Erik Schubert's How To Win Friends And Influence People

I've been quite drawn to Erik Schubert's project How to Win Friends and Influence People lately. His ironically dry explorations of the corporate vernacular are typically infused with a sort of parodic sensibility, often exhibiting the humorous alongside the monotonous. In Schubert's statement he explains his inspirations for the work:

Realizing that we live in an increasingly business-centered society, how we navigate as “businesspeople” may determine the success or failure of our aspirations and the ability to pursue them. I am interested in how this kind of society shapes our visual world and language.

At a young age it was instilled in me that the mythology from Dale Carnegie’s classic book, How to Win Friends and Influence People was one that predicated success and happiness in life. The book has been widely published and accepted by businesspeople and corporate planners all over the world, including my father.

Some images are documentations of found items, constructed on location. Other images are documentations of ephemera that I have collected from such places as expositions, infomercials, my family, and home. With these photographs, I try to explore and communicate metaphorically the success, failure, and complexity of corporate mythologies in society.











All photographs from the series How to Win Friends and Influence People

All Images © Erik Schubert

The Exposure Project Featured in Artscope Magazine

The new Artscope Magazine, a New England based art and culture publication, has a feature on The Exposure Project in their new November/December 2008 issue. The article discusses the ambitions of the project and then goes on to explore the work of Anastasia Cazabon and Adam Marcinek in greater depth.

For anyone interested interested in the article, you can read an excerpt of it here. You can also pick up a free issue of Artscope at one of many locations scattered throughout the New England area. We would like to thank everyone over at Artscope Magazine for the coverage.

Image © Adam Marcinek

Photographic Typologies: Robert Voit

I found Robert Voit's series New Trees via From This Moment about a week ago. His examination of cell phone tower trees, often brazenly and aggressively situated, ironically explores yet another aesthetic addition to the already inundated social landscape. As Christoph Schaden affirms:

"His pictorial inventory, a work-in-progress since 2003, of mobile phone masts in the guise of artificial trees erected in real space in the U.S., Great Britain, South Africa, Korea, Italy and Portugal pays superficial tribute to a diffuse creative will driven by a basic desire for conciliation. To visually compensate for the dangers of electro-smog, mobile phone masts are given plastic “magic hoods” which simulate nature so that they then appear in the landscape as idealized forms of vegetation. The broad range of camouflage outfits includes deciduous trees and conifers, pines, palms and huge cacti. A lucrative manufacturing industry specializing in these artificial trees has emerged with considerable future potential; currently it is gaining a foothold on the European continent."











All photographs from the series New Trees

All Images © Robert Voit

Tim Davis, Paul Fusco & Philip-Lorca diCorcia Lecturing In Boston This Week

Boston-based photography lovers are being treated to 3 distinguished artist lectures this week - Tim Davis, Paul Fusco & Philip-Lorca diCorcia will all be speaking at various venues around the city over the next few days.

Tim Davis @ School of The Museum of Fine Arts
Thursday, November 13, 2008 @ 12:30 pm 

230 The Fenway (Room B-311)

Boston, MA

Paul Fusco @ Boston University's College of Fine Arts' Concert Hall

Thursday, November 13, 2008 @ 7:00 pm

855 Commonwealth Ave

Boston, MA

Philip-Lorca diCorcia @ Mass Art

Monday, November 17, 2008 @ 2:00 pm

621 Huntington Ave (Kennedy # 406)

Boston, MA

I imagine that all of these lectures will draw large crowds, so it certainly wouldn't hurt to show up early to secure yourself a seat.

From Top To Bottom:

Tim Davis, One People...

Paul Fusco, Image from the series RFK Train

Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Eddie Anderson; 21 Years Old; Houston, Texas; $20. 1990–92

All Images © The Artists

Paul Salveson

I found Paul Salveson's work via Fjord's relatively new Artists' Space gallery. His ritualistic look at the commonplace ephemera that fills our lives is refreshingly lighthearted and self-deprecating. In his statement, Salveson proclaims:

"In my photographs, I aim to worship objects I encounter every day, and present them as rebuilt icons with ambiguous purposes. I utilize details in my environment, and frame them to create simplicity and unfamiliarity. The obsessive arrangement of the pieces of my world allows for a reinvention of their purpose and meaning. The process of my photography is suffused with ritual, centering around transformation and re-presentation. When I encounter a certain desirable situation, place, or object, I collect it either physically or mentally. The combining of these logged items results in an event which is photographed meticulously until a formal balance is met. Implicit, but consistent and unyielding rules dictate the composition of my works."











All Images © Paul Salveson

European Month of Photography: Berlin 2008

The month of November marks the European Month of Photography, a continent-wide, month long celebration of all things photographic. Exposure Project member Anastasia Cazabon is in a group show entitled The Sheath of the Self at Photo Edition Berlin. The exhibition explores "the artistic portrait, in its physical, social and psychic presence." The number of exhibitions in Berlin alone is quite daunting, but the quality of work, from what I saw, is quite high. Some of the artists on view include:

Diane Arbus, Jan Banning, Mathieu Bernard-Reymond, Angus Boulton, Mona Breede, Tacita Dean, Julia Fullerton Batten, Paul Fusco, Nan Goldin, André Kertész, Yotta Kippe, Oliver Kunkel, Robert Mapplethorpe, Andres Marroquin Winkelmann, Ryan McGinley, Hans W. Mende, Boris Mikhailov, Man Ray, Simon Roberts, Frank Röth, Sebastian Stumpf, Hiroshi Sugimoto, André Villers, Andy Warhol & Erwin Wurm

The European Month of Photography Berlin 2008 has a comprehensive website with descriptions of all the shows in the festival, not to mention a section with listings for special events and artist lectures. For anyone who happens to be in the Berlin area, or just in Europe for that matter, I would highly recommend taking advantage of this festival.

Splendid Isolation I, 2007

Image © Mona Breede

Natascha Libbert's Men At Airshow & Waterland

Dutch photographer Natascha Libbert e-mailed me yesterday to share some of her recent work. I particularly gravitated toward her series' Men At Airshow & Waterland, both of which, in their own ways, address "the manner in which we give form to our world." Her images strike a fascinating balance between detachment and compassion. This seeming paradox is incredibly hard to achieve, but the results are quite compelling when rendered with the precision and juxtapositional quality of Libbert's best images.

There is an overwhelming amount of work on Libbert's website, however, in addition to the two series' mentioned above, I highly recommend Seemingly Insignificant & Sportsfields.













From Top To Bottom:

Top 3 images from the series Men At Airshow

Bottom 3 images from the series Waterland

All Images © Natascha Libbert