What Is Conceptual Photography?

Thank you, Source, for producing this lovely little video.  There are two more parts, apparently - I'll try to find them and/or be on the lookout for them as they are released.  Very true that this notion of "conceptual photography" is quite contested - although I remain at a loss for why it bothers certain people and practitioners to the extent it does.  Nonetheless,  Source has done a nice job at picking it apart a bit. 

Their editors write that, "The term sometimes refers to 'preconceived' photographs, sometimes images with a historical pedigree and most often to pictures with a generalised indebtedness to ideas. In the current issue of Source three essays suggest different definitions. To complement these articles we have made three films asking a number of artists, critics and curators what they think of conceptual photography. In the first film, critics John Roberts and Lucy Soutter describe the use of photography in Conceptual Art while John Hilliard talks about his own involvement in the movement and how those original principles are still present in the work he makes today."

Watch the video below (or link to the YouTube clip for full screen).
Above and below content from Source Photographic Review

Six Shooters Photo Collective - Exhibition

I found out about this group of women who came together to form a collective a few weeks ago - what a great way to sustain a continued conversation about photographic imagery while thinking through your own work and process as well.  Love it.  Here are a few words from Aline Smithson discussing the project:

"About six months ago, I was out to lunch with a group of photographer friends: Nancy Baron, Noelle Swan Gilbert, Cat Gwynn, Heidi Lender, Ashly Stohl and me.  Over the course of the meal we discussed all the usual photographic topics and also talked about the desire to have fun with photography again, something that gets lost in the onslaught of competitions and reviews. Our goal is to express Six points of view, over Six days, creating a thread of visual connections whether it be through subject, color, light, or gesture, leading the viewer on a photographic journey--a visual train, so to speak, with each image dependent on the one in front and the one behind to make the engine operate and stay on track. We do not create work for the site, instead mine our archives and use work that sometimes otherwise never sees the light of day.  It's also inspired us to create random images, outside of the "project" template.  We are thrilled to announce our first exhibition, featuring five weeks, 30 images, at the Seaver Gallery at the Marlboro School in Los Angeles, opening September 5th and running though October 9th. You can check out the site here, and follow us on Facebook here!"


Above quote from Aline Smithson, Lenscratch

Roe Etheridge

Image Credit:  Roe Etheride, from MoMA

A fine artist to look at considering our recent discussions of recycling/re-appropriating imagery in the Memory & the Photograph course.  Etheridge was included in MoMA's New Photography Exhibition in 2010.  A blurb from their site mentions,

"He shoots in “editorial mode” and also borrows images already in circulation, including outtakes from his own commercial work, sometimes already published in other contexts. “Everything seems to end up in a magazine sooner or later,” Ethridge has said. Drawing upon the descriptive power of photography and the ease with which it can be accessed, duplicated, and recombined, the artist orchestrates visual fugues, juxtaposing, for example, a picture in which he has superimposed an image of a plain white plate, grabbed from Bed Bath & Beyond’s website, on a checkered Comme des Garçons scarf; a photograph of a model dressed in an Alexander McQueen shirt posing against a tripod, which he took at Pier 59 in New York; two filmic pictures of a Julliard ballet student; a still life of moldy fruit he previously published in Vice magazine; a catwalk shot from the Chanel spring 2009 fashion show grabbed from The New York Times; an image of a pumpkin that is a magnified close-up of a sticker; and a picture of a red bag in a corner of the artist’s studio. The pictures acquire their meaning from the salient way in which they have been shuffled, sequenced, and laid out in nonlinear narrative structures. Combining and recombining already recontextualized images, Ethridge at once subverts the photographs’ original roles and renews their signifying possibilities."

Above content from MoMA

Click HERE to view more of the works described above.

Create a Top 10 Group of Your Favorite LoC Images

This is pretty great - have a look, "The Library of Congress is asking for your help to curate a new set of pictures for the Library of Congress Flickr account" click HERE for more info.

New Taryn Simon work @ MOMA

Taryn Simon: A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters I–XVIII

May 2–September 3, 2012

The Robert and Joyce Menschel Photography Gallery, third floor MOMA, NYC

This show is closing soon, so jump on a flight up to NYC if you have the chance.  An interesting, complex exhibition that draws on photography's archival impulse and implicit narratives "A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters I–XVIII exploits photography's capacity to at once probe complex narratives in contemporary politics and organize this material according to classification processes characteristic of the archive, a system that connects identity, lineage, history, and memory." - MOMA

 Taryn Simon. Chapter XVII from A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters I–XVIII (detail). 2011. Pigmented inkjet prints, 84 x 241 7/8" (213.4 x 614.4 cm). Courtesy the artist. © Taryn Simon

Submission Opportunity for Students - Due 8/31

Welcome back, everyone!  Of course, I realize I never said goodbye for the summer, but here we are back again (almost) so let's just jump right in.

Below is a link to a pretty fabulous student exhibition opportunity.  I encourage any of you reading this to consider submitting work.  Pass the info along to any fellow students as well (including those who graduated last spring).

Here is the link:
http://alifestill.tumblr.com/submit

See you all soonish!