VoxPhotographs Weblog

Go again to see the URBAN SCENE exhibit at the Portland Museum of Art - up until 8/17. Several of the paper works have been removed so they are not under the lights too long to cause damage and two new artists have work in their places.

Kennebec Street © David Wolfe, 2007. All rights reserved.

David Wolfe, owner of Wolfe Editions on Pleasant St. in Portland, is a palladium print artist (and is represented exclusively by VoxPhotographs). Four of Wolfe’s palladiums purchased recently by the PMA are now on view as part of this exhibit (”Checkmate”, “Kennebec Street”, “Portland Company” and “Portland Company Doors” all 2007). See more of his work by clicking on either link in this paragraph.

Mark Klett, based in Arizona, was the inspiration and mentor behind the recent MECA show “Re-Visioning Portland” and if you missed that one, you missed something very, very good. The Portland Museum of Art purchased one of Klett’s works “Panorama of Congress St., Portland Maine, September 2007 with the Baxter Building circa 1901″ Inkjet print. The image is about 6 feet long and really fun to study for a while. Klett has published a book of his work: View Finder: Mark Klett, Photography and the Reinvention of Landscape. I’m going to head over to the MECA library (see this blog category “Maine Resources I Love” about this library) and find a copy. I can’t find a website just for Klett, oddly enough.

One thing about reading a newspaper on paper as opposed to the electronic experience is that your eye is forced to travel the entire page of articles looking for things of interest. Online, I just click on the headlines I’m interested in and…well, I would have missed the review of “Islander” for sure if I hadn’t had my husband’s leftover Sunday Maine Telegram in front of me yesterday at lunch here at the gallery in Portland and caught a line or two of Ted Fry’s (Seattle Times) rave review of the film co-written by Thomas Hildreth, a Portland, Maine native, as I was turning the page.

As luck would have it, I did read it, and didn’t hesitate to get myself over to The Movies On Exchange for their 3:15 showing. I love Maine fiction, Maine social history, and obviously Maine photographic experiences and this fit the bill on all three counts.

How about if I just quote from CinemaDave’s review of the camera work in this film? It’s terrific and even if it weren’t couched in a lovely, sweet and authentic story, it would be worth seeing for itself:

Review by CinemaDave © CinemaDave
“Produced on a low budget, ‘Islander’ contains breathtaking cinematography, the slow pace of a southern told tale and a narrative with a complete middle and end.

Despite the fictional elements, “Islander” has the feel of a personal documentary. Many shots are devoted to the detail of pulling lobster traps from the briny deep and bait being cut. While the film is low budget, it does contain some of the best outdoor photography filmed on the open sea. Director of photography Dan Coplan should receive an award by the Maine tourist council. “Islander” is definitely a vacation from the ordinary motion pictures.”

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If you’re into photography, pre-order the DVD, or if you are lucky this summer, get yourself to a cinema to see this film and appreciate what one expert cameraman can do with Maine scenery and its way of life. Here’s more on Dan Coplan:

Dan Coplan, Director of Photography
Dan Coplan is a Los Angeles based director of photography, Steadicam operator, and digital imaging technician. He started his career in entertainment with visual effects and editing, spending a brief period with George Lucas’s company Industrial Lights & Magic. However, the lack of sun and human interaction motivated him to seek a different creative field. On a whim, Dan bought a miniDV camera and started shooting projects for free to gain experience and material for his reel.

One small break led to another as Dan moved from volunteer work to earning a living. Seeking a wider variety of productions with larger budgets, Dan begrudgingly left his great friends and apartment (with parking!) in San Francisco, packed his bags, and moved to LA to make the most of his career. Since then, Dan has worked on numerous projects for a wide variety of clients and is a member of several associations including the International Cinematographers Guild, Society of Camera Operators, Steadicam Operators Association, and Digital Cinema Society.
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Okay, so here’s the bad news. Yesterday was the last day the film was playing in Maine. You’ll need to write to Thomas Hildreth (thomas@sternmanproductions.com) to find out where you can see the movie in the coming weeks here in Maine. Michael Hurley of Belfast’s Colonial Theatre writes that they showed it twice last year. Sign up on the website to be alerted to the availability of the DVD, buy one and schedule a movie party for everyone you know. You’ll be a hero.

But have lots of kleenex handy. I cried ten times during this film, and put off much-needed bladder relief (hey it was hot yesterday and I drank a lot of water!) because I couldn’t miss one second of this film.

• Los Angeles Film Festival official selection 2006
• Maine International Film Festival official selection 2006
• Williamstown Film Festival official selection 2006
• Hatch Film Festival official selection 2006
• Sedona Film Festival official selection 2007 (Director’s Choice Award for Best Feature Film)
• Martha’s Vineyard International Film Festival official selection 2007
• Environmental Film Festival official selection 2007

Thanks to a re-scheduled appt. last Saturday morning I scuttled over to the Portland Museum of Art just after opening time to get my first viewing of the just-opened Georgia O’Keeffe and the Camera - The Art of Identity exhibit curated by Susan Danly, Curator of Graphics, Photography, and Contemporary Art at the museum. The exhibit was already humming with people who were clearly really getting into what they were seeing, to the extent that over the next hour I got cornered by a couple of delighted strangers who just had to talk about what they were looking at. That’s a first.

I went to the far corner of the farthest room of the exhibit to try and get some space and soon totally forgot about the annoyance that there are other people in the world. I had found gold - and the fact that others were enjoying the same treasure no longer mattered.

I’d suggest you start at the beginning. If I had seen nothing but the first photograph Stieglitz took in 1917 of O’Keeffe when she was 30, standing in front of her first one woman show at his NYC gallery, that would have been enough. It is all about her, as opposed to many of his subsequent photographs of her which were much about him. Of course, I’ve seen this image in books, but studying this original platinum print left me practically levitating. Alfred Stieglitz took well over 300 photographs of O’Keeffe and they are truly icons in the history of photography. In 1918, in front of her work No.15, Stieglitz photographed O’Keeffe in her hat and coat, hands beautifully arranged around the top coat button. These two images are simply unforgettable.

After O’Keeffe moved to New Mexico, she was photographed throughout the rest of her life by the best of the best. Many of these images I had never seen. Regardless of the point of the exhibit - how O’Keeffe collaborated with and controlled many of the photographers who came to take her image to create a certain sort of public persona, the portraits collected here are quite frankly breathtaking and talk to me as much about the photographers as about the subject herself.

A huge silver gelatin portrait (1956) by Yousuf Karsh of O’Keeffe sitting in the shady alley of Abiquiu is beautiful beyond belief (and reproduced a little light in the catalog). The touch of light on O’Keeffe’s face and just beyond her in the corner of the alley is something only a master could achieve. Ditto for the catalog cover silver gelatin image portrait of O’Keeffe with a white headscarf on (above). Honestly…could it get better than this?

Well, I had never seen the Irving Penn full length studio shot of O’Keeffe kind of cowering in a corner - did the photographer really master her, I wonder? It is amazing. The iconic Arnold Newman image (1968 ) used for the promotional pieces for the exhibit will be no stranger to anyone and you can see why when you stand in front of the real thing.

John Loengard’s two pictures - The Rock from Eliot Porter, Abiquiu, 1966 and Evening Walk, Ghost Ranch, 1966 are images I will spend much time studying before the end of the exhibit on September 7. The latter says it all about O’Keeffe. An almost endless vista of desert engulfs the tiny figure of O’Keeffe from the back walking on a dry rocky path with her chow further on ahead. Engulfed she may be, but there is no doubt she is completely at home in that desert. It’s completely inspired and both portraits demonstrate Loengard to be a photograper with a powerful and unique vision.

I’m not a huge fan of Ansel Adams but I was blown away by two of his images in this exhibit: the simply gorgeous and perfect St. Francis Church, Ranchos de Taos, NM (circa 1937) and surprise: the wonderful 1937 shot Palomino, Ghost Ranch. I’m so glad it was included in the exhibit - it’s a stunner. Neither are reproduced in the catalog, so I’ll have to return to the exhibit itself to enjoy them further.

I will also return to see O’Keeffe’s simple and exquisite painting The House I Live In, 1937, the quote next to which provoked a seemingly endless monologue from another museum-goer who just had to speak about what he was feeling. I happened along and looked as good as any other witless audience, I guess!

Three years ago my friend Peg Golden and I spent a week in Santa Fe and reserved tickets in advance to tour Abiquiu. The two hours is imprinted forever on our memories. Standing in O’Keeffe’s studio (right next to her priceless journals and catalog raisonné) gazing out the picture windows over the miles of desert she loved, allowed into her spare, beautiful bedroom, her living room, her kitchen, her gardens. If you can, put it at the top of your life’s TO DO list. Of course the photos in this exhibit of O’Keeffe’s personal spaces at Abiquiu bring back that treasured afternoon and that’s a gift in itself.

Summer’s upon us. My favorite beach will be the Portland Museum of Art - cellphone turned to “silent”, a deep frown on my face to discourage comments from strangers, and seriously, my heart speeding up in anticipation as I enter these rooms again and again to lose myself in the presence of greatness.

Susan Porter, Director of the new Addison Woolley Gallery at 87 Market St. in Portland has an agenda and it’s worth talking about.

The full name of her new business is Addison Woolley Gallery and Center for Photographic Inquiry. She wants the gallery space to be a center for a myriad of cultural events including art (obviously), music, writing. But she wants it most of all to be a place where photography is discussed and explored beyond what is on the walls at any given time. Stop in and talk with her about her vision. She’s deeply knowledgeable about the history of photography as well, so the conversations are valuable.

While you are there in May, there’s a 3 person show called Nature: Subtle Sublime Surreal. David Wade’s Sandscapes are made using a small aperture on photo sensitive film, Fran Vita-Taylor shows four large closeups called Baxter Wood Series 1-4, and Dan Dow is exhibiting mostly black and white close ups of natural elements from Peaks Island, Hawaii, Mesa Verde and Key West.

Dead Fern © Dan Dow, courtesy of Addison Woolley Gallery

This is where it gets twisty - in the back part of the gallery are 7 photographs by students in grades 6-8 involved in The Telling Room project called Hidden Portland. Vita-Taylor and Porter taught this workshop. I really liked the images, especially Sarah Hesselink’s red-framed window on a white wall and Kate Hull’s shadow of a bicycle.

What I liked the most is the collaboration between a commercial gallery and a wonderful organization like The Telling Room. These seven kids can see their work hanging in a commercial space and understand that effort and expanding one’s horizons leads to something good. Thanks, Susan.

I knew Maine was kinda quirky, but I never realized just how quirky Maine is until I was confronted by the work of the 2008 graduating class of SALT - Institute for Documentary Studies - currently and briefly showing at SPACE GALLERY, 538 Congress St. in Portland. Believe me…it’s quirky.

Documentary photographs by Maine photographers are guaranteed to feature the disenfranchised and unprivileged - the “marginal” in our communities. It’s a given, it’s getting old and derivative and I quickly pass by exhibits of this ilk. It’s a lot harder work to discover what is interesting about a mainstream person, maybe even a person who has money in the bank, and present a unique view/vision that doesn’t shock or feel like a voyeuristic (thank god it isn’t me) experience.

But I do make an exception for SALT. After all, this is not a photo exhibit, it’s a chance for its graduating class to each show a small project - photos accompanied by a written documentary presentation. And I found a few “normal” people in there. I spent a long time studying the photographs and reading each writing piece. I learned a lot. SALT itself is a unique organization and one that I hope will raise awareness about itself with the public so it’s easier to know what the heck it’s up to. And I hope its next group of graduating students are open to documenting a more balanced cross-section of my home state.

The work is only up for three days in Portland, but if you don’t get to Space Gallery by Sunday May 17, you can see it in Brunswick during the month of June (2-28 ) at Frontier Cafe and Gallery. If you haven’t had lunch at Frontier, you haven’t lived. But…there will be no excuse for missing the opening celebration of the new space SALT is moving to at 561 Congress St. this summer. I’m sure detailed info. will be on their website soon.

I love to see something I’ve never seen before and I saw it yesterday at Whitney Art Works at 492 Congress St. in Portland. And it’s gorgeous stuff.

Geoffrey Leven scans actual flowers (in a darkened space) and prints them on metallic paper. You have to take the time put your face right up to the works and ponder the effect. But that’s not because they are small. The images I’m talking about are very big. Some are multiple image panels like the one here:

Stealing Beauty ©2007 Geoffrey Leven

Then you step back and your senses get socked. These images are not a one-time look. You’ll want to wander around the rest of the show and start with Leven’s metallic prints all over again. Don’t miss it.

Joining him are Portland artist Shoshanna White with an impressive array of mulit-media flora closeups. White takes a photograph and then applies several layers of a combo of beeswax, resin and oil paint. I particularly like two small works: Dandelion Puff and Apple Blossom. Once glance at her bio page tells you this photographer gets around -including four major recent Percent for Art commissions. She is committed and working hard, no doubt about it.

Robert Diamante, a well-known and highly successful commercial artist has presented a thoughtful view of Bali’s myriad spiritual offerings. There are three custom-bound books available as well as a few individual prints and it’s creatively presented by both the photographer and the gallery.

Andy Warhol isn’t just visiting these places in Maine, he’s staying.

If you didn’t catch it in the papers about a month ago, the University of Maine at Presque Isle, University of Maine Museum of Art in Bangor and the Colby College Museum of Art in Waterville, are 3 of 183 college art museums in the USA to receive Warhol photographs as a gift to their permanent collections.

The Andy Warhol Photographic Legacy Program, under the auspices of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, wants his photographs to get out where people can see them - broaden the accessibility to them even in the corners of the country, like Presque Isle. Each Art Museum is getting in the range of 150 pics each, some polaroids, some b&w gelatin silver prints.

Keep in touch with these institutions because they plan on displaying some of the images as soon as they get their heads around the gifts, catalog them and figure out the best way to make them accessible to…you.

I left the Portland Museum of Art grinning to myself last week. And feeling a little sheepish as well.

I had just viewed the URBAN SEEN exhibit on the second floor. Even being a photographs broker, it hadn’t occurred to me there would be photographs included in the exhibit. Hello, Heather??

Not only are they included, they make up almost 30% of the exhibit. We have arrived, people! I need to get with it and ASSUME everyone else is assuming that photographs are fine art worthy of inclusion in any appropriate exhibition!

First there is the cool 1921 video segment. It’s an excerpt from “Manhattan”, a film by Charles Sheeler and Paul Strand of all people. I said “WOW” as I studied Julee Holcombe’s image montage titled “Babel Revisited” (2003). In the same room is Elke Morris’ “Domicile 1″ (2004). I feel like I’ve seen that picture everywhere, but never lose my liking for it. John Dowell’s night image called “Portland II” (2005) is a beauty and makes me want to see more of his work.

Portland II,2005 © John Dowell. Used with permission of the Portland Museum of Art.

Keep counting: John P. Soule has created a good-sized piece showcasing stereo cards of the Great Fire in Portland - these are obviously dated 7/4/1866. On the other side of the spectrum is Scott Peterman’s “NY14D” (2008), hot off the press and as exquisite as only Scott’s work can be. A blurb of his winter NYC show was one of my first blog postings and quite frankly I would love to see a show of just his work one of these days.

I studied for a long time Todd Webb’s NYC scene from 1946 “6th Ave….”. It’s got to be 8′ long and I believe is several images stitched together. Loved it and will go back to study it more.

All in all there are 25 pieces in this show, 8 of which are photography. Spread the word. Better yet, make a visit to appreciate it yourself. Through August 17.

Wow - it just keeps coming. Here is yet another new photo gallery in Maine - a real sign of the times with respect to fine art photography.

The grand opening of Portland Photo Works is Friday, April 4 - featuring the work of six of the group’s members. Check it out and let me know what you think!

State Theatre Building, 142 High Street in Portland - Second Floor - hot music from 5-8!

For more information…www.portlandphotoworks.com

By the way, one of gallery’s members is Elliott Teel and he is an attorney, also located on the same floor in the State Theatre Building, so you can kill two birds with one stone if you have legal issues - make an appt. to see a lawyer and see the gallery of photographs.

On Saturday I did some running around in the midcoast area and was rewarded with some really good photographs to look at.

At CMCA I caught the opening day of their new exhibit “An Other World” and enjoyed once again Jeffery Becton’s images. I always think I’m going to see the same thing just tweaked a bit when I see his work around, but I find each image fresh. (unlike Loretta Lux’s work of those large-headed kids - no more, please!!) There are six of Becton’s images hanging at CMCA, including two black and white - I haven’t seen his work in black and white before. Here are a couple on view to whet your appetites.

I really enjoyed studying his work. If you’re in the area, CMCA is worth a stop of course, and this time around, don’t miss the Becton works for some really pleasurable viewing. (www.cmcanow.org). And for a nice long treat, visit Becton’s own website to enjoy dozens of images in color and black and white.(www.jefferybecton.com)

Finally got to Carver Hill Gallery - wow. (www.carverhillgallery.com) This is a unique concept combining art and home décor and it works. Almost no fine art photography though and I hope that will change soon. But…three really great Cig Harvey’s - including this one were tucked up together under the eaves of the second floor showrooms and they should not be missed. I really loved them. Harvey was just profiled in Maine Home and Design (www.mainehomedesign.com) it was nice to see these little gems while my mind was on her work.

Well, two tiny pockets of photographs to seek out. There you have it. Did I miss anything else? Let me know…

Images © Cig Harvey