Christel Schlager Submits Alan & Blake Weissling A Generational Influence

ALAN WEISSLING & BLAKE WEISSLING
A Generational Influence

I decided to take a small part of each of the boy’s artist statements. So here they are below.
Alan: “I want to photograph my subjects simply the way they are, whether it’s portrait where I’m trying to document the true nature of the person, or a moment of time I want others to see, or an alternate view of a scene many people would have ignored”

Blake: “I’ve open this Pandora’s box now, with drawing parallels between music an photography, so in I must dive, For me, my individual images seem like druses in some unfinished symphony…the photographs I make now hopefully will contribute in some meaningful way to that symphony of mine. I invite you to listen in.”
These guys had great images, I was drawn more to Alan’s work though and his images are the one’s I’m sharing in this entry. He had such a great sense of capturing the moment and overall had such great images that made me think of my Tableau project. He tells a story with not even that many objects or even people present, and much like what his statement was about “wanting to document the true nature” I feel he has accomplished what he wanted very successfully with his work. He makes good use of composition, and uses many interesting angles within his pieces. The one with the couple at the airport is striking. Because it’s a moment capture, and you wonder what has happened to them. Why is the man hiding his face within the womens lap? Are they sad about something, because that’s the general feeling I get when I look at the piece.

Blake’s work seems to be just missing something that Alan is presenting. Maybe it’s just the whole feel and emotion behind the piece. Not all of his shots are successful in playing this symphony he describes, but a few were rather charming.

I really enjoy looking at these pictures at the San Antonio School of Art much more than looking at Kent Rush’s works which are being shown at the same time. I really do feel that if anyone has time to go and look at the Weissling brothers work, that you should.

Christel Schlager Submits Kent Rush "Inchoate and Sublime"

Kent Rush: FotoSeptiembreUSA. Said that “Kent Rush's artwork is a formalist, object-maker's rejection of these ideas, there is something immensely gratifying about the unstudied simplicity of his images, the low tech way they are made, the quiet curiosity they arouse, and the sensual physicality of the photography itself.” Through the audio tour I listened to he has been working on this series called “Inchoate and Sublime” for over 22 years. He wanted to make images with no color, because color seduces individuals and all are printed on silver print film paper. He mentions that he doesn't have much control over the images he takes, because of the low-tech camera he is using. Overall, I had a hard time looking at his images. Probably because they were so vague and blurred and you were unable to really understand what you are seeing. It was frustrating and I had a hard time relating to his pieces, and upon learning he took over 22 years to come to where he was, I have to wonder what I'm missing and why everyone is so enchanted by his work. Maybe it's my own inexperience of photography that makes me unable to understand and appreciate his works. You can send him a email at karmstrong@swschool.org if you want to get a hold of him and talk to him personally a bit more about his works.

Christel Schlager Submits Edward Horsford

Edward Horsford
http://www.flickr.com/photos/edwardhorsford/

Edward Horsford is a photography my boyfriend shared with me. He's not very well known, but he certainly is an artist who takes great joy in the art he makes. I really enjoy his images because he uses his cameras shutter speed to capture something that the eye is unable to see. I think that a reason why something like “stop action” images are so intriguing because it's something you see every day, but viewed in a completely new perspective.  The image I'm sharing above with his hands is him capturing the moment when a water balloon pops. You can see the plastic band crunch up into what looks like a blue rose! I found that pretty lovely and the whole view of just seeing how the water just shoots out in the shape of its counter and burst into little waves as its falling. Edward gets really creative with this idea and starts adding color into the water. That way before he pops them he gets contrast between the balloon color and the water color as it pops. It's nice too when you look at his Flicker page because he puts the setting he used to capture the image. For the balloon it was "Strobist: SB600 on camera left and below, gobo'd, on 1/64th power. SB800 on camera right and above, gobo'd on 1/64th. Balloon with blue dyed water. Retouching / correction in Aperture.” I think what I really want to do after seeing his images, is try to shoot images that also can't be seen with the eye normally, shoot an image, like something jumping in a pool, or just capturing a moment of movement and really capturing the scene.

This is his website http://edwardhorsford.com/index.htm if you have any questions it seems like he is free to answer them he provides an email and even a phone number. ^^

Ashley presents Bent Objects

To start, in my opinion photography, well art in general, should not always be so serious. So I present Terry Border and his hilariously wonderful Bent Objects. Mr. Border creates scenes using everyday household items and food, fast food even (his MacDonald's images are some of my favorite). Sometimes they are meant to be just funny but other times there is a deeper meaning to it that is presented in such an adorably funny way that one cannot help but smile at the absurdity.

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Andrea Couture submits Ellen Kooi

Ellen Kooi is a Dutch photographer working in color. I found her images very interesting and I was especially drawn to the wide format of most of her images because it is a unique format that is not often seen. She uses a lot of children in her photography and with each image there is definitely a sense of mystery and dream-like/fairytale quality...who has children growing out of trees? All of Kooi's compositions are very dynamic and help add another layer of obscurity to the images.

The second image from the top is a very alluring photo. At first glance I just thought there was a woman on the side of the road with cars passing by her. But upon further examination I discovered that the woman was kneeling in the road and screaming into the storm drain. Then I realized that there is another woman in the background doing the same thing. In this photo Kooi also used some of the available light from the cars and street lights (at least that is how it seems). This gives the photo a pink/purple hue adding to the strangeness of this photo.

Here is her website:

http://www.ellenkooi.nl/Ellenkooi.htm

Salina Ellis presents Michael Donnor

Michael Donnor uses negative and print manipulation to render information further than that which the camera captures. His images deal with the concept of true sense of self and outward expressions of that self.

His current body of work “Silent Moan” is reminiscent of Vincent Serbin. Donnor destroys the negative by scratching, tearing, and burning. Interestingly he mentions freezing the negative as well. I am curious what effect this has on the image. The prints in this series are toned with tea and selenium with hand written titles in ink across the white space surrounding the image. By doing this in a flowing uneven script complete with ink splashes, Donnor endows the images with a sense of spirit and emotion. This additional layer of texture provides the photograph with more information from which viewers can construct their own interpretations.

Risa Morales presents Christine Shank

 I saw the work of Christine Shank on the walls of JusticeWorks Studios, here in San Antonio, this First Friday and had to take a second look.  What seems to be popular in photography, right now, is to take images of life-size objects, and use the ability of a 4x5 camera tilt-shift to make it seem miniaturized.  At first cursory glance, Shank's work looks similar.  And then you realize that the objects she is taking images of  are miniature, and that she simply uses a shallow depth of field for her work.

With this realization in mind, I went back and closely inspected each image.  What I found was a playful intellect, and a literal attention to fine details.  These photographs tell open-ended stories of something that has occured, each setup a completely considered environment.  The use of realistic dollhouse furniture and rooms gives this work the ability to be completely immersive, without the effort or expense of setting up such situations in a real place (although I know dollhouse stuff isn't exactly cheap and working on such a tiny scale isn't exactly easy either!).  Additionally, the use of a dollhouse (especially when combined with the image titles) adds a bit of quiet humor to the work, while bringing implications of presence and emptiness, observation and interaction.

The lighting in each image is carefully considered, and constructed to help the viewer believe they are looking at a life-size scene.  Each image is 24 x 30 and the print quality and color considerations are exquisite.

Technical skill? Fantastic.  Concept? Captivating.  I'm totally sold.

Check it out here: http://www.christineshank.com/interiors/interiors_12.html