LAND/ART NM Exhibitions & Lectures at 516 Arts in Albuquerque

Grasslands

October 3–December 12, 2009 at 516 Arts

Grasslands is a photographic series by Michael P. Berman about the Chihuahuan Desert grasslands in New Mexico, Texas and the northern border of Mexico, where he has wandered into the desert without a compass to, in his words, “live deliberately.” He believes that how you see the land comes down to what you value. “I believe art has a greater potential for meaning when it serves some purpose. People have started to recognize these lands as significant and this is something art can help along. If anything my work is to generate small symbols that reveal the greater complexity of things.” This exhibition is presented together with Separating Species, both curated by Mary Anne Redding, Curator of Photography, Palace of the Governors, New Mexico History Museum. The exhibition catalog for Grasslands and Separating Speciesis published by Radius Books, including essays by William deBuys, Rebecca Solnit and Mary Anne Redding. Available from 516 ARTS, Radius Books, and select bookstores nationwide.

Separating Species

October 3–December 12, 2009 at 516 Arts

Concurrent with Grasslands, the Separating Species exhibition features artists focusing on animals, humans, the biosphere and the U.S. Mexico border, including photographers Krista Elrick, Dana Fritz, David Taylor and Jo Whaley. Curator Mary Anne Redding recounts an essay by Terry Tempest Williams, In the Shadow of Extinction, about the destruction of prairie dogs on the Navajo Reservation. The Navajo elders objected, insisting that if you kill all the prairie dogs, there will be no one to cry for the rain. Redding says, “all things are intertwined: the rain, prairie dogs, folklorists, environmentalists, writers, academics, even those in the government.” Grasslands and Separating Species look at these disappearing desert grasslands and the animals that are affected when ecosystems, both in the desert and elsewhere, are destroyed: “no one is left to cry for the rain.”

WPOW show as Part of Foto Week DC

Women Photojournalists of Washington

FOTOWEEK: November 7th - 14th
FOTOWEEK DC Opening Reception: November 7th @ 7pm
Show Length: November 7th – 2010

As WPOW evolves from a local organization into a national nonprofit, the show
represents the organization's mission to connect to and educate the public of the work of women photographers, appropriated titled Launch. Members entries were to embody the words "embark, initiate, introduce and propel" as the theme of this show.

This show was generously curated by *Susanne Miklas (*Newsweek’s Deputy
Director of Photography), *Melanie McWhorter (Photo-Eye’s Book Division Manager) and *Pamela Chen* (Photography and Multimedia Producer for the Open Society Institute.)

PHOTOGRAPHERS: Astrid Riecken, Allison Shelley, Abby Greenawalt, Ashley Twiggs, Algerina Perna, Amanda Lucidon, Andrea Bruce, Carol Guzy, Gabriela Bulisova, Jamie Rose, Katie Falkenberg, Laura Elizabeth Pohl, Melina Mara, Sarah L.Voisin & Yanina Manolova

WPOW is Women Photojournalists of Washington, a non-profit organization of over 200 professional and student photojournalists, photo editors and multimedia professionals in the Washington D.C. metro area. The group provides education, mentorship and networking opportunities to its members
and the general public.

The slide show, print and traveling exhibit of Launch are exclusively sponsored by Camera Bits, the makers of Photo Mechanic.

photo credit: Andrea Bruce

Guide to Unique Photography Photobook Prize with Blurb

GUP is calling all photographers and artists for the 2009 edition of the Prize for Unique Photography (PUP). Deadline is October 1, 2009.

After four editions of PUP we have revamped the concept. Blurb decided to hook up with us and give PUP a fresh feel.

Entering the PUP competition is simple: Any photographer under 35 years of age with an idea for a book - which is largely based on autonomous photography - can take part. It is important that candidates show awareness of the form and lay-out of photo books and keep their theme central to their work. Mixed media is acceptable as long as photography is the main medium.

A professional jury consisting of renowned publishers, famous photographers and curators will pick the winner. The prize comprises of ten copies of the book and a whole lot of free publicity from Blurb, GUP and local media. GUP will offer the winner a unique chance to print a photo book and have a publication in GUP. The winner will be announced in November of this year when he or she will get the opportunity to sit down with GUP editors and curators to draw up plans for the book. The date of publication is spring 2010. The book will be internationally distributed online.

Contesters need to supply the following documentation:
Description (book)project (contents)
Description (book)project (design)
CD-rom/DVD-rom with photos of proposal/concept (only jpeg files)
Printed version with photos of proposal/concept
Documentation list with order and numbering of the supplied photos
CV

Contesters can submit their written (book) project proposal, together with all visual documentation, before October 1st 2009, to:
GUP / PUP Lindengracht 35 1015 KB Amsterdam The Netherlands

Review LA is Open with a Few More Spaces for Reviewees

Center's Review LA

January 14-16, 2010

Center's Review LA is a two-day photographic event in Santa Monica, CA, that provides photographers a platform to network and share work with one another and photography professionals. Photographers have the opportunity to purchase 3, 6, or 9 reviews. Participants partake in portfolio reviews, a night of Portfolio Viewing open to the public, and a photographers' online listing.

For more information please click here.

Interview with Aron Morel of Morel Books

spreads from Paul Herbst, My Shit is Gold

I usually try to keep up with all the small book publishers out there, but this world is ever-expanding. One great one that I missed was Morel Books. Luckily, Aron Morel emailed me a few months back about his new book on Jonnie Craig. Morel is pushing the bounds of the zine publications and branching into the addicting world of photobook publishing.


MM: Who are the founder(s) of Morel Books? When was it founded and why?

AM: Morel books was an idea I had been fumbling in my idleness for ages. It just had to leap out of the causeless chaos of cranium and into the tangible magic of book! Books are a fascinating form of tangible information. They can come in any size, format, texture, substrate, weight, print-run etc. --the forms are unlimited as long as you can still define it as a “book”. This gives the "artist" the ability to present their work within a context which they feel is the most appropriate to suit their means. Further, the relationship between the book and the viewer has many variables. The viewer can choose to flip through the book consecutively, backwards, randomly, at their own place and within whatever setting/time they choose. At times, I prefer books to gallery shows-- though seeing original prints is always a wonder.

I suppose to overcome that let down, we arranged some of our books come with an original print, etc. On the other side is the desire to mix great artists. We work with young upcoming artists i.e. Jonnie Craig, Paul Herbst, mingling them with the like of Ryan McGinley, Gerard Malanga, and Stella Vine. It’s a "democratic" vision, as long as its good work, it works without any prioritizing.


MM: Why did you choose to self-publish? Have you had any experiences with publishers?

AM: Why? To busy idle thumbs and escape the devils ennui! And I suppose I’m obsessed by artists books.

spreads from Stella Vine

MM: Who designed and printed the zines/books? How many did you print? How do you choose how many to print?

AM: All the books work differently. Most of the books are designed in house (not all), with close communication with the artist. I think it’s fundamental to get what the artist wants. Production wise, I suppose one of the fun parts is finding different production methods. I’ve done my fair share of binding etc. I find it meditative and it’s good to have your hands in all aspects of publishing! I try to keep the print-runs really low but still cheap, I think it’s great when someone can pick up a modestly priced book that might become collectible-- like the Jonnie Craig zine “Nothing in particular” was only a 50 print-run offered as a gift with the first 50 books sold. I only have one (I think it’s the same case with Jonnie), I’m even seeking them out from old friends myself.


MM: How would you recommend a photographer get funding for his or her project aside from personal funds? Do limited edition prints help?

AM: Beg, Steal, or borrow. Work the graveyard shift and use whatever wit you can, be it limited edition prints or extortion and trafficking.


MM: What was the budget for the book and did you come close to this number when the project was finished? Where there any unforeseen complications with the project that you did not anticipate?

AM: Budgets etc spoil the magic of books, all books have a budget, it’s just about getting the most out of it.


MM: Do you have other advice for photographers seeking to self-publish?

AM: Don’t be too ambitious with print-runs, create a network, and try to get your work online.


MM: Who is your favorite photographer or one who has impacted your life and work?

AM: No such thing, too many genres, styles etc… I collect found photographs; they seem to be inspirational and nameless enough.

spreads from Gerald Malanga, Someone's Life

MM: In your personal work, are you influenced by other mediums other than photography? Which ones and why?

AM: When it’s not photography, there’s a lot of poetry--mystical stuff, urban drunken visionaries Attar, Rimbaud, Cummings, Orhan Veli… I’ve tried for years to combine them, but it always ends out cheesy. I suppose only Blake managed to mingle vision and verse in his illuminated books, and I guess his success can be attributed to his brother instructing him on the method from beyond the grave.


MM: What blogs do you read? Magazines?

AM: I have a huge list of blogs… There are a bunch of highly influential curators working online! I think their use of the medium is fantastic and I’ve never really bought any magazine.


MM: What are some of your future projects?

AM: At present we’ve just release Ryan McGinley’s Moonmilk. We’re also working on a poetry book, A Season In Hell by Arthur Rimbaud, with illustrations from Patti Smith as well as a selection of photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe. This is gonna be a tiny print run! Zine-wise, we have a Jerry Hsu, Gavin Watson, a possible Daido Moriyama, coming up, as well as London Art book fair, Published and be Damned, New York Art Books fair.


MM: The Ryan McGinley book was highly successful, selling out within a couple of weeks from its release date. The popularity of McGinley and the increased price of his out-of-print books are two of the reasons the book was so successful, but will you elaborate on how you marketed this book? Did you market it any differently than any of your other titles? All our books are treated with an equal approach be it a zine or a Mcginley book.

AM: Ryan's new body of work had already received much attention as it is a brave and beautiful departure from his previous work, -so the word was already out there. We still kept the book in specialist retailers, a limited print run, and at a modest price -in spite of the knowledge that it will be heavily sought after! I suppose the only thing we actively did, is not allow one retails to order too many books, as it is nice to give eager admirers worldwide an opportunity to access the book!

**I had hoped to publish this interview before the Ryan McGinley book Moonmilk was released, but time was not permitting. Now, this new Morel Book publication is out-of-print. I would keep an eye on Aron Morel and Morel Books. Follow him on twitter or email mail@morelbooks to be on the mailing list.

The Age of Stupid Trailer

The Age of Stupid Global Premiere Trailer from Age of Stupid on Vimeo.

More videos on Vimeo.

Interview with photographer and publisher Erik van der Weijde

Erik van der Weijde from This is Not My Son

A little after I started this blog, I added an entry about the photo zine which sparked some debate at work about the true nature and definition of a zine (maybe I will discuss this more later). This post also brought my blog to the attention of photographer Erik van der Weijde. He emailed me about his website 4478 zine where he lists and sells all his printed materials and since that time, I have become a huge fan of his work. Erik's newest publication, This is Not My Son, is only printed in a small edition of 100 copies and 10 limited editions (this version is already sold out). Here Erik discusses this and other projects.


MM: Will you tell me the history of 4478 zines? Where did you get the name?

EW: I started making and distributing my own zines already in art academy, somewhere in 2002 I guess. When it became a bit more serious, around 2004, I started numbering them, but the main title always was ‘foto.zine nr.1’. And then you had first, second etc. issue. This name I used, because it was like a zine, or fanzine, but with only photographs, and as each issue had a different graphic design, I then came up with the nr.1 thing. I have a collection of porn mags from the seventies and eighties, but only their first issues. They have such a great ‘non’-design what inspired me. Often they would stop existing or went on with a new name after the first issue. I liked that. As a name for my publishing company I also wanted to use a number. And of course it had to be a bit mysterious, like many of my zines, which lack of any explanatory text. So I have this collection of pictures of the Mt. Matterhorn in Switzerland; postcards, books etc (I love the Alps) because this is graphically such a beautiful mountain and its height is… 4478 meters. It’s my homage to the Matterhorn, actually.


MM: You seem to have a interest in photographing architecture and particularly German and Brazilian works? Why does this interest you?

EW: Well I live in Brazil, though I’m Dutch and I’ve been going there since 1994. So it’s kind of my second, actually first now, home. As a child I’ve spent many holidays in southern Germany, my grandmother is German and it was my first ‘exotic’ place to visit. Good old (holiday) memories, what for me photography is all about. I like modernist architecture a lot, because it was, and often still is, so different. Where this architecture is still sort of a witness of history, it gets even more interesting for an artist. The State architecture of the Nazi’s often still in use, I recently found a former transformer house, for the Nurnberg Rallies, which is now a Burger King. That’s exactly what I look for. And as for Brazil, Oscar Niemeyer is just a great architect, who had the opportunity of a lifetime, to build almost a whole capital. An artist’s dream, I guess. I think I’d really like to be an architect, that also might be a reason for the photographs…

Erik van der Weijde from Siedlung Special Edition

MM: Your new book is titled This is Not My Son? What is the project about?

EW: Basically it’s about my son. My beautiful eight years old boy, of whom I take pictures since he was 5 seconds old. I have all these great pictures of him, but then I started wondering if it was work, or just a father photographing the family. And I started questioning my role whenever I took a picture of him: Am I a father photographing a son? Or an artist photographing a model? And he, was he posing for his father? Or just to be in a picture? But in the end it’s all just great pictures and why shouldn’t I use that in my work? As he’s such a big part of my life and who I am. So in the book it’s not my son, but pictures of my son…

Erik van der Weijde from Archivo

MM: Although you published your book Siedlung with Roma Publications, with your new book This is Not My Son, you published it yourself. Why did you choose to self-publish? What are some of your experiences with publishers?

EW: Well actually it’s published by the Swiss publisher Rollo-Press, in collaboration with 4478zine. I was thinking of publishing it myself and looking for a way to print and then came across this great publisher, who prints almost all publications on an old Risograph machine. And that was just the look I was searching for. So I approached the one-man publisher Rollo-Press and it sort of clicked and we took it from there.


MM: Who designed and printed this book and your other zines/books? How many did you usually print? With the project This is Not My Son, why did you choose to do such a small edition of this book? How do you choose how many to print?

EW: This book was designed by me, as all of my books, because it’s a big part of the work, of the projects. I’m not a graphic designer, but I don’t want my books to have a too graphic graphic design, if you know what I mean. Usually I print about 400 to 500 copies, mostly in Brazil, but for This is not my Son I wanted something more personal, handmade and exclusive. So together with Urs Lehni, who’s a graphic designer and the guy behind Rollo-Press, we printed the whole book in 4 days on this great Risograph machine. Did you go on-press? If so, what was your role on-press? I went from Brazil to Zürich to print the book. Rollo-Press owns this sort of digital mimeographer, the Risograph, and we started printing right away. I really wanted kind of the default quality of the machine, in black and white, with sometimes a colored picture in between; a red, blue or green one. So my role on-press, hmm let me see, I sometimes checked the blackness, I made coffee and chose the soundtrack for the printing… And in the meanwhile I quickly designed a new, 4 by 5 inch booklet for the zine series, which we printed also the last day. A very limited edition collection of green Volkswagen beetle images…

Erik van der Weijde from This is Not My Son

MM: How would you recommend a photographer get funding for his or her project aside from personal funds? Do limited edition prints help?

EW: There’s the hardest part. I mean, personal funding is usually the biggest part. The smaller zine series now kind of pay themselves, but for other projects, it’s difficult. I always use a pre-ordering system, where friends, colleagues and collectors get a small discount if they pre-order their copy. But you also have to be aware that as an artist, if you’d do an exhibition with large prints, some aluminum or framing, you could almost pay for a publication. Maybe not in full color and on a glossy paper, but still… That’s always been my consideration. And once you’ve made your first one or two books, it becomes an addiction and you’ll find the money somewhere. Yes, you have to invest some money, but I’d rather invest it in my work than buy a flat-screen TV… As for limited editions, sometimes it works, sometimes it don’t. I mean all the small bits are welcome when you’re looking for funding. If a limited can help get you another 10 or 20 percent, that’s great.

From Down the Rabbit Hole

MM: What was the budget for the book and did you come close to this number when the project was finished? How do you choose the materials for each project?

EW: Haha, that’s a good question! I really don’t know…I’m still waiting for the invoice, so… I started the project with some 1500 dollars or so, but I have no idea how much we went over the budget. We really didn’t talk finance yet. Luckily the book started selling right away, so I’m not too worried. And about the material, it always has to fit the content of the project. Take the Siedlung book for example, which is about houses built by and for the Nazi’s in the 1930’s, so for me the book should look as if it was made in that period. And where I show harsh reality of prostitution in Brazil, in the book Praia, of course it should be in quite raw colors and a fitting glossy paper. But maybe this is so clear for me and you might think— why the hell did he use…?


MM: Where there any unforeseen complications with the project that you did not anticipate?

EW: Well yes. But that’s also part of photography for me. I mean a shadow falling right on my subject is as a gift from above, not? These coincidences make the work more interesting, I think. For this book I wanted the dust jacket-cover to be in silkscreen, but then the friend with the silkscreen setup had to move his studio those days. And I wanted the book ready, so we came up with this Japanese sort of table sized silkscreen device, a Gocco printer, which we could borrow. The great thing about this Gocco, you should Youtube it, ‘cause it’s really awesome, is that you can print as many colors you like, in one run. So I now have a six color print on the cover, thanks to the silkscreen ‘complication’…

MM: Do you have other advice for photographers seeking to self-publish?

EW: JUST DO IT!!


MM: Who is your favorite photographer or one who has impacted your life and work?

EW: That would be Paul Kooiker, with whom I worked in his studio. He’s a great artist and his work still surprises me. His work is what photography could and should be.


MM: In your personal work, are you influenced by other mediums other than photography? Which ones and why?

EW: I guess I’m influenced mostly by books, art or photography books. And of course architecture. A good photobook or a good building makes me wanna run back to the studio and start working!


MM: What blogs do you read? Magazines?

EW: I frequently visit iheartphotograph.com and vvork.com. And Facebook. I read that as it were a magazine and always find something nice. And I also wanna pitch my own blog fz77.blogspot.com with many found photographs. For me found amateur photographs are very inspiring…


MM: What is your favorite book, photo or otherwise?

EW: Ahh. That would be a few, but Case History by Boris Mikhailov is the one I’ll choose here today. Great, heavy, raw. Just good.


MM: Any mistakes with your publications or anything you would have done differently with a project?

EW: There are always small things, which the viewer probably doesn’t even see. And it also changes from time to time: sometimes I think I chose the wrong paper, but then a few months later I totally agree again with my paper choice. And I think I wouldn’t have done things differently, because from those mistakes you learn most, for next book projects.

Erik van der Weijde from This is Not My Son

MM: What are some of your future projects?

EW: Ok, here we go. I’m working on a follow up for the Siedlung book, together with ROMA Publications, which will feature the housing in Brasilia, the so called Superquadras. Those ‘Superblocks’ were built mostly in the 50’s and 60’s and all have a similar basic plan. It’s gonna be a really nice thing, beginning of 2010. And I’m finishing a new foto.zine series, the nr.3, of which I’ve already printed the first issue. It’ll have this really low printing quality, a bit strange…Uhm, a new foto zine coming up for Kaugummi Books, called Down the Rabbit Hole 3, already. And apart from this I have already 3 other books in my mind, almost ready, but…still looking fur funds…and for new titles and upcoming things you can always check my website 4478zine.com