Found still life

© Caleb Cole

Ribalta, you had me at “social contract”

Over at Foto8 there’s a great interview you should read called Jorge Ribalta on Documentary and Democracy. I think what he says is incredibly important and timely, and it would do all of us documentary folks some good to consider the place of this type of work in the context of our own era. Reading it spurned a number of thoughts for me on these subjects.

Although I am greatly inspired by fairly traditional post-war documentary and street photography, I think it’s pretty clear that this time period is long gone and the work that those of us create today needs to have some serious thought behind it, based on what it can and should accomplish in our various social and political situations. I also think the idea of photographic “realism” needs a major overhaul. Someone reminded me recently that many don’t believe documentary has a place in fine art, and I couldn’t believe more differently. While I still feel like an outsider to the art world and am just beginning to really understand it, I feel strongly that the idea of “straight” documentary photography actually being realism is a bit naive both today and 60 years ago, although definitely more today.

With every form of or attempt at either art or documentation, there are choices to be made. When there are choices to be made, there is always creativity. Whenever I document a subject, I am aware that my work is very much about my own experience with the subject. I can’t help it. I have 100s of choices to make in creating and editing that work, which are always guided by my own opinions, creativity, comfort, goals, etc, whether I think about it at the time or not, and whether I deny it later or not.

I don’t think the growing accessibility and standardization of digital photography has changed the realist integrity of documentary photography as much as people attribute to it. Then again, I did just say that realism is just an ideal that can’t be accurately applied, anyway. But digital is, basically, just another tool. My best darkroom learning experience ended with the realization that I can change the entire composition of my image by the way I print it. I can dodge and burn away the focal point and create an entirely new one. I can hide insignificant details in shadows that I create. There are a myriad of possibilities here.

What the world of digital has done is made some of these choices easier and more accessible, of course on a much grander scale and in a very short period of time. I think that in a way and for this reason, it’s become a scapegoat. Possibly because we yearn for some kind of document that seems wholly “legitimate”, non-manipulated, apolitical, and void of any kind of cultural or social impressions. Maybe because we want ourselves to be documented in such a way. Maybe because we think our own integrity as image-makers relies on these ideals, because of the value that has been placed on them.  Maybe because we create societal institutions that we infuse with some of the same ideals (courts, police, schools, etc), that prove over and over again that it just doesn’t work this way. But does that mean we shouldn’t still attempt to document, and that documentary photography can’t possibly have similar affects on the world as it did year ago? No, I don’t think so. I think we just need to be real about expectations and changing social conditions. I don’t necessarily have the answers, but I think about these things often.

Ribalta says “The idea that, ‘after Photoshop, photography is dead in the realist-indexical sense’ is a belief that I find both theoretically unproductive and, on a political level, potentially reactionary or anti-democratic in some way. Its effect is to erase the documentary power of photography, which is precisely the political potential to link art to transformative radical politics.” I agree with him. And certainly there are many ways for art and document to work together and be productive and useful to all camps and various needs in the ways of art and storytelling as well as indexing and creating proof.

Randy’s toys, © Steph Plourde-Simard

night self-portrait…

…by the light of the newly-installed street light right outside our livingroom window.

© Caleb Cole

Song Dong

Leslie K. Brown alerted me to this article and slideshow in the NY Times on the artist Song Dong.  I am fascinated by this installation.  Anyone want to take a trip to NY with me before this show closes in September?

© Todd Heisler/The New York Times

yes

This week has been full of incredible displays of support for and faith in me.  As I prepare for my Artadia studio visit, this support has been incredible.  It doesn’t mean I’m not still freaking out a little, but it’s good to know that other people believe in what I’m doing.

From a night photoshoot with my best friend, Rebekah:

© Caleb Cole, 2009

Where I’m at

It’s been a while since I’ve posted a substantive update on what I’ve been up to and what I’ve been working on. It’s pretty much all about time right now. I’m working 4-5 part-time jobs, and although most weeks I work over 40 hours, there are often weeks where I work less because I’m not needed that much by my employers. On any given day right now I’m either an administrative assistant, an artist/photographer’s assistant, a web designer, a bookkeeper, a digital photography lab assistant, or a laborer. It’s nice to not be bored, but some weeks I barely make it. I’m spending money right now to make prints, buy frames for small shows, and submit work, but I’m not getting any financial returns yet. I dream of selling a couple prints right now, not only to help cover some of these costs, but for a symbolic sign of hope.

When I finished school and set out to become a photographer, I went back and forth between wanting one full-time job or various part-time ones. I had to weigh things like money, flexible schedules, and time off to do my own work. I still weigh these two options on a regular basis, over and over again. I’m sure this is a phase that many artists go through, that may actually last a very long time for me. It’s really fine, I’ve committed to it. But I look forward to someday having the options and/or means to have the work I do to pay the bills be determined by the needs or demands of my photography career, rather than the other way around.

I do have some things to look forward to in the near future. One of my platinum/palladium pinhole images was chosen for the Photographic Resource Center’s annual benefit auction. I’m participating in Jamaica Plain Open Studios in late September. And I have a solo show coming up in the Boston area this winter [more details to come]. I’m also keeping up with submitting work regularly and I had a portfolio review recently with Leslie Brown from the PRC, who gave me a lot of great suggestions for how to promote my work. I had an opening earlier this month for my small show at Dame in Jamaica Plain, where I got to talk to people about prints that rarely see the light of day, and I met a lot of other local photographers and artists. I’m looking forward to a closing event there as well, just days before my studio visit from Artadia.

I was floored and surprised by a phone call from Artadia last week informing me that I made the short-list of 15 finalists for this cycle of awards in Boston. I am so excited-beyond-belief to have my work taken this seriously and actually considered for funding. Being a finalist has been incredibly validating and encouraging, and if nothing comes of it in terms of receiving a grant, that’s OK, because so much has come of it in terms of my attitude and confidence and motivation. Although I can’t imagine what $3,000 or $15,000 would do in terms of allowing me to continue some of my projects and start new ones. I definitely wouldn’t mind having to work out a budget for that!

© Steph Plourde-Simard

The myth of neutrality

I don’t believe in the notion of the objective photographer, that somehow a photo is balanced and you’re dispassionate. I don’t think that would have value. That’s like a security camera. –Nina Berman

There are some situations one simply cannot be neutral about, because when you are neutral you are an accomplice. Objectivity doesn’t mean treating all sides equally. It means giving each side a hearing. –Christiane Amanpour

I’ve been meaning to write about the idea of neutrality and objectivity in photography for some time now. I know that many photographers — most often photojournalists — strive to be [or seem] objective in their work. I know this is often driven by how the media has operated for decades, and that there’s been a demand for images that seem neutral. I say “seem” for a reason here.

Just to put it out there in case anyone is confused, I do not at all try to be objective or neutral, in either my life or my images. I do take sides. You can call me one-sided and I would consider it a compliment, because that means to me that you see what I and my work are about, and that I did a good job. I was driven to photography as another way to speak, to comment, to illustrate a point, to agree or disagree, to discuss, and to question. I don’t always have a fine-tuned point with what I photograph, but I rarely ever find myself in any situation where I don’t know or haven’t decided yet what I think about it. And I do believe that shows in my images, at least the most successful ones. And I’m glad that it does.

We are at a point where the age-old assumption that a white male Supreme Court judge can interpret the law and make rulings in an un-biased, objective, neutral way, and can do this better than a Latina woman, is finally coming to a head and being challenged. We are also at a point where printed news sources are flailing, and looking to more accessible, user-driven sources, full of opinion and bias based on the experiences of the content providers, for assistance. In a newspaper the other day I read an article that a year ago would have quoted individuals with names to add a bit of opinion into the facts. But this article solely quoted Twitter users. While I am a huge fan of “citizen journalism” and more accessible ways to speak up in the world, including through social networking, because it can call attention to issues and communities often ignored by mainstream or corporate media, I wonder what will be lost by never leaving the computer desk to gather anecdotal information anymore. I wonder if what this perceived benefit to news is would also be accomplished by replacing newspaper images with stock photography. That thought scares the crap out of me, and not just as a photographer.

Some of the photographers I admire the most are the ones who take sides. I think this can be done in a myriad of ways. I wonder if information, imagery, storytelling and news can all benefit from celebrating and honoring [and at the most basic, admitting] bias and opinion, rather than denying it.

foray into 4×5

I’ve always looked at color 4×5 longingly from afar but never really got off my ass and started to shoot.  It wasn’t as comfortable as all the other formats I was already used to, was slower and more expensive.  I’m making myself do it and loving it, even if I have to charge it all until I can afford it.  I’m making mistakes and learning lots already.  This was one of my first test shots on the roof of my building.

It’s the Final Countdown!

We are so excited and happy to announce that not one, but both of us, Caleb and Steph, are among the 15 finalists in Boston for grants from Artadia: The Fund for Art and Dialogue. The news came out officially today, and we’re really honored to be included. You can read more below, as both of us are pretty excited beyond words. We’ll each post in the next few days about what this means for us personally and update you on the process. We are now preparing to go through the second round, which involves a studio visit with jurors who will decide which 7 of the 15 finalists to fund.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 8, 2009

SHORT-LIST OF 15 FINALISTS ANNOUNCED FOR ARTADIA AWARDS 2009 BOSTON

New York, NY—The exceptional range of artists living and working in Boston was evident as three internationally prominent jurors selected the 15 Finalists for the second cycle of Artadia Awards 2009 Boston. Jurors Sanford Biggers (artist, New York), Dan Cameron (Founding Director, Chief Curator, Prospect New Orleans), and Randi Hopkins (Associate Curator, The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston) named the finalists out of the nearly 600 applications received for the second cycle of Artadia Awards in Boston.

The 15 Finalists for the Artadia Awards 2009 Boston are: Claire Beckett, Cree Bruins, Ambreen Butt, Laura Chasman, Caleb Cole, Margo Cooper, Raul Gonzalez, Eric Gottesman, Wendy Jacob, Erik Levine, Steph Plourde-Simard, Nick Rodrigues, Amie Siegel, Suara Welitoff, and Joe Zane.

Peter Eleey (Visual Arts Curator, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis) and Rita Gonzalez (Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art) will join Randi Hopkins in Boston for the final jury studio visits later this month from Thursday, July 30 through Saturday, August 1, 2009. The jury will then select seven Artadia Awardees for two awards of $15,000 and five awards of $3,000. The list of seven Artadia Awardees will be announced by mid-August.

make some art

This past weekend, during some of my time off, I made this little art project/reminder for myself out of a thrift store picture and some white paint.  It took me a while, but I’m quite pleased with the results.

4th of July

This weekend was fantastic— a whole weekend off of work and time to relax.  It was also my wife’s birthday on the 4th, so we went over to a friend’s house for a bbq/karaoke birthday party.  I’ve removed the incriminating pictures, and what was left was these few.  Ha!  It was a blast.