Find Vivian Maier on Amazon: US | UK
Also at A Piece of Monologue:
6.9.14
Werner Herzog: On Location
A selection of images from the British Film Institute
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| On the set of Fitzcarraldo (1982) Credit: © Werner Herzog Film GmbH. Courtesy Collection Deutsche Kinemathek |
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| On the set of Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) Credit: © Werner Herzog Film GmbH. Courtesy Collection Deutsche Kinemathek |
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| On the set of Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) Credit: © Werner Herzog Film GmbH. Courtesy Collection Deutsche Kinemathek |
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| On the set of Aguirre, Wrath of God (1972) Credit: © Werner Herzog Film GmbH. Courtesy Collection Deutsche Kinemathek |
Find on Amazon: US | UK
Also at A Piece of Monologue:
2.9.14
Inside The Paris Review: NYC Offices
Two photographers take a look around the iconic literary journal
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Paul Barbera |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
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| Photograph: Sara Kerens |
Part of the “Where They Create” project, photographer Paul Barbera goes inside the offices of legendary literary journal, The Paris Review. 208 issues on from its first in 1953, the magazine was orginally produced by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton, Americans in Paris, the opening statement reading "The Paris Review hopes to emphasize creative work—fiction and poetry—not to the exclusion of criticism, but with the aim in mind of merely removing criticism from the dominating place it holds in most literary magazines…" Featuring interviews and work from the likes of Hemingway, Faulkner, Ezra Pound, V. S. Naipaul, Joan Didion and Truman Capote, the magazine continues to introduce the work of new writers and reevaluate established names. More in our gallery, for the full set of images head here and read an interview with current editor Lorin Stein here. [Read More]From Claudine Ko (Refinery 29):
In New York City's esteemed literary world, there are parties, and then there are The Paris Review parties. Indeed, as long as the quarterly journal has garnered respect for discovering new writing talent — Jack Kerouac, Adrienne Rich, and David Foster Wallace, to name a few — it's also been known for its all-night, booze-flowing soirées where society and the counterculture drink from the same bottle of whiskey.Also at A Piece of Monologue:
“It’s always been two things at once,” says editor Lorin Stein. “On the one hand, it’s a hyper-sophisticated, modernist, avant-garde magazine. On the other hand, it’s sort of a destination party.” And over the decades, the 60-year-old publication has continually attracted an eclectic crowd, from Jackie O, Truman Capote, and Norman Mailer, to more recently, Zadie Smith, Malcolm Gladwell, and the editors of Vice. [Read More]
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