Can the art inspire positive change? This week the UK parliament has declared a state of ‘Climate Emergency‘ as a response to widely held public protests catalyzed by the Swedish teenager, Greta Thunberg. It is interesting to note that protesters held images by Gideon Mendel from the ‘Drowning World’ series he has made over the…
Category: Contextual Research
Apocalyptic Sublime @davidmaisel1
“We had dreamed of building cities, fields of glittering towers, urban fantasies meant to house our hopes of progress; now we seek our dismantled landscapes, abandoned, collapsing on themselves. Rather than creating the next utopia, we uncover the vestiges of failed attempts, the evidence of obliteration” (Maisel, 2013: 124). This is a very poetic way…
SPILL by @BeltraStudio
When we think about the history of iconic events that created a shock in the public mind that influenced the development of environmental ideas several key moments come to mind. The Three Mile Nuclear Accident (1979), Bhopal (1984), Chernobyl (1986), Exxon Valdez oil spill (1989), Kuwait Oil Fires (1991), Fukushima (2011). One of those disasters…
Robert Delpire @rencontresarles
Last year, the great French publisher, Robert Delpire (1926-2017), passed away at the age of 91. To celebrate the life and achievements of this extraordinary publisher the Rencontres d’Arles photography festival hosts a spectacular exhibition: https://www.rencontres-arles.com/en/expositions/view/746/robert-delpire-photo-poche Famously known for inventing the ‘Photo Poche‘ book format, a small format photographic album, Delpire published many iconic photobooks…
Henri Cariter-Bresson @aperturefnd
The new book of Interviews and Conversations made with Henri Cartier-Bresson between 1951 and 1998 has just been published by Aperture. A pure delight to read, full of exciting details and inspiring facts, this collection brings together twelve interviews with the master, most of which have not been reissued in English since their publication. From…
Birthday @The_Globe
First of all, thank you all for your wonderful birthday wishes, it is all very much appreciated. It was equally a delight to watch the Shakespeare’s Globe perform under the stars in the Oxford Bodleian Library quad, in the same way it was done in 1600s. Simply fabulous. The best birthday present one could wish…
Street life @rencontresarles
What is peculiar about Arles is that you never know what you are going to see. A few meters off course and you are embraced by a lively celebration of an exhibition you have never heard anything about. You meet the artists, curators, the press and relive the experience through their perspectives and explanations. I…
Notes from @rencontresarles
It has already become a tradition for me to make some images exploring the photographic life of Arles during the Rencontres photo festival. I will be returning to this idea in several future posts. Sincerely hoping that the images will speak louder than words. What attracts me in these scenes is the immediacy of life,…
Flânerie @rencontresarles
This year the world famous Rencontres d’Arles photo festival is full of surprises. First of all, the Magnum photograher, Raymond Depardon presented his exhibition ‘Depardon USA, 1968–1999’ at the iconic Espace Van Gogh, where the famous painter spent some time in Arles. Secondly, Todd Hido is showing his new series ‘La Lumière sombre’at Palais de…
Racism, cultural politics and the environment @NatGeo
It is 2018 and every single tabloid is publishing and republishing a confession of the chief editor of National Geographic that the coverage of the magazine in the past was racist. Right. We know it. Yes, in the United State and many other parts of the world, people of different ethnic groups have been misrepresented…
Hiroshi Sugimoto @MarianGoodman
Hiroshi Sugimoto’s ‘Seascapes’ fascinate, puzzle, surprise and, finally, encourage further examination. I came across a major show by Sugimoto at Marian Goodman Gallery that celebrated 40 years last year. What appears at first sight to be very similar images of nothing more than a horizon with the upper half of the image occupied by sky…
Critique of the Image @umbertoeco_
In his seminal essay, Critique of the Image, the renowned semiotician, Umberto Eco, proposes a clear taxonomy of codes used to interpret an image in the semiotic tradition. He differentiates between the following types of codes (the text below closely follows Eco’s original formulations) : 1) Perceptive codes, which for Eco are establishing the conditions…
Eco Art Gallery 