Rest in Peace, Helen Levitt

Read Helen Levitt’s  obituary in the New York Times.

As a shameless lover of street photography, I’ve been a huge fan of Levitt’s work. I also admire a number of qualities about her, one of which goes too often unnoticed: Helen Levitt played like the boys, and she was good at it. When the street was just an extension of the home, and the folks with both the ego and humility to photograph it were mostly men, Levitt captured life in ways that commanded respect and awe from the other masters of the time. She also contributed immensely to documenting an era that no longer exists today.

Her images are just one story, which I could go on about for days.  But the story that her exiting this world prompts me to think about, is the one of her life and her approach to photography. It turns me right back into the 10-year old tomboy trying to prove I could play just as hard as the boys — the ones who were expected and encouraged to get dirty and win all along.

Thanks Helen Levitt. You were a badass, and I owe you one.

© Helen Levitt

Alvin Baltrop

Please read Osa Atoe’s article on photographer Alvin Baltrop, on the ColorLines Magazine website (originally published in the zine Shotgun Seamstress).

“Why does so much art have to be filtered through the doors of white-owned, high brow galleries before it makes it to the general public?  Who are the people who decide what art gets seen and what art doesn’t, and what is their agenda?

Alvin’s story reconfirms my belief that people of color and queer people desperately need our own independent media to cover our own work.  We also need to make it a point to work within communities who take racism, classism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia and other forms of bigotry seriously.  Mainstream white-owned media won’t cover our art unless it matches up with their stereotypes of us. When they do cover our work, they don’t do it justice or they try to whitewash it.”

You can view some of Baltrop’s work and watch a documentary created by his assistant, at baltrop.org.

this dollar was on my balls

Yesterday the $20 I received from the ATM bore this message:

I immediately put it in my wallet, vowing not to spend it until I could scan it the next day at work.  It got me thinking, though— could this be considered art?  I know the whole “what is art?” argument gets old for some folks, but humor me.  What most people would consider vandalism or a silly prank is for me a loaded gesture which deliberately places the possessor in the position of having to evaluate their feelings about the bill and its message (no way out of it— that bill is in your hands whether you like it or not and without your consent).  There is a randomness to who might receive the bill out of the ATM and the message/reaction varies with each.   If a straight man receives the bill it is likely that (since this is in the United States) he may have to deal with his internalized homophobia, but if a woman receives the bill the message may serve as a form of delayed sexual assault (I’m not saying it couldn’t also be sexual assault for a man; it could).  Then there is the line of questions about hygiene and disease and misinformation/paranoia about sexually-transmitted infections and public perception of male genitals vs. female genitals… there’s a lot to think about.  And this message has a delayed delivery so that it is anonymous, a hit and run.  The recipient is left to guess at how serious the author is and is unable to ask or respond.

Then there is the next part of the action, when it comes time for the recipient to spend the bill.  S/he is in the position of being able to choose to whom to give the bill and becomes an active agent in putting someone else in the position s/he was just in.  If the spender is a man, the new recipient of the bill is likely to believe that the “speaker” of the message and the spender are one in the same.  How does this make the new recipient feel?  If it is not assumed to be the spender’s message, what sort of exchange takes place?  A mutual discomfort or chuckle at what a third party has done?  I’m very interested in how this cycle might play out and continue over and over.  I’m also interested in what might change in terms of reactions or behavior if the message changes, like if it said “I have a bomb and will blow this place up” or “I just wanted you to know that tonight I will kill myself.”  What are the players’ responsibilities then?

Maybe the question of whether or not it could be art is irrelevent.  It does ask the kind of questions and function in the way that the kind of art I like best does, so there’s that.  I like work that serves as a starting point for endless questions and endless imagining.

waiting for a shoot

Took this today while waiting for a shoot to begin… if it were larger you would be able to see a woman in the window across the way…

© Caleb Cole 2009

Inspiration Spring

We don’t take pictures with our cameras. We take them with our hearts and we take them with our minds, and the camera is nothing more than a tool.
-Arnold Newman

We don’t make a photograph just with a camera, we bring to the act of photography all the books we have read, the movies we have seen, the music we have heard, the people we have loved.
-Ansel Adams

There are many things in my life that inform and inspire the work that I create. This spring I’m going to focus on listing and describing some of those inspirations. They come mainly from my life experiences, my politics and understanding of the world and society, and the people I surround myself with. I also choose to dive into certain themes and ideas that I enjoy or think are important by reading books, watching movies, listening to music, and looking at art. All of this influences me.

Here are a few highlights from the last year that really struck  me, and that I found inspiration in, specifically related to the creative PROCESS.

I recently watched the documentary Bruce Springsteen: Under Review 1978-1982: Tales of the Working Man (I admit that I’ve been a huge Springsteen fan since birth, thanks to my mother raising me on his music). The film chronicles the 3 albums produced during that era — Darkness on the Edge of Town, The River, and Nebraska. What I love and respect about Springsteen the most is that just after he hit the big-time with Born to Run and became incredibly well-known, we went and made 3 albums that were very unlike the music and image that had brought him fame. He did something different than what had been proven to work, and in that sense he took a huge risk. This sat with me for a while after the film ended. It worked out very well for his career and his music, but it just as easily might not have. Still, the decision to change managers and create work that was true to his heart and in the direction he felt pulled towards, rather than continue along the same formula as before, was significant and very respectable. This is very representative of the kind of creative process that I hope I can always have as well.

I am also a huge fan of Marjane Satrapi’s graphic novel series, Persepolis. I was so excited when the film came out in 2007, and even more excited that Satrapi was so heavily involved in it’s creation (I saw her speak once — she’s amazing). I could list everything I loved about it, but I’ll stick to the one thing that immediately made me think about my own photography, process, and materials. In the “making of” documentary that came on the DVD, Satrapi explained why, amid all the digital technology that could have been used for the animation, the film was drawn entirely by hand on paper. The decision was based on lasting quality over time, the creation process, and staying true to her experience by using a medium that did not create “perfect” images, as human beings are not perfect (“There’s a vibration in the human hand that brings the image to life” -Satrapi). This was so influential and validating to me, and parallels the decision many photographers, myself included, make about continuing to work with film or in a wet darkroom. I really enjoy learning about other artists and creative people making similar decisions and having such an amazing outcome. Really, who can argue with it?

You can view The Making of Persepolis online, which I highly recommend.

Twitter

I’m now using Twitter to post updates about what I’m working on. I think this will be a great way to send out short messages that wouldn’t necessarily warrant an entire blog post. Check me out at twitter.com/splourdesimard!

I’m also looking for folks to follow, so please comment if you’re also using Twitter.

Jason Lazarus

I’m not sure if I’ve yet made known (publicly) my very geeky art-love of Jason Lazarus, but ever since I stumbled upon his work several years ago while researching Chicago art schools, I’ve been hooked. It seems like he is everywhere these days, and getting lots of much-deserved praise, which I’m psyched about. His work is the kind that really gets me on every level and sticks with me.  It’s the kind of work I want to be making.

© Jason Lazarus

What I’m posting about is a recent artslant.com interview with Lazarus, where he nails exactly what I’ve been trying to say about an element of my own work, but much more eloquently.  I very much identify with it:

“[...] I wanted to create a body of work that, in some ways, mirrors the complexities of living. Living is as hilarious, confusing and varied as fixing the drain in a bathtub, to being at a significant, historic event. Our experiences range from the banal to the profound constantly. I love imaging those moments and the ones in between. [...] I like trying to figure out the place where the artwork coalesces, the idea of having a journey as confusing and sad as people’s lives are day-to-day. That’s what I like to structurally mirror in my images, in the subject matter, the way that all these things bounce off of each other.”

when I die

© Caleb Cole 2009

This is it

Many moments are mundane and seem worthless, but they form and shape our lives. They are quite different from the Herculean labours and extraordinary moments that photographers are addicted to.
-Paul Graham

I’m going to file this one under “Things I’ve Been Trying to Say Unsuccessfully That Someone Else Said a Whole Lot Better”.

new pic

© Caleb Cole 2009

ebay art

I’ve recently become a little obsessed with buying original art and photo ephemera on ebay.  Here are some of the items I’ve scored in the last couple months:

This daguerreotype is sure to be the first of many I buy— I’m fascinated by the poses and expressions of daguerreotype and tintype portraits.

I also have a bit of a fascination with displays of male affection in vernacular photography.  After I finish what I’m currently reading I have a book on the subject I’m excited to dive into.  I love this picture for its negative space and the way they are posed.

Since spending time scanning my grandparents’ slides, I’ve become taken with family slides from the 50s, 60s, and 70s. This is one of 7 slides from someone’s prom I bought— I plan to fix it up and make a print. This room and this couple are just so perfect in a way I can’t manage to describe.

I’ve also made a point to look into acquiring more original art for our apartment so that we’re not only hanging photography on our walls.  I bought these drawings from this really cool guy who works in an automotive factory and likes to draw— I love them so much; it’s ridiculous.

And then I found this drawing by a 5-year-old Thai boy who loves drawing ships.  This kid is amazing, and I would assume it is a hoax (this 5-year-old is attempting perspective and depth!) if it weren’t for the fact that the parents paid more in shipping than I paid for the picture and I’m not sure what they’d gain from the whole exchange.  Read the auction info below… looking at this picture makes me happy.

Well, the picture says it all. Let me highlight a points: Our 5 years old son (Yaqin) is enthusiastic about drawing and colouring since childhood; The story of Titanic (from movie and from us) attracted him; He kept dwawing bigger and bigger Titanics everyday that can carry tens of thousands of people on board. If you examine carefully you will see that Yaqin (the artist) and his mother is on board and Daddy (me) is in the sea.

Now that he knows about computer, Internet and Auction/eBay, he wants to sell his FIRST picture here. If you win the bid, we (the parents) will send you the original picture after nicely framing it. We’ll also happily bear the shipping cost (worldwide standard shipping). (original work is on a A4 size Paper).

Even if you do not bid/win this items, please accept our heartfelt thanks for the time you take to see our son’s art work. Please pray for his dreams come true.

You have a wonderful day – everyday.

I’m fascinated by his obsession with the Titanic and his choice to put his father in the ocean, and though I don’t believe in prayer, I do hope his dreams come true and he keeps drawing.  This is what he wrote on the back:

Photographer’s Forum

I’m honored to be one of the 4 photographers who’s portfolios are featured in the spring issue of Photographer’s Forum. After getting an honorable mention in one of their contests, I was asked to submit a portfolio, which they selected for publication and then narrowed down to the couple images in the magazine. Be sure to pick up a copy!

I’m very happy with the images chosen. They’re from my series on Ana and Julio’s family outside of La Antigua, Guatemala (Rosa’s Toy and Julio and Brando). I’m sending the family an issue and I think they’ll be pleased. Thanks, Photographer’s Forum!

Another Open House Postcard

I never find out about these things until I see the cards floating around somewhere, but an image I made a while back of my friend Thade drawing himself out of existence is on the latest NESOP Open House Postcard: