photography | THE HARLOW

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EVERYTHING IN PLACE, GRAEME MITCHELL’S PHOTOGRAPHY

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Isabella Cecconi

I usually love to discover and talk about brand new widely opened third eyes (i.e. unknown photographers), but sometimes I can’t do anything in front of the neatness of renowned photographers. This is the case of Graeme Mitchell. Born in Manitoba, Canada, in 1980, he grew up in various small towns in the Pacific NW where he studied Literature. He later moved to NYC where he is now based and is currently concentrated on portrait and fashion works. In his hands, photography has immense possibilities, his shots are neat and precise, his fashion portraits are stunning and devoted to display the plainess of the subject. Models, actors, dancers, Graeme Mitchel has a talent for rendering his subjects vivid in clarity and definition. The composition, the color scheme, the most minute expression of a model’s face works towards the overall theme of the photograph. There is no detail in these photographs that is out of place or by chance so that to become an effusing praise for the photographic art.

http://www.graememitchell.com

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SLAVA MOGUTIN

Posted on March 15, 2013 by admin

From the series No Love, Ryan – Knitting, Providence 2002.

Courtesy of the artist

www.slavamogutin.com

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SLAVA MOGUTIN

Posted on March 1, 2013 by admin

Among all the images we surf daily here at The Harlow, those of Slava Mogutin have a special place in our heart. This fascinating artist, born in Russia but New York-based is both photographer, video maker , sculptor and painter. To us, his photography is just sublime. His insolent shots appear hot, shocking, prodigious, contagious, pervert, against rules. Since 2004 he is co-founder of SUPERM, a multimedia art team. The Harlow is proud to host for four weeks the images of this incredible man and invites all our readers to discover his art.

Top image, Limber (Marko), New York City, 2010 from the serie Suddenly Last Summer

http://slavamogutin.com

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JESSICA TREMP

Posted on February 22, 2013 by admin

From the series ‘But a fleeting touch’, courtesy of Jessica Tremp.

www.jessicatremp.com

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JESSICA TREMP

Posted on January 31, 2013 by admin

The Harlow is delighted to host and present talented Jessica Tremp. Jessica is a photographic artist from Melbourne, Australia and this is a shot from her ‘Mousse’ series.

http://www.jessicatremp.com/

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GERARD RICHTER, THE REAL ILLUSION OF PAINT

Posted on January 30, 2013 by admin

From tomorrow, Jan the 31^th until April the 21^st 2013, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo of Turin will host and present the exhibition Gerhard Richter – Editions 1965–2012. Richter is a worldwide successful German artist best known for his paintings, featured in museum collections all over the world. Editions are original works of art, not produced as unique pieces but in a certain number of impressions: prints, photographic editions, editions of paintings, artist’s books, artist’s posters and multiples. Richter is nowadays one of the most important living artists. Since the 1960s, he has immersed himself in a rich and varied exploration of painting, continually challenging the medium, encompassing a diverse range of techniques and ideas: his magnificent realist paintings based on photographs, colourful abstractions, portraits, landscapes. Richter has also been working with other media and materials, over-painting his own photographs or photographing details of his own paintings. Gerhard Richter has ever since been one of the first German artists to reflect on the history of National Socialism, creating paintings with victims of the Nazi party and has simultaneously produced abstract and photorealistic painted works, as well as photographs and glass pieces. Following the examples of Picasso, he’s been undermining the concept of the artist’s obligation to maintain a single style. Richter is regarded as the top-selling living artist in fact, in Oct 2012, his Abstraktes Bild set an auction record price for a painting by a living artist at $34milion. His photos projected in canvas replicate the look of the original picture,offering the image a paradoxical photographic appearance; landscapes and portraits, are thus rendered fragile illusions, fleeting conceptions, a photographic imagery as a starting point for his early paintings. Richter’s work is breathtaking. The viewer is projecter in a place where there’s no space, nor time, nor real subject and this sweet timeless illusion through which we can admire Richter’s art is a warm and safe cuddle.

Gerard Richter -Edizioni

Turin, Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo

31 January – 21 April 2013

http://www.fsrr.org/home/

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AND THE BEAT GOES ON! ALLEN GINSBERG’S PHOTOGRAPHY

Posted on January 28, 2013 by Isabella Cecconi

“Without even intending it, there is that little shiver of a moment in time preserved in the crystal cabinet of the mind. A little shiver of eternal space. That’s what I was looking for.” – Allen Ginsberg

The beat movement, the cultural and literary movement that woke up a nation’s consciousness. Never too big but gigantic in influence and cultural status. The years after the Second World War, the loss of conventional structures of society, the post war economic boom, the rampant materialism. The Beat Generation was the result of questioning on capitalism on dissatisfaction with the consumer culture, the taboos against sexuality. The Beats stood in opposition to the clean formalism of the early twentieth century modernists. Their literature was bold, straightforward, provocative. The “founders” of the Beat Generation were Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, but also Lucien Carr, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Neal Cassidy. Gregory Corso and great William S. Burroughs. In 1956, the publication of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl was a turning point in the history of Beat literature, not to mention American literature in general. The long-form poem to be read aloud, almost chanted, a sort of return to an oral tradition neglected in literature for a long time. In the beat movement there were drug-addicts, drifters, prostitutes, and swindlers. Continue Reading →

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IN MONOCHROME WITH BALTHUS – HISAJ HARA

Posted on January 15, 2013 by Isabella Cecconi

“We do not know how to see reality” Albert Camus

Balthus’s paintings have always appeared naive and slightly sinister to me. Canvas where the figurative style emphasized on a dark or fairytaled or mysterious atmosphere. Balthus works are certainly timeless, but according to many, strange. A reverie that seems to have touched Japanese photographer Hisaji Hara. His series of images meticulously recreate Balthus’ most famous works. Between 2006 and 2011, a real young girl, have been posing for the photographer, recreating the suggestive originals. Shooting in black and white, Hara’s nod to Balthus, recreated the surreal oddness, with a touch of formal Japanese film. The setting for the interiors has been a Japanese medical clinic. These tableaux hark between a suspended period between childhood and adulthood and Hara’s technique is the old-fashioned, labour-intensive method that includes multiple exposures and the use of a smoke machine to create the opaque quality. The blur and the opaqueness used thus creates the otherworldly atmosphere. Hara’s monochrome portraits look strangely familiar to me and become an interesting discovery and a gorgeous composition and example of tableaux vivant.

http://hisajihara.com/

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THE VISUALLY CAPTIVATING ALISON SCARPULLA

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Isabella Cecconi

“Alison Scarpulla’s pictures on the other hand clearly stand out in contemporary photography, a unique and complex portrait of a world that seems to exist parallel to our reality where carefree picnics on a perfect summer day could easily end up in a rendezvous with the Grim Reaper.”

To me, these are wildly imaginative photos. I stumbled on Alison Scarpulla by chance and by chance, I must admit, I got quietly fascinated. Her images are an interesting fusion of portraiture with landscapes, some are surreal or look epic, haunting , gorgeous. The viewer focuses on the shapes created rather than the colors. From what I read she is a young self-taught experimental photographer and multimedia artist from NYC, who has a keen and sensitive eye for the abnormal, absurd, weird and surreal. Her shot are powerful with an intriguing tone of beautiful decay, looking quite out of time. She creates her work using double exposure or maybe layering two pictures and her symmetrical composition are definitely unique. So very dream-like. The result? Simply Mystic.

http://shuttermade.com/alisonscarpulla

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JUCO’S INTENSE LUMINOSITY

Posted on December 20, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Julia Galdo and Cody Cloud’s photography is simply cool. JUCO photography is simply cool. I know this is not the best literary way to start an article on photography or to describe a photographer (or two photographers in this case), but what can I say? It is! Fine art photographers, irreverent and colorful. Galdo was raised in Miami and attended the San Francisco Art Institute, graduating in 2004. She is a fine art and editorial photographer now based in Los Angeles. Julia met Cody at the time of the Art Institute. Ever since, their work have been involving humans and their various environments, their love for photography is everywhere and you can feel it if you browse through JUCO’s portfolio which include fashion, personal, editorial and ad work. JUCO’s images involve humans and unique scenes (you can’t miss the colorful shot with parrots). Some of JUCO’s clients have been Good Vibrations, Juxtapoz, Nike, 7×7 magazine and many, many more. Galdo and Cloud’s quirky anthropomorphic compositions are an intricate sort of mise en scene, which seem to dare a unique and sometimes disquieting narrative power. They get out the conventional advertising photography, snatching the moment, being sensual, provocative, exotic, surrealistic, sometimes sinister too. Their stories seem strange and mysterious, sexual and surrealist. Julia Gado and Cody Cloud are thus partners, a collaborative duo that met at The San Francisco Art Institue and has been working together since their first class assignments. The team is based in Los Angeles, CA and share a similar vision of the beauty of the world. So get started being mesmerized by their pictures and their magnificent lightly-sensitive-iridescent- chromaticity!

http://jucophoto.com/

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BLOSSOMS DO BLOOM, THE ELISE BOULARAN PHOTOGRAPHY

Posted on December 13, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

The first time I wrote about Elise, she was 26 years old and stranger to me. Not that I know her now perfectly, but I consider her friend to me. Back in 2010, she was a tranquil photographer of sublime visions. Simple, light in flowing, alluring and multilayered. Generally growing up happens to everybody. Surviving to trouble or to a struggle and then recover from it, creates professionality, skillfullness. Elise growed up or this is what it seems. Staring at her new images and works is to me an evocative reminiscence of pleasure. She is professional. She seems to have total control of her shooting eye. The images still glow, like they used to years ago, but they seem wiser, less shy they appear with more force. Her evocations are now thick, in space, in concept, in colors. He photography is pretty poetic, capturing the ethereal moment and making it super romantic. Photos are sensitive to beauty, to action, to exposure. The ordinary is transformed into something new, fresher, more and more engaging. A smile, a gesture, a brief moment, the one that changes everything. The past sometimes reminds us of the scars, those which are now a safe space of appreciation. Elise Boularan is a photographer whose ability will never stop to improve, providing from her personal experience her own guideline.

http://www.eliseboularan.com/

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WATER LANDSCAPES, SUSPENDED ENERGY

Posted on December 5, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Little I still know about this photographer, but I must admit it was a pleasure getting to know his photography. His, is maybe not a new way to interpret the ocean but surely a vehement manner to consider it. What you get by seeing his images of amazing big waves is an appeal to water in motion. Paul Bobko’s unique interpretation of the water started while sitting on a surfboard waiting for the perfect wave. In his short and meditative time he started seeing the shape and energy of the wave itself. Even if Californian by birth, Paul lives and works as photographer in New York City.
His series of work was photographed on the shores of the New York and California coasts. The composition of each image is similar to that of a formal landscape, the photograph shoots at the horizon and his point of view and perspective is the one just before the water changes into an approaching wall of water. Continue Reading →

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OH I WANT YOU SO BADLY!LEICA X2 BY PAUL SMITH

Posted on November 23, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Totally in love with Leica. Totally in love with this special edition! Totally in love with the Christmas wish list I’m about to put down! If you love colors, good photography and of course Sir Paul Smith, get ready for this perfect combination. The Leica X2 Edition Paul Smith is a special edition of 1500 units of Leica X2. With a flamboyant look, it combines high performance of the German evergreen crafted technology and the styling of Paul Smith’s extravagant color tones. The result is pure harmony. Connoisseurs and lovers will appreciate this creation as it features a metal top plate in dazzling orange. The set contains not only the beautiful camera but also a selection of accessories like the carrying strap and the camera protector in calfskin. The camera is 16.5 megapixels with 24 mm f/2.8 lens and the classic focal length for photojournalism. Enough for me, love is in the air.

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SNAPPING EVERY BREATH WE TAKE: DANNY LYON

Posted on November 21, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

If you have never heard of Danny Lyon, I’m really glad to introduce and getting to know this magnificent filmmaker, writer and self-taught photographer born in 1942 in Brooklyn, New York. After a graduation at the University of Chicago, with a BA in Arts in 1963, Lyon began creating his own photo books with the pictures he would take during his many adventures. His first, was a study of outlaw motorcyclists as he was member and part of the Outlaws motorcycle club of Chicago. He traveled with them and shared their lifestyle. He later got interested in the Texas penal system and started taking pictures of prisoners. Lyon also befriended many of the prisoners. His images are nowadays considered part of the New journalism movement, meaning that the photographer had become immersed, and was a participant, of the documented subject. For the past five decades he has produced a mix of documentary photographs and film, both politically conscious and personal. In the 1960s when photographers where working the poetry of the streets and snubbing their noses at the tradition of photojournalism, Lyon embraced both the lyrical potential of photography as well as its ability to raise awareness to political issues. Some of his earliest images were as staff photographer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee documenting the civil rights demonstrations against segregation in the South. Later, when he moved to Texas he lived and documented for 14 months the Texas prisons. Lyon’s work belies the detachment of documentary in favor of a more complicated subjective involvement, his style is marked by its pursuit of the moment, in the communities of the outskirts, the outsiders of mainstream society, the exceptional and strong political consciousness and concern. Throughout his long and prolific career, Lyon has combined an eye for beautiful compositions with passionate interest in political struggle and change. Photographs from all periods of the artist’s career as well as images from a new series create poetic reflections on memory, family and life. Nowadays he runs a blog where you can follow his adventures. Today 70, Danny Lyon is a continuous flow of passionate photography.

http://dektol.wordpress.com/

http://www.bleakbeauty.com/home.html

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OPPOSITES ATTRACT – FLO FOX AND GIGI STOLL, PARATISSIMA 2012

Posted on October 31, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Opposites Attract is a story, made of images and friendship. A story that has been linking two people for years. The story of a mentor and a student, the story of curiosity and rules to be changed and twisted, of pulsing and beating lives, of fighters and survivors, of strength and wisdom where nude bodies melt with street photography, where irony meets drama, where Flo Fox meets Gigi Stoll. Continue Reading →

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CUT THE RIBBON: VIRGINIA OLDOINI, LA CASTIGLIONE

Posted on October 30, 2012 by admin

La Divine Comtesse! Long, wavy blonde hair, pale skin, delicate oval face, green and violet eyes. The Countess was known for her beauty and her flamboyant entrances with elaborate dresses at the French imperial court. Virginia Oldoini, (Queen of Hearts), Countess of Castiglione, better known as La Castiglione, was an Italian aristocrat who was sent by cousin Count of Cavour on the very first mission to the French court of Napoleon III to plead with the emperor the Franco-Piedmontese alliance. La Castiglione’s skills and charm, prevailed over politics and surely made her a first ribbon cutter in many ways; maybe embarrassing but useful for to Italian politics. The large presence of her seductive institutional cause, gave the expected results:in her luxuriously house in Paris, she was a ‘mondanissima’ and official mistress of the Emperor Napoleon III, arousing envy, great scandal and the fury of the catholic Empress Eugenie. It was even said that the rivalry came to the point that, having been the emperor target of an attack in the house of the Countess in Rue Montaigne, everything had been orchestrated by the Empress itself to damage the opponent. The Countess significant power, being aware of her beauty, ambition and intelligence made her a sharp shooter and rigorous instructions follower, considering her plead to the cause of Italian unity with Napoleon III of France. Her achieved notoriety and scandal led her Italian husband to demand a marital separation. The Countess returned to Italy in 1857 when her affair with Napoleon III was over. Four years later, the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed, conceivably in part due to the influence that the Countess had exerted on France. In her declining years, La Castiglione would spend her days in her Parisian apartment in Place Vendôme, where she had the rooms decorated in funereal black, the blinds kept drawn, and mirrors banished.

She is buried at the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. .

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POR UNA CABEZA..HORACIO COPPOLA!

Posted on October 19, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Have you ever been to Buenos Aires? To me it’s like feeling home. I simply adore this city, giving that I’m more than sure that I was Evita Peron in my previous life or Carlos Gardel, the tango singer. And do you know who Horacio Coppola is? Oh well, you have to. Think about the 30’s. Think about cafes, side streets and neon-lit boulevards of the capital of magnificent Argentina. Think about ordinary objects like a typewriter or a doll, a shop window, a simple man reading a newspaper, a restaurant. Coppola’s photographs of Buenos Aires are a pictorial love letter to his city, demonstrating Argentine metropolis emerging from its grand traditions to embrace modernity either in its street scenes or nocturnal vistas with bars and music halls, trams and all the vibrant and juicy material of his photography. In his 105 years of life (yes sir, I said 105), Coppola has been documenting his city thought superb black and white shots. Mr. Jorge Luis Borges, a friend to Coppola, launched the photographer’s career by using some of his shots to illustrate a book of poet Evaristo Carriego. Born in Aires, to Italian parents, he was the 10^th son of an immigrant couple. All though his long life, Coppola explored many photographic approaches in search of the “magic chiaroscuro”. Coppola’s influences included the modernist movement, architectural angles and shadows and obviously his fascination with cinema. All the shots were executed with a 35mm Leica. Brassai is to Paris like Coppola is to Buenos Aires. Viva Argentina!

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AGAINST OPULENCE AND PRETENTIOUSNESS: JOHN RAWLINGS

Posted on October 9, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

What a nice story: there’s a boy, born in Ohio in 1912 who has moved to NYC in the 30s to start, after graduation a freelance career as store window dresser. After buying a Leica to photograph his work for potential clients, he has discovered the love for pictures and has started shooting his aristocratic clients. Then, years later you see the same boy in a circle of friends. These friends meet in a Magazine headquarter, for instance let’s say…VOGUE.

I’m talking about the fab five: John Rawlings, Irving Penn, Horst P. Horst, George Hoyningen-Huene, George Platt Lynes. This very time, I’ll brush up John Rawlings, who, with over 200 Vogue and Glamour covers and more than 30,000 photos of personal archive immortalized maybe the best era of American fashion and style. With his three-decade affiliation with Conde Nast, Rawlings has expanded the power of fashion press, giving a never-seen-before attention to society stars of the 1940s and 1950s. His subjects included Marlene Dietrich, Salvador Dali, Veronica Lake, Lena Horne, Montgomery Clift and many, many more. But, when opulence and pretentiousness were prevalent in fashion photography, I’m referring to Brit Cecil Beaton, or German Horst, or the Russian Hoyningen-Huene, Vogue decided to change direction and place more information and less art in its pictures. The change of direction happened to be with a very young and talented Rawlings who later became one of the most prolific and important photographers of the twentieth century. Crave with me these marvellous shots, which are still extremely contemporary and stunning. You can’t avoid loving Rawlings at first sight and appreciate his simply beautiful photography.

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STILL LIFE, QUICK HEARTBEAT: JEFF WALL

Posted on September 6, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Jeff Wall is alluring to the point of transfixion. His photography is so outright gorgeous and intensely pleasurable that you can bet to have the Stendhal syndrome when seeing it. Images link together society, art, history, and most of all the human animal. Wall’s photographs start from a sort of painting tradition: landscape, still life later evolving into street photography. Jeff Wall is basically a photo realist, and uses the communicative power of photography to pierce our eyes. Born in Vancouver, in 1946, this Canadian outstanding photographer is one of the most traditional/untraditional artists to emerged from the 1970s. His circle in Vancouver which includes camera-friendly Cindy Sherman, was created by photo prodigy and artistic bloomers. He has frequently been called a modern storyteller whose work is shaped by western art and literature. On november the 30^th 2012 until may the 17^th 2013 the Ian Potter Centre with National Gallery of Victoria, Australia will host a unique opportunity to see 26 photographs of the artist spanning from the 70’s till nowadays including large scale works.

http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/

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THE PAST IN THE PRESENT: SHAWN CLOVER

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Luca Andriani

Since 2010, San Francisco photographer Shawn Clover has been working on a striking series of then and now composite photos of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.Clover’s work is divided into two parts, Part one, was created in 2010 and Part two was completed just last month. To create the series, Clover collected archive photos of the earthquake’s aftermath. He then replicated the photos himself, down to the location, camera position and focal length (to the best of his estimation). The resulting composite photos hauntingly combine stark images of the earthquake’s devastation with modern scenes of everyday life in San Francisco.

http://shawnclover.com/

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NINA LEEN, MASTER OF PHOTOGRAPHY

Posted on September 3, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

There are many images that come to my mind when I think of masters of Photography. I don’t know why, but I always look back in times. I adore contemporary photography but to me, master is equal to past. What can I say about Nina Leen then? To start I can say that she was one of the first women photographers at Life Magazine. She was Russian-born who lived in Germany, Italy, Switzerland and lately US. Through her career as photographer she has been reporting a surprising amount of insight into the post world war period. Housewives, working girls, fashion, Upper East Side socialites, glamorous women, mannequins. Her work has been an interesting study on femininity,and photojournalism. A research of public versus private. When in 1945, Leen joined LIFE, she started producing magnificent pieces of art, producing over 40 covers for the magazine. Along with her portraits of American life Leen’s photographed animals too with a unique ability to see details of the natural world in unexpected ways. Leen was modern, perfect in shooting, true and most of all ageless. Nina Leen’s pictures portray the elegant days, the stunning glamour of a unique eye. The real beauty being captured on women in the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s.

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PAINT IT WHITE! BRAND SPIRIT

Posted on August 31, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Logos, brands, everywhere, every time. We are surrounded. Last spring, Andrew Miller has started a project called Brand Spirit. For 100 days, he has been painting objects in white, taking a picture of it and removing the visual brand. Objects were all under $10 of value. The white reduces items to their pure form and eliminates the corporate bombing that we unconsciously receive every day. The result makes us ponder on society, culture and photography too. I love the shapes of objects and the way they are portrayed. Images and neat and the result is totally clean.

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VERNON MERRITT III, NEW YORK – SUMMER OF ’69

Posted on August 2, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Vernon Merritt III, one of my favorite photographers. His images captured during New York’s summer of 1969 are an everlasting evergreen beauty. Long hair, long legs, bell-bottoms, all are wearing what they want to wear. Everybody’s free, to love and be loved. Kids play in the street, summer is darn hot, the city boils. Girls seem to get their kicks with makeup. As they wear it anywhere. The most important thing is to express yourself and New York looks like a daily celebration of the self. Vernon Merritt III, was a photojournalist who chronicled the Vietnam War and the South during the turbulent 1960s. His photographs appeared in a number of publications including Newsweek, the Saturday Evening Post and Life. At Life, his work encompassed the breath of American life, the lifestyle of the ’60s, the capture of Charles Manson, astronauts, farmers, sailors. His photos speak for themselves. His images are truly street style photography before it had a name: each one telling a story of this particular era. Vernon was and still is and will always be a true originator.

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THE RAW ELEGANCE OF PORTRAITS: CHRISTIAN WEBER

Posted on July 30, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Profound and precise, full of verve and beauty. This is the photography of film-maker and photographer Christian Weber. A man who has always been challenging the conventional interpretation of beauty and portraits. His visuals and work demonstrates an inner elegance using a variety of technological devices to assist in creating his work. His photographs have won numerous awards and have appeared in such publications as The New York Times Magazine, Life, Interview, Harpers Bazaar, and Newsweek. His images seem real silver gelatin and look picture perfect. I like his portraits best, the tones and the general mood of his photography, sharp, neat, perfect. Weber has attended the Southeast Center for Photographic Studies which in turn propelled him to New York City into a career in the arts. Take a look at his pictures, ça va le coup!

http://www.christianweber.net/

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VIVIANE SASSEN : PARASOMNIA

Posted on July 23, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Viviane Sassen is a Dutch photographer who studied fashion design and photography before receiving an MFA from Ateliers Arnhem, the Netherlands. Viviane spent three years as a child in Kenya and when her family returned to the Netherlands in 1978, she was troubled, feeling uneasy. At age sixteen, she revisited her beloved country and has been traveling and working in Africa ever since. Parasomnia is a body of work, in a number of intentionally unidentified African countries, that features anonymous subjects. Parasomnia is a sleep disorder and wickness whose symptoms include abnormal dreams, nightmares and sleepwalking. Her surreal pictures lead the viewer to a journey through the mysterious remnants of her memories. Sassen’s photography is not easy to define. Sure thing is that there’s a sort of “air of dislocation” in all her images. She creates striking and hyper-vivid colors, blistering, I’d say, that serves to emphasize the mystery of her subjects in undefined locations.

Viviane Sassen’s work has appealed many either in the photography world or the fashion industry. For instance, David James commissioned her for Miu Miu campaing.

http://www.vivianesassen.com/

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CHRISTOFFER RELANDER : WE ARE NATURE

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Photographer Christoffer Relander’s new series of photographs titled “We Are Nature” uses double and triple exposures done in-camera with a Nikon D700. Relander is a self-taught photographer from Raseborg, Finland. As I love multiple-exposure photographs and I’ve seen many lately, I realized that throughout this abundance, an excellent example is Christoffer Relander himself. His haunting black and white portraits of people and animals mixed with landscapes create a good result and incredible images. Relander has been published in many art magazines and has been capturing a lot of attention lately. All the shoots are made with his Nikon by triple exposure and than remastered digitally in tones and contrast. Relander’s photography is thus clean, technical and surely graphic. “We are Nature” brings people back to our inner root, to where we really come from. Human beings are together with leaves and trees, animals and landscapes. Continue Reading →

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TOMOKI MOMOZONO

Posted on July 17, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Tomoki Momozono is an awesome photographer. I mesmerized his Sumo pictures with a sort of Stendhal’s syndrome, feeling transported into the audience of his images. I felt like experiencing the fight of the scene. Momozono’s powerful shots portray the competitive contact sport of Rikishi (sumo wrestlers) who attempt to force each other out of the circular ring. Picture tones are perfect, yellowish and dark, delivering the anxious force of the fight, of surrenders, of physical power. Sumo belongs to Japan’s ancient traditions and it’s highly regimented with rules. Momozono majored in Tokyo’s Sophia University and got into the world of photography in 2001. Starting as a sport shooter he later gained knowledge in lighting. He currently is based in London. Discovering his photography is a journey into a brand new world. Enjoy the fight and.. いは始めましょう!

http://www.momozonophotography.com/

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SUSPENDED BETWEEN A SCULPTURE AND AN IMAGE: ELAD LASSRY

Posted on July 13, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

I can say it officially: I heart Elad Lassry! This Israeli talented and same age of mine photographer is the only one (from my point of view) who can perfectly combine generic images with vintage picture taken from magazines or film archives. Lassry studied film at the California Institute of the Arts then earned an MFA from the University of Southern California. All through his career ha has been tapping the culture of visual arts and motion pictures. His vibrant works of still life, collages, or portraits are always picture perfect, never exceeding on dimension and displayed in frames that derive from colors of dominant hues. Elad’s genius lays on re-discovering images from an array of sources. He uses media, films, drawn sketches and sculpture to re-approach to his art. Continue Reading →

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GABRIELE GALIMBERTI – CORTONA ON THE MOVE

Posted on July 12, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Gabriele would you just stop moving?! No everybody he won’t. I must admit that it hasn’t happened often to meet to encounter such a wanderer. Knowing Gabriele is a journey to restlessness. Photographer, jumper, musician, book reader, cook, eventually worldwide couch surfer. Gabriele Galimberti can be one or many things altogether. Tuscan by birth, he has soon realized he was citizen of the world. So he took some of his ideas and waved his hand goodbye. Off to see the world. I’m sure you have read his stories of the couch surfing project so many times, you just had to pop a D di Repubblica magazine and go to the third or fourth page. There you could find one of his adventures followed by his beautiful pictures. Easy thing to understand is that Gabriele is an adventurer and a nomad too. Actually, once while we were having a conversation I realized he knew he was instead well rooted. Couch Surfing has been his main mean of traveling all over the world. Each country cost him lots of camera clicks, jumps and wide openings of eyes. This summer, opening on July the 18^th, The Cortona On The Move Festival, will host Gabriele Galimberti’s entire world tour. This International photography Festival of travels is one of the first of its category to be centered on this genre of photography. Traveling, moving, migrating, being in motion are all well known conditions, common to human civilizations of all times and geographical areas and have different meanings and modalities: from the trip as a synonym of exploration, knowledge, and pilgrimage departing from streets and places and arriving to an inner journey, from escaping from responsibilities to mass tourism, from traveling due to socio-economic transitions to new forms of citizenship, to the social phenomenon of migrants and people fleeing from war, famine and climate changes. Living means motion, exploration and mind traveling both in the world and beyond. Enjoy.

http://www.gabrielegalimberti.com/

http://www.cortonaonthemove.com/

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VICTIM OF BEAUTY: VASIL GERMANOV

Posted on July 5, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

You may define these images brutal, shocking, disquieting. I found them SUBLIME. Why this? Because they create tension and get you into deep thinking. Beautiful injured women used in a fashion magazine. Strange isn’t it? Victim of Beauty is a project by Bulgarian photographer Vasil Germanov. Maybe an attack or reminiscence to women’s domestic violence , maybe just a subliminal alarm clock for our brains. Don’t trust the surface, don’t trust what just appears. Models look impeccable, gorgeous; light is perfect and the shots are magnificent. They are pictured perfectly while “wearing” a black eye, a slashed throat or mouth, a burnt half face. Blood mixes with perfection and the images are the opposite of a glamour of violence. The work is obviously against a violent approach, it’s against the commonsense. The pictures depict what’s actually underneath a beautiful exterior, underneath the imagery of fashion. Violence sneaks into our lives, daily. As Jim Morrison once said: “We fear violence less than our own feelings. Personal, private, solitary pain is more terrifying than what anyone else can inflict…Violence isn’t always evil. What’s evil is the infatuation with violence.”

Vasil Germanov’s work features in worldwide magazines: Amica, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Madame Figaro, Rolling Stone, Vice, and Max. Get to know this new talent.

http://www.thinktanklab.com/

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Liz Hingley Under Gods

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INNER CITY LIFE, CELEBRATING CULTURAL VIBRANCY: LIZ HINGLEY

Posted on June 22, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Liz Hingley’s images from her series “Under Gods” capture different cultures from all over the world of different states of religious practice. Catholics, Hare Krishnas, Jehovah witnesses, Muslims, Anglicans, each photograph shows a different side of a religious life. The funny thing is that all the images have been shot along a single stretch of road in Birmingham, U.K. In the two-mile Soho Road of Birmingham, there are more than 30 religious buildings and about 90 different nationalities. As Hingley grew up in the city, she had personal knowledge of the religious diversity that existed in her hometown. Hingley, daughter of two Anglican priests, has spent nearly two years capturing the practices and interactions of her multi-faith community. “Under Gods” captured some wonderfully intimate moments in which different cultures overlap in the small community creating Tableaux Vivants, where a sense of disquietude becomes part of the aesthetical overall image. It is not a documentary on religion, if considering religion as active part of our daily life. It’s everything. It’s more of a celebration of the rich diversity of religions that co-exists and the reality in lifestyles. Faith in fact has to be interpreted differently, depending on time, place and people.

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ARNO RAFAEL MINKINNEN

Posted on June 14, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Always naked, as the day he was born; affinity for nature and water which comes from his Finnish roots. For Arno Rafael Minkkinen, Finnish-American photographer, nudity is like spirituality. He is not a nudist but he is a researcher for the relationship between his naked body, time and nature. His are more than simple shots, they are actual performances where the body is pure fusion with the landscape in a quiet and discreet scenario. Over the past forty years that sense of freedom has compelled him to photograph himself in a variety of places, from sandy beaches to cliffs, practically everywhere. Many of his photos have always required extreme physical risks. His body of work explores an uncanny juxtaposition between the human body and what surrounds it, where body parts function as integral parts of trees, lakes, skylines. Performing for the Camera: forty years of Self-portraits will be on until june the 29^th at the Barry Friedman LTD gallery, New York City. Get your clothes off and stare at these shots!

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ERIC VALLI: HONEY HUNTERS

Posted on June 5, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

The feeling I had when I first saw Eric Valli’s images was the same I had an early morning, when out of my tent in the trekking path of Annapurna I felt freedom of my soul. Whoever visits Nepal says that energy is everywhere. You can feel it in its people, its mountains, its fabulous landscapes. A spiritual country, the roof of the world. Eric Valli, a talented and experienced French camera snapper has always created a photography that basically consists in breathtaking shots, anthropological essays, eye-narrated stories that document incredible events of normal people. Specialized in mountain scenery and inaccessible locations, he has always been expert on the Himalaya. Continue Reading →

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THE DARK BEAUTY AND EPHEMERAL APPEARANCE OF LIQUID MEMORIES: MUSTAFA SABBAGH

Posted on May 28, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

Edgy, dark, seductive, mysterious, achingly beautiful. It’s hard defining Mustafa Sabbagh’s photography. It’s even harder to write about someone you know personally and appreciate. It’s engaging but at the same time extremely ‘funambulesque’. On my way to Ferrara, for the opening of his exhibition, on May the19th 2012 at the Palazzo Massari, I thought how thirsty and eager I was to see once again his pictures. Sixteen photographs and two installations, have been protagonists of Memorie Liquide, a body of work born from the encounter with magnificent paintings by Giovanni Boldini, the celebrated portrait painter of the Belle Epoque, and in close dialogue with the spaces of Palazzo Massari who hosts the monographic museum. Located along the halls, the shots of the Jordanian-Italian photographer dialogue with fine art and its environment. A gloomy and out of space atmosphere that reincarnates memory and nostalgic remembrances of a far away world. The selection of photographs, presented along the path of the museum, portrays hidden figures behind fetish masked models wearing various objects such as forks, wigs, blinkers, hats, veils, stuffed birds all styled by Simone Valsecchi, who has collaborated with artists such as Luca Ronconi and Peter Greenaway. Sabbagh’s figures are juxtaposed with nocturnal landscapes, his images are shot with extreme care and refinement; Mustafa is an expert and obsessive for details, precision, realism and technical composition. Being a technical expert, means capturing the subject and plunging it in the depth of dark gray and cobalt, locking it in hieratic poses, both front or profile, as if carved on ancient roman medals. In both fiction of disguise or real life-like attitude, Sabbagh’s subjects are shielded by masks, vehicles of detection of the self and its instinct. Continue Reading →

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CHRISTER STRöMHOLM : LES AMIES DE PLACE BLANCHE

Posted on May 17, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

The International Center of Photography, will host from May 18 to September 2, a magnificent exhibition of Christer Strömholm. Very little known outside of Sweden but for many, one of the great photographers of the 20th century or father figure of Scandinavia photography, Strömholm was the winner of the prestigious Hasselblad Award in 1997. The exhibition presents the body of work Les Amies de Place Blanche, a documentation of Paris’ transsexual in the 1960s. Strömholm portrays intimate shots and lush Brassaï-like night scenes form a magnificent, dark, and at times quite moving photo album. It’s a tribute to these girls, the “girlfriends of Place Blanche.” Continue Reading →

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AERIAL NUDES : JOHN CRAWFORD

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Isabella Cecconi

These are basically images taken from high elevation, with one naked body, in a variety of locations. John Crawford’s photography can be considered as a plunge into digital transformation, abstraction, interpretation of reality, minimalism, and artistic master working. One of New Zealand’s best accomplished photographers, with his latest series of photographs titled “Aerial Nudes”,he presents highly entertaining images and easy to enjoy shots. His images capture anyone’s interest. By squinting our eyes, we try to figure out exactly what we’re looking at. Joyful and colorful. His photography his eye catching. Enjoy.

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