Artist Talk - Kevin Miyazaki

Kevin Miyazaki
Photographer
By: Kylee Diedrich

Recently Kevin Miyazaki spoke to students, faculty, and friends of UWM at the Artist Now! lecture series. Miyazaki discussed his fine art and commerce work from his beginnings to his current work.  I found the way he talked about his work to be inspiring.  His vision is extremenly refined and without the drama that young artists grapple with as they are learning.  Miyazaki is a talented photographer, with a lifetime of knowledge in the medium of photography.

The project I was drawn to the most was his project Perimeter.  I found the project particularly interesting because it loosely relates to my own senior thesis project.  He drove the scenic route around Lake Michigan photographing the people along the shores, as well as an image of the lake that day.  His approach is more narrow than my own concept, but I find his work to be one inspiration for where I could take my project in the coming years.  His photographs are beautifully quiet and thought provoking as they take the viewer along the shores of Lake Michigan.

Though Miyazaki's project was the result of a commission, I chose my senior thesis based on the connection I have to the lakes, and what I find so interesting about them.  Miyazaki's project shows the variety and connectedness between the populations and people who live and depend on the fresh water of Lake Michigan.  The images share the variety in the lake, as well as the variety of people who utilize it daily.  I look up to Kevin Miyazaki and use him as inspiration for my future as a graduating senior. 

Landscape - Penelope Umbrico

Landscape: Penelope Umbrico
By Deshawn Brown

Penelope Umbrico is an artist / photographer known for appropriating images found using search engines and picture sharing websites. Her work has been published in books, exhibited and she has received awards. She was born in Philadelphia in 1957 and graduated from the Ontario College of Art and Design. She received her MFA from the School of Visual Art and PS1 Contemporary Art Center, New York. Currently, she is a faculty member in the School of Visual Arts MFA Photography, video, and related Media Program and resides in New York City. Her work is in collections including International Center of Photography (NY), McNay Museum of Art (TX), Metropolitan Museum of Art (NY), Museum of Contemporary Photography (IL), Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego (CA), Museum of Modern Art (NY).

I feel her work,  is very simple. She doesn’t do anything on her own but search images on google, yahoo, etc. She then combines these images together into one whole rectangular collage. I understand that she wants to show the audience about how we  use the internet to consume and create materials over a period of time,but I wish there was a better outlook about the way they were captured.

Landscape - Close Observation - David Liittschwager

David Liittschwager

by: Allison Krenz

David Liittschwager is a photographer and scientist whose main focus is on Natural History. 

Liittschwager studied under Richard Avedon, and started working in advertiing, but very quickly realized his passion was in what was hidden within the landscape. Liittschwager's work shows us what is unseen, as he works to create portraits utilizing macro photography. While at first glance his work seems clinical, he insists his work is tiny portraiture instead. 

One Cubic Foot

In his work One Cubic Foot (pictured above) Liittschwager isolates the creatures that pass through- one cubic foot- of land and takes their photo. It is endearing that he views each organism as it's own subject, but his work does not reflect this stance. It is unclear why he displays them all together when in interviews with him, he says they are individual portraits. Liittschwager does not have a lot of published work that has been deemed "art", but his name has appeared and will continue to frequently appear in scientific journals.

Landscape- James Balog

James Balog
Photographer

By: Kylee Diedrich

James Balog is a photographer and geographer breaking new ground in documentation of human modification of the planet.  He has become a premier advocate for the earth and the environment. Balog founded the Extreme Ice Survey to photograph the receding glaciers in order to aid his presentations world wide about climate change.  His work with the EIS evolved into a documentary about the receding glaciers called Chasing Ice which won an Emmy Award in 2014.  Balog also founded Earth Vision Institute, a non-profit aiming to educate and inspire society to explore and understand the environment.  

Balog's photography has been shown in National Geographic numerous times and is considered inspiring and exhilarating, as well as confirming his passion as an artist, scientist, explorer and adventurer.  His role as an ambassador for Nikon,  National Geographic, his family and the companies he has founded together contribute to support his projects.  He goes to extensive lengths to share his knowledge in the hope of a better future.  

I find Balog's work revolutionary and groundbreaking in the field of photography. He gives all photographer-adventurers hope that they too can begin a conversation about topics like climate change.  He proves that with both commitment and ambition any project can be realized, but with  research it could become a most important contribution to the science of climage change.  

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 Chasing Ice- James Balog

Linblad Cove, Antarctic Peninsula, Antarctica, 2011 from ICE

Landscape: Pedro David
By; Ryan Cindric

Pedro David is a Brazilian visual artist and photographer with a bachelors in journalism. He has been dedication himself to the interpretation of the relationship between people and their environment. In it's various forms and context. 

His series- Stone Men, is an interpretation of the daily life in the Brazilian northeastern outback; the inhabitants of that region, and their close relationship with the harsh nature. It's a highly hybrid culture, a mix with traditional values, pre-industrial primitive activities, and the globalized behavior. Stone Men are all of the people who inhabit this landscape, trying to understand their juxtaposition of the different times running in their moving environment. You can see how barren the landscape is, making the struggle for life one that we may never know.

His series- Things Falling From the Sky, is a series done in response to objects appearing near his apartment, he says,
 "I moved my home to a ground level apartment with two private cement areas, soon i noted, small things appearing everyday on the ground, some recur, i collect them."

It's interesting to think about all the small things on the ground that get overlooked, and how we can create an environment for them just by getting close and taking a photo with the right focus. It's also interesting how he manipulated these objects in their space, and the choices he made when setting them up. 

Commerce/Economics-Hand of Man-Corey Arnold

Corey Arnold
By Rebeka Schmieder 

Corey Arnold is both a photographer and a commercial fisherman in Alaska. He studied at the Academy of Art in San Fransisco, CA. During the summer he worked as a fisherman. His first love is fishing and his second love is photography. When he was a kid his dad showed him how to fish and later on his dad introduced him to a camera. His work is a documentary expose on fisheries in Alaska and Europe. His images explore both his personal relationships with his co-workers and also the strenuous work fishermen encounter everyday. Arnold's photographs have been published in a number of magazines, including Time LENS magazine, Esquire. The New Yorker.

His ongoing series Fish Work:The Bering Sea documents his work on multitude of fishing boats, some of which he owes, and on larger vessels as well. It is important for Arnold to accurately present the story of the hard work and danger encountered by fisherman. He would shoot between work and sleep.

Untitled 

Gulf Crossing

Opilio Bed

Between String

The photographs are visually elegant, and sometimes shocking. The photo Opilio Bed is both disturbing and humorous. Arnold does a fantastic job of capturing emotions of the workers. He reveals that it is not always dangerous, sad and dreary work, there are moments of fun among the workers. His work presents all aspects of working on a fishing boat.

In another series, Arnold  focused on life outside of commercial fishing. Graveyard Point documents the residents of a small village in Alaska. The series combines landscape and portraiture.

The Graveyard Hotel

Kvichak Exploratory Committee

Bobby after the Shooting

Ben and King

Arnold documents the unique individuals of this dying community. Despite the appearance of a ghost town, scenic documentary shots and portrait of the residents bring life and character to Graveyard Point.

Arnold's work inspires my documentary work because he manages to do both photography and fishing in equal measure. It's refreshing to see that he did not give up one dream to live out the other. I would like to think that it would be possible for me to do this with my own work.

Landscape - Memory of Land - Nona Faustine

Nona Faustine 
Lainey Koch

Photographer and visual artist Nona Faustine's work focuses on history, identity, and representation. Born and raised in New York, Faustine has used the landscape around her to uncover and represent history that has been otherwise ignored.

In her series White Shoes, Nona Faustine explores centuries of slave trade that occurred in the United States. Using the landscape of New York, she reminds viewers that slavery wasn't just an evil concept from the south.

“Of My Body I Will Make Monuments In Your Honor” Pre-Revolutionary cemetery in Brooklyn 

The images of White Shoes evoke a sense of vulnerability within the viewer, as Faustine poses for these images in public spaces wearing nothing more than a pair of white high heels. The shoes symbolize the inescapable white patriarchy. 

“Over My Dead Body”  New York City Hall

She chooses landscapes intentionally for their historical significance. Many of the locations Faustine chose were formerly sites of slave trade.

“From Her Body Sprang Their Greatest Wealth” Site of Colonial Slave Market, Wall Street 

In examining the history of these locations, she's exploring a history that isn't represented by public monuments in the United States. Faustine mentions that US history is notorious for displaying only a "one sided history" - the history of white men. 

“Like a Pregnant Corpse The Ship Expelled Her Into The Patriarchy” Atlantic Coast, Brooklyn

My reaction to these photos was very emotional. I thought it was interesting that White Shoes was capturing a very ephemeral performance piece. The fact that the artist would actually stand nude in these urban public spaces and the minimal (if any) editing added a very raw sense of vulnerability to the photographs. Faustine is reclaiming the spaces she inhabits in her photographs, also exposing an evil side of history that many don't consider when traveling through the areas she's documenting. 

Question: Do you think media other than film and photography would be able to properly represent the concepts Nona Faustine is exploring? Why or why not? 

Landscape - Susan Derges

Susan Derges

By Mandy Litwin

First trained as a painter, Susan Derges has decided to combine her painterly interests with her passion for photography. Going beyond the basics, Derges works with unique camera-less techniques. As she describes, she is now painting with light. The fact that she could work in an abstract way intrigued her. “It is able to speak of the invisible rather than record the visible,” Derges says.

She is one of the most famous camera-less photographers, having her work shown internationally. Much of her work is conceptually based around nature. One technique Derges has worked with is placing a light-sensitive paper in water to capture the ripples. She is attempting to create a new perspective for the viewer to see nature. By abstracting relatively common objects with her techniques, the viewer is likely to spend more time trying to figure out what Derges has done to achieve her images.

While she enjoys using various light-sensitive materials and emulsions to capture light in a more analog style, she has also recently combined those processes with digital techniques to create work that pushes her style even further. Like in her Moons series, shown below, she combines images she took of the moon with images made in the dark room of water and branch patterns affected by sound vibrations. What we are left with is fascinating imagery created by Derges. [Link]

Questions:
Have any of you worked with other photo processes, such as in our Materials and Processes class? If so, which process interested you the most?

Economics-Edward Burtynsky

Edward Burtynsky

Photographer

by Kylee Jo Diedrich

Edward Burtynsky focuses on global industrial landscapes. His work began by photographing the General Motors plant in his hometown of Ontario, Canada when he was young. His work explores the human imprint on the natural landscape, not as a landscape photographer, but a photographer of human systems in the world. He uses aerial photography to capture visually stimulating and enticing images. Burtynsky's work is unique. He straps his expensive cameras to drones capturing the right aerial photograph, and exhibits extremely large scale prints. 

Thjorsà River, Iceland, 2012

Burtynsky does not frequently photograph untouched landscapes, however this Iceland image is one of a pristine landscape.  

Burtysnky's photographs are, in his own words,

"meant as metaphors to the dilemma of our modern existence; they search for a dialogue between attraction and repulsion, seduction and fear. We are drawn by desire - a chance at good living, yet we are consciously or unconsciously aware that the world is suffering for our success. Our dependence on nature to provide the materials for our consumption and our concern for the health of our planet sets us into an uneasy contradiction. For me, these images function as reflecting pools of our times." 

I think his photographs touch on the sense of time. The time it takes for oil to spread through a river, or for a river to dry up in a desert. Ironically, human influence on the land seems to take no time, yet it takes a very long time to recover the landscape, sometimes impossible. His work is extremely pertinent today.  I connect with this work because my work begins my understanding of the folly of human industrial activity on the land.

                                                     VeronaWalk

Naples, Florida, USA, 2012

Death/Destruction - International Center of Photography

International Center of Photography

By Mandy Litwin

The International Center of Photography is an internationally well-known and highly respected organization. Essentially, their goal is to keep photography and visual culture alive. They do this in several ways. One way is through the exhibitions that are always taking place at their museum in Manhattan, New York. Another way is through the use of their website.

The ICP also contributes money to the community and education. They offer various workshops and classes for people to come learn about art! In addition, they also host the Infinity Awards which is an event that continues “honoring outstanding achievements in photography and visual arts”. It first started in 1985 and is still continuing annually today.

The website is set up as a great resource and archive of hundreds of thousands of photos and their respected artists. The website is easy to use and very efficient when it comes to searching for new material to research. With their browse feature, it is easy to trickle down to an exact search in an attempt for anyone to search for something specific.

One example of an artist I had not known before by using their search engine is Lewis Baltz. He was a visual artist who is well known for his work in the New Topographics Exhibition that took place in 1975. His work, along with others, is minimal. It aimed to capture a “man-altered landscape”, much different than the natural landscapes we recognize from Ansel Adams. The project made a great impact with its simplified aesthetic of the space. People are still trying to emulate this style to this day and keep their work alive.

Park City, interior, 38

Questions for the class:

Have you ever used ICP as a resource?

If so, what is your experience with it?