Photographic Events in Santa Fe for the next couple of weeks:
Mass book signing at College of Santa Fe on November 15th from 1 to 3 pm. See the invitation below for a list of photographers and location. 
Following the signing is a unrelated lecture and panel discussion hosted by Santa Fe Art Institute titled History of the Future/La historia del futuro with Michael Berman and Julian Cardona at Tipton Hall across the hall from the Marion Center. The panel discussion will be from 3 to 5 pm and a signing and reception at Santa Fe Art Institute is from 5 to 7pm.
There will be a lecture at College of Santa Fe's Tipton Hall with Tony O'Brien titled Afghan Dreams on Wednesday, November 12th at 6pm. The show opens at Verve Gallery of Photography on Friday, November 14th, along with the work of Ruijie and Karin Rosenthal.
On Friday, November 21st from 5 to7pm, Through the Lens: Creating Santa Fe exhibition opens at the Palace of the Governors.
If you want to submit to the dress show I am curating for Fraction Magazine, the deadline is today. Here is the info. Email if you have questions.
"... but if a photographer is producing a project book I think they should be careful with text. Sometimes it's necessary, to open up a project, to help free it from conventional perception. An interview is always clarifying, but the three-page catalogue essays you see everywhere are no fun. I don't read them. They're like the liner-notes on LPs from the 1960s. You know why they're written, and they carry no weight. " from Shane Lavelette's interview with photographerr Torbjørn Rødland courtesy photo-eye MagazineThis interview, in addition to being outstanding and loaded with wonderful quotes, brings up the issue that I did not address with the "read the text" comment in the previous post. I See Angels Everyday; The Pond; Ghetto and Chicago all have essays, you can elect to read or do as Rødland does skip this extra info and read only the images.
Arguably, the most successful use of text accompanying images is Jim Dine and Diana Michener's 3 Poems. Many of the pages have text printed at the bottom of the page, one of the 3 poems possibly, overlayed on the images. It is blatant and gives the images another signification.
Text has a place and it is usually not adjacent to the photos. Text applies meaning.
Some more quotes to share from the interview:
"A cliche is only interesting if it contains a hidden truth"--Torbjørn Rødland "No medium does melancholia better than photography"--Torbjørn Rødland
In flipping through the Blind Spot tribute issue (No. 32 dedicated to the founder Kim Caputo), checking out mostly the photos, I noticed an article by Tim Davis. Tim's new book, My Life in Politics, had just come out so his name caught my attention. Pausing only briefly from my thumbing of the pages to read the opening line of his essay "No one reads the essays in art books. Admit it." Speaking for myself, I admit it. I have not read the text in at least half of the art books I own although I have read some. I can think of four in particular that are of note: The prelude in Hiroshi Watanabe's I See Angels Everyday; the opening story of John Gossage's The Pond; the historical (and political) text accompaning the images by Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin in Ghetto and Chicago; and Carol Mavor's introduction to Taj Forer's Threefold Sun.
Forer has documented the communities around the US associated with the Waldorf Schools and the teachings of Rudolph Steiner. Carol Mavor describes the images with the most poetically descriptive terms, stating that the lucky will be touched with the "mud and snow and blue juniper berries, their green cabbages and sun-baked farmer, their crusty gnome holes and missing maypole ribbons". She not only explores the photos, but also the historical and philosophical ideas equating Forer's photos and the communities with Thomas More's concept of Utopia. Her selection of vocabulary-- blue, heavens, daydream, wishful, poetic, envisioned, calm-- generate a feel of the ideal within the essay itself.
Now, juxtapose this writing with the new regular contributing editor to Art in America magazine, Dave Hickey. Hickey reintroduces himself in the October 2008 issue with an essay on the utopian verses the pagan. Starting in the opening paragraph he begins with a reference to the book My Life as a Traitor by Zarah Ghahramini and Robert Hillman and how Ghahramini's belief in Zoroastrianism, and ultimately, in "pink shoes" and all things pagan, saved her from her kidnappers and torturers in Iran. He goes on for only two pages in classic Dave Hickey style, but no worries, the next issue has more.
Although I have previously mentioned the new issue of Nueva Luz, I read the text last week. Darius Himes edited this issue on the topic of race and opened with an introduction of how he, as a curator, intended to deal with this complex topic. Possibly sensing the feeling of change in our nation, or not, nevertheless apropos, Himes states "In an era of rampant tribalism, nationalism and racialism, the task of our time is to internally reconcile the paradox of being separate as distinct and unique individuals--through culture, class, race, religion, education, and individual talents-- and yet connected to all of humanity."
From utopian, to pagan, to altruistic. Read the essays!
Newspace Center for Photography invites photographers to submit images for our themed juried exhibtion. We are seeking work that celebrates the beauty and mystery of the plants and animals we share our lives with. Portland photographer and Newspace Program Director Laura Valenti will be selecting images for the exhibition. Deadline is Friday, November 15, 2008.
Bonjour Melanie,
I'm really proud of American people. You must see the reaction in Paris people were on the Avenue des Champs- Élysées celebrating, as if OBAMA was elected President of France . I believe if he ran for the first "world president" he would have been elected...I mean it. So many people desiring change from Africa to Europe , passing through the middle east. You are the envy of the rest of the world for showing us the real America.
America became younger and the rest of the world older.
Maurice
© Adrienne Salinger
©Suzanne Revy
