Caroline Burghardt

I came across Caroline Burghardt's work and I really like the way that she works with her family as her subjects. She uses natural light as a way to work with the space and I think that is a large part of why I felt drawn to these images. I always prefer to photograph in natural light and I like seeing how other artists work with it as well.

http://www.carolineburghardt.com/

another project update

This week has been about editing images, both in cropping the actual photograph and deciding which ones I am going to print. I shot quite a few so the editing out process has taken quite a bit of time. I think that I have narrowed it down to four images and am getting ready to start the printing process. I'm a little nervous about using the printer because I have never printed digitally, but I'm up for the challenge and I am sure that I'll be asking lots of questions. Color correcting on a computer will be quite the experience.

Sharon Lockhart

I've spent the last few weeks researching Sharon Lockhart for another class and I wanted to share some of what I found. I was particularly interested in her piece, Pine Flats. She spent three years on this project where she filmed and photographed the children of a small town, and what I liked most about this was the element of collaboration between she and these kids. A lot of her work can be seen at Gladstone Gallery and there is also an interesting video of an interview that she gave about Pine Flats.

http://www.gladstonegallery.com/lockhart.asp?id=166

http://artforum.com/video/mode=large&id=20859

milk vs. empty room

During this last week I have spent a lot of time reshooting for this project and trying new ways to think about how to charge a space and how to show a desire for the physical presence of another. I started working with milk as a representation of a body and a person, because it is this bodily substance that we all start out drinking as infants and then continue to throughout our lives. I tried to find ways of immersing myself in this substance and allowing it to be immersed by my own body as well.

Initially I was determined to steer away from using the body, but when I was thinking about my core idea and concept I felt it was more important to visually go in another direction if that meant conveying my concept successfully. I still think that the empty room has possibilities that I have yet to explore, but this is where I am so far.

New images for this project

This project has become quite a challenge for me.. I began with a set idea and plans to stick to it, but I've been discovering that sometimes you have to venture off from your traditional ways of thinking about a project or about anything. Here are a few images that I have spent the last few days experimenting with..

a few more images

these are just a few more of the images that I shot last week...

thoughts for my project

I've been thinking about how to expand on the last images that I posted, and how to continue with my project and I really like Karen's suggestion about different times of day for the milk.. I'm planning to start my shoot early tomorrow morning and continue throughout different times of the day and into the evening with other light sources. I think that the one image with different light would be really interesting and also show the progression of time. Thanks for the suggestion Karen!

New photos for the project...

I spent this afternoon shooting some new photographs for my empty room project, but I tried to rethink my whole idea and method of shooting. I thought that maybe the room does not need to be empty and maybe charging the space with a presence does not need to be about my sister. I just wanted to leave behind my original idea and try something completely different. I used a glass of milk as my subject and photographed it in different places around my apartment as a drank it. I shot a few with my hand or arm in the image to suggest my presence in the scene. If anyone has any comments of suggestions I would love to hear them!

artists

I've spent a lot of this week looking at different artist's and blogs. iheartphotography is becoming one of my favorites to just browse through and every once in awhile I come across something completely random that I really like. Even though this image has nothing to do with what i'm working on I really felt drawn to it. The artist is Mathias Poledna and he is up on this week's postings from iheartphotography.blogspot

I've also been looking at work by Nicholas Nixon. The series that he did of his family and the one of sick people are what I have found particular interesting. A lot of is work is available to look at through the Fraenkel Gallery. http://www.fraenkelgallery.com/index.php

reshoot plans

I'm planning on reshooting for my project and I'm trying to decide how to change the space in which I will be photographing. I want to experiment and test myself on how to charge the space without the presence of a person... I'm feeling a little stuck on how I am going to accomplish this goal without being cliche, but this week will be about trying different things and seeing what comes from it...

project update..

I spent yesterday thinking about how to work on using this empty room and how I can charge the space without using such cliche objects. I spent hours looking at artists to see what they have done with different spaces and I'm trying to think outside of my usual though process. Some of my ideas involve using sculpture in the room or possibly using clothes to suggest the presence of a person or persons.

Some of the artists that I was looking at:

John Divola - www.divola.com

Thatcher Keats - www.thatcherkeats.com/dig.html

Marla Caplan - www.marlaleighcaplan.com/index.php?category_id=12

Project so far...

Here are a few images from my first shoot for this project and my project description...

Project Name:

Grey Room

Project Description:

This is the the core outline or abstract of what you are doing. What kind of work will it be, what type of shape and generally what thematic underpinning will it contain.

Conceptual Concerns:

I want to create a presence or energy in an empty space. I have been struggling with the idea of a person or persons being physically gone from my life but still they have a presence in it. I want to charge this space with these people that are no longer a part of my everyday, but are still a large part of me. Their energy is still all around. I want to find a way for this space and the items that I place in the room to convey that energy.

Technical Skills Covered

This is the first time I have attempted a photographic project with a digital camera and digital printing. It is important for me to learn how to properly photograph in RAW format and become comfortable with the technical aspects of digital shooting. I also want to find a way to use photoshop to emphasize or assist my visual delivery so that it accurately represents my conceptual idea of a charged space/room; possibly helping my light situation or compositing other images into the original photograph. Finally, I would like to learn how to use the printers in our lab in order to fully understand how to make a quality image when printing digitally. The transfer of what I see on the screen to what prints out is something that seems difficult and I would like to become more knowledgeable in that process.

Formal Guidelines:

The medium is going to be a digital print made from a digital photograph. I think the size will be dependent on how many I decide to print. I am currently deciding how many I will need in order for this project to be complete. Due date will be towards the end of October.

Artistic References

Damien Rice – Grey Room – musical reference

Readings

I haven’t found a lot of readings that have been an source of inspiration or a reference yet, but in general I have been reading Invisable Man, Trainspotting, and for my seminar class, Regarding The Pain Of Others.

Grade

Unsure about the grade for this project for now.

Goals List

- Shooting successful digital images

- Using photoshop to assist with enhances the photos

- Printing in the digital lab

- Conveying the energy that I want to create within the grey room

Elinor Carucci

Elinor Carucci is an artist I've been looking at recently. A lot of her work deals with her personal relationships and the idea of getting closer to someone by photographing them. Her body of work titled Closer is one that I particularly relate to. I have been working on a project that deals with my relationships to certain people and how they define who I am or who I have become and how those relationships effect my perception of mortality and humanity in a person, or sometimes the lack of humanity. I like that her work show an interaction between her and the people that she photographs. There is a sense of intimacy between them.

Elinor Carucci is an Israeli-born photographer who lives and works in New York City. She received her BFA from Bezalel Academy in 1995 but began experimenting with photography when she was 15 years old. Carucci has been exhibited widely, with solo shows at several international venues including: the Hafia Museum of Contemporary Art, Israel; The Photographers’ Gallery, London and Fotographie Forum, Frankfurt. Her photographs are included in public collections such as The Museum of Modern Art, Brooklyn Museum of Arts, International Center of Photography, The Jewish Museum and the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. Carucci is a recipient of numerous awards including the ICP Infinity Award (2001), and a Guggenheim Fellowship (2002). Publications include, Closer, Chronicle Books 2002 and Diary of a Dancer, SteidlMack (2005)

elinorcarucci.com