Archive for the art + photography category
CalArts homie Kevin Lyons has a new show Your Mom’s In My Business at the HVW8 Art+Design Gallery in Los Angeles, if you’re in the area and dig on hand-made design, go check out the show. Kevin is a heavyweight:
Printed Ephemera and New Works by Kevin Lyons
Opening Friday, May 9th, 6 - 10 pm, Show runs May 10th - June 15th
HVW8 Art+Design Gallery
661 N. Spaulding Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90036
Gallery open: Wed - Sat, 1- 5pm
Or by appointment:
323 655 4898
Kevin Lyons is a 1992 graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design where he received a degree in film. After working for Nickelodeon / MTV as an Associate Producer, he co-founded the NYC based design firm, stereo-type which for two years was responsible for much of the graphic look of the New York City underground Hip-Hop and Acid Jazz scene. This included the logo design for the long standing NYC based club, GIANT STEP. Stereo-type’s client list also included Soul Kitchen, 555 Soul and the LA-based, Brass Recordings. After receiving his masters degree from CalArts in 1998, Lyons has gone on to work for Nike, both in and out of house, was the former Art Director of Urban Outfitters on two separate occasions, and has been Art Director for filmmaker Spike Jonze’s Girl Skateboard Company. He was also the original US Art Director for TOKION Magazine and maintains long-standing freelance relationships with Nike, Jordan Brand, Adidas, Stussy and Stussy Japan, Beams Japan, HUF, Nieves Books, Stones Throw Records, Commonwealth Stacks, and long-time friend and collaborator NYC artist, SSUR.
more info here.
[via Juxtapoz]
I stumbled across Seshn.com’s relatively new Shutter Butter featured photography gallery. I peeped Quincy Dein’s surf culture related photography.
The thing that I really like about Shutter Butter is that the photographer is given audio space to put context to the images. You’re not only seeing gorgeous imagery, you’re getting to know the photographer that captured the image.
I do believe that audio can be distracting and can unnecessarily “color” the images. Non-narrated slideshows, gallery shows, monographs etc… all have their proper space. But once in a while it’s nice to get behind the imagery to understand the process.
And great work by Dein.
Trying to Put a Name to a Face of Evil in Myanmar - New York Times
My homie Isaiah Seret gets a super-huge write-up in the New York Times for his work directing Ellen Page in a spot for the Burma Can’t Wait Campaign:
The spot is one of 30 produced for U.S. Campaign for Burma, starring celebrities like Will Ferrell and Jennifer Aniston. They will be distributed on Fanista.com, a social-networking and entertainment retail site, then passed along to sites like YouTube and Google Video every day for the next month. The goal of the campaign is to thrust the cause of human rights in Burma — now known as Myanmar — into the orbit of A-list activist causes, along with Tibet and Darfur, and to encourage international pressure on a government that activists say is one of the world’s most oppressive.
…
A story that is going to hold people’s interest also needs a villain. While General Shwe is a natural in the role, said Isaiah Seret, a 30-year-old music video director who was enlisted to write and direct the Ellen Page spot, the general also came with built-in drawbacks — his name lacked impact, his face was forgettable. The general, Mr. Seret said, lacked what is known in marketing vernacular as a “unique selling point” — like Hitler’s mustache. So the director attempted to turn the general’s blandness into a joke. In the spot, Ms. Page scribbles a Hitler mustache on a large photo of the general and declares, “Make no mistake about it, he is a professional dictator.”
Isaiah conceptualized, wrote and directed the Ellen Page piece (which debuts in the next few days - i think), as well as seven or eight others that will be released one-a-day for each of the 30 days of the campaign. I’m super excited to see Isaiah’s name up in print. I think he hit a home-run with this spot. Sometimes stars align and this is one of those times. He’s been working like mad on this campaign and it completely dove-tails with his personal voice. This guy is definitely an artist to watch. Each time I see new work of his, I’m amazed at his progression in style and form, without losing his personal voice. I’m callin’ it now: Dude is gonna be famous.
- Burma Can’t Wait.org
- All the clips listed on You Tube
- Isaiah Seret.com
image from Michael Dweck’s Montauk series
Michael Dweck has some gorgeous photography, especially his Montauk series of 50s era surf-culture / americana inspired shots, his book looks amazing.
[via The Year in Pictures]
On a recent trip back to the homeland (NYC), my sister Mosbef hooked me up with It’s All Good by a syrbian photographer living in New York, that goes by the name Boogie. The book is published by powerHouse:
A gritty, graphic, and gripping exposé of the underworld and its inhabitants, It’s All Good, the first monograph by Boogie, presents the predators and the prey in the drug game today. Shot in New York City’s most notorious neighborhoods—Bushwick, Bedford-Stuyvesant, and Queensbridge—Boogie gained intimate access into a world few dare to venture, a world closed to outsiders, a world of crackheads, junkies, and gangsters. From the cops patrolling the project roofs to the addicts overdosing on the streets, It’s All Good chronicles ghetto life in stark, heart-stopping images and intense testimonials. Boogie brings us to a place few will leave and most will stay, a place where escape is one rock, one shot, one glock away.
The photos are intensely candid and close-up. The people being photographed know and confide in the photographer and you can see it in every image. Boogie spent a lot of time getting to know these people and gaining their trust. The book is really powerful and grim.
In photography books / monographs, the images always stand on their own. In the truest sense, the story is told through the images. Text and image don’t often collide. It’s all about the images and most of the time, rightly so.
In ‘It’s All Good’ the images appear one to a page, with an introductory text to each of the characters every few pages. In the back of the book, there is a glossary of images, each one with a comment, from the photographer, on the person being photographed or context that the photo was taken in.
I really enjoyed Boogie’s comments and although the book kinda takes the middle road (by displaying the images by themselves and then including the glossary), I gotta say that I spent a lot of time in the glossary section looking at the thumbnail images and reading the comments. The full size images are gorgeous and raw, but the comments really open the story up and provide the details and context that the photos sit in. I can’t help but wonder why they didn’t just include the text with the photos.
There’s definitely a conversation there, about the role of the image, versus the roll of image and text together. And the intention of the publisher/author to present the images versus the intent of the viewer to understand the context of the images. I’m not sure if my “art discourse” hat is fully on today, so I’ll leave it at that.
Art by Ty Williams (L) and Julie Goldstein (R)
Montanaro Gallery in Newport Rhode Island, is having an art exhibition called Toward The Great Expanse that features the surf/water inspired work of Ty Williams and Julie Goldstein. The pieces are beautiful.
The Montanaro Gallery site has what looks like all of the pieces from the show, up on the site, in nice big jpegs. Very thoughtful of them, for us left-and-down-coasters. the name of the show couldn’t be more perfect for the flavor of art.
[via Foam]
A American Family Man: Re-Design: A Reader Poll
Vincent Skeltis was asked, informally, to re-design Foam (a surfing mag for girls). Skeltis has posted the brief, current/projected readers, the latest cover and a few of the covers from his re-design process. He’s asking people to comment on what he’s done so far (with the disclaimer that the logo is still very rough). Skeltis is letting us all in on his process, which is awesome. It can also be a double-edged sword, so in that sense he’s being very brave (and silently hoping no one skewers him, anonymously, in the comments).
Skeltis has some amazing photography and art-direction over at his portfolio site. I’m sure that whatever designs he ends up presenting, regardless of how they’re eventually implented (or not), his art-direction will be top-notch.
[via APE]
–
Update: It seems that Foam had Skeltis pull down the blog entry. understandable. well, I guess i’ll leave this up for posterity sake.
The Year in Pictures hips us to these awesome posters created by Brazilian graphic designer Daniel Molin. The Google Machine™ has never heard of Molin (unless he’s the same guy creating massive amounts of sci-fi fantasy art - which i doubt). That’s a shame. Regardless of your political leanings, these are beautiful pieces of design.
Simplicity works so well.
I’m really diggin’ on Zoo York’s new artist series boards done by Mark and Matt Owens (Matt of VolumeOne fame). The art-direction is pure 70s NY mashup. Equal parts Massimo Vignelli, Milton Glaser, Paul Rand and Lance Weyman mixed with a slight case of Monty Python. Great designs! Having grown up in NY in the 70s-80s my childhood is filled with the kind of iconography that this is derived from. Athletics. has the lickable larger versions.
btw - nice Athletics site, right?! talk about clean and beautiful layout and typography. gorgeous stuff. i’m taking notes. Athletics is Matt and Mark Owen, Samia Saleem, James Ellis, Jason Gnewikow, David Ahuja and Wes Duvall. wow, very cool.
I’ve been meaning to link to this for awhile, but since it’s Earth Day, there’s no better time than the now (not now, but right now). My dad has a wicked photographic essay called Where Has All The Plastic Gone? The photographs feature trash found at the beach here in Mexico. Trash is a common sight on the beaches and along the roads, so much so that it begins to become invisible to the people that live here. The essay feels like a visual archaelogical survey, recorded for whoever might inhabit earth, long after we’re gone and all that’s left are bits of oddly shaped, brightly colored plastic.
flickr set | fullscreen slideshow
On a similar tangent: there’s been an awful lot of talk about plastic building up in the environment and being around forever. My hope is that long after we’re gone (assumably the plastic by-products killed us off), maybe there’s some kind of bacteria that somehow evolves or makes it to earth aboard some large meteor and uses the plastic (and toxic chemicals it amasses), as a food source. Similar to the way bacteria feed off the toxic chemicals emitted from deep-ocean vents. The dinosaurs gave us oil to drive our vehicles, maybe our gift to future inhabitants is, well, food. Or more likely we’ll just decompose and become oil for future inhabitants’ automobile equivalents.
Just a thought.
I was grubbing through my mint stats when I happened up on The City Loves You, a multi-editor spanish/english-language blog about the street art scenes and its intersections with gallery, fashion, music and commercial art with an emphasis on mexico-based artists and international collaboration projects. Each editor essentially has their own blog sections in the City Hotel section, with all entries appearing on the front page. Editors cover their home town scenes from all over Mexico. I’m particularly interested in the Guadalajara section, as I travel to the GDL frequently and I’m always keeping my ear out for good art/music shows.
It’s nice to see a highly visible blog-style website dedicated to street culture in Mexico. I haven’t come across very many information resources that are as accessible and consistently updated. If you wanna know what’s happening in Mexico’s street art scene give The City Loves You a look.
Shakas & Singlefins is the blog of Ryan Tatar. If you’re in to photography and surfing, chances are you’re already hip to it. This guy churns out beautiful surf culture inspired photography by the pound, continuous daily updates of low-key california wave sliding gorgeousness directly to your rss reader.
The thing that I find most interesting about Tatar’s work is that although surfing is definitely a focus, it’s not the lion’s share of imagery, the subtle details surrounding the act of surfing are just as important. This idea is central to my own work on the subject as well and though I see tons of awesome surfing-related photography, Tatar’s work is truly more about the entire culture and process as a whole, rather than the isolated act.
If you don’t know, now you know.
Update: Ryan has just debuted an online store for purchasing his photos, over at his portfolio site. Shelter Surf Shop in Long Beach CA will be carrying some exclusive prints, so go support a fellow surfer/photog. I’m hoping to score a print of that blue-green/metallicy silhouette shot from his Drift Surf Mag feature. righteous.
A-Side Studio combines beautifully subtle graphic design, illustration and photography. Their work is tight and laced with surf/skate inspiratory vibe. They art-directed a new surf culture related book project coming out called The September Project:
During the month of September in 2006 two dozen creatively driven surfers took residence in a house on the west coast of Ireland. The September Project documents the collective experiences of this place and time by means of photography, illustration and words.
plus lots of good goofy skate/surf/design snaps at their blog.
[via It's Nice That]
Insight has some killer art-direction going on for their new shortboard catalog. Really left field. I wonder who’s behind it. I’d buy a set of prints of these.
[via Life's A Beach]
Stefan Ruiz takes the photos I make in my head.
[via the jackanory]
I’m really digging the illustration and left-field content of Stephen Floyd. great stuff.
[via CH]
How I took Pulitzer-winning picture - by photographer Adrees Latif | The Guardian UK
Latif just won the Pulitzer for the above photograph of japanese video journalist Kenji Nagai (of APF), as he lays dying, videoing Burmese troops attacking protestors, after just having been shot. Nagai later died. Latif weaves a lucid context for the photo in the Guardian article.
On a side note: this hits close to home for all the obvious reasons but also for the fact that recently I’ve been helping my homie Isaiah Seret on a psa campaign for the situation in Burma and the FREE BURMA movement. Isaiah is writing, directing, producing and editing several spots and I’ve been handling art-direction and on-screen graphics for a few of them. Too early to show, just yet. Isaiah’s campaign hits the subject matter from several different angles, each one more creative than the next. It’s a watershed project for him, and I can’t wait to see the entire campaign assembled.
[via A Photo Editor]
Saturday night I was hunting around Flickr for a surfing-related group to add my photos to. There are plenty of groups on surfing, surfers, big waves, hawaiian surfing, surfer chicks etc… but after extensive searching I couldn’t find one whose focus was more about surf culture in general, in and out of the water (and on the way to the water and stopping off at the taco stand on the way home and climbing over that barbwire fence with the do not trespass sign). So I decided to create a new group.
I present to you: Surf Culture:
This group is dedicated to all things surf culture related.
There are plenty of groups for surf-mag inspired surfing shots. you know the ones. aggro, big wave action shots, groms tearing up the lip, bikini shots etc… Those kinds of shots have their rightful place in the pantheon of surf culture, but this is not the place for those. This is the place for the more solitary and meditative aspects of surf culture. I’d say alternative surf culture but it’s not really the alternative (alternative to what?), more like the side that isn’t shown as often in top-shelf surf mags. A counterbalance to the showier/competitive side of surfing. “The journey is the destination” and this is all about the journey. With that said, any action shots that have especially aesthetic qualities, feel free to add ‘em.
Pics don’t even need to be surf-specific, as long as they are consciously or unconsciously informed by the process of sliding water hills, staring at the horizon while floating and shaping wave riding craft. Pics that are derived from:
journeys towards mythic spots, trim, surf culture influenced art, wave sliding equipment, haping bays, five/ten toes, fancy footwork, blur, color, motion, F2.8 / F22, film stock, old school methods, beautiful losers, quivers, hulls, sleads, single fins, eggs, quads, tris, logs, longboards, shortboards, new / old school fish, finless , surf mats, shakas, displacement, fins, custom graphics, spray paint / stenciled graphics, cigar bands, hand-lettered, hand-drawn, left points and right handers, close outs, rivermouths, pelicans, dolphins and all manners of surfing forefathers, sunrise/sunset, crowded / vacant lineups, jungle treks, no trespassing signs, barbwire fences, ruthless urban development threatening sacred surf breaks, inspired transportation for long and short hauls, all manners of collected / directed energy moving through water, new / old wax, duck diving shots, split view half-in / out the water shots, aerial shots, corduroy lines, beards n mustaches, gath helmets, custom mount tube pov shots, signs and signage, old dogs n new tricks, new doggies n old tricks, new doggies n new variations on old tricks, local shapers, portraits, bottom turns, all manners of waves occupied or not, art galleries and installations, interviews and media hijinx, walking the plank, perched, doubles etc…
As I was going about inviting my flickr friends to the group and searching out some good content to lead by example, it occurred to me that everyone in the group should be able to curate. Everyone should be given the opportunity to add interesting photos to the group, that they see while trawling the infinite flickrverse.
I’ve given each member admin (curator) privileges, in the hopes that this group can become a collection of amazing surf culture related imagery, more than simply a place to dump sequence shots and such. You can read more about the curator aspect of the group here.
I trawl tons of surf blogs a day and if 1/100th the amount of awesomeness that shows up on these blogs makes it to the group, it’ll be worth it.
So if you’re on Flickr, why not join us.
This is what you get, when you mix great photography with great architecture with great flash design: Amy Barkow Photography. Sometimes the mix can be
transcendent.
[via QBN/Honest]
Lance Wyman is the mastermind behind the superlative ‘68 Mexico Olympic branding system in addition to a hundred other logos you’ve probably seen, but never attributed to Wyman (or maybe you have and I’m a crowd of one).
I’ve never seen a full exploration of the concepts and applications Wyman’s team created for the project, so when I ran across the examples on his website (shown above) I was amazed at how many different applications there were and how the letterforms grew and morphed into a pattern of geometric shapes with the logo almost but not quite illegible. A brief search on google, amazon, et all… and I couldn’t find any books on Wyman’s work or the ‘68 Olympics branding. There should be (if there’s not already) some kind of definitive, impressive tome on this subject, if not in english then at least in spanish as the logo is still as relevant and venerated as it ever was, reappearing constantly by reference in modern Mexican pop culture.
Here’s a fascinating interview with Wyman from Eye Magazine. He delves into the logo’s dual inspirations - native Huichol art and Op art. OpArt which was coming on strong internationally and Huichol art which was just starting to be embraced and exhibited in Mexico. The Mexico 68 Olympics logo was a melding of these two seemingly diametrically opposed arts, that ended up working together pretty superfluously.
Incidentally, Creative Review asked Wyman what his thoughts are regarding the London 2012 Olympics logo:
“The London 2012 logo has been presented with promising descriptive text but besides the date, I don’t think the logo itself attempts to reference anything of significance,” he says. “It has certainly aroused a lot of critical references, from grade school paper cuts to porno.
“My gut feeling though is to give the logo a chance, he continues. “It has a recognisable, brash character and might offer an open book of application possibilities that will keep it fresh into 2012.
More on Lance Wyman and larger images from the Mexico 68 Olympics series at Web Esteem Mag.
[via TypeNeu]
Kitsune Noir posted awhile back about an Evan Hecox show at Kinsey/Desforges in Los(t) Angeles. The post went right over my head. Somehow, yesterday, I stumbled on to KN’s flickr set from the show and it blew me away. Hecox has a signature street-style meets wood-cut / silkscreen / guache painting and for this show he went to Mexico City and applied his art with the vibe of DF, the results are amazing.
+KN’s show review | +KN’s flickr set
Photo from the India portion of Eskildsen’s Roma Journeys
Check out the photography of Joakim Eskildsen. Gorgeous shots. His Roma Journeys book is epic, a clumination of years of continuous work. Also worthing of checking out is his lengthy list of self-published books. Jörg Colberg has a recent interview with Eskildsen.
[via Heading East]
File this one under: Ideas I wish I had thought of:
Self evaluation in transit: public art by Candy Chang
Sidewalk Psychiatry encourages self-evaluation in transit by posing critical questions on the pavements of New York City. Now your daily ponderings and emotional problems can be prodded and treated on the go - and, best of all, it’s free of charge!
Medium: Stencils, temporary spray-chalk. Brilliant!
[via Wooster]
FUCK is a diabolically simple and brilliant photo project that spawned a book and a user submission based website. I’m a fan of the word and all it’s thousand uses.
Dude is collecting images for a second edition, here’s the text regarding the responsibility behind the project, priceless:
I will not be responsible for irresponsibility. This is supposed to be about collecting funny images, not FUCKing up people’s personal property. That’s why the stickers are strong, but removable. Don’t be an asshole and leave the stickers on signs around children’s playgrounds.
I know… cheap people want to have fun too. If you’re one of them, here’s a few templates that you can print on full-sheet labels, and cut them yourself. Believe me, it’s easier to just buy a pack from me, but whatever…
[via The Daily Drop]
Photo from Gutierrez’s Xinjiang series
Raul Gutierrez’s photography is currently blowing my mind. all of it. I could rummage around his portfolio site all day long. His images are impeccably well done, yet there’s something very raw about them, which I’m very much in to.
Why not listen to Raul’s muxtape while viewing his portfolio or blog (how cool is the internet?!). I also found these interesting finds while on his flickrstream.
A little birdy tells me that InterfaceFlor are going to be making modular carpet tiles based on the La Fonda Del Sol series from my favorite nice modernist Alexander Girard. The designs look gorgeous and well produced. can’t wait to see them in the wild.
If I end up getting a few of these I’ll be putting them on the wall.
Lee Rogers has some pretty nice looking surf-culture related photographic works in a nice clean site. also peep his graphic design section. more surf/beatufiful shots up on his flickrstream.
I just got back from taking photos. I’ve been shooting for a tentative project about cookie cutter developments here in the bay area, trying to coalesce my ideas. I was catching up on my blog reading when I came across the work of Livia Corona, linked from The Jackanory. Her splash page (the image above) illustrates these kinds of developments gorgeously.
I am in awe.
I’ve posted about the photography of Robin Schwartz before. Robin is having a show at Tomasulo Gallery in Cranford, NJ of her Amelia World series. The show opens this Friday, March 14th from 6-8pm and runs until April 17th:
Animals have always been an important part of Schwartz’s work and are represented as part of our everyday world. The Amelia photographs are drawn from real journeys with her daughter, generated fantasies. The photographs create fables of an allegorical and imaginary world. Schwartz explains that she and Amelia, “…play out their eccentricities where Amelia and animals not only co-exist but also have relationships. Animals are not props in my photographs and are not “PhotoShopped” in. Our world is one where the line of who is a person and who is an animal overlaps, is blurred.”
In addition, Amelia’s World is being published by The Aperture Foundation as part of the Tiny Vices series. very cool!
If you go to the show, tell Robin I said ‘hi!’
drawing by Geoff McFetridge | larger view
Hey Los Angeles peoples, Ooga Booga is a cool little store downtown that sells independently published art books, zines, etc… by tons of amazing artists and authors including: Geoff McFetridge, Mike Mills, Aaron Rose, Chris Johanson, Ed Templeton, Kevin Lyons, Kim Gordon and many many more.
Ooga Booga is having an exhibition of the entire library of zine publisher Nieves throughout the month of March and each Thursday there will be a signing from 7-9pm. Geoff M. signed this past Thursday, Mike Mills signs on the 13th and Ari Marcopoulus signs on the 27th. go check it out!
[via Fader]
