Kevin Van Aelst

Kevin Van Aelst's work appropriates everyday artifacts to recontextualize geography, mathematics, astronomy and cell division. In his statement, Van Aelst expounds:

"This work calls upon historical tenants of conceptualism and minimalism. Conceptual art has shown that the ideas behind a specific artwork can be more important than the aesthetics or visual appeal of the piece itself. The serial process, showing each successive permutation of a fractal pattern, refers to minimalism. Equally important to this body of work is humor—via odd juxtapositions of sophisticated content with banal subject matter.

This Body of work is about creating order where randomness is expected, defying natural probabilities, so that lint stuck to a sweater forms an accurate star chart of the summer sky over New England, and milk spills from its carton into a logarithmic spiral. I use common everyday objects and foods to illustrate timeless and lofty ideas. While the subjects of the photos are artifacts of modern culture, the content of the photos, such as the Golden Mean, are often ancient and revered notions."











From Top To Bottom:

Right Thumb, 2007

Summer Constellations (lint and thread on sweater), 2005

Cardboard Box, 2008

Hawaii, 2007

Logarithmic Spiral, 2004

All Images © Kevin Van Aelst

Phil Jung's Windscreen

Our good friend Phil Jung's MFA thesis exhibition Windscreen is quickly approaching. I've been lucky to catch glimpses of the work around school over the last year and can say with confidence that this show is not to be missed. Every photography lover in the Boston area should show their support by stopping by Mass Art and seeing the show!

Windscreen
April 13 - April 23
Reception: Thursday, April 16th from 6-8 pm

Hours:
Monday – Friday 10am – 6pm
Saturday 11am – 5pm

Sandra and David Bakalar Gallery
Stephen D. Paine Gallery
621 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115

Photograph from the series Windscreen

Image © Phil Jung

The Eternal Sunshine of Fred & Anne

The vernacular photography website Square America has so many wonderful archives that I was having trouble deciding what to post. That is, until I found The Eternal Sunshine of Fred & Anne, a cryptic and fragmented family album depicting "a 1910's - 20's Iowa couple in which all evidence of former loves has been imperfectly, and often violently, erased." As the site declares:

"A great number of photos had either had faces cut or scratched out or had been removed altogether and all those photos appeared to be of women. Not all the women in the album had been removed but in each case where there was a name attached to a removed photo it was a woman's name. Now I have lots of photos where faces have been cut out to be used in lockets or in album pages like the one at the top of this page but these were far too crudely removed to be of any artistic use. Clearly, someone went through the album and systematically, and sometimes apparently violently, removed photos of women."











Photographers Unknown

Mathew Scott's Coexist

Mathew Scott recently updated his website with a new series entitled Coexist. Not dissimilar to the Suburban explorations of Alan George or J. Bennett Fitts, Scott's photographs explore the uneasy cohabitation of human beings and nature. The only written accompaniment for this project on his website consisted of these two quotes:

"Of substances no one has any clear idea, farther than of certain simple ideas coexisting together. -Locke

So much purity and integrity...coexisting with so much decay and so many infirmities. -Warburton"











All photographs from the series Coexist

All Images © Mathew Scott

Call For Submissions: 2009 New York Photo Festival

The 2009 New York Photo Festival, taking place May 13-17 in DUMBO, Brooklyn, is currently accepting submissions for their annual Photo Awards. Anyone interested in submitting work has until May 1st to do so.

"The New York Photo Awards 2009 will once again honor talented photographers from all over the world whose exceptional work breaks new grounds visually, intellectually and aesthetically. The Awards will give these visual artists the opportunity to reach key decision makers in the photographic community and the editorial, fine art and commercial worlds. Submissions will be accepted starting March 2nd through May 1st, 2009. The Award winners will be announced in May during the second edition of the Festival."


Photography Submissions

-JPEG format saved at level 10 compression
-Images must be no greater than 1600 pixels on the longest dimension
-Images must be saved at 100dpi
-Maximum file size: 5MB
-Color Profile: Adobe RGB (1998)

Short Film/Video Submissions

-Maximum Length: 5 minutes
-Maximum file size: 30 MB
-File type: Quicktime (.mov)

Image File Names & Category Codes

Prior to uploading please rename your image files as follows:

Individual files should be titled with the Photographer’s last name, a sequential image number (whether for multiple submissions in a single category or for a series submission), and the appropriate category code - see below.

Editorial - Single (Category Code: ED)
Editorial - Series (Category Code: ES)
Short Film/Video (Category Code: SF)
Fine Art - Single (Category Code: FA)
Fine Art - Series (Category Code: FS)
Advertising (Category Code: AD)
Photo Book - Published or Unpublished (Category Code: PB)
Social Documentary - Essay (Category Code: SD)

For example:
A photographer whose last name is Smith and is submitting a series of 3 single editorial images should name his files as follows: smith1ED.jpeg; smith2ED.jpeg; smith3ED.jpeg
A photographer whose last name is Smith and is submitting a series of 4 fine art images as part of a series should name his files as follows: smith1FS.jpeg; smith2FS.jpeg; smith3FS.jpeg; smith4FS.jpeg

For more info or questions on the submission process, please contact awards@nyphotofestival.com

Katrin Schacke's Parcours

I found Katrin Schacke's work via Ian Aleksander Adams' Blog today. Not unlike the photo sculptures of Alejandra Laviada, Schacke's photographs reflect the fluidity that can come out of interdisciplinary practice. The images that ultimately work the best for me, however, are those in which neither medium is foregrounded, those that are independently realized as both photographic images and sculptural installations.











All photographs from the series Parcours

All Images © Katrin Schacke

Michele Abeles

Michele Abeles got in touch with me today to pass along the link to her website. I've been meaning to post some of Michelle's photographs for a while now, so it was serendipitous to find an e-mail from her in my inbox. The wonderful surreality that exists in Abeles' images seems always heightened by the way her photographs relate, or for that matter, don't relate to one another. This dialogue is akin to a photographic stream-of-consciousness, a continuous and uncensored story without a plot.

Doug Rickard, founder of American Suburb X, had this to say about Abeles' work:

"Michele’s “something”… her photographs… are images from a kaleidoscope lens- a turning wheel that spins and stops at a spot… disconnected shards that are taped together as fragments along a leather whip… the whip is swaying side to side… motionless but moving… held by a gloved hand and whipped with a thud against the dark night cement. Humans mixed with textures mixed with animals mixed with death. Death mixed with hair mixed with cement mixed with earth… tension brewing violently underneath it all… all of it interconnected and yet, all of it knowingly separate. The “something” is like a kink or ripple in the reality… something is warped, causing a bend in the reality… something broad and running under the surface of Michele’s created world… all of it affected by this warp, waves move across all... all of it is bent under the force of this curve."











All Images © Michele Abeles