March 30, 2009

assignment 5

Get out! Observe! Go to an art museum.

The Whitney: I went to see Artists Making Photographs
. It's a small exhibit, but very interesting.

The Met: I visited their online collection database where they keep an archive of their photographs... then I went to find them on the walls. Here are some of my favorites.



Photos by:
William Henry Fox Talbot, Marie-Charles-Isidore Choiselat, Albert Sands Southworth, Louis-Rémy Robert , David Johnson, Nadar, Gustave Le Gray, Édouard Baldus, Roger Fenton, Eugène Cuvelier, Carleton E. Watkins, Alexander Gardner, Timothy O'Sullivan, Thomas Eakins, Edward Steichen, Paul Strand, Charles Sheeler, Andreas Gursky, El Lissitzky
To find out who did what, go here.

To see new photography from people you might not have heard of, go here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
See the rest...

March 29, 2009

sketchbook



I think I might start adding photos in between assignments. Here's one. 
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March 25, 2009

assignment 4 [PROJECT 1]

Still life. Take a picture of 3 objects together in an interesting composition.



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March 23, 2009

assignment 3

Take 10 photos of the same chair in 10 different positions. (I do not have a chair... this is the closest thing to a chair in my apartment. I also did some extra credit and took 20 photos.)



See them on my flickr page.
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March 20, 2009

birthday


Today is my birthday. As a present, leave me some input about my blog! What you think would make it better, what you don't like, what you do like.. or show a friend!

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March 16, 2009

assignment 2

Define some basic art terms using photos (ie: line, highlight, negative space).

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March 12, 2009

assignment 1

Take 1 photo inside and 1 photo outside of your apartment. Don't think about it too much.



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March 10, 2009

homework

After eagerly unveiling my first post on Sunday, I realized I had no idea what to do next. I had some vague plans, but nothing with structure. I decided I would give myself homework. Using the syllabus from a drawing class I took in college, I've created a schedule of assignments that I'll complete over the next month and a half. They cover the basic principles of art, although I'm not sure how to translate some into the photo world. Below is my initial blog syllabus.

1. Take 1 photo inside and 1 photo outside of your apartment. Don't think about it too much.
2. Define some basic art terms using photos (ie: line, highlight, negative space).
3. Take 10 photos of the same chair in 10 different positions. (I need to buy a chair.)
4. [PROJECT 1] Still life. Take a picture of 3 objects together in an interesting composition.
5. Get out! Observe! Go to an art museum.
6. [PROJECT 2] Maybe someone can help me with this. We were supposed to draw pictures from photos... maybe I should take a photo to recreate a drawing? Maybe recreate a photo I see somewhere? Hm. There will be 2 photos for this. Maybe I'll experiment.
7. Get abstract. Look at two corners of your apartment in a different way. Reinterpret them in the photos. They do not have to look like anything.
8. [PROJECT 3] Go outside and do what you just did in #7. 
9. Take 10 pictures of the human figure in 10 different positions.
10. Recreate 10 of the images from the handout (pictures of body parts and stuff... it will be clearer down the road).
11. [PROJECT 4] Take a picture of the human figure. (I'll have to make this special... maybe the person will be naked or something...)
12. [PROJECT 5] PHOTOGRAPH ANYTHING. 

I promise this is as boring as the posts will get... I just wanted to establish some plans. Since this is a photo blog, I feel like I should post one...

Here's a picture of my notebook with my syllabus in it.



Thanks to Jason Tomme, my drawing teacher.
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March 08, 2009

stand still

I was working as a poorly paid house manager for an Off-Broadway theater company. To keep me on the staff, they hired me as the House Photographer. I'd never taken photos professionally before. I didn't really know what I was doing. I still don't. Somehow, photography jobs (all unpaid) keep falling into my lap. I want to make myself a better photographer. I will post photos as I work and experiment. Hopefully over time I'll be able to see some progress. Let me know what you think!

On the title...

Paul Schmidt, one of my favorite literary translators, took on the works of Arthur Rimbaud, one of my favorite poets. One line that has always sent my imagination wild was the way he translated a line from Une Saison en Enfer / A Season in Hell.

Rimbaud wrote...

"Ce fut d'abord une étude. J'écrivais des silences, des nuits, je notais l'inexprimable. Je fixais des vertiges."

Schmidt translated...

"I began it as an investigation. I turned silences and nights into words. What was unutterable, I wrote down. I made the whirling world stand still."

It still takes my breath away. It's also how I've always thought of good photography. I hope to someday make the whirling world stand still.
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