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I find the work of German photographer Heidi Specker truly fascinating. It is the captivating contrasts of mundane objects in her compositions, objects creating patterns that would be usually ignored but become alive with her pictures. More images here, and don’t miss her books.

I am interested in the contrast between recorded reality and the effect of the image that I create. – Heidi Specker

This is why we start, this is why we keep doing it …, isn’t it?

In the moments when inspiration does not find our path, or when the jobs are scarce or the client complains too much … remember, it is all about the fun. Enjoy the moments when photography flows from inside …

More about Jacques-Henri Lartigue after the jump. Some pictures here, here, here and here.

Jacques Lartigue was born in Courbevoie on June 13, 1894. He took his first photographs at the age of six, using his father’s camera, and started keeping what would become a lifelong diary. In 1904 he began making photographs and drawings of family games and childhood experiences, also capturing the beginnings of aviation and cars and the smart women of the Bois de Boulogne as well as society and sporting events. An unfailingly curious amateur, he tried out all the available techniques, tirelessly recording the fleeting moments and meticulously arranging his several thousand images in large albums.
However, it would seem that photography was not his true vocation. In 1915 he attended the Académie Jullian: painting was to remain his professional activity and from 1922 onwards he exhibited in the salons of Paris and southern France.

His acquaintances in the world of the arts included Sacha Guitry and Yvonne Printemps, Kees van Dongen, Pablo Picasso and Jean Cocteau, while his passion for movies saw him work as still photographer with Jacques Feyder, Abel Gance, Robert Bresson, François Truffaut and Federico Fellini.

Although Lartigue occasionally sold his pictures to the press and exhibited at the Galerie d’Orsay alongside Brassaï, Man Ray and Doisneau, his reputation as a photographer was not truly established until he was 69, with a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the publication of a portfolio in Life. He now added his father’s first name to his own surname, becoming Jacques Henri Lartigue. Worldwide fame came three years later with his first book, The Family Album, followed in 1970, by Diary of a Century, conceived by Richard Avedon. In 1975 he had his first French retrospective at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. For the rest of his life, Lartigue was busy answering commissions from fashion and decoration magazines.

He also produced the official photograph of the new French president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing.

He died in Nice on September 12, 1986. [source]

I am very pleased to post an in-depth interview with photographer Jennifer Loeber. Jennifer Loeber is a young photographer based in New York City. Jennifer’s portfolio reflects the exploration of an evolving artistic vision, from documentary series to portraits that have the quality to bridge both the subject and the viewer with a unique sense of intimacy. Her work was exhibited at a group show by the Humble Arts Foundation in New York City. Her latest series, Zeig Mal (Show Me), was featured in a profile on Gothamist.com and her first feature documentary, Fishkill Flea, is currently exhibiting internationally. Jennifer has also a personal blog.

Tell me about your beginnings as a photographer … when did you get into photography?

My background with photography began in high school when my homeroom was actually the school darkroom. Every morning in high school you would be required to report to your homeroom to get attendance taken- mine was not in a regular classroom but in the schools photography area and darkroom. I started each morning bumping up against enlargers and stop bath so it was natural to develop a curiosity about it. Prior to that I think I wanted to be a fashion designer, but photography got its hooks in me!

The death knell for my future fashion career happened during my first semester as a freshman when the photography teacher showed us a slideshow of Nan Goldin’s work. Having recently discovered a love for all things punk rock and downtown, Nan’s work was a revelation to me. I had no idea photography could be so raw, so real. Her work seemed to embody all the outrageous, dangerous fun a 14 year old from Queens, New York could only dream about.

So, you then moved on to acquire formal training in photography …

I enrolled in the undergraduate program at the Massachusetts College of Art studying under Nick Nixon and Abe Morrell. Nick was a huge influence on me in terms of encouraging me to run with whatever ideas I had- like shooting with the schools 4×5 Crown Graphic in the middle of punk clubs.

[note by Miguel: by the way check out the series of the Brown sisters, 25 yr, by Nick Nixon, stunning is all I can say.]

It is interesting that you studied with Nick Nixon. Besides encouraging your personal exploration -as you say- do you think that his work influenced your aesthetics to take portraits, snapshots of people?

When I entered college and started studying under Nick Nixon, I had only ever used a 35mm camera. Nick introduced me to large format cameras and the beauty of documentary work. I think he influenced my approach to composition much more than my drive to explore portraiture at the time, I spent most of college shooting a documentary style series focusing on my circle of friends and wasn’t particularly interested in formal portraiture.

Nick encouraged the unexpected while showing us how to really focus in on the specifics of what you want to capture. Its that idea of creating a stand alone world out of light and space and gesture that I have carried through with me as a litmus test of what I deem a successful image. I am not a fan of narrative series that fall apart when the images are pulled out on their own. Nick’s guidance and influence can be seen in any image I can create that tells a story on its own as well as within a series.

Which path did you take to initiate your photographic career after finishing college?

After college I shot paparrazzi for a little bit, and completely hated it.

Why exploring work as paparrazzi? Was that driven to access quick money?

Shooting paparazzi seemed like a decent way to make money and use my camera everyday after graduating. I hated it almost immediately- I found it hard to be a big enough bully to force my way through crowds to get a shot and the whole process was just totally uninspiring. Instead of shooting for the agency I was working for I asked to just work in the office helping them archive.

So I worked for a couple of different photo agencies until finally making my way into the photo departments at several big fashion magazines. Working behind the scenes was an invaluable experience that also taught me just how much I wanted to fully be on the flipside as a photographer rather than editor.

Which agencies you worked for?

I worked for Big Pictures and later for Retna and dealt mostly with fashion and celebrity magazines. That was my first real experience with photo editing and I learned a great deal in a short amount of time. I was eventually offered a job at one of the fashion magazines through a friendship I struck up with the photo editor.

Why you did not like to work as a photo editor?

Working at magazines both excited and depressed me- I was learning a lot about how to edit for narrative flow and seeing a ton of other photographers work, but I really started to yearn to be out there shooting as well. I eventually compromised and went freelance as a photo editor so I would have time to make my own work. It’s been an extraordinary learning experience but my passion is absolutely photographing not editing.

Who are the artists that have inspired your work?

As I mentioned before, I had huge crushes on the work of Nan Goldin and Sally Mann in college and shot black and white exclusively. I quickly moved into Eggleston worship and started shooting more and more color film. I recently shot a documentary film thats making the rounds at both national and international festivals and that experience alone dramatically impacted my methods and influences as a photographer.

The films of Werner Herzog and Robert Bresson are influences. The color palette of photographer Evelyn Hofer’s portraiture and the gesturing of Rineke Dijkstra’s beach series are huge influences. I saw a show of Helen Levitt’s work while in Paris recently that just completely knocked my socks off. I’ve been traveling a lot this year and that in itself is an enormous influence- removing myself from the familiar has always been a huge creative impetus for me and has really played into my most recent work. The theme of doing the unfamiliar.

You have in your portfolio very interesting series and excellent portraiture. Could you please tell us about the conceptual process and purpose of your series and how did you get into portraiture?

Some of the series I have worked on (Fishkill, Coney Island) came about because of other creative endeavors I was involved with. Fishkill was a series I shot simultaneous to shooting of my documentary film because I really felt like the quietness of photography was a powerful tool in helping represent that space. It was also here that I really delved into portrait work- something I had not done much of before that.

I began making more portraits- pushing myself to set up more formal shoots, something I had not really had any experience with as a more candid documentary style shooter. Shooting nude portraiture seemed like a natural progression of my ideas to continue pushing myself towards the unknown.

I like a lot your work series Coney Island … the images could be qualified within the genre of street photography … do you like to do street photography? Some photographers like to document the life of people in communities taking portraits of the individuals that they encounter in the street after approaching them and asking for a picture. It is more staged, and at the same time allows for better control of the portrait. Is this an approach you like to explore in your work?

The Coney Island series was a bit of a departure for me, as I don’t consider myself a street photographer in the classical sense. I was inspired by whether or not I could produce something interesting or unexpected from such a well-documented place. I tried to focus more on the mini tableaux playing out as I wandered around rather than attempting to stop and control the situation in any way.

Do you consider your FishKill series a “side product” of your film? Which media did you feel is more effective in conveying the decay of the Fishkill Flea Market?

I think they both help describe different aspects of the location and people. The film was a collaborative effort between myself and my other two co-directors and we had certain narrative threads we wanted to follow and explore within it. My photographs are focused more on my personal relationships with the people of the flea market and my own affinity to the space itself.

The photo series was never specifically intended to be shown in conjunction with the film per se- we have used some of the images for promotional materials but the series came about because I had been interested in photographing there from the first time I visited. Due to interest in the project I just recently decided to publish a monograph of the photographs from the Fishkill Series through Blurb.com, which I’m very excited about.

Moving to portraits. What really drive you into portraits, a personal need to connect with the people, perhaps the need to document people’s? … what are the special challenges you felt while taking pictures of people?

My instinct to start shooting portraits was mostly based on my own need to explore the unfamiliar, challenge myself. I had wrongly assumed that portraiture was staid and unexciting. Once I began shooting them I realized that the scenario of two people in a room, staring at each through a camera was a surprisingly complex situation and rife with tension, anxiety and anticipation. That to me was exciting. I use that nervous energy to draw out what I think will make an interesting image. As a naturally anxious person, I’ve always tried to examine what makes others anxious and how that emotion affects interactions. Anxiety seems to stem from ones perception of the moment at hand so I was really interested in trying to visually capture that sort of concern in its different permutations. I use natural light and give very little direction, barring occasionally asking someone to hold a gesture I like. I prefer to let the scenario unfold naturally between us.

How did you get involved with them, how do you approach to a person to take a picture?

My subjects are a mixture of strangers, friends and friends of friends. Nothing in my approach is very complicated, I just ask. I’ve asked strangers at barbeques and parties and coworkers at some of the magazines I do work for, anyone I find interesting really. Most people are willing to at least consider it and almost all of them offer up friends they think might be interested as well.

Do you feel that your portraits of the Fishkill series portray the individual -as a key subject of the picture or they are just an element of the narrative of the story you try to convey?

In the Fishkill series, my subjects are all people I met during the course of filming and each image is both a portrayal of the individual as a stand-alone subject as well as a collective series about my experience of the place.

I find very interesting and intriguing that you are also involved in the making of films. How do you think that both media complement each other? How do you think that filming and photographic affects your approach for composition with both types of cameras?

I made my first film, a feature documentary, with two other people and none of us had any real filmmaking experience. Having a background in visual language as a photographer was incredibly helpful. Being forced to rethink how to make a composition work within the framework of a moving image both opened up my perspective and strengthened my eye. Shooting the film forced me to interact with strangers in a very direct way I never had before. It really taught me how well that risk could pay off.

Are you planning to combine both documentary film and still photography?

As far as combining the two mediums- I already have to a certain extent. Within the film we included a photomontage that acts more as a filmic moment rather than a more typical photography slideshow.

Your portraits are really extraordinary. Is this the main genre you plan to explore moving forward?

Thank you, and yes for the time being absolutely. I’ve only just scratched the surface in exploring what more I want to do with it.

Why do you think that nude photography was a natural progression for your work? Do you think that the challenges of nude photography are different from other types of portraiture?

Shooting nudes seemed to me to be the next logical step further in exploring the tensions inherent in portrait photography. One of the differences or challenges in shooting nudes is just finding people willing to pose. Men tend to be much more skittish about it in my experience. I think with all my subjects there is a certain level of trust applied to the situation but the normal feelings of nervousness and anticipation are heightened when you’re sitting starkers in your living room with a stranger! Each individual brings their own feelings about nudity to the scenario and that can very much alter the mood of a shoot and I think add another layer to the images.

What are the main challenges you have experienced as an emerging photographer and what are the main challenges you encounter at this moment in your career?

I think the biggest hurdle is simply getting eyes on your work. There are a lot of people all vying for the same galleries and contests and attention and you really have to find your own voice and stand out from the crowd. I’m still in the throes of feeling my way around self-promotion. My main challenges right now are just continuing to get my work out there. I would love to get into some smaller shows with the ultimate goal of a solo at some point. I’m also very interested in shooting editorial work.

Please tell me about one photograph, an image that is especial for you?

A photograph I shot of my husband standing in a motel doorway several years ago is very special to me. It represents the shift in my life back to photographer. After going straight into photo editing after college, I had abandoned shooting almost entirely. Around the time of that image I had just started to pick up my cameras again and feel the need to make my own work. We had also just begun production on our film at that point so it was a hugely creative period for me. That image encompasses all those feelings of hopefulness.

Would you mind to describe two photographers that you specially admire and you think influence your work, ideally one emerging photographer and one classic or established photographer?

I doubt she’s still categorized as emerging but a younger photographer I have always been incredibly drawn to is Katy Grannan‘s. Her work is both immediate and deeply thoughtful and I suppose I feel a bit of a kinship with her interest in disquiet and voyeurism. An established photographer I greatly admire is Helen Levitt, more specifically her color work. I was lucky enough to catch an exhibit of it while in Paris recently and it just floored me. Her wonderful sense of humor and affection for her subjects is apparent in all her work and something I deeply admire.

Do you feel that contemporary photography has evolved the aesthetics of photography in a significant manner from 30-50 years ago. Are we in a moment of evolution or revolution in photography?

The aesthetics of contemporary photography seems to me to be in a state of push/pull with the past. A new genre of digitally altered and manipulated imagery rubbing up against a resurgence of interest in view camera work. I’m not sure if that is indicative of an evolution/revolution or just a reflection on the seemingly endless choices our new digital age can offer. Old photographs look new! New photographs look old! 50 years ago the choices weren’t so vast.

How do you see digital photography affecting the photographic industry in the future?

The ease of digital is very democratizing, everyone can be a photographer! Unfortunately I think it also allows for a certain degree of laziness. It strips a bit of the thought involved out of the creative process and I think that can lead to a glut of sub par work, most specifically in the stock field. Will it change the industry? I’m not sure I’m qualified to answer that as someone who recently made the switch back to shooting negative film!

Thank you very much Jennifer for your candor to share your thinking and experience as a photographer. I really wish you the best moving forward and take for granted that I will be very interested to see your progression as an artist in the future. I think you are an excellent example of the new generation of photographers that will have a definitive and lasting influence in the field during the next decades. Never stop pursuing your vision, it is a joy for us to see it turning into excellent work.

Via Gallery Hopper, I found the newest work of the great Michael Kenna, a series of New York City that was exhibited at the Robert Mann Gallery (images here) in New York. It is wonderful to see the unique “Kenna” style, with dark shadows, high contrast and clean lines. His work provides a distinct look of “perhaps” the most photographed city in the world. Few weeks ago I had the opportunity to see some of his prints and I have to say that if you ever get the chance to see a print from Michael Kenna prepare yourself to turn breathless. They are so amazing.

My fellow blogger and photographer Doug Stockdale, is having a hard time accessing blogs while traveling in China. Here I loan him again a post so he can share his experiences and findings on how to access a blog when you are in China. If any reader has information on how the censorship that limits access to external blogs from China works, or how to get around it, please share it with us. Here there is some information about China Censorship from wikipedia.

China Blog Blocking
by Doug Stockdale, photo-blogger, Singular Images

If you are a photo-blogger, or really any blogger, and you don’t get many ‘views’ from China, it’s more than just a language issue. And the reason may also explain why you don’t get much visibility in other tightly controlled governmental regions of the world.

During my recent assignment in China last Fall, I found that I was totally unable to post, administrate or view my blog Singular Images. Grrrr, what the heck was going on? And I could not access most of my other favorite blogs, so how was I to find out what was REALLY going on in the world? Anyhow, I am not a techie, but I was not going to give up easily. So I tried other computers, internet browsers, servers, etc. to no avail. NO can do!

So after returning to California, I started posting my images from China and venting my frustrating experience. A photo blogger from WanHu China then commented on something I was beginning to suspect, it was not me but the China Blogger ‘Red Guard’. Yes, it was not ME! I now can say that China is not Blogger Friendly, but there is a way. So the blogger sent me the Chinese blog ‘work around’ and it’s very complicated and not simple. Yikes! Complicated and not simple, and I have problems with simple;- )

So now that I am back in China on another assignment , I had left a message on my blog that I am not available until the end of the month. Oh, well.

But I have not given up yet! I am now working on a ‘simple’ way to increase access and I think that I have a couple of recommendations that break the China blocking filter code. And I suspect that these same blog blockers are being utilized by other governments that don’t condone blogs.

First, you’re blog URL can not be the traditional blog name with the ‘dot’ truncating the name from the blog service, such as mine: www.singularimages.wordpress.com and typical of WordPress, Blogger and Typepad. Any URL with the dot-truncated name is going to have major issues. Two potential solutions to this, first is to have a single word URL such as my web gallery: www.douglasstockdale.com, which works here. Another alternative is to use slashes to provide the address name, such as Jorg Colberg’s Conscientious site: www.jmcolberg.com/weblog/

Second, you are going to have to eliminate the word ‘blog’ from any of your website title, name and meta data. Until China puts a block on it, ‘weblog’ could be one of your alternatives. My guess is that someone from the China Blogger Red Guard will soon read this, but pretty soon they will have to block just everything and that is going to make a bigger mess over here.

This may not be perfect fix, such as this blog, exposurecompensation.com, is not readable in China and Miguel just did a check of his source code and meta data which does not use the word ‘blog’. But at least if you make these changes, you improve your readability odds;- )

As I was not entirely sure about the meta data, I tried a little experiment and did a Google of bunch of words and terms I felt were sensitive for China. Such as the following words: democracy, Christianity, politics, religion and nude as well as a whole bunch more. Most did single word URLs not have a problem, but ‘democracy’ was really mixed (Duh!) and ‘nude’ was a solid block. So of course, I tried a few courser variations on nude and they were also blocked. But when I went to a photo web site that has some beautiful nudes such as Kim Weston’s, no problems. So that is when I suspected that China employs two types of filters, both the truncated URL as well as the wording of the meta data and web titles.

Thus, one of my projects when I return to California next month is to modify how I have my blog running on the internet, eliminate the dot-truncation and to make sure that my meta data does not have the word ‘blog’, probably use ‘weblog’. I have read some blogs here in China that do meet these conditions and use a blogger service, such as WordPress, as the backbone. I just need to figure out how!

Thus, if you want to have a greater impact with your photo-blogging, especially in China, you might want to consider doing the same.

By the way, if you are going to China, there is a way to at least read your blogs while here, but it won’t help to administrate, at least for WordPress. With thanks to Meredith at OFOTO Gallery, you can use the following ‘simple’ process; type in the following URL and at the end, add the URL for the blog you want to read.

http://anonymouse.org/cgi-bin/anon-www.cgi/http://(then your blog URL)

For example, for my blog Singular Images, I used the following URL here in China to view it:

http://anonymouse.org/cgi-bin/anon-www.cgi/http://singularimages.wordpress.com/

Best regards and currently reporting from JiaShan China,
Your foreign investigative photo-blogging reporter, Doug Stockdale

Contemporary Photography is alive and flourishing in Shanghai China.

by Doug Stockdale, photo-blogger of Singular Images.

While on another assignment in China, I had the opportunity to go into Shanghai this last weekend and spend time in the M50 district, Shanghai’s version of NCY’s SoHo. This is also the location of the four active photography galleries of Shanghai

• OFOTO Gallery
• M97 Gallery
• Epsite, Epson Imaging Gallery
• ArtSea Photography Gallery.

There is also a fifth gallery, 1918 Artspace which will occasionally include photography and is about a 6 minute Taxi from the M50 district.

You will immediately know that you are in the region of the M50 district, located at 50 MoGanShan Road, by the presence of street art and graffiti, of which you see very little of in greater Shanghai.

Two of the photography galleries had opening exhibits last weekend, one had a continuation of an existing exhibit and the fourth was a standing exhibit of the gallery’s artist. With the exception of the last gallery, ArtSea, the other three were spacious, well lit and a pleasure to walk about and view the exhibiting work. So here follows a quick rundown of the three of the five galleries of interest.

OFOTO Gallery was opening a one person exhibit (1/19 – 2/14) of Yan Xinfa, who’s beautifully printed black & white images were taken in Central China, where he lives and works. He has been continuing to document his surrounding area over the last twenty years. I had inadvertently ‘crashed’ the gallery an hour before the planned opening that evening, but providing them with a copy of LensWork magazine with my recently published series as my ‘business card’ did wonders for breaking the ice and providing an introduction. As a result, I had an hour to walk the exhibit with Yan and discuss his work. I have requested a low resolution of his image Xiaoguan 2002 for further discussion later in February.

At Epsite Epson Imaging Gallery was the opening of a one person exhibit (1/19 – 3/2) of Zeng Li, “Tale of Two Cities” which were large panorama color prints taken in Beijing and Shanghai. Yes, extremly large color images printed by a very wide Epson printer. The images were beautiful and stunning landscapes, both grand and more intimate. The close up studies were the more compelling and interesting to me, the other grand landscapes a little too documentary and without making much of a personal connection.

At M97, less than a block from the M50 group of galleries, was an extension of a previous exhibit, Lost and Found Exhibition. The two photographers exhibiting were Meng Jin and Fang Er. Fang had color and black & white images from two series, The Zoo and The Sweetest Thing, while Meng had color images from three series, Every Room is Illuminated, Will You Come? Or Shall I Go? and A Room with a View. In addition, M97 also had prints hanging of other artist that they represent. All in all, it is a kaleidoscope of colors, images, feelings and diverse work.

As four of the five galleries are within a couple of minutes walk of each other, with a sprinkling of other galleries, book stores and coffee shops, this is a great destination and opportunity to see the best contemporary photography in Shanghai. Oh, yes, and at this time of year, expect cold drizzly rain, turning to sleet and snow flurries and bone chilling wind. But the images you find may warm your soul and stimulate your mind.

Also of note, a lot of the Chinese photographers publish their work in softbound books which are wonderfully inexpensive, such as the one I purchased of the photographer Luo Yongjin titled About Face for 50 RMB, which is about $7.00 USD. I will write more about Luo at another time.

Best regards and currently reporting from PingHu China, Doug Stockdale

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is home to the deadliest war in the world today. An estimated 5.4 million people have died since 1998, the largest death toll since the Second World War, according to the International Rescue Committee (IRC).

You can see the impressive multimedia photographic work by Marcus Bleasdale [from Agency VII] at MediaStorm. If you are interested you can purchase a DVD or a book of this heartbreaking work, and if you are generous you can donate at any organization mentioned in the article. It is really a shame for all humanity that this world is still experiencing never ending tragedies like this one in Congo … sadly, it is just one more among others.

Thomas Misik is a German photographer that photographs spaces where geometry, color and composition create an illusion of unpopulated areas isolated from their own context. His work shows the space as an art form, sterile, without human presence. Unfortunately, it is not easy to find much of his work online but found some interesting images via galerie-poller. The navigation is not very intuitive: click on the images until you see thumbnails on the right side, with galleries for different years. Click on the thumbnails to see larger images.