Today Steve Lewis led the discussion...below is his narrative
You know what they say, “when the cat’s away, the mice will play…” And so it was that in the absence of our fearless leader, those f8’rs who showed up Saturday took advantage of being without a laptop computer to set aside our usual visual presentations in favor of rich conversation and storytelling. Steve played the role of provocateur, but not before our “warm-up” conversations were extended into the session. Jim bought with him several books to offer to anyone interested in adding to our respective collections. This led to a discussion about the importance of books vs. digital print material, and a general agreement about the value of a tactile interaction with material. Rod shared experiences from his 1967-68 military tour in Korea. Steve noted the common innocence of children that he’s observed in places where poverty prevails but has not yet dampened the spirit of kids who play, laugh, and express hope before their awareness awakens. John noted the irony of how wealth and poverty/homelessness are juxtaposed in Los Angeles (as in many other places). Cyndi shared stories about her work in Japan, where she broadcast a radio show for 1-1/2 years. While in Japan, she experienced a cultural bias directed against foreign women of which she was one. This led Howard to tell the most compelling story of the day. Howard was drafted into the Army and sent to Thailand with orders to perform a certain function, but upon arrival and presentation of such orders, he was informed that there was, in fact, no need for that service. He was, instead, told he would report for ship loading and unloading. Howard, in a true Oliver Twist moment, pushed back on that possibility by stating he was college educated and could not see his talents being wasted loading ships. The order-giver looked over Howard’s papers and exclaimed, “your test scores are higher than the Base Commander’s!” Howard was told to report for an interview the next morning with the Sargent-Major (highest enlisted rank). When he arrived, he was taken in to meet the S-M, who was a big Black guy with lots of stripes and medals adorning his uniform. After listening (or pretending to) Howard for a while, he looked at him and asked, “what is your favorite song?” Howard, who was more into Rock, thought for a moment and remembered the #1 song in the States when he left was “Up, Up, and Away” by the Fifth Dimension. So that’s the song Howard offered. The S-M smiled and told Howard he could have the job as a radio host, adding that his daughter was the Florence LaRue, famous member of the Fifth Dimension. Sure enough, Howard looked at the S-M’s name badge and he was in fact LaRue. Howard proceeded to broadcast a program to 8 bases in the region. Steve then went around the room and asked members if they could name a single photograph they’d taken that remains their #1 favorite. This led to some really interesting reflection. Here is a sampling:
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“There is a vast difference between taking a picture and making a photograph.” Robert Heinecken First up was Howard discussing his wife's (Dr Ellen Landau's) new catalog / book on an exhibit starting next week in New York... 'SPACE POETRY:THE ACTION PAINTINGS OF MICHAEL WEST—born Corinne Michelle West—is recognized by art historians as a vocal and active participant in the development of Abstract Expressionism, bringing a highly developed personal philosophy and vision to her work. Congrats Ellen ...An example of her work is below Howard showed two abstract images he shot in New York...the image on left is a window with reflection / on right is a shot down to a roof top Joe presented some newly processed shots...he also provide some narrative which I hope will be a template we all could use as we present and I post "The bridge shots are of the bridge on highway154, San Marcos Pass Road between Santa Barbara and Solvang. The photos were taken from Stagecoach Rd, which passes under the bridge. The detailed photo of the bridge structure was to bring out the detail of the bridge while at the same time have the viewer think about just what it was they are looking at. The second image was more about the thinness of the bridge shooting across the foggy sky." "The color shot of the building with the pier in the background, and the image of the bench next to the metal gate on the pier, were shot in Capitola, CA. In the building shot I wanted to bring out the pre-dusk glow of the lavender building by both increasing the saturation of the building color and de-saturating the adjacent sand and water. The bench was shot at night using a flash, something I rarely do. I liked the emptiness of the shot, empty bench looking out into complete empty blackness and a gate opening also into blackness." Kevin talked about and showed a video about Edgar Angelone a musician and photographer ...worth 15 minutes of your time to watch...the link to the video is below and below that is an example of one of his platinum prints https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSfBNrjb6ro Bill showed several things...he passed around a print he showed electronically last week entitled "No Answer"... it prompted a discussion on the importance of the print in photography...the print should be the endpoint of all of us at f8 Bill also showed his new book "De/Faced" released at the reception for his exhibit at Girdner Studio & Gallery...image of the cover is below. It's $40 either at the gallery or directly from me. Here is a link to Bill's updated website.... / billwishner.com
"I embrace the abstract in photography and exist on a few bits of order extracted from the chaos of reality." Ralph Gibson Today we were lucky to have as a guest Bart Ross (and his son) a local photographer we all know. Bart's unique approach to processing his images that transforms them to new visual entities. Here is a short two minute video describing his technique https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uSIxTQlZDk Steve Lewis talked about the visual underpinning of Bart's work... Euclidean Plane Isometry Below is a wikipedia link to the description https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclidean_plane_isometry Bart showed numerous examples of his art creations that prompted group discussion of interpretation of the final images....below are 4 examples of his final transformations Check out Bart's website
BartRoss.com “There is some mysterious process at work here which I don’t even want to understand” Philip Guston Before we discuss and see our images today, two things: Philip Guston was a painter, not a photographer; the abstract photographic image on our homepage is from Bill Wishner...more of both as the blog today unfolds. First, Philip Guston who was a prolific painter and a muralist for the WPA. Hauser & Wurth Gallery in the ArtsDistrict has an extensive retrospective on Guston on display. Bill became aware of Guston's work while he and Kathy worked at City of Hope Medical Center in the 70's. On the grounds of the center was a synagogue in which was a mural by Guston that was in need of restoration and ready to be painted over...it was ultimately saved by a generous donor, restored and remains there to this very day. Today the synagogue is used as a visitor center. While the picture below is of the almost entire mural...the greatness is in the detail which I could not capture. Some of Guston's paintings and caricatures Richard Nixon are below His daughter wrote a biography entitled "Night Studio" Now a bit of our own works...first are several images by Cyndi the fist is from a Judy Chicago exhibit the second from a Halloween event at the Nethercutt Collection in Sylmar Finally two contributions fro Bill...the first is an single image of telephone from an earlier time. The second is a before (on left) and after (on right) image derived from a wall image converted to abstract by a bit of computer wizardry
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