Johnathan Gitelson

Image copyright Johnathan Gitelson

I've been a fan of Jonathan Gitelson's work for a while now. Whenever I'm feeling a bit down or have been looking at "heavy" work, his pictures always make me smile to myself. It's not that they are light weight in any way, just that there is something really understated about them. In some ways they remind me of Stephen Gill's work. Anyway take a look here: http://www.thegit.net/

"Woke up this morning, got yourself a gun"

The Sopranos, Bon Jovi, Bruce "The Boss" Springsteen. What do you know about New Jersey? Well the folks at I Heart Photograph would like to see you portray the place even if you've never been! Here's the call.

"You were born in New Jersey. You’ve been there. You’ve never been there. "You know it from movies. TV. Songs. Newspapers. You’ve Googled it. YouTubed it. Wikipediaed it. Flickred it. You’ve never even heard of it.
So ask yourself: is it possible to make a photograph of New Jersey regardless of where you are in the world? The Pierro Gallery and iheartphotograph.com invite photographers, designers, and artists of all kinds to participate in this global open call for work".More here:http://www.aphotographofnewjersey.com/

Skylines

Images copyright Mark Page

In yesterdays M.E.N and over on Manchester Confidential http://www.manchesterconfidential.co.uk/property/index.asp?Sessionx=IpqiNw86KDImNwB6IaqiNwA were articles about the latest tall builds from Ian Simpson and West Properties, pretty impressive even I have to admit. There is little doubt that the Manchester Skyline has changed, massively over the last decade. The above photographs where taken around eight years apart.

sorry

I've noticed that because I've posted about Shell dropping it's sponsorship of The Wildlife photographer of the year award, google have put an advert for petrol on the blog!

Robert Adams interview

Image copyright Robert Adams

Interesting interview with Robert Adams over on Bloomberg.com of all places...... here: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=ahiXJH1OdpMc&refer=muse

Curious............

Should you be curious in knowing what Martin Parr gets up to......... here :http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml;jsessionid=DTOMPGZEDZAL1QFIQMFCFGGAVCBQYIV0?xml=/arts/2008/01/26/baweek126.xml

Shell drop wildlife photography prize.

Not that I do any wildlife photography, the odd pigeon perhaps, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3257039.ece

In my case DNG's & tiffs

"Negatives are the notebooks, the jottings, the false starts, the whims, the poor drafts, and the good draft but never the completed version of the work... The completed version a print should be sufficient and fair return for a magazine's investment, for it is the means of fulfilling the magazine's purpose ,,,, The print and a proper one is the only completed photograph, whether it is specifically shaded for reproduction, or for a museum wall. Negatives are private, as is my bedroom " ....

- From W. Eugene Smith's letter to Life, refusing to allow the magazine to have possession of his negatives.

Michelle Sank

Third Prize 2007 National Portrait Gallery Photographic Prize "Janine" from the series Reality Crossings, Germany.

From the series "The Water's Edge series".

I have long been a fan of Michelle Sank's portraits and the quality of her work has now been endorsed by The National Portrait Gallery http://www.npg.org.uk/live/photoprize.asp where she was awarded 3rd prize in 2007. "The Water's Edge" work which was commissioned by Open eye Gallery to mark Liverpool's 800th anniversary in 2007, is one of my favourite pieces of Michelle's work. See some more here: http://www.michellesank.com/

Cat head man

Image copyright cat head man

Feeling completely inspired after yesterdays post, I present a picture from a series on people who share their pets heads, and I promise to put this silliness behind us tomorrow............

A dog of an idea..

This has to be the stupidest photograph I have ever seen. I thought at first that maybe it was the genius idea of some art director somewhere, but no it was actually the idea of a photographer! What must he have been thinking...........Apparently it's about people that look like their dogs, I'm not being funny here mate, but she looks fuck all like that dog, and even if she had a black nose and a furry face why would you cut and paste them together? And as a model why would you agree to be photographed like that? "Oh here's Tracy or half dog half woman head as we now call her". If anyone out there knows of a dafter idea for a picture then I for one would love to see it.....................

Pete Davis

Image copyright Pete Davis

Here's one I've got circled in the diary! Pete Davis is at Bolton Museum from 2nd February to 3rd May, with a show entitled "Wildwood" more info on Bolton here:http://www.boltonmuseums.org.uk/exhibitions/ and on Pete Davis here: http://www.pete-davis-photography.com/

Economic down turn..........

Image copyright Mark Page

Some folks never had the up turn...................

John Angerson at Impressions Gallery Bradford.

Book Signing and Talk: John Angerson
Thursday 24 January 2008, 6.30pm to 7.30pm
Photographer John Angerson will be talking about his work and signing copies of his latest publication Love, Power and Sacrifice, with plenty of opportunity for your questions.Photographed over twenty years, this body of work is a portrait of the Jesus Army. The Jesus Army is an evangelical Christian movement based in the United Kingdom. Their motto and three basic tenets - Love, Power and Sacrifice - form the title of the book.John Angerson has worked around the world on photographic assignments for a variety of international publications. His personal work, however, is concerned with Britain and it’s changing cultural landscape. His long-term projects address definitions of community - focusing on how specific communities form, shift and develop.The publication Love, Power and Sacrifice is available to buy in the gallery bookshop priced £12.99
Click here to read more
Image © John Angerson. A rain storm hits the Power Festival Weekend, a yearly gathering of members from across the UK, at Cornhill Manor, Northamptonshire.

photography thats gets people looking, thinking and talking
Impressions Gallery Centenary Square Bradford BD1 1SD +44 (0) 8450 515 882 email us
Charity No. 503238 Company Reg. No. 1161029 Legal Credits

John Stezaker at Openeye

Image copyright John Stezaker
Below text sent from Openeye Gallery

Out of Body
25 January 08 - 22 March 2008
Open Eye Gallery is proud to present the most substantial UK exhibition of John Stezaker's work in many years.
Using manual cut-and-paste techniques, Stezaker breathes new life into photographs salvaged from forgotten film archives and old magazines, transforming them into otherworldly, uncanny objects. His subtle, unsettling interventions allude to the subconscious and the surreal, and explore our seemingly endless fascination with the human face. Stezaker ruptures the naturalistic surface of his images, constructing views which are fragmented and dislocated. His pictures fuse and separate before our eyes, creating surreal new creatures and worlds.
Stezaker has played a central role in a number of developments in contemporary art practice over the last three decades, from Conceptual Art and New Image Art in the 1970s, through to the recent resurgence of interest in collage. Stezaker first showed his work as part of the British Conceptual Art group in 'The New Art', 1972 (the first Hayward Annual exhibition). His interest in the conceptual later gave way to a long-term fascination with images themselves, and it is this interest which he has subsequently pursued through much of his work with found photographs and printed matter.
John Stezaker lives and works in London.
A Stills Gallery touring exhibition, presented in partnership with the Approach Gallery, London.

www.openeye.org.uk

Gareth Phillips

Image copyright Gareth Phillips

Sooo much interesting work (although quite dark) on his site it's hard to know where to start! He is also showing as part of projection 08 so here's a bit of a taster. http://www.garethphillipsphotography.com/

Police horses Ronaldo & cans of Tennants.....

Finished....... opening tommorrow at The Social, Urbis. Private view in the morning. All in all am very pleased with how it went. Both The Booth centre and Urbis learning were great to work with. And of course, Brian John, Andy, Lee, James, Paul, David and Stephen. Thanks fella's............ The work can also be seen on my main site. here: http://www.manchesterphotography.com/

It's coming!

Projection 08 coming soon!

www.redeye.org.uk

Martin Amis

Image copyright martin Amis

Nice work unfortunate name! I really like the "Racing Seen" work http://www.lifeshots.co.uk/ he also has a great blog over at http://www.hipshots.co.uk/

Yawn yawn

It's boring but I suppose necessary to keep up to date, latest on copyright here: http://www.bjp-online.com/public/showPage.html?page=686066

Horses for courses,

Last night I spent the evening at Redeye HQ, www.redeye.org.uk I had been asked to be one of the judges for Projection 08 which is an event that is to be held at The Lowry Salford quays on 31st January. There had been a fair amount of submissions and we sat through a fairly long (got a bad dose of image blindness towards the end) evening. The call had gone out for slide show presentations, a set of images, (coherent) along with a soundtrack the idea being that this was a single piece of work. Some of the work, in fact a lot of the work fitted the above brief. There were amongst it photographs that could hold their own with any.
And then next to these wonderful images had been "grafted" some god awful piece of music which at best detracted from the images. Adding music can at the beat of a crotchet send a body of work tumbling into a big smelly bowl of cheesiness, (not in a good way all the people who like cheese). The funny thing is that only once was music mentioned in the original call. soundtrack was referred to, but most people read this as music. The work that shone through was the work that had been made with projection 08 in mind, or at least with this type of presentation in mind. This work is great, sometimes running alongside genius and those who come on the night are in for some great work. Other work was never made to be viewed as digital files with soundtrack, or multimedia, or digital tales or scrapbook TV or what ever this new and for me exciting way of showing images is to be called.
some photographs are always going to be best viewed as fine prints on a gallery wall, and long may that remain. I know as a photographer how desperate we can be to show our work, but in what context should always be an important consideration.................

Britains got talent.

Britains got talent but judging by the size of the queue standing in the pissing rain outside The Palace very little self respect! http://talent.itv.com/

Jessamyn Lovell

Aperture prize 2007 winner, http://www.aperture.org/store/ap2007-w.aspx Strong & tender...... http://www.jessamynlovell.com/

Pieter Hugo

Image copyright Pieter Hugo


Pieter Hugo had already been included in the 2005 excellent Thames & Hudson book "reGeneration 50 photographers of tomorrow" for his portraits of African albinos. And that was before his later work "The hyena & other men" not to mention "Messina/Musina" and all the other great work on his site here: http://www.pieterhugo.com/ talk about rising star...........

Get your grainy pics out!

maybe the super slick, photoshopped to fuck, advertising photographers have had their day? Read here:http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/index.jsp?viewID=news_view&newsLang=en&beanID=1024816846&newsId=20080114006403&ndmHsc=v2*A1200315600000*B1200377439000*DgroupByDate*J1*N1010492&epi-content=GENERIC

Jurgen Nefzger

Image copyright Jurgen Nefzger

Love Jurgen Nefzger's landscapes especially "Fluffy clouds" http://www.juergennefzger.com/

Pub Crawl

Pub crawl, Manchester to Leeds new years day 2008, is a really nice idea from Robert Norbury & Jean Bashford. Robert explains,
"This link will take you to a slideshow with music. Photographed by myself and my partner on New Years day 2008. It features a photographic pub crawl from manchester to Leeds and is accompanied by music from Nicola Renshaw of Manchester.
It was born out of our interest in the Yorkshire Lancashire divide, as we live almost right on it." http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=25899746

Bolton MA at Richard Goodall.

It's an odd one this. The post I mean, and the name of the course from Bolton. "MA in international photojournalism, documentary & travel photography! How many genre's in one course title, talk about edging your bets! Thing is it had some great work. The gallery is a great space as well, except for the too loud wine bar jazz, which to be honest is just fucking annoying when your trying to look at photo's. I also can't believe that in this day and age, photographers doing an MA don't have websites! weird and a shame because I would have loved to look at more of Daniel Jordan-Killoran, Tom Steventon, Rob Thomas and Carl Pinnington's work. Oh and It was hardly advertised,it was almost a big secret, on from 7/1/08 till 14/1/08 so we all missed it as well!

E.Chambre Hardman

Image copyright National Trust

In honour of Liverpool 08, E.Chambre Hardman has to be mentioned. Until recently an unsung hero, he is now beginning to get the recognition he deserves. Liverpool's Atget? perhaps, a fine photographer Oh yes. Now I wonder if The National Trust will do me for using that picture? All about the man here:http://www.mersey-gateway.org/chambrehardman/server.php?show=nav.00100o005

Good luck Liverpool!

I've always been a little bit jealous of Liverpool. It's that waterfront location, I would love to live that close to a BIG river like that, and they seem to have a really good art scene. And they've got the open eye gallery, although they can keep them fucking seagulls. And now Capital of Culture. Well done and good luck with the coming year, you "little scouse monkey's"............................ All starting this weekend http://www.liverpool08.com/

Laura El-Tantawy

Image copyright Laura El-Tantawy

A powerful body of work from Laura El-Tantawy: http://www.lauraeltantawy.com/

Stuart Griffiths at Open eye.

Redeye Network MeetingWednesday 16 January, 7.30pm
Bi-monthly public meeting for photographers to exchange news and views. Stuart Griffiths will present his project on the homecoming of British soldiers, a project that began in 2000 when he was living in a homeless hostel for ex-servicemen in east London, to be published by Trolley Books in 2008.Free eventRead more >
More events at Open Eye Gallery >
Open Eye Gallery
28-32 Wood Street, Liverpool, L1 4AQ
Telephone: 0151 709 9460
Email: info@openeye.org.uk
www.openeye.org.uk

That explains it!

Earlier in the week, (Sunday's post) I was commenting on Channel 4's "Picture this" game show, and to be honest was at a loss as to why the venerable Mr Parr would bother getting involved with such a bag of shite. This article goes some way to explain it.http://news.independent.co.uk/media/article3313041.ece

"Projection 08"

Amongst other things, this is your chance to get The Lowry 2008 on your CV's and kick start the year. Our friends at Redeye http://www.redeye.org.uk/ are organising something new this year and are calling for your submissions. closing date for submissions is this Friday (11th) so you will have to get a wiggle on! Full details here: http://www.redeye.org.uk/redeye/eventsdetail.asp?uvarEventID=439 or you can contact the event organiser here: mishka@redeye.org.uk

Todd Hido

Image copyright Todd Hido

After my post yesterday regarding "Picture This" I found an interview with Todd Hido http://www.toddhido.com/ about his portrait making. http://www.jmcolberg.com/weblog/2007/06/a_conversation_with_todd_hido.html

Picture this.

Bloody hell another photography programme on the telly! I've only just recovered from the brilliance of "The genius of photography" (BBC) and another comes along this time on Channel 4. That's where the similarity ends, well actually not, because Martin Parr is on this as well.

Format. It's a bit like a talent show/competition, some photographers, some judges, and some really smart prizes, "more pictures mean prizes" than "points mean prizes". The four judges, "some of the most influential names in photography" the commentator proudly announces. Mr Parr granted, a nice rather posh lady from The Photographer's Gallery whose name I should no doubt know, OK, a female photographer I've never heard of and some twat in glasses. Contestants get set a task this week, portraiture. Off they go snap, cliche, snap, cliche. take their efforts back for a critique, or "slagging off" as they were known when I was at college. Two get binned, rest come back next week.

I think to make it more interesting they should make the fuckers skate at the same time!

Anyway if you must, 7pm Sundays Channel 4 http://www.channel4.com/culture/

Todd Deutsch

I

Images copyright Todd Deutsch

Really like Todd Deutsch's "Gamers" series. http://www.todddeutsch.com/index.html

Simpsonisation.

Seems like Nottingham is soon to look like Manchester! http://www.skyscrapernews.com/news.php?ref=1284

Running from camera.

Image copyright Muggezifter

James Nisbeck, http://www.lightstalkers.org/james_nisbeck pointed me in the direction of this blog, well I say blog, more a "body of work" really http://runningfromcamera.blogspot.com/

Pleased to meet you!

Hello to the people who have arrived due to the call for submissions. If you've never visited before, "come in, make yourselves at home". Take a look around and if you like the photography on this site and thinks yours would fit right in then please feel free to send a link. (NO myspace/fliker, regular readers will know my opinions on that!) Whats the catch? oh you cynics, nothing I just love looking at good photography and believe that here in the UK it doesn't get enough space to be shown, so we set up this little old place. Once again I'm very pleased to meet you all.

Human Bridges & Happy New Year!

Image courtesy Human bridges blog

Well did you have a "good un"? I stayed in as I normally do on New years to watch Jools Holland, but with the exception of seasick steve it was a bit shit this year to be honest.



Anyway back to business, New year, holidays behind us and time to move on. Plans for this blog in 2008? Keep showcasing the best photography from here in the North-West and the rest of the world. Quick peeks to see what other visual types are upto. I hope to bring you interviews with some great photographers at some point, and well play it by ear really and have some fun.





Which brings me nicely to James Nisbeck's new(ish) project "Human Bridges" http://humanbridges.blogspot.com/ why not get involved and work off some of them Christmas pounds! I'd like to but not sure I can with these old knees...........................