Lismore Exhibition

We are opening our first exhibition of summer 2009 on Friday coming, July 3rd. All welcome! The exhibition is already hung, and runs until July 26th. All prints are framed and for sale. There will be 15 prints by 7 photographers on show.

The Lismore gallery has a great darkroom at the back. It contains five enlargers, a huge sink, and trays for up to 16*20″ paper. Dev, stop, fix and hypo clear included. See the website for more information by clicking here. For more information, call Mariela Martin on +353 (0)58 72824 or email her marielaphoto@hotmail.com

– Rory

Lismore Trees by Rory O’Toole

6 Perspectives on Light

stairs by miriam king

I should have written this post a week ago, but between this, that, and the other, I didn’t. Anyway, 6 Perspectives of Light is an exhibition currently showing at the Greenroom Gallery, Cork Arts Theatre. The work will be up until Thursday July 2nd, so there are a few days left to go take a look. It’s definately worth a visit. 6 Perspectives on Light is a Group Show by 6 Irish artists, Roseanne Lynch, Padraig Spillane, Miriam King, Ciara O’Flynn, Lucy Clarke & Eimear Tunney.

Read more about the show at CorkAP Padraig Spillane’s site, and at Miriam King’s site.

– Rory

Great Photographers on the Internet

Just re-read Mike Johnston’s brilliant and hillarious article from almost exactly three years ago – Great Photographers on the Internet

Under the above photograph by Edward Steichen he has put in the following faux internet forum comment –

“… Much too dark exposure and not sharp. I suppose you may say that you tried to make it unsharp but what the hell’s the point in that. I like things sharp. Maybe you should study some other peoples’ photographs here on this forum and get an idea of what a good photograph should look like  …”

Read the full brilliant article at Mike’s site here

– Rory

PS this photograph by Steichen, “The Pond – Moonlight” was the most expensive photograph ever sold at  $2,928,000 at Sotheby’s in New York in February, 2006.

Kodak took our Kodachrome away

Sharbat Gula, Afghan Girl, at Nasir Bagh refugee camp near Peshawar, Pakistan, 1984.

(C) Steve Curry, shot on Kodachrome

ROCHESTER, N.Y., June 22 — Eastman Kodak Company announced today that it will retire KODACHROME Color Film this year, concluding its 74-year run as a photography icon.

Sales of KODACHROME Film, which became the world’s first commercially successful color film in 1935, have declined dramatically in recent years as photographers turned to newer KODAK Films or to the digital imaging technologies that Kodak pioneered. Today, KODACHROME Film represents just a fraction of one percent of Kodak’s total sales of still-picture films.

“KODACHROME Film is an iconic product and a testament to Kodak’s long and continuing leadership in imaging technology,” said Mary Jane Hellyar, President of Kodak’s Film, Photofinishing and Entertainment Group. “It was certainly a difficult decision to retire it, given its rich history. However, the majority of today’s photographers have voiced their preference to capture images with newer technology – both film and digital. Kodak remains committed to providing the highest-performing products – both film and digital – to meet those needs.”

Read on here

Dublens

Just came across this in Facebook. It ain’t analogue, but the photos look great. If you are in Dublin next week (starting 23rd), get down to Curve St in Temple Bar for the exhibition

– Rory

Book Review – Alexey Titarenko Photographs

I first came across Alexey Titarenko a few years ago when he was exhibited in the Sirius Arts Center in Cobh. His photographs, many of which exhibited at that time also appear in the book “Alexey Titarenko Photographs”, stuck me immediately because of the conveyed feeling of life, movement, and the organic filling of the stark city backdrop with humanity. More than most photographers, Titarenko is able to make the city seem alive because of the people living in it. The photographs were taken in St. Petersburg (or Leningrad as it was then) from 1986 onwards – back in the Iron Curtain days. The symbols of communism are stark – giant statues of Lenin, signs depicting messages from The Party, and the overall drab greyness of the city.

And yet it is the movement of the people, the life, that stands out so much in so many of the photographs. The one above, from “The City of Shadows” series is one such photograph. Normally a photograph shows the briefest moment in time – a snapshot. The buildings in the background are such – sharp, motionless, caught in a snap. But on the steps are the blurred motions of people climbing. A greath faceless swath of people swarming upwards, only the odd hand paused on the rail indicating that this is a crowd of people at all. Titarenko has not so much stopped time, but grabbed a chunk of time and paused it, stretched in a blur of movement and mystery. Titarenko says, “In my work, I try to introduce a third dimension, that of time, which adds an element of continuity and narration… I attempt to transpose time into a purely visual language” **

What really draws me to Titarenko’s work however is the sheer beauty of it. The framing, the composition, the printing. Many of the photographs have a painterly dimension, with great swaths of movement. I would love an Alexey Titarenko print hanging on my wall

– Rory

**Artistis Credo, 9 April, 2001

Portable smortable

More eye candy camera porn from Tokyo Camera Style !

– Rory

Stefan Ruiz

I recently came across photographer Stefan Ruiz via Andrew Hetherington’s blog, “whats the jackanory?”. Ruiz shoots fantastic portraiture on a 4×5 large format camera in places like Africa and South America – places most people would not even consider lugging such a beast. However the large, old fashioned camera opened doors for him in itself, as he notes in the sidebar accompanying one of his images, “…the Congo was kind of scary. I didn’t feel comfortable there. I’ve spent quite a bit of time in Africa, really liked it and never had a problem. But here, because they’d been in a civil war for so long, everyone was on edge. Everywhere there were guys with guns. But the portraits worked out well. I had brought my camera and lights and once I took them out they loved it. People often like to get photographed with a large format camera. It’s not something that happens every day…”

See more of Ruiz’s work on his wesite here

– Rory