Portrait Hunting

I've been engaged lately with work on my MA and haven't had much enthusiasm for shooting portraits.  I have managed, though, to find the nerve to begin approaching people and asking for photos.  A few of these are included here.  As with most things of this kind, I found my fear to be greater than the reality.  No one has yet turned me down.  On the other hand, you may note there is only one image of a woman, and this I took without permission.

P&P: Exercise 1: Scale and Setting

I signed up for P&P in July.  I finally took my first portrait yesterday.  It has taken me that long to find someone I felt comfortable asking.

VJ is a nice guy, easily approachable, and I felt if anyone would agree it would be him.  He didn't exactly jump at the chance, but he agreed, and I got my first images.  While photographing he appeared self-conscious.  Other people were around and may have noticed.  The same was true of SH.  I've seen him about before, but I don’t believe we've ever spoken.  I approached and chatted him up a bit, flattered him on his dress, and then asked if I could take his photo.  Here is a good reason I don’t like this:  I would never have mentioned his appearance except as an inducement to get him to agree to being photographed.  Not that I was dishonest about his appearance,  I genuinely did appreciate it.  But it's not something I typically mention to anyone.  SH laughed nervously and ignored my request.  He relented after I requested a second time, but he was obviously uncomfortable, perhaps especially so as three women were off to the left chatting and paying attention.

However - after showing the images to the subjects, they both asked for copies!  Hopefully they will approve of the processed results.

Review: Dark Light (2009) and Everybody Street (2013)

I went out yesterday determined to start shooting portraits and came home with everything but.  I can't seem to find the courage to ask strangers to model.  I can't because I don't see myself giving that permission to a stranger asking the same.  I know there are people who wouldn't mind, who might be happy for the attention, or just curious about me or the situation.  It's getting to them through all those likely to say no that seems daunting.  It seems denial is one of my fears.  How to get over it?  I guess just to get out there and do it.

After returning home I tried fortifying myself with a couple of films.  Dark Light is 30-min HBO short about the most unlikely photographers, those with little or no sight.  Two of the photographers featured grew up sighted and gradually lost most or all of their vision in adulthood.  Their practice seems to be a means of coming to grips with loss, of in fact denying loss at all.  The third photographer was born blind and seems to practice more out of curiosity and exploration of the world.  He seemed genuinely more happy than the other two, who though they produced great work seemed tense, anxious, and fearful.

Everybody Street is a 90-minute review of New York street photography featuring interviews with living practitioners, as well as reminiscences of some of those past.  What struck me most was the difference in approaches between Jamel Shabbazz, who always asked permission from his subjects, and Bruce Gilden, whose practice involves ambushing strangers, not only with a camera but often with a handheld strobe.  I could not personally do what Gilden does, and he himself acknowledges the world would be a worse place if there were more like him.  The results, though, are obvious - many of Shabazz's images appear vernacular, as if taken by the very people who are their subjects.  Gilden's are more electric and idosyncratic.

Other take-aways ES:

Review: Uncommon Places, Stephen Shore, 2005; Stephen Shore : New American Photography, dir. Ralph Goertz, 2010

Uncommon Places is the book that said, yes, you’ve been here.

Not the places, mind you, though I may have been to a few.  But the mindset of the photographer.  Here is someone who did what I’ve been doing, practiced as I practice.  I intuitively get what Shore was doing, because I’ve been doing the same.  (And I wonder now why none of my tutors, coursemates, or fellow enthusiasts referred me to this earlier.)

Here is how Shore describes his work at this time:

Vienna: Frustrated Exhibit Visits

One of the pleasures of being a teacher is long vacations.  Unfortunately, the longest one is always in summer, a time of year when lots of other people vacation and so not much seems to happen culturally wherever you might visit during June, July or August.

Case in point, I've spent the last week in one of Europe's, if not the world's, cultural capitals but have been frustrated in my efforts to view photography exhibits.

I was excited to find the city has a dedicated photo gallery/musuem and that it was exhibiting the 2014 World Press Awards.  On closer inspection I found not only does that exhibit not begin until September, but that the gallery is closed for the summer.  Damn.  A sister gallery + library has remained open for the summer, but  1. I'm not much interested in the current exhibit, and 2. it's a bit of a hike from my hotel.  The city hosts a Month of Photography event with numerous exhibits - beginning the end of October!

Walking through the city I found a small gallery with a collection of mid-20th photos representing Austrian children (pictured here) and also - closed for summer!

Once I get back to Dubai I'll probably find a few interesting exhibits, but by then I'll be so deep in work and assignments that there won't be time.  

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Review: Wynn Bullock: Revelations (Atlanta High Museum of Art, until 2015.01.08)

I had never heard of Wynn Bullock before checking the scheduled exhibits for Atlanta's High Museum of Art.  A bit of online research revealed him as one of the masters of mid-century West Coast movement, along with Adams and Weston.  It was in fact his meeting with the latter that convinced him to give up an acting career to pursue photography.  But where Weston and Adams are well-known, Bullock is largely forgotten, even though one of his two images in The Family of Man was chosen by exhibit visitors as their favourite of the collection's 500+ photos.

Scott suggests Bullock may have been ignored because he was difficult to classify, working in several genres, from early experiments inspired by Man Ray, to straight, to commercial, to late period color abstracts.   It may also be that he was ignored because he was interested primarily in exploration of experience, especially ideas of space and time, and less in particular kinds of subjects.

The last major exhibit of his work was nearly 40 years ago, presumably near the end his life, or shortly after his death in 1975.  So why an exhibit now?  And why in Atlanta?

Review: Angier, R. (2007). Train your gaze. Introduction & Chapter One: About Looking

Angier, R. (2007). Train your gaze. 1st ed. Lausanne: AVA.

Nothing in the book itself regarding the author.  I found the following at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where Angier appears to teach.

Roswell Angier (photography, Studio at Tufts) was educated at Harvard University and University of California, Berkeley. Angier has worked for commercial magazines and on numerous documentary projects. Books include A Kind of Life: Conversations in the Combat Zone (Addison House, NH, 1976), and Train Your Gaze: A Practical and Theoretical Introduction to Portrait Photography (AVA Books, 2007). His work is in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Fogg Museum, Cambridge, MA. Angier's exhibitions include solo shows at Howard Yezerski Gallery, Boston, and Gitterman Gallery, New York. Current interests are landscape and narrative. He is currently working on Revere Beach Boulevard, a project about the sea wall.

Angier is currently represented by the Gitterman Gallery in New York City. A substantial amount of his work can be seen on the gallery's web site, www.gittermangallery.com.