Artist Analysis #9

Gregory Maiofis

Taste of Russian Ballet

Gregory Maiofis is a Russian photographer known for his modern surrealist photography that emulates the old style not only in subject but also in process. Every image he shoots has a deep meaning behind it and usually focused on various russian fables or fairy tails. Gregory shoots on black and white film and develops on Bromoil giving his images an old style feel. He revives not only the old method of printing but also the old mechanism for creating meaning in everyone of his works.  

This image is from a series of other bear and ballerina photos and one of his more humorous series. Showing a ballerina dancer performing in front of an attentive grizzly bear. This was not Photoshoped or manipulated in anyway. It turns out that he knew an animal trainer from the circus and convinced him to let him bring a 400 lb grizzly bear into his studio. It must have been a fast shutter speed knowing how fast things change when working with animals and the dancer is completely in focus while moving. The lighting is very dramatic, looks like only one main light is set up to the left and maybe a dim fill off to the right. I think its fascinating that he still uses such only technology for his work, it gives it a sort of timelessness that is further strengthened by this old look.

Chair Gif

Artist Analysis #8

Richard Prince

Richard Prince, "Untitled (Cowboy)" 1989

Richard Prince is a well known photographer, known for rephotographing found images and collages. He began his career as a painter, and making a living by working for TimeLife Inc. clipping articles for staff writers. At the end of the day he would end up with tons of torn out advertisements on his desk. During this time, he became extremely fascinated and repulsed by the images presented in these magazines, mostly focusing on advertisements. He saw them as trying to portray or evoke "hallucinatory fictions of society's desires". What he would do is crop out the text in order to remove the context of the original photo, and sometimes he would cut them up and adding drawings or other photos to them. Some of his works included cowboys, gangs, celebrities, car hoods, and nurse paintings. Prince's main influence was Jackson Pollock, not only based on his abstract paintings but also because he was fascinated with Pollocks loner lifestyle. His work has been viewed as very controversial over the years, because some people see it as a form of steeling or copying. Although because he takes the photo out of its context and re purposes them in a way, his work now days is considered original.  

This particular work the "Untitled (Cowboy)" was originally an image taken from an advertisement for Marlboro cigarettes taken originally by Sam Abell. This series in particular clearly highlights American's dreams and desires and looking at societies attraction to watching others rather than experiencing something themselves. It was printed using the chromogenic printing process, and is 50 by 70 inches.  

Artist Analysis #7

Richard Billingham

Richard Billingham is an English photographer who is best known for his series called "Who's Looking at the Family?" later published into a book called "Rays a Laugh".  In which he documents his family life and captures his childhood memories of growing up in poverty with an alcoholic father and an obese mother. As it turns out, Billingham actually ended up becoming a photographer almost by accident.  He graduated from Sutherland University in 1994 with a degree in fine arts, specialising in painting. So originally his photos were intended to be used only as source images for his paintings and nothing more. It was until later that he realised the uniqueness he had captured and became interested in film and photography professionally.

This image is part of a set from an exibition called "Who's Looking at the Family?" All the photos from this series were taken at his families house. This photo in particular shows an older man in a sports coat sitting in a chair, pulling back from the camera covering his mouth with his hand, as if he's about to sneeze. Above him is a black and white cat suspended in mid air. The surrounding room seems to be untouched by the photographer and seems quite natural. This photo has a sort of candid feel to it, like a snap shot. All his pictures would be taken on the cheapest film he could find, and contain many aspects of consumer photography, such as harsh shadows, brash colours, and bad focus. However this all seems to add to the authenticity of the images. This photo probably was taken with a small aperture to get the background blur, and a fast shutter of no lower than 200 because of the flash.     

Photo A Day Project

Johnson Field, motion blurred soccer players, and a beautiful Albuquerque sunset.

Experimenting with double exposures in dorm room.

Ghosted students on their way back from the Frontier.

Abstracted motion blur and hospital.

Wide angle, sunset, motion blur.

Ghost bus

Artist Analysis #7

Alec Soth

Alec Soth is an American Photographer who concentrates his work on "off beat, hauntingly banal images of modern America".  Some think his photos have a very cinematic feel to them, like they were taken straight out of a movie. He shoots portraits mainly, and uses an 8x10 camera. What he attempts to capture in all his photos is the equal importance of the subject and the the journey getting there. Some of his influences are said to be Walker Evens, Stephen Shore, and Diane Arbus. He shoots most of his photos outside, using natural light, avoiding harsh shadows by shooting on overcast days. All his photos contain very dull colors in order to better blend in with the surrounding nature and avoid drawing too much attention to the subject. This also makes his pictures more relatable and seem more natural and real.  

This image was taken from the cover of one of his books called "Sleeping by the Mississippi". It was taken in Minnesota during the winter. A man is shown dressed in a flight suit standing on a roof, holding two vintage model planes. This photo just begs to have a story associated with it, as many of his works do, although I could not find any back story on it unfortunately.This picture looks like it would have been a fairly bright scene to expose for, so he probably had to set the shutter moderately fast, while using a larger aperture to achieve the blurred background. The original print is a Chromogenic print mounted on aluminum and is blown up to 40x32 inches. The fact that he was born in Minnesota, I think really effects the final product of his work. All his work ends up embodying some memory or familiarity from his own life.

Artist Analysis #5

William Eggleston

Early in his career Eggleston shot only in black and white, because that's about all that was available at the time. Later on, however, he began experimenting with color processes, such as dye-transfer printing, a cheap process used mainly for commercial and fashion prints. This process was used for many of his most famous works. Eggleston's works marked a sort of turning point in the history of photography, he was one of the first to start making colored prints and the first to start taking photos of everyday life rather than monumental landscape shots, like that of Adams and Weston.

This photo is one of 88 prints from his body of work titled Los Alamos, from sites he saw while traveling through New Mexico from 1965 to 1974. This image shows two people sitting at a booth, enjoying a smoke, at a non nondescript cafe or restaurant. The camera is at head height and positioned directly behind one of the subjects acting to obscure the other person across the table. This is obviously a period piece based on the hair style, clothes and the fact that its illegal now days to smoke in a restaurant. The colors are extremely vivid and are complementary calming and easy to look at.  There is vignetting happening on the corners, which could be an effect he added or naturally occurring from the dye-transfer process. The only thing truly in focus is the back of the woman's head, which means he was probably using a fairly large aperture setting. His choice not to show any faces and only a small zoomed in portion of the space gives it a sense of anonymity, and I think would make it feel timeless if it wasn't for the other clues of the time period.

Artist Analysis #4

Hiroshi Sugimoto

Polar Bear 1976

Hiroshi Sugimoto is a photographer from Tokyo Japan. Much of his work is very simple, with little actually going on in the image. He takes long exposures with an 8x10 large format camera. Sugimoto gets much of his influence from artists such as Marcel Duchamp, the Dadaist, and Surrealist movements, as well as from modern architecture. He has a huge and very diverse body of work, based on many different themes. One series he did was of pictures of old drive in theaters, another was of animals in natural history museums, also Japanese architecture, and electrical charges. His aim for his photos is to reveal time passing, which can be portrayed in many different ways, through blurring, long exposures, or exist in something deeper within the photo.

The photo above is from his natural history series and shows a polar bear on an ice shelf cautiously approaching what looks to be a dead seal laying on the ground. Hiroshi is known for his ability of creating real looking scenes from something fake. This image in particular is extremely hard to tell if it's real and fake. The ice behind the seal has recently cracked and creates a line pointing directly towards the seal which helps to move the viewers eyes around the image. It also has great balance dividing the scene essentially in two, with the seal on one side and the polar bear on the other. For this photo, he a process in which you print on silver gelatin. Because of the nature of shooting in such a bright place like this, he most likely took this opportunity to use a very small aperture opening in order to include everything in focus and create depth within the image. This would have allowed him to leave the shutter at a slower speed.

Artist Analysis #3

Gregory Crewdson

Gregory Crewdson is a well know American photographer known for his highly staged and manipulated scenes of suburban life. His work has always been set in and around Boston, Massachusetts, . He shoots half his work in the studio and the other half in real neighborhoods. He usually takes around 50 photos of the same scene without moving the camera, that way when it comes to post production he's able to have complete control over the image. He has the ability to exaggerate various elements of the scene, adjusting the focus, lighting and just about anything else he chooses. Crewdson does not use digital, but instead shoots on large 8x10 film, giving his images that surreal quality he's so known for. When he's satisfied with how it looks, he makes extremely high resolution scans of the negatives to further preserve the original quality. Crewdson's goal as a photographer is to eliminate all aspects that people usually associate with photography, such as blurring, soft focus and grain. He knows this is simply impossible but attempts to do it anyway. He wants the viewer to just fall into the world of the photograph with no distractions in-between.
The photo above caught my eye because it is extremely powerful and emotional yet at the same time so simple. It shows a man in a business suit looking down at the ground, standing in the middle of the street in a late night rain storm. His car is parked behind him with the door open and his briefcase sitting on the ground next to it. It looks as if could be in a small city's downtown area, it also looks like he could be holding something in his left hand ready to drop it. This photo could be read many different ways, but to me it looks as if he just got let go from his job and doesn't know what to do next with his life. The composition of this photo is very well balanced with the main subject centered in the scene and trees framing it on either side. The lighting is another key component of this image, creating the right atmosphere for the scene. The detail in the photo is amazing and really does pull me into the scene completely. It looks like he used a slow shutter speed, just from looking at the lighting, but its hard to tell what was added in post processing and what the raw photos looked like. I think this image is very effective at conveying the ideas Crewdson had in his mind and is able to create the surreal, painting-like effect to pull the viewer into the scene.

Artist Analysis #2

Andreas Gursky

Andreas Gursky is a german photographer known for his images of industrial buildings, and landscapes. He uses a wide angle lens and prefers shooting from high vantage points. He shoots on large format color film making his images extremely vivid and detailed from the closest subject to the furthest. Andreas is not so much interested in capturing humans as individuals, but focusing more on the human species as a whole and their interaction with the environment. Much of his work is highly manipulated in post processing which gives his work a kind of surreal look almost like a painting. 

The picture above was taken at the Time Square Marriott in New York. As you can see here, this image was highly manipulated, from the intense colors to the vines hanging from the building. The composition uses patterns and perspective lines to draw the viewers eye. Although its a very generic and anonymous place and point of view, he is able to capture it in the most dynamic fashion. Much of what influenced his work, came from his teachers at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in Germany, where he learned how to systematically photograph industrial machinery and architecture. Also from landscape photographers such as John Davies, who strongly influenced Andreas to switch from street level photography to high vantage point photography. Looking at his work for me provides new and interesting ways of thinking about photography and how its important to not be afraid to edit your photos to get the look and feeling that you want.   

  

Artist Analysis #1

Robert and Shana ParkHarrison

Robert ParkeHarrison and his wife Shana ParkHarrison work together to create some of the most surrealistic, dream-like, and disturbing images of our time. Much of their work concentrates on the ever deteriorating relationship between the natural environment and humans. Almost all their works have a poetic quality to them, and are made to look antique, like they could have been taken in the early 1900's. Though much of their earlier work was shot in black and white, their more recent work uses warm tone printing to create an abstract and monochromatic color to the images. All their images are created by with elaborate set ups and then digitally altered to create the signature effect that is so recognizable.
This image shows a businessman with his back facing the view, and arms spread out, holding a birdcage in his left hand and strings attached to a dozen or so flying birds. This is a very powerful image that is thought to represent mans dream of flight, or showing the impact humans are having on the environment in modern times, kind of holding back the natural progression of nature. Shooting against a blank background helps to focus the attention on the subject with no distractions. The composition does a great job of keeping the viewers eyes moving around by dispersing the birds to the top of the frame and then pulling the eye back down the strings to the main subject. This image looks as if it was shot on a medium format camera, considering its squared aspect ratio. To make the background blurry he used a large aperture and to get the birds still, he used a very fast shutter speed.

Flying Lesson by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison

It was hard to pick just one, so here's another one of their work. This work is entitled Burn Season and depicts a man in a business suit, with many small bags of water attached to himself, walking into a burning field. Its possible that he's committing a sacrifice of some kind.

Burn Season by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison

In Class Artist Analysis

Bruce Davidson

Bruce Davidson, London 1960. Girl Holding Kitten.

Bruce Davidson is interested in shooting people at eye level, creating emotion in his work. He portrays such emotions such as loneliness, despair, love, determination, and uncertainty. He catches candid moments of people in transition, searching for meaning. He likes to humanize his subjects, giving the viewer insight into their live struggles and disires.
This photo was taken on one of Bruce's drives through London in 1960. It depicts a young girl holding a kitten on the sidewalk. After stumbling upon a group of teenagers on the street he was able to isolate this girl for the picture. He was interested in the hopefulness, positivity, and openness to life she conveyed. The shallow depth of field works to isolate the subject and may have been caused by the lack of light. She looks slightly off to the left of the camera, which makes it seem more candid and spontaneous. The street behind follows the same line of sight of her eyes, which further focuses the attention where she's looking. He used a leica camera to take most of his photos.

First Post

First Post

Hey its my first post if you didn't get that already. I guess I'll tell you a little about myself. I was born and raised in Eugene, Oregon, a place in which I still love to this day. Coming to New Mexico for schooling was a choice I made after attending the local community college for three years, and realizing I needed to do something with my life. I wanted a big change, something that would offer me a new perspective on life. I picked Albuquerque because I was intrigued by big city life, also its large art and outdoor community. This will be my third photography class, but my first working with the digital manipulation of photos. Being my first photography class in some time, I'm excited to jump right in. I can tell this is going to be a great term and can't wait to see everyones work.  

Just stumbled on this Photo and thought it was cool. It was taken by Phillippe Halsman, who became good friends with Salvador Dali and took this un-manipulated photo of seemingly floating objects including Dali himself. It amazingly took him only 28 tries to get this photo.

Dali Atomicus (1949)

Philippe Halsman