Exploring 21st Century Photography

F295 Seminar on 21st Century Photography
January 17, 2010| B&H Photo | New York, NY USA | 10:30am - 4:30pm

2010 brings the 7th F295 event and the 3rd installment of the free F295 Seminar series at B&H Photo. This free day long event continues our ongoing exploration of 21st Century Photography through the voices of practicing photographers. Artists will show slides and speak about their work and the ideas and rationale behind it. Woven into their talks will be thoughts & reflections on photography’s three fundamental components; Light, Time, and Apparatus and how those elements impact their work. We’re pleased to welcome Gabriel Biderman, Dan Burkholder, Jill Skupin Burkholder, Anne Arden McDonald, Lothar Osterburg, Tom Persinger, Norm Sarachek, and Henrieke I. Strecker as this years featured speakers. Attendance requires preregistration.

Register here >>

In 2010 F295 will be running an exciting program of workshops out of their Pittsburgh, PA USA studio. They’re welcoming leaders in the field for a series of small intimate workshops on some of the most interesting photographic processes in use today. This will be a rare chance to work, study and collaborate in such small groups.

Workshops Include:
January 30-31, 2010: Full Moon - Nocturnal Pittsburgh Workshop with Gabriel Biderman
February 20-21, 2010: Modern Dry Plate Tintype with Jill Enfield
March 20-21, 2010: Handmade Large Format Photography with Tom Persinger (pre-reg full!)
April 17 -18, 2010: Calotype Workshop with Dan Estabrook (pre-reg full!)
May 14, 15, 16, 2010 : Three Day Hands-on Daguerreotype Workshop with Jerry Spagnoli (pre-reg full!)
June 2010 (TBA): The Practice of 21st Century Photography with Tom Persinger
July 10-11, 2010: Albumen Printing Workshop with France Scully Osterman

Visit our Workshops and Memberships page to register or pre-register. Workshops will be opened for registration 90 days prior to each workshops start date. We are offering a $20 pre-registration option for those who would like to reserve their spot and not risk missing enrollment. Please be advised, that so we can maintain a high quality of instruction and participant:teacher ratio we’re only accepting 6 participants for each workshop. Therefore we expect each to fill quickly.

*Grey text = pre-registration is full. Email to get on the wait list >>

This just in from F295 friend Ann Jastrab - the Gallery Director at RayKo Photo…. Last year the show was wonderful, this year it moves to the main gallery! We encourage you to send your work for consideration!

In honor of Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day on April 25, 2010, RayKo Photo Center will be hosting an exhibition of pinhole photography in our main gallery. This is an open call for photographic work taken with a pinhole camera. Artists selected for exhibition will be encouraged to participate in the artist’s reception and Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day on April 25th between 12-5pm. RayKo will be offering free image uploads onto the WPPD website, supplies for making pinhole images, and displays of pinhole cameras.

Submission Guidelines
•Images must be made with a pinhole camera only!
•Limit 5 images per person:
•CD entries must be jpegs
•Save files with artist’s last name and title of image
•Make sure contact information is on the CD and CD case and individual slides
•Please note that any work deemed misrepresented by its CD or slide will be declined
•Completed submission form
•SASE or adequate postage for notification and return of CD or slides, if desired
•Late submissions or substitute images will not be hung
•Entry Fee: There is a non-refundable entry fee of $25. Check or money order should be made out to RayKo Photo Center. No Cash or Credit Cards, please.

Mail or Deliver to
RayKo Photo Center
c/o Pinhole Photography Show
428 Third Street
San Francisco, CA 94107

Submission of Accepted Work
The work must be framed or mounted with a wire affixed and ready to hang. NO saw tooth hangers, please. Entries will be handled with the greatest care, however, RayKo assumes no liability for work on its premises. All works selected for exhibition must be for sale. RayKo will retain 40% commission on all work sold, so please price your work accordingly. Please note that images selected for the show may be used for promotion of the exhibition.

Exhibition Schedule
March 7st, 2010: Deadline for submissions
March 13th, 2010: Notification of juried results
April 19th, 2010: Delivery of accepted work
April 25th, 12-5pm: Opening reception
April 25th – May 31st: Exhibition on view

Untitled, Robert Hirsch 2009

We just received this message from F295 friend and member Robert Hirsch. He’s working on a fifth edition of his definitive book ‘Exploring Color Photography‘ and is looking for new and exciting work to showcase - naturally he thought he could find it among the members of F295! If you send in work to be considered and are a member make sure to let him know!

Work Call for Exploring Color Photography, Fifth Edition

Dear F295,
We are collecting photographic and digital images for the new fifth edition of Exploring Color Photography to be published by Elsevier’s Focal Press. First published in 1988, the book’s basic premise is how artists use color photographic processes to realize their vision. This revision will greatly expand its digital coverage, but work done in any analog or digital color process is welcome. Emphasis will be placed on contemporary ideas and techniques, especially those combining analog and digital methods, but traditional images are wanted too. Quotes from the artists that incorporate their conceptual and technical ideas are featured with each image. Artists whose work is used will receive a copy of the book and an on-page credit for their contribution. Suggestions for new topics and assignments will also be considered. We strongly advise that you look at the current fourth edition to get a complete overview of the project.

Submission Requirements:
For preliminary consideration please submit up to 20 images with the following criteria:

1) Small JPEG files on CD. Images should have their longest dimension at 800 pixels (length or width) with a resolution of 96dpi. Each image should not exceed 200kb.
2) Contact sheet or small hard copy prints of each image.
3) Image checklist with the following information: title, date, size, and process.
4) Artist’s statement
5) A technical addendum covering the specific process for each image. Details concerning your working modus operandi and technical details are ESSENTIAL so the image can be placed within the book’s framework.
6) Hardcopies of all text documents.
7) The URL of your website presence (if applicable).

Please include Exploring Color Photography in the subject line of any email so your correspondence does not end up in the Junk folder. Please do not email image files, as they will quickly overwhelm our mailboxes.

Do not send any original materials, as we cannot be responsible for them.

Provide an SASE if you want your materials returned.

We would like to receive your materials by December 4, 2009. Earlier is better.

Send to:

Robert Hirsch
Exploring Color Photography
146 Newfield Street
Buffalo, NY 14207-1650 USA
LightResearch@broadviewnet.net

Thank you.

First Impression is an exhibition of contemporary photographic works by artists Marco Breuer, Dan Estabrook, Eric William Carroll, Michel Frizot, Michelle Kloehn, and Chris McCaw. The artists use photographic methodologies that result in unique, first-generation imagery. The types of work include calotypes, tintypes, paper negatives, photograms and other prints resulting from timeless processes.

In conjunction with the exhibition, CCNY will host a panel discussion featuring exhibited artists, on Tuesday, September 22 at 7 pm, School of Visual Arts Amphitheater, 209 East 23rd Street (between 2nd and 3rd Avenues). Admission is free to SVA students and staff, and CCNY members, $5 for other students, and $10 for the general public.

September 16 - October 30
Opening Reception: Wednesday, September 16, 6-9 pm
Panel Discussion: Tuesday, September 22, 7 pm, School of Visual Arts Amphitheatre

*it should be noted that the editors of F295 have tweaked the above description so as to not use descriptors we find misleading or unsatisfactory (eg: arcane).

We are pleased to announce that on September 15th, 2009, Proud Flesh, a new series of photographs (contact gelatin silver prints from large ambrotypes) by Sally Mann is scheduled to open at Gagosian gallery. The Aperture Foundation will be releasing a monograph containing the work to coincide with the show.

You can read an essay about the work prepared by Sally Mann especially for Jorge Colberg’s blog, Conscientious, here >>

*Image by Sally Mann

Photographer and F295 member Jill Enfield’s project “The New Americans,” a portrait exhibition celebrating the American immigrant, will be displayed at Ellis island during the Upwardly Global event on September 26, 2009.

Enfield is known for the 150-year-old wet plate collodion process used in her portraiture. In addition to the many photographs on view, a limited number of portrait sittings will be auctioned off at the event. Enfield will also be scheduling private appointments thereafter.

All proceeds will go to Upwardly Global. Buy tickets here >>

View a two minute time-lapse visual representation of the wet collodion process here >>

Upwardly Global - Passport to Possibilities
September 26, 2009, Ellis Island
New York, NY

F295 member Jo Babcock has a show opening Friday, September 11 from 6-8pm at Steven Wolf Fine Arts, 49 Geary Street, Suite 411, San Francisco, CA 94108.

From the gallery:

Past Life Picturesque
Jo Babcock could go down in history as the only photographer to successfully crack the competitive field of San Francisco Bay Area; assemblage. In the 1980s, Babcock began making pin hole cameras from found objects. They all work and produce a picture unique to their construction. The most beguiling ones refer to the strange relationship between sculpture and photography that make up their identity. Take, for instance, the camera made from an old, believe it or not, Ansel Adams coffee can; or, the one made from a Brillo box; or the one made from a can of Mr. Painter latex flat paint. The charm of these objects reveals itself on contact and needs no explanation. Other cameras are more obscure but equally interesting, such as the mailbox camera, the one made from a toy safe and the one made from an old box of Chanukah candles.

At rest cameras are slightly disturbing. Are you looking at them or are they looking at you. Babcock’s cameras, haunted by a past life, seem to embody a specific if dormant spirit. And as their Dr. Frankenstein, it is Babcock who holds the key to their unholy reanimation. According to curator Doug Nickel, who wrote the essay to Babcock’s 2005 The Invented Camera, this can be said to occur when Babcock uses the cameras to make photographs. Each camera is deployed by Babcock to take pictures of things as though from its own perspective, giving it a sense of viewpoint and independence. The band-aid box camera, for instance, snapped a self-portrait of an injured Babcock. Nickel argues that Babcock’s cameras with their self-defining point of view, fulfill the camera’s destiny of independence embedded in its 19th century invention. “We’ve covered ourselves in things,” concludes Nickel, “and now we find to our surprise and horror the things no longer need us.”

In addition to producing this small survey of his cameras, Babcock has designed a series of visceral peepholes that tap into the anxiety that runs beneath our culture of obsessive looking and surveillance. Most people associate peepholes, those reverse telephoto lenses, with front-door security. The world outside is dangerous but the world inside is fine. In Babcock’s world, you are on the outside looking into a world of ticking clocks and giant red light bulbs. Not only is the inside no longer safe, it’s no longer clear what’s inside and what is out.

Steven Wolf Fine Arts
49 Geary Street, Suite 411
San Francisco, CA 94108
415-263-3677