Engineer's Daughter

michael bosanko's light graffiti

Something fun for your Tuesday: Michael Bosanko's photographs, in which he leaves his camera on a long exposure and then "draws" figures on darkened landscapes with colored flashlights.  I'm always impressed when someone really knows how to work with light like this, even when they're just making goofy pictures populated by aliens and other critters, as I'm a rank amateur in that particular area when it comes to my own camera.  You can see more of Bosanko's experiments with photography on his Web site here.

rankin live! preview

Somewhere in my adult life I have developed an intense discomfort with having my picture taken, and I doubt I would be any more relaxed with a professional photographer more accustomed to shooting models and celebrities pointing his camera at me.  James Anthony recently experienced what it was like to work with the world-famous Rankin as the photographer preps for a project later this year called Rankin Live! in which he will shoot 1,000 British citizens and almost instantly exhibit the pictures, then give the proceeds from the sale of those portraits to charity.  Anthony lived to tell about what it was like to be in front of the intimidating piece of equipment you see in the picture here and the man who wields it:

I am nervous – to put it mildly – but Rankin is remarkably adept at putting me at ease. His sense of humour is, by all accounts, as quick as his eye for a good shot.

In Anthony's case the results are quite hot, and you can see for yourself in the gallery here.  I really do wonder how models do it sometimes, how they can smile so naturally and not look, as so often in my case, like a deer caught in headlights.  Maybe they just have a photographer who can make them laugh.

guess who came to dinner?

Now through the end of February Birmingham's Black British arts and culture center the Drum is hosting an exhibition called Guess Who is Coming to Dinner.  Focusing on some of that city's first mixed-race families, the show was put together by Birmingham native Tracey O'Loughlin, herself the child of a black father and a white mother.  Chris Arnot spoke to her about her memories of growing up mixed-race:

She says of her father, who died 14 years ago: "He was 6ft 4ins and 18 stone, so we didn't get too many comments when he was around." There were plenty of hostile stares, however. As her mother, Sheila, records: "We were considered trash. And you were treated like that, so you felt like that."

The show could not be more timely here at the beginning of the new age of Obama and also at a moment when mixed-race is the fastest growing ethnic group in the UK.  You can see some pictures from the exhibit, mostly taken in the '50s and '60s, in the online gallery here.

inequalities in liverpool

All eyes were on Liverpool in 2008 while it enjoyed its year as the European Capital of Culture and hosted everything from a massive Klimt exhibit to a giant mechanical spider.  However, a mere two years earlier a study had found Liverpool's historic ward Everton, perched on a hill that overlooks the city center, to be the poorest area in all of Britain, and it is a part of the city that faces continual closures and general abandonment.  Photographer Christian Petersen has been attempting to draw attention to Everton's plight by capturing its struggling residents and workers on film, and his images are the most melancholy kind of street photography.  They were recently on display in downtown Liverpool in what I hope was an eye-opening exhibit for residents and tourists alike.  You can see some of Peterson's Everton pictures in the gallery here or on his Web site.

david lachapelle retrospective

Famous for his candy-slick photographs of celebrities and models, David LaChapelle is currently enjoying a mid-career retrospective at (appropriately enough) La Monnaie de Paris, the Paris Mint, at a moment when the artist has been insisting his work has an anti-capitalist message.  Syma Tariq covered the show for the Guardian:

LaChapelle received his first professional commission from Andy Warhol, who encountered him while he was a bus boy in Studio 54. The influence is clear when viewing the Marilyn Monroe-like rendering of Amanda Lepore, the transsexual who is one of the photographer's muses (Amanda as Andy Warhol's Liz RED, 2007). "I want to communicate, without my work needing a paragraph on the wall next to it," he says.

While I have always liked LaChapelle's wild imagination and his over-the-top portraits, I also think his portrayal of women often leaves much to be desired.  For example, I wonder what exactly he is trying to communicate by photographing a woman lying unconscious on the ground or inert under a giant slice of cheese while Jeff Koons leers above her.  You can see those particular images and more, and judge for yourself, in the NSFW gallery here.

john gay retrospective

British photographer John Gay would have turned 100 this year, and to celebrate English Heritage is hosting a retrospective of his 60 years of work at Kenwood House called England Observed.  His casual black-and-white shots of the everyday people and places in Britain are exquisite, whether he's capturing a joyful moment on the Hampstead Heath swingboats or the insane pigeons of Trafalgar Square.  The Guardian has a nice selection of pictures from the exhibition here.

matt writtle's portraits for posterity

For Matt Writtle's Portraits for Posterity series the photographer has created simple, haunting images of aging Holocaust survivors.  Each picture is accompanied by a few words from the subject about their experiences, but often all you need to know is written right there on their faces, in their eyes.  As the poet Michael Etkind says, "Death is the winner of all wars / Man is their victim and their cause."

pick of the pics 2008: dan chung

At the beginning of 2009 the Guardian asked some of its photographers to go back and pick their best pictures from the previous twelve months, and my favorite set is composed of Dan Chung's images from his year in China.  From political unrest to the devastation of the earthquake to the Olympics, Chung brilliantly captures both large moments and small from what was an astoundingly tumultuous year for that country.  You can watch a slideshow with Chung's own audio commentary right here.

eyewitness

cityscape 5
Originally uploaded by London Transport Museum

This is just me testing out the ability to blog a photo from Flickr, using this nifty picture from the London Transport Museum.  And while I'm at it I might as well point you to more of my favorite images from my contacts list, which you can see here.  I heart Flickr.

community in the elephant

Elephant and Castle is one of those names that could only exist in London.  Supposedly named after a vision some (likely soused) individual once had on London Bridge, the district today is set to undergo a massive regeneration project that hopes to clear out the squatters and "less desirable" elements to make way for new buildings and better economic opportunity.  But of course there are people living there right now who will be displaced.  The nearby London College of Communication has been assigning its photography students to document the area and its current residents with the hopes of creating a record for posterity, and they will continue to do so for the next decade as the regeneration really begins to take effect.  The current batch of pictures is themed around the idea of community, and includes Thomas Ball's landscapes such as the one pictured right that seek to give a different perspective of the local high-density housing estates.  I also really like Anna von Stackleberg's "aerial" photos of the estate gardens.  The students' photographs have been collected into a book and are also on display at the Cuming Museum through March, and you can see some images from an earlier iteration of the project, "Home", in the gallery here.