Slow news day
Usually when I haven’t been to any exhibitions I get my tantalising art-related material from the “news”.
I have a number of arts news sources up my sleeve for these times of need, but given the biggest thing going down on ABC Arts this past fortnight pertains to Wyclef Jean, I’m finding myself a little bit stuck for inspiration.
The stuffy nose and microplane (“cheese-grater” for those less versed in new-age kitchen utensil vocabulary) throat isn’t helping. But, on this sick old day I am determined to bring you something. ANYTHING.
How about… several things?
Bringing you A Survey of Everything That’s Caught Nobody in the Art World’s Attention This Week… (well, not everything, but can’t win ‘em all, eh? Chin up.)
Sumer Erek | Newspaper House | 2008
First things first and let’s start with a bit of controversy. San Francisco maintenance man Rick Norsigian had a real life Antiques Roadshow experience when he happened upon a box of negatives in a garage sale several years ago. Recently, they were found to be those belonging to prominent American modernist photographer Ansel Adams, and attributed a value of USD200 million. Fancy that - $200 million just landing in your lap.
I hope he relished the feeling because over the past couple of days questions have been raised as to the legitimacy of the provenance claims, with the valuer being proclaimed a ‘dodgy’ convicted felon (strong words!) and a case for the negatives belonging to lesser-known Earl Brooks being built.
Read all about it in the New York Times.
Bit of background info?
Adams belongs to the ‘modernist tradition’ of art photography, which emerged in the early 20th century in response to the prevailing ‘pictorialism’. The ambition of the pictorialists was to distinguish ‘art photography’ from photography’s other (commercial and popular) purposes. They were faced with quite the conundrum: if it was the image-making machine (the camera) that was responsible for creating the images, could these truly be called art? From a pictorialist perspective, not unless artistic decision-making was involved in the production of the finished product. Usually this related to the kind of surface upon which the print was made.
In contrast to this, modernist photographers saw the ‘art of photography’ as being in the decision-making processes prior to the actual taking of the photograph. Hence, selecting a scene, waiting for the right light, selecting the aperture and, most crucially, the ‘decisive moment’ of taking the photograph, all became relevant.
Here is an example of a photograph in the pictorialist tradition:
Henry Peach Robinson | The Lady of Shalott | 1860
Contrast with a photograph in the modernist tradition:
Edward Weston | Dune Oceano | 1930
Along with Weston, Adams led the early modernist trend in art photography.
Not too long after this came surrealist photographer Man Ray, and anyone currently in Tokyo (I know there’s at least two of you) should definitely get thee to the National Art Centre for theUnconcerned but Not Indifferent retrospective. The exhibition features more than 400 works from the Man Ray Trust, as well as personal items belonging to the artist’s estate.
Now for something from the ‘blogosphere’. I came across Sophie Blackall’s Missed Connections NY blog this morning and I just had to show someone!
By ‘someone’, I mean you!
Blackall is actually an Australian artist currently working in New York. She creates works based around Craiglist’s Missed Connections page (every city has one of these), and they’re gorgeous!
And kind of romantic.
But some are creepy.
But this one isn’t:
I was the face painter at the party today and you were there. Jake? Jason? John? Something or another. You had a nice face. I would have liked to have stayed and chatted but me and my co-worker had other parties to attend to.
And last but not least we wouldn’t be complete without a what’s-on-in-Brisbane segment.
Of course there’s the Valentino exhibition at GoMA which I really must get myself to. My own mother has beaten me to it, and has nothing but wondrous praise as a result. Better save your pennies, though, because it’s $20 for adults and $16 for students of the tertiary variety.
It is Valentino after all, darling.
Something else I’m planning to see is the Brisbane Airport Fresh Cut 2010 exhibition on at the IMA. The exhibition is a showcase for Queensland emerging artists, particularly Sally Golding, Kelly Hussey-Smith, Fiona Mail and Elizabeth Willing, to whom the Fresh Cut 2010 $5000 grant went to.
So hop to it.
