Irving Penn: Small Trades Exhibit

I went to this exhibit a few weeks ago at the The Getty. Probably one of the largest photo exhibits I have ever been to. Portraits of working citizens from New York, London, and France.

Link to a video from NY Times.

Kohjiro Kinno

Kojo came to my photo class to speak about his photo career. He is an assistant photographer to a staff photographer of Sport Illustrated, Robert Beck. These guys travel all over the world to shoot events, like the Beijing Olympics, and take portraits of athletes.

Kojo quotes:

His ultimate goal would be to put his work in a fine art galleries.

He wishes he traveled more before he started working full time.

He likes to shoot weddings. It is a change of pace and everyone is happy. And you actually can earn some money.

You just can't quit.

Never say no.

With working with so much equipment, simplifying photography on his personal projects is his inspiration.

I Don't Wanna Grow Up

When we are all lost, what do we do? We all look at the night sky for answers.
-Tom Waits

When Im lyin in my bed at night
I dont wanna grow up
Nothin ever seems to turn out right
I dont wanna grow up
How do you move in a world of fog
Thats always changing things
Makes me wish that I could be a dog
When I see the price that you pay
I dont wanna grow up
I dont ever wanna be that way
I dont wanna grow up

Seems like folks turn into things
That theyd never want
The only thing to live for
Is today...
Im gonna put a hole in my tv set
I dont wanna grow up
Open up the medicine chest
And I dont wanna grow up
I dont wanna have to shout it out
I dont want my hair to fall out
I dont wanna be filled with doubt
I dont wanna be a good boy scout
I dont wanna have to learn to count
I dont wanna have the biggest amount
I dont wanna grow up

Well when I see my parents fight
I dont wanna grow up
They all go out and drinking all night
And I dont wanna grow up
Id rather stay here in my room
Nothin out there but sad and gloom
I dont wanna live in a big old tomb
On grand street

When I see the 5 oclock news
I dont wanna grow up
Comb their hair and shine their shoes
I dont wanna grow up
Stay around in my old hometown
I dont wanna put no money down
I dont wanna get me a big old loan
Work them fingers to the bone
I dont wanna float a broom
Fall in love and get married then boom
How the hell did I get here so soon
I dont wanna grow u

Michael Jr. And The Road Less Traveled

Jerry Seinfeld once said the road less traveled, is less traveled for a reason. It takes a bold person to walk down the road less traveled.

Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power.

I drove by the San Diego museums, and saw that there is a Richard Avedon exhibit at the San Diego Museum of Art.

Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power traces Avedon’s interest in and fascination with American politics through 200 portraits created from the 1950s until the photographer’s death in 2004. During his six-decade career, Richard Avedon was arguably the most important American fashion photographer and portraitist. This exhibition traces Avedon’s fascination with the forces behind American democracy. Together, these photographs represent both an historical group portrait. SDMA is hosting the only West Coast viewing of the exhibition, on view during a season of unprecedented political change and focus on those who lead us. Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power is organized by the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C

Field Trip to the Annenberg Space for Photography

I went to The Annenberg Space for Photography last friday in West Los Angeles. The exhibit was about Los Angeles native photographers that have worked in LA in the past 50 years or so.

Images as diverse as the city for which it is named.
L8S ANG3LES

It is easy for native Southern Californians to forget our massive diversity as a culture of our own. From the beach to Hollywood to Venice to the little ethnic towns on every corner to the freeways to the mountains. In between all of this, there are ten million people in Los Angeles counties.

The exhibit showed the change in our culture, and the effects our surroundings on our people.

My favorite part of the exhibit was the video. They interviewed all of the photographers, including 98 year old Julius Shulman. Sometimes I like to watch interviews of photographers and artists, sometimes. I like to hear their 1000 words on their own work. Julius talked about how photographers eye, soul, and feelings go into their own work to make it their own signature work.

Other quotes from the photographers:

Photography connects people from all over the world. People instantly connect with images.

Art can't be taught. One learns by doing.

I think the critics are Lost.

I think it is strange that all I hear is negative feedback from this song. That is what artists do, what THEY want. You don't get to the top by listening to everyone else's opinions.

OC Job talk

Check out
OC Job Talk. The new kind of REAL networking.

Interview with The Flashbulb Group

I was Interviewed by The Flashbulb Group, and I was impressed with Justin Moore-Brown's smooth talking writing.
Thanks a lot.

His work ranges from landscape, portrait, and most notably, weddings. We were impressed by his natural ability to photograph some of the most standard images and turn them into visual adventures. His portraits, even when shot for fun, are masterfully composed and his wedding photos tell fantastic stories...

- Describe your style or approach to your work.
Rambo. I use my camera like machine gun. I shoot 3x more than anyone
else I know. I don’t care. I WANT the shot. I have been averaging 1000
shots per photo session, and 4000 per wedding...

And I meant to say I shoot Nikon. oops..THERE WAS SO MUCH PRESSURE!

Big Rave Dave

My cousin Big Rave Dave has been making some cool mixx tracks. He made the second one for Nick, called Swimming in Heaven

Dave's Mix

Swimming In Heaven

You can download these songs into your iTunes. They are about 70 minutes.
I have been listening to them constantly.

Passages exhibit at the Bowers Museum

I went to the Bowers Museum yesterday with Erica. She kept saying all week that she wanted to go to see an exhibit at the Bowers, and she usually doesn't ask to see any specific exhibit at a specific museum. The first sunday is free, and it doesn't take much twisting of my arm to see any museum for free, so we went. Turns out there was this awesome cultural photography exhibit of African ceremony and rituals by two National Geographic photographers.


Passages: Photographs of Africa by Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher
November 15, 2008 – August 16, 2009

Presented in large format color photographs, photographers Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher’s images of African ritual practices are vivid, rich, intimate and intense. This dynamic exhibition of images from around the African continent is divided into six themes: Coming of Age, Courtship and Marriage, Beliefs and Worship, Masks and Masquerades, Royalty and Power, and Spirits and Ancestors. Six videos bring to life the song, dance and movement of related ceremonies and, objects of personal adornment similar to those as in the photographs will be included. Three-dimensional objects from the Bowers Museum’s permanent collection of African objects will also be on display. Beckwith and Fisher have traveled and lived within Africa together and independently over the last thirty years prolifically documenting tradition and ceremony.


National Geographic Interview









Looking back on all these images, I can really relate to these photographer's work when I was in Russia, documenting the lives of Russian orphans. I was there for a total of a few weeks, they were there for over twenty years!
Hmm...maybe I can get my book published...

Joe Photo visited Cypress College to speak to the Career Photography Class

Joe Photo was asked to speak at Cypress College's Photo Career class. Joe knows I am one of those life long students that can never seem to graduate college, and he called me up to let me know he was giving a presentation at my school.

Joe unveiled a new logo, too.


This guy is one awesome photo veteran that has a lot of solid gold nuggets of information in the wedding photography business.
Joe's book reccomendation for the class:E-Myth Mastery
He also likes monopoly, but good luck beating him.

"Every wedding is always different. People, places, plans & details, weather, preferences... My photography is blending traditional & different styles, with weddings, fashion, landscape, architecture, fine art, & journalism.

Blessed are the flexible.

Sometimes you never know who is watching. Always look nice. Appearance is key.

Success in your business is from doing all the small things, daily. If you let the small things go, you will lose sight of the big things.

Does time drag on while you work?
Follow your passion. Do what you love. Time will fly by and you will have fun working.

Confidence, especially in your fee.

Listen to what the clients have to say."

Michael Fatali

I saw Michael Fatali's gallery outside Zion National Park, and I was really impressed with his photography. He uses large format film and does not edit his images.

"Early in my life I turned to the motherhood of nature for my personal and spiritual growth. This relationship with the natural world has been my lifeblood. I am drawn to places of mystery where I feel at peace with the power of the Earth's spirit.

Over the years, I have learned to use my photography as a voice for the gospel of nature. It is my goal and mission to communicate the mysterious connections we all share with this land having chosen to be a portrait photographer of God's creations. I will continue to practice ways that bring us a little closer to the spirit of nature."

Once in a while I will run into a photographer that is extremely talented, and I was blown away by his work.
He had some odd "spiritual" quotes in his gallery...but what else would you expect from someone that grew up in Sedona.

"Light is the language of the soul..."

Earth From Above

"The Earth is art.
The photographer is only a witness."

Yann Arthus Bertrand galleries are coming to America. His work is published in National Geographic, and this guy has traveled EVERYWHERE! His website is separated by the countries where he did photography work in. I posted some of my favorites of the countries I want to go visit.






Wikipedia Link

Another Site about the Yann

One more thing to check off the "list" before I die...

RADIOHEAD
I FINALLY saw Radiohead last night at the Hollywood Bowl with my brother, Anthony, my cousin, Ricky, and Anthony's friend, Jana. We started the celebration early with two bean and cheese burritos from King Taco.
I have been wanting to see radiohead play for a long, long time. They really blended their live set very well from mixing A LOT their songs from different albums. Thom even played a string of acoustic songs. They came out for two encores after two hours of playing, and said some stuff I couldn't understand at all. His english was worse than Bono's.

With hollywood bowl's infamous stack parking, I was able to do a U-turn with my Mini in a very crowded parking lot, and squeeze out of there in five minutes.

Olympic Photographer

The Olympics are for the best of the best. Check out this veteran sport photographer, Vincent Laforet's Olympic gear! The large lenses in the back are over $7000, each. The Image below is over $60,000 of equipment.



Laforet's Blog

"I was able to borrow an 800mm 5.6 lens from Canon (both Canon and Nikon set up shot at the main press center and loan equipment to photographers, as well as make repairs on site, which is priceless!

The 800mm is a lens that's just been released by Canon and I really wanted to see what I could pull off with it. One of the reasons that this lens is useful is that there are only 4-5 of them here at the Olympics—and what that means is that there are very few other photographers who will be shooting with it. Why does this matter? Because you can shoot from positions that others aren't in (because they are shooting with different (shorter) lenses...) and this gives you a little more breathing room, and a better chance of making a unique frame. The Olympics are all about trying to make frames that no one else is making—and that's something that's very difficult to pull off when you're competing with the best 1,500+ sports photographers in the world."

Let There be DRUMS!

One Night Only Concert: Nike’s 88BoaDrum


Building on the cult-like status of last year’s 77 BoaDrum—when experimental noise rock band, the Boredoms, gathered 77 drummers on 07/07/07 to play in Brooklyn—Nike is hosting this year’s 88BoaDrum at the La Brea Tar Pits, right next to LACMA. This time, as you might expect, 8 is the operative number.

Featuring: 88 drummers
For: 88 minutes
On: 08/08/08
At: 8:08 pm

This event is guaranteed to sell out fast. Tickets (one per person) are free but necessary for entrance, so be sure to pick yours up in person at LACMA’s box office soon!

Under Construction

I have been working on my book the last couple of nights, and the images are looking real tastey.


Here is a shot of Joe Photo. Joe showed me that layering dirty textures over the images makes them look cool.



Lenin. There is a statue like this in every town in Russia.

Letters from the International Superhero, Devin Carberry

I get a letter from my friend Devin once in a while about his travels. He sort of gets around the world. I have a very mild case of wanderlust compared to Devin, but my case of jealousy is pretty strong. And in my opinion, he is the modern version of Jack Kerouac. When I met Devin in New Orleans, he was practicing acrobatics. Now he is living the dream in Buenos Aires. I think I might have a portrait assignment to do in Argentina soon...
So for my support of travels, cool letters, and random blogging, here is a random letter from Devin in Argentina.


Que onda, querida gente?
It's been three weeks since I arrived in Buenos Aires. What follows are notes on Argentine living and the debacle that is my life.

Note 1: The first night here we went out to dinner at eleven (any earlier and there is no one in the joint) and I got a steak stuffed with bacon, ham, and carmelized onions. My vegan friend, Mary, got a salad that was lettuce and only lettuce. Serves her right. Then we went to a club across the street featuring fat draq queens dressed like bumblebees and breakdancers (these are a few of my favorite things). Everyone was ridiculously, ridiculously good looking. It's like the attractive elite of the world decided to relocate to B.A.--I'm kind of bitter that I didn't get the memo until now. The men are super aggressive, machista d-bags who like to grab at and unduly whisper into the ears of women (I think they whisper the yin yang twins "wait'll ya see my..."). As a result, I've been teaching Mary how to Judo chop and puke on command.

Note 2: Everyday there are protests. If you haven't read, Argentina's farmers are on strike. It's difficult to discern what the hell is really happening since people protest the government, then the government pays protesters to protest the protesters, and sometimes people barricade streets with burning tires and no one seems to know why. The media is allegedly critical of the government, but there is graffiti everywhere condemning the media for just the opposite. Either way, domestic and international protests always make front page news, which is refreshing coming from the U.S. where international protests of millions of people receive two paragraph coverage on page B28. What is for certain is that prices here suck because inflation is out of control and everyone seems worried that another crash may be nigh.

Note 3: Circus school is for winners. I've been training in circus two to four hours a day. The vocabulary is beyond me sometimes, so I watch and copy...it gets tricky, though, when I'm basing in partner acrobatics and there is no one big enough to demonstrate. one woman, dominique, has taken a liking to me and escorts me around the school asking if anyone wants to take my hand in marriage. then i do handstands or juggle to avoid the awkwardness that ensues. monday i start trapeze class.

Note 4: MC Hammer pants are cool for women. Mullets are cool for men. Everything is drab--grey, black, and blue. Canadian tuxedos are popular. Hip Hop is still street. And Argentines can't dance...an anomoly in Latin America.

Note 5: Ten minutes after Mary turned 25, her dress lit on fire whilst standing next to the fireplace. We tackled her to the ground and put out the fire, but not before she recieved second and third degree burns on her ass. Yours truly has had the unique pleasure of dressing said ass with gauze and aloe vera every day.

Note 6: We went to a Naked Tango show and only saw one boob.

Note 7: I have the vocabulary of a sixth grader, so my humor has become even more slapstick and outlandish than normal. Yesterday in Spanish class, I told a story about unicorns, rainbows, slaves, Batman, monkey butlers, and Marilyn Monroe.

Note 8: I live in an apartment with a Goth named Graham who is studying Norwiegan, French, Portuguese, Spanish, violin, and figure drawing. Nate who secretly has terrets syndrom and his dog, Manu, who i walk everyday. A Brazilian/American couple that sleeps till 4pm and is up to something. Through the kitchen is an old school printing press and studio space for three crazy fifty-something Argentine painters. Our living room is their gallery space.

Note 10: AMER-I-CA, FUCK YAH! For the fourth, my roommate threw a party for her English students and brought four beer bongs as indispensible icons of American partying. Never would I have though it cool or funny to watch people beer bong, but wathcing Argentineans discover the beer bong made me a little weepy. We sang Karaoke and danced till 8am.

Note 9: If you want to contact me: I live at Avenida Juan De Garay 223, Dtpo. 1, Capital Federal, Buenos Aires, Argentina CP 1154. My phone number is 011-15-6683-6646. I'm not sure if you have to dial a country code in addition to that number.

Note 10: In August, I will be travelling around Brazil. If you know anyone I can stay with or should hang with or any places to go, let me know.

Love, Devin

Memorial Day for Cornell Capa

Photojournalist, Cornell Capa, associate member of Magnum Photos, died last week. Although Memorial Day is supposed to honor those who have died for our country in the service, Cornell served in the U.S Airforce, then he went on to work for Life Magazine and a photographer for JFK.

"Photography has the capacity to provide images of man and his environment that are both works of art and moments in history."

-Cornell Capa

Magnum Photo Blog