Denver Library Photo Exhibition

Masculine Feminine Project

The assignment was to juxtapose feminine and masculine. Originally I had a series of three of my room mate Ellie and two buildings that had masculine and feminine contours. However I thought the series would be stronger if i just focused on Ellie. Ellie is one of the girliest people I know but there is another side of her when she plays sports. I tried to show the masculine personality aspect while maintaining her femininity. 

blurb book

http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/2026111?ce=blurb_ew&utm_source=widget

Time

"Tory and Anna" Extroverted, Gregarious, Amazing People. Time Photography: I love photography friends, for me photography is a way of preserving memories and the people in my life are the ones I want to remember the most. 

This photo was taken after a really horrible round of golf. It makes me think of time, as I finally learnt that as bad as one day is the next day and next time you go out there it will be completely different.
 "Melissa". One of those special people that truly appreciate life. I wanted to capture the way she lives; arms open embracing it. 

"Karin and Grover"- Brought my camera for a walk and ran into these two. It's Karin as I know her, loves animals and always full of energy

"Alyssa"Alyssa" serious about life but with a wicked sense of humor.  These photos are my attempt at capturing the essence of my friends personalities in one shot and freezing how I see them in time.  " serious about life but with a wicked sense of humor.  These photos are my attempt 

Self Portrait Pictures

Cultural Event Three- Denver Public Art

Denver Public Art

            As a group we went down town to the convention center to view the public art in the area. We viewed the iconic “I know what you mean” more commonly know as the Blue Bear by Lawrence Argent, Bernard Venet’s “Indeterminate Line”, Jonathan Borosky’s “Dancers”, John McEnroe’s “Model state” and the Denver Theater billboard “Faces of Colorado Art”. The interesting thing about the public art on display was the sheer scale of the pieces. Unlike museum art that in general requires close scrutiny to appreciate the craftsmanship the public art that I viewed could be both appreciated from close up and from a distance. It was equally interesting to see how the art pieces interacted with their environments. Some of the artwork enhanced and almost blended in to the landscape for example “Faces of Colorado Art” displayed on a gigantic billboard against a red brick wall, while others like “Dancers” stood in stark contrast to the surrounding landscape.

            The two pieces I really enjoyed and felt most impacted by were Argent’s “I know what you mean” and Borosky’s “Dancers”.  From a distance the shape of Argent’s work seems organic though the blue coloring is unlike any bear that has yet been discovered in nature. The bear is forty foot tall and weighs in at over 10,000 pounds. The scale of the piece is impressive from a distance and I found it just a little intimidating from up-close. Even though the object is inanimate the size of the piece gives it an undeniable presence and a sense of power.  From this close perspective one realizes the bear is not smoothly fashioned but rather carved using flat planned angles. The angled planes were created when the bear’s design was fed into a 3-dimensional computer model generator. The artist Argent decided that he liked the strange effect and decided not to alter it. The bear’s color is also a serendipitous occurrence as it was the color the computer had generated for it, again the artist decided to roll with the color and keep it.  The piece is made from molded concrete polymers and steel.  The material is very durable and is ideally suited to Denver’s harsh winters. The dark blue coloring also makes the piece difficult to deface.  Argent is a concept artist who was inspired by a toy bear one of his children owned.

Public art interacts with its environment, the giant blue bear in my opinion fits perfectly into the landscape surrounding the convention center. The convention center is a modern building built to an enormous scale. This huge blue nature statue peering in the window of the convention center is an unusual play on the relationship between nature and man. It seems to me that the bear represents a transitional stage between nature and man. The shape and characteristics are from nature but the design and color are from the realm of man. This piece works well in Denver, which is notorious for being an outdoor nature conscious state. In others cities or locations this piece might not be as effective or as beautiful

            The second piece that I enjoyed was Borosky’s “Dancers”.  The piece is located in the green space outside of the Denver Performing Arts Complex. According to the Public Earth website the piece is quite controversial and has many admirer and critics who both love and hate the piece.  Regardless of ones opinion the piece is undeniably powerful and striking. The piece extends over sixty feet into the air. The materials used were steel and fiberglass. It is composed of two featureless elongated figures and an auditory component of rhythmic music that is played through speakers set into the ground below the piece. The figures are painted white, a color I would presume is easy to deface yet the pieces were unmarked when I viewed them. I wondered if they are regularly maintained or if at night there is security patrol that prevents graffiti tagging.

 Unlike the blue bear that though large is constructed to a smaller scale than the surrounding buildings, Borosky’s piece stands quite a bit taller than the surrounding infrastructure and can be viewed easily from a distance. The piece was constructed in 2003 into a large area that was designated as a sculpture park.  “Dancers” was the first work to be displayed in the park and so far it is the only one. The scale of the piece has made finding complimentary or works that won’t be overwhelmed by Borosky’s piece difficult. The piece is located outside a performing arts studio so the dancing figures are responding to the environment. They are set quite a distance from DCPA buildings making the relationship much more tenuous than Argent’s work is to the convention center.

I really enjoyed the piece. From long range the piece seemed static but from close up it has the impression of movement.  We visited the piece during the middle of a sunny day. The shadows created by the piece combined with the powerful beat of the music added to the illusion of movement. When viewing the piece from ground perspective the backdrop is the sky, which on a windy day has moving clouds or on a hot day the sun makes the air shimmer. When I looked at them I thought they were moving and the windy sky was static.

The figures appeared otherworldly; beings whose very essence was dance. I found myself nodding my head and tapping my foot to the music, the piece is very interactive inspiring a strong desire to join in. Although the faces are featureless the body language indicates joy and happiness. The figures are also genderless. Traditionally I would associate partner dancing with male and female figures yet, Borosky has chosen to make them genderless. I feel this makes the piece very inclusive and universal reaching out to all members of the population, which for me is the most important factor in public art work.

Overall, I feel the public art I have seen around Denver gives character to the city and makes the areas downtown friendlier and more interesting. It gives the city a sense of culture. I think it is great that an area traditionally associated with business would dedicate space and resources to inspiring and challenging its population.  It brings a very human element to the concrete metropolis.

Venet's "Indeterminate Line"

"Faces of Colorado"

"I know what you mean" Lawrence Argent

                                                "Dancers" Borosky

Annie-Lou Leibovitz

Annie Leibovitz is an American Jewish Photographer born in 1949. Born the third of 6 children she spent much of her childhood traveling as her family frequently moved house to accommodate her fathers Air force Career. Her mother was a modern dance instructor.

When her father was relocated to the Philippines the Liebovitz family joined him. A bored Annie took to photography and using the dark room in the militaries base to stay entertained.



(Above: Louis bourgeois Rolling Stones)  

During high school she became interested in the arts, in particular writing and music. She attended the San Francisco Institute of Art and studied painting. After high school she worked several jobs including a stint on a kibutz in Israel. In this period of her live she continued to study and take photographs in her spare time. 


She returned to the United States in 1970 and began working as a photographer for the newly launched Rolling Stones Magazine. As Rolling Stones grew in popularity so did her reputation. Unfortunately the rock and roll lifestyle caught up to her and she was forced into a stint in rehab to clean up. Afterwards she joined Vanity Fair and stared taking more editorial style of photography.             (Merce Cunningham, rolling Stones)




During her career at Rolling Stones she developed a close relationship with John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono. On the day of his unexpected death Liebovitz was sent to take pictures of him. Lennon had insisted that both him and his wife would be on the cover. Originally Ono was supposed to take her top off but on seconds thoughts Liebovitz had decided against it. After Lennon was killed the picture was run on the cover of rolling stones with no other words. It is pretty prophetic, Lennon clinging to life.

At Vanity Fair Liebovitz developed the ability to shoot staged shots. She learned how to make things dramatic and attention grabbing. A criticism of her work is the sheer expense of a lot her shoots especially the ones that are of celebrities. However, her ability to create amazing photographs that visually challenge the viewer have put her in high demand despite her price tag. Celebrities love to work with her. 

For a period Leibovitz had tried to capture the movement of dance through photography. After extensive attempts she realized that it was impossible and there was something beautiful in the fact that dance could not be captured in still. 

in 1989 Leibovitz met Susan Sontag a famous writer and essayist. They had a close romantic relationship up until Sontag's death in 2004. She has three children and despite having a multi million dollar portfolio is currently in a large amount of debt. 

I think her photos are awesome. There is something more real than life in them as if she has concentrated so much in each pixel. 

More Team Photos

Sally Mann

Sally Mann is an American photographer that worked mainly through the medium of black and white. In her early works she photographed her three children. It was the photos of her children published in Immediate Family that catapulted her to fame. Her work was very decisive, many loved it, more criticized or censored but importantly thousands viewed it.

Throughout her career she used an 8x10 bellow camera that was over a hundred years old. In the mid 1990s she progressed from photographing her children to the landscape. She decided to use Collodion, a throwback to old school photography. She took photos of old battle scenes the decaying remains of her dog Eva and human bodies taken at a Federal forensic Anthropology Center.

Mann has three children Emmett a former Peace Corp member, Jessie an artist and Virginia a student of Law. Her husband Larry is a lawyer who unfortunately suffers from muscular dystrophy. Mann released a book of photographs documenting the evolution of his disease.

Information from in class film and from Wikipedia.

Studio Photos of some of the Team

The Juxtaposition of Masculine and Feminine

My idea of what constitutes masculinity and femininity is not based on gender. Femininity is a way of being, an attitude towards just as masculinity is a separate way of acting. To me femininity is high awareness of beauty, emotions and aesthetics. It can be seen in nature, in fashion and in art. I feel masculinity is a sense of power and strength, noticeable in protectiveness, ambition, and assertiveness. I believe that everybody has a mixture of both femininity and masculinity inside them. From day to day and in different situations the balance between the two changes.

                                                                                (advert for Paul Gautier)
The fashion photography of Inez Van Lamsweede shot mainly in black and white has an interesting play on the dynamic of masculine and feminine.

                                                                                                       (role reversal photo 2)

The Photo taken of the lone tree in front of the construction site was inspired by a photo by shotbart that I stumbled upon. The photo "Last Winter's Arms" juxtaposes nature with modern architecture. Nature is the feminine element in the photo and the buildings represented the masculinity of business world.
                                                                                                                    
The Three photographs of the girls I took are of my friend Ellie. Influence by the role reversal work of Kristina Sintuko. I wanted to play off the established feminine and masculine norms and show that the norms are not instinctive but conditioned.

Cultural Event Two: Dario Robleto An Instinct Towards Life

For the second cultural event I attended Dario Robleto’s solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver. On display was a collection of his works from the past decade. The collection explored “how art can contribute to our understanding of the experience of wartime” (Nora Burnett Abram, MCA associate curator). The artist Robleto has an interesting and comprehensive way of addressing the conflict of war; he chooses to focus on not only the soldiers experience but also their widows, children, extended family and health care providers. For me this approach made the conflict easier to relate to, Robleto brought the experience of war on faraway battlefields back home to everyday America.

Robleto did not center his work on one particular war; rather he investigated the overall genre of war conflict.  Although all of his pieces are three-dimensional and many are sculptures none of pieces are sculptures of people. Instead he used photographs, boxing gloves, buttons and many other everyday items to approach the subject less directly. I felt that the absence of people in his work was intentional as if the soldiers never returned home or if they had they were so altered by the conflict that who they had been when they had shipped out was now gone. It tied into the overall feeling of loss I experienced when viewing the collection.

A large portion of Robleto’s work had words and phrases incorporated into them. Furthermore the artist statements were quite detailed. I thought the words and statements personalized the piece and brought unique stories to the objects. I got the impression the artist was trying to convey an entire story not just a brief feeling or snapshot into the life of his subjects.       (The Melancholic refuses to surrender)

The first piece in the exhibit that I viewed was “The Melancholic Refuses To Surrender”. The piece struck me acutely, it was the first time I had encountered art of this nature. On first glance the boxing gloves were not startlingly, they were just a little larger than real life scale and the worn dark red coloring was quite accurate. However, on closer inspection Robleto’s choice of material was unnerving, the texture was ceramic rather than fabric and the gloves that in real life are symbols of power seemed fragile. The artist statement informed me that      the gloves were made of “broken male hand bones, ground coal, horse hair, dirt, pigments, lead salvaged from the sea, string, rust” and “a melted vinyl record of Leadbelly’s ‘The Titanic’”. His choice of materials was effective in portraying a sense of destruction and defectiveness. Instinctively I felt that something was not right, that the conflict that the wearer of these gloves had experienced was harrowing. The bone dust used to construct the gloves reminded me of cremations and a chilling awareness that life is vulnerable. The gloves seemed to be an elaborate interactive tombstone. This feeling was echoed by many other pieces in the exhibit. I felt that I could almost touch the pain and grief in the room.  

I was impressed by the artist’s ability to change styles from “The Melancholic Refuses To Surrender” to the noticeably different “Defiant Gardens”. “Defiant Gardens” is a large-scale piece 79.5inch by 61inch by 4.5inch (MCA exhibition guide). The piece is made from “cut paper, homemade paper (pulp made from soldiers letters sent home), thread and cotton from soldiers uniforms”, dead battlefield shrapnel, dead flowers from battlefields, bullet lead and a quite few more items (artist statement). At first glance the piece is overwhelming in its magnitude and detail. In order to comprehend the piece I had to view it section by section.                                      (Suspension)

Writing on the piece proclaims that the piece is made by the “National War Garden Committee” and the “Women’s Central Association of Soldier’s Relief”. I felt that the piece depicted the world of a soldier’s wife or widow.  Framed pictures of soldiers in uniforms and couples were embedded in the piece. The pictures were accompanied by short statements for example; “Lunge for life as if it were air” and “With nothing to risk love can’t exist.” I could be mistaken but I felt the piece was a shrine to a husband gone to war, the writing in the piece seemed like lovers prayer for their soldiers survival or justification for their husband leaving to fight. Although nothing in the piece explicitly states that the soldiers in the pictures died at war, the form of the piece suggests funeral wreaths. The dead flowers, muted colors and faded pictures speak of something that is no longer living and preserved solely in memory. The sheer detail of the piece put me in mind of the days and months spent waiting, praying and missing the soldiers at war, as if each day the soldiers were missed, someone would plant a new flower in the garden, or add another detail to the shrine. Taken altogether, the piece felt like an entire life spent missing someone. According to Abrams the curator the work “a tribute to this time-traveling solider of Robleto’s imagination”, personally I felt it was more Robleto’s tribute to the memories of the women left behind.  Although the form of “Defiant Gardens” is different from “The Melancholic Refuses To Surrender” I experienced the same emotions when looking at both of them. The grief was palatable, I half expected to turn around and see a crowd of grieving widows dressed in black. Robleto’s work encapsulates a world full of pain and loss on an extremely personal level and while the exhibit emotionally difficult to experience; I respect Robleto’s work and his power to intensely convey the torment of war.  

The future of Photography

http://www.lightstalking.com/future-of-photography

8prediction on photography for the next decade by Light Stalking website.

1. In camera HDR
2. Unlimited ISO
3. Simulated Digital Grain
4. 3g Equipped Cameras being the norm
5. Polaroid Making a Comeback
6 Universal Batteries
7. The Everything Lens
8. GPS Equipped Cameras

Although it does look fake and I wouldn't like it as the norm for photography, HDR is pretty dam cool!