This Rocks
November 5th, 2008
I’m resisting doing another political post. I’ll just say that now that the promising, posturing and lying is over for a while it’s time to see if any of the promises will be kept. History tells us that it’s not likely. But I have hope, while remaining a skeptic.
That’s Phoenix Kelley posing while freezing her pretty ass off down in the Hocking Hills a couple weeks ago. I shot this before I rediscovered Anne Brigman and started researching her work. Now I find this photo looks so much like some of her work that it’s a bit strange. I think I’m doing some different things from what Anne did with her work…but I have to wonder what her work would look like if she were alive and working today. I’m certainly not into the heavy manipulation and deliberate fuzziness that was a big part of pictorialism. And I’m very interested in color and the effect of light on the color of our surroundings. But still…my interest in the relationship of the female figure to the forms we find beautiful in nature seems to be very much what Anne was working with.
A Famous Photographer
October 31st, 2008
And now something a little different.
I recently received a copy of the Taschen book, Camera Work, The Complete Photographs, as a birthday gift from my wife. It’s a great book. Every photographer should have a copy in their library. This book will show you the starting point for photography as art. And it’s a beautiful starting point.
Pictorialism has often been ridiculed in recent times because of its attempts to be like painting instead of following the inherent qualities of the medium of photography. But seen in the proper context of the times and the goal of establishing photography as a legitimate medium for creating art, pictorialism was necessary and proper. And I would argue that there is value in the pictorialist approach even today.
But I’ll let that argument wait for another day because I want to talk about one of the pioneers of photography as an art form. And I want to mention that one inspiration for this post is the wonderful blog, museworthy, which I read and enjoy regularly. Her posts about artists provided the pattern for what I’m about to tell you about a great photographer. I’m not going to be nearly as articulate and thorough as she always is in her posts, but I’ll give it a try.
Looking through the Camera Work photographs I kept coming across photos that were clearly taken by someone with similar photographic interests to mine. The photographer is Anne (or Annie) Brigman. I had seen one of her photographs along the way as I studied the history of photography, but had never investigated her body of work. The first photo in this post is the photo that is most often associated with her.
But she did much more work, of course, and it was consistently, at least in her early work, concerned with the connection of the form of the female figure with the forms of nature. And the work is beautiful. Everyone shooting photos today of the nude in nature should be familiar with Brigman’s work because she was doing what we are trying to do and she did it extremely well. And she was possibly the first to work seriously with photography on this subject matter. And that was more than 100 years ago.
According to Wikipedia Brigman lived from 1869 to 1950. She died the year before I was born. She was born in Hawaii but spent much of her life in California. Her studio was in Oakland and was the center of art photography on the west coast at the time. She was published in Camera Work, was the only woman and only photographer living west of the Mississippi to be a member of the Photo-Secession.
From Wikipedia:
“Brigman’s deliberately counter-cultural images suggested bohemianism and female liberation. Her work challenged the establishment’s cultural norms and defied convention, instead embracing pagan antiquity. The raw emotional intensity and barbaric strength of her photos contrasted with the carefully calculated and composed images of Stieglitz and other modern photographers.”
Pretty amazing stuff for a woman at the beginning of the 20th Century.
Brigman was also an actress and a poet. She continued to photograph into the 1940s with her work becoming more modern as pictorialism fell out of favor. Her only book of her poetry illustrating her photographs was published in 1949 just before her death. It had been delayed for 8 years because of World War II.
The text accompanying a 1997 exhibit of Brigman’s work at the Oakland Museum of California says, “As a California photographer, she was revered by her West Coast colleagues, influencing a whole generation of prominent photographers that includes Edward Weston and Imogen Cunningham.
“Brigman’s favorite subject,” that text continues, “was the female nude, often posed outdoors in dramatic landscapes to suggest an intimate, immensely powerful connection to the natural world.”
Is it any wonder I am drawn to her work?
Of course, now I find myself wondering why it took me so long to find her work. I studied the history of photography in college. I read and look at photo books all the time. Anne Brigman doesn’t come up. Is it because she was “isolated” out on the west coast a century ago? Or because pictorialism is so often disrespected by “modern” photographers?
But she was was a major figure in the photo world of her day. What does that say about those of us who are minor figures or less in the photo world of today? Is there any hope for our work to survive us and be seen in the future? Does that matter at all? 
I don’t know the answers to those questions…and that doesn’t matter. I do what I do because it is how I see the world. I guess if others in the future come across what I’ve done and enjoy it, that’s a nice thing…but it can’t be the motivation for what I do today.
Thank you, Anne Brigman, for doing beautiful work. I wish I could have met you. I think we might have had a pleasant conversation. I’m sorry that couldn’t happen, but I’m very pleased that you left your photos here for me to enjoy.
I hope you all enjoy the photos Anne left for us as much as I do. These are just a few examples. I’ll be looking for a museum where I can see some of her original prints as I travel around the country in the future.
All photographs in this post are by Anne Brigman.Trick And Treat
October 28th, 2008
It’s that time of year again. If you’ve been following this blog for a long time you know I have an old favorite Halloween photo that I’ve posted a couple times. I was thinking that I’d just post it again this year. But I was over at Athena’s last week and she showed me the pirate girl costume she had put together for this year. I talked her into bringing it in to the studio so I could do a proper photo of it. So this year you get something new…and quite a treat, if I do say so myself.
Then, after we finished shooting, Athena showed me some of her real super powers. After watching me fooling around with PhotoShop on these for a bit she jumped in and did the post-processing herself, with just a little input from me on what I was after. You see, Athena is not only a sensational model, but also a photographer and a graphic artist. She knows more about PhotoShop than I ever want to know. So she worked her magic on both of these photos. She’s available to do photo retouching and I can highly recommend her. She does great magic tricks with the computer and she is also quite a treat to know and photograph.
I Hate Politics
October 24th, 2008
Yes, I hate politics. I hate it in all forms at all levels. National level, local level, family or social politics. I hate it all. Really hate it, in the churning stomach, cringing, run away, run away now, way. I always have and expect that I always will. In my former job I had regular occasion to meet and work with many politicians at the national, state and local level. Usually just being in the same room with them made me sick. I often felt like I needed to shower after talking with them.
Now, I understand that politics is a basic part of the human condition. It’s nothing new and is probably not as bad today as it has been at many times in the past. But I still hate it. There have been some politicians who were exceptions to my general disgust with them. John Glenn stands out from the crowd. I had opportunities to interact with him one-to-one and found him to be a genuinely decent honest man. There were other exceptions, but they were few.
Only once in my life has there been a candidate for president of the US who I really wanted to win. That was John Kerry. Kerry served honorably in Vietnam and then came home to say “That is wrong!” and lead the anti-war movement that ultimately brought an end to that tragic, stupid waste of lives. Right there he had my vote. I don’t think I’ll ever get over the absurdity of the Republican attacks on Kerry’s honorable military service as he ran against a man who dodged service and couldn’t even manage to show up for his National Guard drills. I was drafted myself back in those days and served as ordered. I have respect for anyone who served and also for anyone who left the country or went to jail for refusing to serve. I don’t have much respect for those who worked the system to avoid their responsibility. Like our current president.
Those attacks on Kerry are a good example of the sort of politicking that disgusts me so much. The simple repeating of a lie deliberately, in the knowledge that if it is repeated enough it will take on the power of truth. That is wrong. That is an assault on the very foundations of a democratic society. And that is the program of the Republican party. Those Republicans who have been behind that sort of tactic would do well to remember the words of the greatest Republican president, Abe Lincoln, “You can fool some of the people all of the time, all of the people…” you know the rest.
I’ve never been a member of a political party. But as you may have guessed by now I’m supporting Barack Obama in this election. I’m not tremendously enthusiastic about Obama. I think he’ll be an ok president. I’m happy that a black will be president. That is a good thing. But I don’t really know if Obama is a politician who I would want to be in the same room with. And I’m pretty sure I’ll never really know.
But I’d support Attila the Hun if he were running against the Republican candidate in this election. I actually like and respect John McCain. At least I liked the John McCain who was there before this campaign got going. Can’t say much good about the way his campaign has been conducted. But that’s the problem I want to do something about. I want a Democrat in the White House because I don’t want any of those Republican assholes like Karl Rove who have been behind this administration’s dirty tricks and obscene distortion of the democratic process to have any access to the White House in the next administration. The only way to assure that is to put a Democrat in there. If McCain became president the same Republican henchmen who have done so much harm to our country in the past 8 years would continue to run things behind the scenes. And we just can’t afford to allow that to happen. Our democracy can not stand to have that happen.
So, there you have it. This isn’t a political blog and it won’t become one. I’ll be back to photography in the next post. Just wanted to let you know where I stand in this very important election.
More from Vermont
October 22nd, 2008
Here’s a little different view of Kathryn Ann in the cold and rainy mists of the Green Mountains in Vermont. She did a great job in some pretty unfriendly weather conditions. Thanks Kathryn for suffering for my art.
I did another fall colors shoot yesterday down in the Hocking Hills. It was a bit cold, but not wet. Of course with the drought we have going on here in Ohio that meant there was no water at all going over any of the waterfalls down there. But it’s still a very beautiful place. I’ve shot there a lot, but I found some new spots to work in this time. You’ll get to see some from that shoot in a few days when I get time to do some editing.
Meanwhile I have a couple other shoots coming up and I’m trying to get a lot of things done to send off to a variety of places that may be showing my work in 2009. Lots of deadlines to meet in the next few weeks.
2009 Calendars
October 17th, 2008
I’ve just finished publishing my calendars for 2009. They are now available for order here in my store at Lulu. If you click on one of the cover photos here it should take you directly to the page where you can order that calendar. You’ll note that there are two versions of each of the three calendars this year, for a total of six calendars. The larger calendars are 13 1/2″ x 19″ and are printed on heavy textured paper. They have a very nice look and feel and each photo could be framed when you finish the year. The smaller calendars are on 8 1/2″ x 11″ glossy paper. Still nice calendars if you don’t want to spring for the larger version. The large and small versions are not exactly the same because of the difference in format, but most photos are in both versions.
Fall in Vermont
October 15th, 2008
That’s Kathryn Ann again. No, she didn’t fall…but those leaves had. Even though the weather prevented getting any views of the mountains covered with brilliant fall colors, that didn’t mean I couldn’t shoot some close up. And Kathryn adds a nice touch of a different sort of beauty in the mid-ground.
I’m swamped as usual trying to get caught up on things here at home…and also trying to set up a few more outdoor shoots before the fall leaves are gone and it gets too cold. Sounds like I’ll do at least two shoots in the next week or so. Meanwhile I’ll probably post another one or two of Kathryn being nude and beautiful in Vermont.
Leaf Peepin’
October 12th, 2008
I’m back home from my trip to Vermont. The weather didn’t cooperate for me to do the leaf peepin’ nudes with Kathryn that I had planned to do, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying the colorful scenery that the state is famous for this time of year. I stopped on the drive home to take this quick shot at Lake Bomoseen. Unfortunately, there was no nude model handy to place in the obvious spot reserved for her figure in this composition, so I just had to shoot it without.
I still might try to get some fall color nudes back here in Ohio before it’s too late. The weather looks great for that this week. Do I have any volunteer models?
Cold, Wet and Dirty
October 9th, 2008
I often warn my models that if they work with me they are likely to get cold, wet and dirty. That really happened today when I shot with Kathryn Ann on a mountain trail here in Vermont. We started out before dawn. I wanted to get the fall colors at sunrise. The past few days have been cool and clear, so I expected the same this morning and hoped to get shots before the sun rose too high and started washing out the color in the leaves.
Well, of course, the weather changed today. It was warmer, and when we started up the trail it was misty but very nice, really. But about half way up the mountain it started to rain. I have a lifetime of experience hiking in the woods so, of course, I’m prepared for rain. I had a gore-tex raincoat, a hat and an umbrella (always handy to keeping rain off the camera while doing shots). And, of course, they were all back in the van at the bottom of the mountain. So I got a little wet this morning.
Kathryn was a little better prepared with a hoodie, but, she had to keep getting naked out in the rain. And it got colder the higher we went. But she is a real trooper and didn’t complain at all. And she looked just so very beautiful out in all that fall color.
The weather didn’t clear up until after we had come down off the mountain. So I didn’t get the vistas of fall color with Kathryn in the foreground that I had expected to shoot. But when working in nature it’s important to stay flexible and work with whatever mother nature has decided to present to you. In this case the mist and rain were beautiful, though they restricted shooting to closer scenes like this one. But it all worked out quite well.
So, I’m happy with this shoot. Very happy. And I’ve added a new model. I don’t like to shoot with every model who comes along…I do better working with a few models who I get to know and who I get along with…models who understand what I’m trying to do and want to be a part of it. Kathryn Ann is now one of those models and I look forward to working with her again on future trips to Vermont.
Thanks so much, Kathryn. Hope you are all warmed up and cleaned up now.
Ruins
October 8th, 2008
I’m on a slow dial-up connection, so this will be short. I’m having a great time and great weather in Vermont. The leaves are near peak and I may have some Vermont photos to share in a few days.
Meanwhile, here is Neva again from our Death Valley trip. After our stop at Big Dune at dawn we went on down the road and spotted this abandoned place, apparently some sort of industrial complex. It was out in the sage brush all by itself, so we stopped and looked around and did some photos. It’s always nice to have a beautiful model ready to shuck her clothes when you spot a place like this along the road. Thanks Neva.
