Misty Keasler
*****
"Aunt Myrtle's Cat" 2008, photography, dimensions unknown
"Manga Room, Hotel Adonis, Osaka, Japan", 2004, photography, dimensions unknown
*****
In two different series Misty Keasler opens up a dialogue between her viewer and culture. Personal preference is addressed in both her ivestigation of the public and the private. In "Aunt Myrtle's Cat", she is taking a portrait of her aunt without having her in the photo at all. Rather, its her taxidermy cat. This image talks about the personality of her aunt and suggests the importance of this cat in her life. The Love Room series investigates sexuality and sexual preference. She photographs and displays these special rooms meant for a couple (couple being a debatable word) on a more public platform, such as books, internet and gallery and references sexual fetish. In both series she is creating work that is based in personal preference and attachment.
*****
I never try to be objective when taking photographs - which is ironic because I believe the finished edited series are much more objective and straight forward than I am (it is important to me that I don't shove my viewpoint down anyone's throat, give the audience room to breath and think on their own). But I generally always find that I am seduced by my subjects and I fall in love with them. I think this is quite evident in the orphanage and dump photographs - those series are quite warm and have a warm palette. These are contrasted by the Love Hotels where the perspective is much colder and reflective of the lack of love hastily covered by bright colors and trappings to fill the gap. But to answer your question, I let myself get involved - I sponsor a kid in the Guatemala City Dump and would like to one day adopt from one of the orphanages I have photographed. Sometimes what I have been exposed to keeps me up at night, but I think something is wrong with photographers who can be there, make exposures and leave without being haunted. We need to be challenged and to have our lifestyles challenged. I find a balance between this and dignifying my subjects by making all the series cultural studies, explorations and portraits of spaces and rooms.
*****
Colberg, Jorg. "A Conversation with Misty Keasler." Conscientious. 15 June 2007. 21 Sep 2008
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Artist 6:
Tina Barney
*****
Title Unknown, circa 1980, photograph, dimensions unknown
"Marina's Room", 1987, photography, dimensions unknown
*****
Tina Barney is a rich north easterner with a 4x5 camera, which she does not know how to use. Her work is about her rich family, her privileged life and her family drama. Is she commenting on the nouveau riche or is she just a spoiled girl taking photo snapshots? Her work is a staged document of her life. I chose her because it is my personal belief that she (like many other privileged children) cant see past the tip of her own nose and she takes these photos because she can. I find them to be extremely successful because of this. Its self absorbed and unapologetic ad suggests that all may not be well although it seems to be on the surface.
*****
So the Story Goes is the name of an exhibition highlighting the work of five contemporary photographers who use personal images not only as their inspiration, but as the very core of their art. Tina Barney, Sally Mann, Philip-Lorca Dicorcia, Larry Sultan and Nan Goldin have produced large prints of photographs that cannot help but lure and keep the viewer. The amateur photographer strives for perfection in photos that exist as evidence of his or her own life, but these artists use the messiness and flaws of personal details in order to draw us into the narrative. And we eat it up. Photography grants us permission to stop and stare, to eavesdrop, to spy and to observe. These five photographers have invited us to examine their friends and families, their relationships and settings. We in turn must pass judgment and a critical eye over their honesty and offerings.
*****
arctic.edu, sabine7. "So The Story Goes." ArtMoco. 11 Dec 2006
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Artist 7:
Philip Lorca Dicorcia
*****
"Tennile", 2004, photograph, 69x49 inches
"Julliette Ms. Muse", 2004, photograph, 69x49 inches
*****
In his series Lucky 13 dicorcia presents thirteen photos of strippers on poles in the LA/Vegas area. It could be argued that these photos look somewhat like Christian Martyrs, however I believe that read is too simple for what the artist was going for. In these photos the women are showing no emotion, theyre flying through the air, however look still. They are anatomy studies. This fits into the relm of the personal because we, as a society place our morals, or better yet, moral superiority onto the women involved in the industry. This artists doesnt suggest that he is for or against the dancer or the institution. This dives head first into the discussion of personal because he does the opposite. These images are shockingly benign.
*****
Philip-Lorca diCorcia’s “Lucky 13” is a collection of thirteen full-body portraits. His subjects are pole dancers at work. Some people will be dismayed by his choice to shoot these women. Others will be disappointed by his impartial eye, which doesn’t glamorize or vilify them. As for me, I was floored.
It’s become trendy to talk about the “mainstreaming” of the sex industry. However, most images of sex work tend to be informed by one of two ideologies. According to the first, sex work is de facto awful and everyone who does it is a victim, or pure evil. According to the second, sex work is endless fun, and everyone who claims to have been hurt or exploited by the industry is a liar, and pure evil. “Lucky 13” belongs to neither camp. The women in diCorcia’s portraits don’t look tragic, nor do they look like they’re having the time of their lives. They look like women at work.
To state the obvious: all the subjects of “Lucky 13” are in various stages of undress. So are lots of the female subjects at the Met and the Louvre. But this is no Odalisque, with a naked woman lying passively on display. These women are in action, which gives them a sort of power. You have to respect the athleticism of their performance. DiCorcia catches them in incredible poses, holding themselves in the air with one hand on the pole, with two legs wrapped on the pole, with one leg wrapped around the pole, with what looks like nothing. He places emphasis on the performance, and not its context, by shooting the dancers in empty clubs and by illuminating them with a harsh white spotlight, placed directly above the frame. This light shows dust on the soles of their feet, wrinkles, scars, the sheen of sweat on a dancer’s chest, and the way that the pole tugs at the skin of another woman’s stomach. It makes them human. It also emphasizes their remarkable physical strength. These women have muscles: pronounced, tensed, capable muscles, the lines of which are shown up by the black shadows cast in that hard white light. They’ve arranged their practiced bodies into states of extraordinary grace. The women of “Lucky 13” are not only athletes, they’re artists in their own right. DiCorcia doesn’t portray them as desired bodies, or debated bodies, but rather as extraordinary examples of the human body and its potential.
*****
sadyo, "Philip-Lorca diCorcia: Lucky 13 - PaceWildenstein, NYC." Culture Catch. 29 Sept 2005. 21 Sep 2008
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Artist 8:
Nobuyoshi Araki
*****
Polaroids, 1997, polaroid photo, approx 3x4 inches each
Polaroids, 1997, polaroid photo, approx 3x4 inches each
*****
Arguably the Nan Goldin of Japan, Nobuyoshi Araki photographs his life. He shoots everything from the prostitutes he pays, to the dinner he ate and everything in between. Theyre overwhelming. They tell many many stories all at once. They play on the idea of document, but these picture are more than a document. They are a sad sad tale of a very lonely mans life. Why does he share this work? Why is it important that we see yet another diarist? Is this the male version of Tracy Emin? These photos are captivating, no doubt, but who are they for? Why are they successful? Is there some discussion going on or is this just gratuitous?
*****
"If I didn't have photography," Nobuyoshi Araki has said, "I'd have absolutely nothing. My life is all about photography, and so life is itself photography." Araki's art overflows with life, and his life is awash in images. They are good, bad, indifferent; posed, random, accidental; prurient, erotic, anarchistic, touching, vulgar, lascivious, lurid, sentimental. The cumulative effect is overwhelming.
This Thursday, the most comprehensive exhibition of the 65-year-old Japanese photographer's work to be held in Britain opens at the Barbican in London, filling both floors of the main gallery. Subtitled Self. Life. Death, the show covers the entirety of Araki's career, from the early 1960s onwards. Coinciding with the exhibition, Phaidon Press is publishing a major monograph, and the Barbican is screening Arakimentari, a funny and often moving documentary about his life and work.
There are thousands of images in the exhibition, each one unframed, even the many vintage prints on show, and pinned directly to the wall in grids, clusters, arrays, cinematic runs and groups. It might be bewildering, especially in as awkward a space as the Barbican, with its balcony and bays, the columns and intrusive staircase, the obstructed sightlines. But, for once, these are turned to good advantage. One is kept constantly on the move - and Araki's art is all about movement and restlessness, even though he returns again and again to the same fixations. From sex scenes to the street, and to portraits, clothed and unclothed, of Araki's models and lovers. Pictures of the dishes the artist ate on his visits to Seoul, and every meal he ate with his wife, the week she was at home during her terminal illness. Tokyo seen from the passenger seat of a car, the images abutted into a continuous tracking shot. I keep reminding myself that this isn't the half of it, that the curators have consciously excluded some of Araki's most iconic images. A complete show of Araki would be impossible."
*****
Adrian Searle, "Dirty Pretty Things." Guardian-UK. 4Oct 2005. 22 Sep 2008
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