At the beginning of 2023, I had the pleasure of participating in LACP’s photo reviews. Although there are some obvious limitations to reviewing work online rather than in person, it’s still great to meet new people and see new projects that are unfolding. One of the projects that struck a chord with me was Connolly’s “Wishmaker” series and the Landau gallery project.
Read MoreNicole Campanello’s In the Interim takes us on an unsettled journey through uncertainty, invisibility, and liminality.
Read MoreAs a viewer, I feel the lived emotions the creator has embedded in the frame via their story. Finley's work is authentically chronicled from his life experiences; his emotional life shoots out of the images like water pouring from a hydrant. But it's not shouting—it's softly whispering its secrets to the viewer.
Read MoreI’m on a bit of a tear here with some environmental articles and bodies of work. It’s hard to pass them up, primarily because of the immediacy of the situation facing future generations. I think anyone with an eye towards wanting to live on an inhabitable planet and avoiding severe climate disasters might be having some sleepless hours during the night on occasion. Speaking about the gravity of the situation and what may come of it to the youth of our world has become a top priority for many, especially parents. So once again, I bring you something to chew on and think about. This time around is a body of work I saw while reviewing portfolios during Review Santa Fe last November – Cracks in the Ice, by photographer Jason Lindsey.
Read MoreThe photographic art world is a place where an immense amount of skills and abilities reside. It takes a considerable amount of time and energy to excel in any one of them, and is one of the things that I'm constantly surprised and delighted by. It's not simply that people put so much energy into them, but those with multiple talents that stand out clearly have a passion for the medium, often rising above the fray. So, this is not the first time that the work of Cathy Cone has been on my radar, and it is for this aforementioned reason that it remains there. She embodies the work ethic, sheer talent, and creative energy that it takes to not only maintain a discerning photographic eye but also have the adjacent qualifications that make her a master printmaker. While I am highlighting a specific body of work here, a cursory look at past collections patently spells this out, and I implore you to seek her photographs out whenever possible.
Read MoreAs an artist, Grew explores her intentions through a variety of media, including photography, painting, printmaking, installation, and collage. For this latest series, she combines alternative photographic processes with installation to create something that piques the imagination with a visual tapestry worth experiencing. Photographic representations of living forest scenes are made as lantern slides using the carbon printing method on glass, with the carbon harvested from the actual coals left behind from the fires. The glass plate images are then hung towards the center of a room to represent the Ghost Forest. As a result, the experience is immersive and interactive. Grew also does an incredible job of rigging the individual plates adeptly throughout the installation through a combination of cables and glass mounts.
Read MoreTrees are an essential building block of this planet, and most importantly, without trees, there is no life at all. Artists, writers, and philosophers all wax poetic from the inspiration found in sharing our lands with them. So it’s easy to see why so many gravitate towards photographing trees – they are vital, unique, and have a beauty that is pure and significant to the energy they project.
Adam Gerlach is one of these photographers that feels the pull of trees and captures their essence in his own uncommon way.
Read MoreLet’s talk about the elephant in the room, shall we? As a person and artist, Molly McCall is a favorite around these parts. She has appeared in Analog Forever Magazine, Catalyst: Interviews, and Diffusion Annual – all outlets that show, promote, and emphasize photographic creatives and creativity.
Now she’s here on Poignant Portfolios, and in order to illustrate her work once again as a visual support component for her appearance on The Diffusion Tapes podcast. Apparently, Blue Mitchell and I have been sending up flares for a while now. Oh damn – I didn’t think we worked for her, but maybe we do!
Read MoreOnce again, I'm sitting at the table reviewing work for Photolucida in April of 2022, and in comes Landry Major to show me her platinum/palladium and gelatin silver prints of horses and ranch life of the American West. Am I familiar with work like this? Yes. Have I seen a multitude of images of the West through the eyes of the cowboy and what they represent from an Americana perspective? Again, yes. But have I seen it done so well and beautifully that I cannot take my eyes off the scenes I'm seeing presented to me? Absolutely not.
As I learned, this collection, Winter's Horses, is a subset of a larger body of work from Major, Keepers of the West. However, it was the winter images that stood out to me (note: everything here is incredible). These images were simply magical, as what one might expect from witnessing scenes in such a frosty environment. Making photographs in this environment is difficult at best, but when you couple that with fast-moving subjects of an unpredictable nature, you more or less have a recipe for disaster. That's why I was so stunned by what I saw in this work. Major has committed herself fully to capturing the essence of these beasts and those who strive to control and use them in their ranching efforts.
Read MoreThe world of fashion and beauty is most certainly a strange one to most people. Even those who are thrilled and enamored with the latest trends and styles often find a never-ending stream of oddities coming from designers and cosmetic companies. Unfortunately, there's also a dark side to it all - one that teaches young girls the perfection of their skin, hair, teeth, and weight are paramount in their lives. Having been on my fair share of fashion shoots for some of these companies, I can say that I've seen and heard things that are not in the best interest of any impressionable young girl.
Read MoreIt's no mystery to anyone who knows the slightest thing about me that I'm drawn to art or photography that has an overwhelmingly crushing and f'd up appearance. It's both a reflection and a response. When you couple that with a message about the environment, climate change, or rising sea levels, then you have my undivided attention.
Read MoreThankfully, in the age of digital, there are still photographers experimenting in the darkroom and Jane Olin is one of those folks. Olin has a long history with the community of photography and has studied with some of the biggest influencers in the craft and now has become one herself. We first published some of Olin’s work, Thirteen Crows, in The Matter of Light (Diffusion, Volume VI) and I believe that was my first introduction to her. Thankfully, Ann Jastrab reintroduced us by way of her newest series, Intimate Conversations where Olin has expanded on her darkroom experimentation by creating spontaneous happy accidents with darkroom chemistry and light.
Read MoreTraumatic events weave themselves into our identity and journey. Norah experiments with depicting visceral experiences of emotional states and memories. Childhood and intergenerational trauma live within my body and mind in a cyclical process of death, liminal space, and rebirth. Yet, my vivid reality is unseen by others. Moments of despair and hope, fear and peace, defeat and triumph, pass unmarked to the outside world.
Read MoreHello readers, I’m pleased to share our first poignant portfolio from work seen at the 2021 Click! Portfolio Reviews. I’ve been fortunate to review work for Click! over the past 4 years both in person and now online, which as you can guess is a hard task when looking at work that really resonates the best in tangible form. From my experience, Click! has drawn in some of my favorite styles of photography (and photographers for that matter). Meaning, I’ve seen a lot of great hand-crafted process work over the years and these lovely mixed media cyanotypes by Sally Chapman are no exception.
Let’s not talk about the process though, Chapman covers that below, but I will say this, I dig it. I’m a romantic, at the very least when it comes to art. Easily taken with pretty pictures. But it is more than just that, Chapman’s recontextualizing of monuments into new environments nods to the reclamation of the land by nature. An apocalypse even. And Chapman’s color use and frame spillover are beautifully designed.
Spend some time with these and take in the details, you won’t regret it. Thanks, Sally for sharing your work with us!
–Blue Mitchell @onetwelveprojects
Read MoreI stumbled upon Michelle Robinson's work when I saw a PR notice in my FB feed for an upcoming exhibition of her work entitled You Are Not Here. I knew I had to see more, so I went online and searched the interwebs, where I came upon this project, Transmission. This mixed media work is unusual in that it manifests in various forms, including wet darkroom work, collage, printmaking, encaustic, and sewing.
Many people would have difficulty integrating so many different styles into a cohesive project, but Robinson is so deft at this that she makes it look easy. My favorites amongst the varied works are the pieces that are the most abstracted. Processed by hand, then torn apart and sewn into new non-literal imagery that is still evocative of nature and the built environment. The curled edges, irregular margins, hanging threads, and earth and sea tones all come together with the imagery to speak to an uneasy partnership between the manufactured and the natural worlds.
Read MoreO Espelho do Avesso (The Mirror of the Reverse) is about silence and duality, and both live within the imagery of this work. There is nothing showy nor screaming, "Look at me!" here. Like an ASMR whisper, it draws you in and makes your head tingle just a little. Subdued and dark, she uses desaturated colors to achieve quietness. You almost feel like carefully tiptoeing from image to image so as not to disturb the silence.
Read MoreMegan Bent’s photographic series “I Don’t Want to Paint A Silver Lining Around It” reframes disability as a part of human diversity .
Read MoreArchana Vikram's photographic series "The Unwelcome" brings to light the untold horrors of female infanticide routinely practiced in India and is a call for action to put an end to this barbaric practice.
Read MoreThe sense of nostalgia evoked in the graphic synthesis of these images is augmented through the use of a wash of warm sepia tones that permeate the images. There is also a visual correlation between inhabitants of the boxes and the boxes themselves. The folds of the boxes having a quality not unlike origami, is reflected in the contortionist-like bending of the human forms within.
The unusual and dissimilar combination of people and cardboard boxes is visually unified through the repetition of angles. Despite pairing such disparate elements, I bring them together harmoniously to form images with visual impact, and are frankly, fun to look at.
Read MoreThese images from Joanne Chaus’ Conversations with Myself series were made between 2016-2020. They are visual diary of the joys and pathos of daily life, as seen and felt by the young girl within who has become a woman, a mother, and a wife, as a female in our society navigating the challenges and incongruities of desires, constraints and personal will.
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