SPE san francisco 2012

it's been announced, sally mann will be the keynote speaker at the 2012 SPE conference in san francisco.




guess i better get my ticket now.

if you're not aware of what SPE mean, it's the Society for Photographic Educators. There will be talks, demonstrations, book explanations, portfolio reviews and my favorite... free supplies.

A few years ago, I attended SPE with some classmates of mine when it was in Philly, it was an amazing trip and completely worth it. I remember carrying my portfolio in my hands on the plane, in fear it would get damaged. The girls and I showed up first for the portfolio review and took over five or so tables. People traveled from all over the country and were representing all different kinds of photography departments and schools.
I remember how excited i was to finally get to speak to Arno Rafeal Minkkinen, a photographer on the SPE board and has influenced so much of what is my self portrait work. He pulled me aside and critiqued my work and signed my copy of his book.






Anyway, I encourage anyone who can to go to the convention in march. it will definitely be an experience!
go to: https://www.spenational.org/
Conference Prices are as follows: Member, regular: $250
Member, adjunct faculty: $230
Member, senior: $175
Member, student: $90

Non-member, regular: $375
Non-member, student: $180

illustrator IV

illustrator III

work in progress

illustrator II

work in progress.

tulsa, oklahoma. yep.

back to school, back to school

I'm attending tulsa university as a nondegree seeking student, trying to fill in the fine art gaps of my b.a.. Here I have three classes- tile making, silkscreen, and illustrator. basically, a dream come true. when I went for my undergrad, my computer lab classes felt like they were noneducational and honestly boring. I didn't learn much. though this lab class is at times boring, i never feel like it's useless. today, I implemented what we were doing in class into something I personally enjoy. my work in progress is below.



i know these skills will come in handy with silkscreening as well as my own personal work.

also, today in silkscreening, we went to the philbrook museum and viewed the rauschenberg at gemini exhibit. I encourage anyone in the area to check it out and be sure to sit outside of the exhibit and view the video about his life. it was very interesting to see how his work progressed and how the public responded to it. in the end, he was just another deadbeat artist that just enjoyed making art his way and hoped it would sell. obviously relatable.




it's nice to be a student again and this time on a real campus. yes, tulsa isnt chicago, not even denver, but it still has resources and creative people. i'm excited to see what happens this semester.

hello tulsa, let's kick some ass.

photo diary.

I've noticed while looking over my negatives and my facebook uploads, my photography has turned into more of a social photo diary.

ralph eugene meatyard+++++

///the art institute of chicago is exhibiting RALPH EUGENE MEATYARD july 2- sept 25///




over the years I have become obsessed with photo history and MEATYARD has definitely left an impression on me. I encourage anyone in the chicago metro area to stop by this amazing show and take a look for yourself.

here's what the art institute had to say about the show:
"Ralph Eugene Meatyard (1925-1972) has been on the fringes of photographic history- so much that he inserted one of his own prints into his personal copy of Beaumont Newhall's classic History of Photography, which did not include him. And yet his impact on photographic practice, belatedly recolonized, has been significant. An optician in Lexington, Kentucky, Meatyard sustained a life-long interest in visual perception. Well read and deeply connected to a circle of poets and philosophers, he made photographs rich in literary allusion. Meatyard's photography was not accidental or documentary, but rather deliberate, often staged, and searching for inner truths rather than ephemeral surfaces.

In his last decade, Meatyard kept returning to the tropes of dolls and masks, often photographing his children posed in abandoned houses and landscapes. These pictures put an uncanny spin on family photographs, exploring the contrasts between youth and age, childhood and mortality, intimacy and unknowability, sharing and hiding. For Meatyard, dolls represented a physical human presence, whether employed in a scene alongside people or instead of people. He used masks to universalize his sitters rather than make portraits of individuals. Masks reflect the faces we all put on for the camera; indeed, Meatyard's last project before his untimely death was The Family Album of Lucybelle Crater, a project based on the common snapshot album but featuring friends and family all wearing masks. Drawn from the photographer's estate, this focused exhibition- all works made before that iconic project- examines dolls and masks across different bodies of work as a window onto this enigmatic photographer's larger practice."

Admission:
Adults: $18
Children, Students, and Seniors (65 and up): $12
Children under 14 are free. Members are always free.

Museum Hours
Monday–Wednesday, 10:30–5:00
Thursday, 10:30–8:00
Friday–Sunday, 10:30–5:00


do yourself a favor and go.