Smithsonian American Art Museum - The Pyramid Domes, Pyramid Lake, Nevada, 1867.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
At the heart of darkness
Almost every eminent photographer over the past century has made at least a few memorable images at night. Technical hurdles to noctural picture-taking, once a lonesome specialty of astronomers, were overcome long ago with the advent of high-response films and the portable flash. It is odd, therefore, that so few photographers have produced major bodies of nighttime work, especially given the centrality of shadowy goings-on in film noir and other cinema genres. Brassaï, Bill Brandt, Weegee, Ted Croner, O. Winston Link, Henry Wessel and Larry Fink are very much exceptions.
Robert Adams is another, and his series "Summer Nights, Walking," at the Matthew Marks Gallery in Chelsea through April 17, may rank as the subtlest investigation of the world after dark ever attempted. As an artistic endeavor that successfully joins black-and-white formal experiment to documentary essay, it is unique.
Many photographers have adopted the unheroic approach to landscape gleaned from the work of Mr. Adams and his colleagues in the New Topographics movement of the 1970s. This influence hasn't been altogether for the good. Too many of their younger imitators are cavalier to the point of indifference about what deserves to hang on a wall or appear in a book.
Many photographers have adopted the unheroic approach to landscape gleaned from the work of Mr. Adams and his colleagues in the New Topographics movement of the 1970s. This influence hasn't been altogether for the good. Too many of their younger imitators are cavalier to the point of indifference about what deserves to hang on a wall or appear in a book.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Powerful Days
Charles Moore; photographed civil rights violence: his obit appeared 16 March 2010. His colleague, writer Michael S. Durham, wrote "Powerful Days: The Civil Rights Photography of Charles Moore" (1991). A 1995 documentary was made about him, "Charles Moore: I Fight with My Camera."
"I've never seen such hate in anyone's face before," he later said, according to John Kaplan, a professor at the University of Florida, who wrote his master's degree project on Mr. Moore. "It was like I were vermin."
"I've never seen such hate in anyone's face before," he later said, according to John Kaplan, a professor at the University of Florida, who wrote his master's degree project on Mr. Moore. "It was like I were vermin."
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
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