By Paul Goldfinger, Photography Editor @Blogfinger
My photo was taken of Central Park after the 1969 blizzard. I climbed to the top of Mt. Sinai Hospital and took the picture with my Pentax Spotmatic 35 mm single-lens reflex camera which a friend had brought back from Korea. I only had one lens, a 50mm. I made the print in my darkroom using traditional wet/chemical methods .
Years later, as I learned more about photographic history, I admired the work of André Kertèsz, a Hungarian born photographer who lived in France and then came to America where the third phase of his career elevated him into the ranks of the most famous fine art photographers.
He and his wife moved into a 12th story apartment overlooking Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village in the early 1950’s. He loved to shoot images with a telephoto lens out the window at the park. He especially enjoyed snow scenes.
From Photograph Magazine via Swann Galleries, New York.
When I saw his image (above) from 1954, I was struck by the similarity to mine. But my photo was not derived from his, since I was unaware of him in 1969. At least I don’t believe I ever saw his work before.
But art always owes a debt to the work of those who came before, and that is why artists must study the history of their genre in order to build on the past. The influence of one generation of artists onto later ones is sometimes unconscious on the part of those who may be borrowing without even realizing.
Because of our two similar images, and I am not comparing myself directly to Kertèsz, I feel that there is a kindred spirit—a connection— that somehow exists, and that is something that is both weird and exhilarating.
Have any of you artists/writers out there (and there are some in Ocean Grove) ever felt such a relationship?
JENNIFER THAYER (This song was featured in the movie The Thomas Crown Affair and sung by Noel Harrison)
Years ago I did only color photography. I did well making pretty pictures, some of which wound up winning contests and being displayed internationally by Pfizer Labs. But I got bored with it and decided to do black and white photos. Eileen got the job of documenting our family’s history in color.
So I took courses and learned how to create high quality black and white prints in the darkroom. That was much more challenging and rewarding than merely sending the film to a lab. Half the battle with black and white negatives becoming fine prints is in the darkroom.
Some of you who have been interested in fine-art photography know that most of the greats of the past worked only in black and white.
I became a Leica B&W photographer, one of a specialized group that used those fabulous German cameras with their remarkable lenses. Many of those professional artists were photojournalists, becoming expert at street photography using those small and unobtrusive 35 mm cameras. They bridged the gap between news and fine art.
Remember Robert Capa? He was on assignment for Life Magazine. He took his Leica along when he landed with the first wave at D-Day. There is a remarkable story about that. Here is a Blogfinger link:
One of Capa’s D-Day images. He won a Pulitzer for this courageous work.
Cartier Bresson carried his Leica under his raincoat while sitting at cafés in Paris. All of a sudden he would stand up with his camera and take a picture. Then sit down and get back to his espresso. He called it the “decisive moment.”
So for years I only did B&W, although there were some exceptions. Basically I preconceived my photos by looking at the world in black and white.
A great debate eventually developed over which was better: film or digital, but that became academic since high quality digital color and black and white images could now be obtained.
In my case, before Blogfinger, I continued to do only film work and I built a darkroom in my 1880 OG house. It was historic because photography was invented before OG was founded. Remember Matthew Brady during the Civil War?
But when Blogfinger began, I saw that digital images could look spectacular on the Internet. That’s when I closed my darkroom. No more hours breathing in chemicals, on my feet, and no more matting, mounting and framing prints. And I entered a color phase once again, along with B&W.
I like to display my images on BF or by having digital black and white prints made by a fine-art lab, usually in small sizes and then I dry mount them on photo mats. This way they can be placed on a shelf without any glass or plastic….just the basic image which can be picked up, changed, and moved about easily–very retro and satisfying.
But now, as Blogfinger becomes more artsy, I am going back to the days when I shot mostly black and white. It takes some getting used to by the photographer and by those looking at those pictures.
I think black and white images generally contain more richness, soul, subtext, subtlety, and spirituality. And it takes me back to when black and white was all we had, kept aloft by all those S’s.
And now I have to figure out how to get the most out of a new digital camera that only takes black and white images. I sold my film cameras—there is still a market out there for them, and the pendulum is swinging back somewhat. Art students are learning how to do darkroom printing, sometimes pursuing historic materials such as light sensitive gold or platinum.
Below is the latest M series Leica digital camera–the “Monochrom.” It is purposely designed to look like its ancestors from the 1930’s, but it is incredibly complicated with software menus out the wazoo.
I have one, but it will take time to excel with it. You will be seeing more black and white on Blogfinger, but feel free to submit color images if yours are very good. I will too. I still have a fine color camera for the 4th of July parade and other “color-essential” events.
Leica M “Monochrom” digital camera. 2019. High speed Leica 35 mm. lens “the Summilux-M.”
Chihuly centerpiece in front of the Conservatory at the BBG. Photo by Hope Moraff, special to Blogfinger.net.
This show is not a typical gallery display. It is a garden exhibit showing the works of a remarkable artist, Dale Chihuly, whose glass sculptures are internationally known.
The current show at the Bronx Botanical Garden will be around only until October 29, but it is worth a trip into the Bronx, even if parts of that borough look like a third world country.
We visited for the daytime exhibit which displayed 20 Chihuly installations interspersed around and within the gardens, and everything is within walking distance.
The presence of this georgeous colorful art presented in a natural environment is remarkable.
By Paul Goldfinger, Photography Editor @Blogfinger.net
Builder Levy is a photographer who was born in Tampa, Florida, 1942. He received his BA in Art from Brooklyn College, and over the years his work has appeared in many exhibits and books. He is best known for his work in Appalachia. This image is from his book Appalachia, USA.
Vanity Fair wrote this about him: “Photographer Builder Levy’s Appalachia USA (David R. Godine) does for today’s coal miners what Walker Evans did for sharecroppers and tenant farmers in the Dust Bowl.”
I hadn’t heard of him until I received an announcement of his latest exhibit at Shepherd University’s Scarborough Library in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. I got to view some of his work, all in wonderful black and white. His images are strong and include dramatic scenics as well as portraits.
He is also known for international images (eg Mongolia) and some wonderful photographs in New York City (see link below.) He recently had an exhibit at the Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, Florida.
Recently Hillary Clinton said that she wanted to “put the coal companies and the coal miners out of business.” But if you saw some of Builder Levy’s Appalachia work, you realize that coal mining is a culture and a way of life which will be resistant to change.
BILL MONROE and his BLUEGRASS BOYS “Blue Moon of Kentucky”
We have reported before on Stephen D’Amato’s work because he often paints in the Grove. He has now notified us of his forthcoming exhibit in Pompton Plains at the Pequannock Public Library during November. (973-835-7460.)
He will be showing 20 paintings with Jersey Shore themes, including some new works from 2004-2015. So if you are seeking art with Jersey Shore themes, Steve’s the main man.
Link to our last post about Stephen D’Amato from 2012: BF 2012 post
RACHAEL CANTU “De Colores” by Joan Baez
“All these colors are like all the love
I have known in my life
And keep filling my heart
All these colors are like all the love
I have known in my life
And keep filling my heart.”
Above: “This Photograph is my Proof” by Duane Michaels. Click to make it a bit bigger.
By Paul Goldfinger, Photography editor @Blogfinger
Duane Michaels, an important American photographer, is 80 years old, and there will be a retrospective of his work opening in a few days at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh.
Michaels has been a pioneer in photography by doing two things. The first was handwriting narrative text on his images. He says that the writing “gives information that the photograph could not convey.” Well, so much for a picture being worth a thousand words. His words usually consist of poems or brief stories as seen in the photos above and below.
The second advance was to place multiple photographs in sequence to relate a story. Duane Michaels is a storyteller.
Here is a quote from the Carnegie: “Michaels is cited as being seminally important in his willingness to bend the rules of the medium to suit his own ends. He is credited for broadening our understanding of the philosophical dimensions of photography from the 1960s to today. ”
The picture on top is called “This photograph is my proof.” I think it is enjoyable to read his brief narrative which adds an extra dimension to appreciating his images.
In general, I like my own images to be self explanatory to the point of rarely giving them titles. Just documenting the place and date is usually sufficient for me. I like to use the headline on Blogfinger to say a few cryptic words about the photo, but my goal is to stimulate interest rather than to narrow the experience for the viewer as occurs with Michael’s stories.
However, I actually am drawn to the notion of adding handwritten storytelling to a photograph. It is a fascinating and original idea. Today, most photography is shown on line, and you can’t very well write a handwritten note.
One of the beauties of creating an actual photo print, mounted on a mat board, is that you finish with a tangible work of art that you can hold in your hand. The handwritten note by the photographer adds a hand-made touch. I like to display photographs without frames—just the image on a mat board leaning against the wall or on some sort of easel.
In my blog gallery, I usually add music (“soundtrack”) to my photos to provide an added dimension. Like Michaels, I want to enhance the appreciation of the photograph, but, at least online, I do it with music, which is less specific than a written note. It’s like the soundtrack for a movie.
My idea of accompanying photographs with music is fairly original, although there are precedents. In 2011 we posted a piece about a museum show which featured the photography of Disfarmer accompanied by live music with Bill Frisell.
