South x Southeast photomagazine Now Launched!

South x Southeast, the new online photomagazine of photography in the Southeast, is now launched.

Ths first issue is rich with imagery by Shelby Lee Adams, Anderson Scott, Brandon Schulman; interviews with Jack Spencer and Marylin Suriani; a feature on the museum at Hampton University; a report on Look3 2011; and a whole slew of other stuff.

This is a must-see, folks. Check it out.

June in One One Thousand

The New Orleans-based photography ezine One One Thousand has featured some strong, thoughtful, and challenging B&W work in June. 

This work includes the exceptionally strong as well as witty work by once-Washington, DC-based, but now Portland, Or, based photographer Lauren Henkin in her portfolio The Other Charleston, about the Charleston in West Virginia (see her image Pressed for Time, above).

I suspect Lauren has been looking long and well at urban landscape work by Walker Evans, especially his work in Bethlehem, PA from 1935, but she also brings to this work an exceptionally careful compositional eye, a concern for making the most from the smallest number of elements in the frame, and a a healthy sense of irony.

Lauren's work is available to us in a variety of ways, including her website  at laurenhenkin.com, her hand made books at laurenhenkinbooks.com, her blog at laurenhenkinblog.com, and her interviews with gallerists, curators, educators, artists, and others at Photo Radio --  photoradioblog.com.

Also on One One Thousand this month, displaying its own particular brand of wit and irony, has been the portfolio of St Augustine, FL-based photographer Alexander Diaz, showing us Florida's Mountains. 

If you missed the fact that Florida has mountains, be assured the "mountains" in Diaz' images are not the mountains familiar from traditional landscape photography of the Ansel Adams school, but mounds of earth thrown up by the displacement of the land to make way for suburban sprawl.

Through the use of carefully-chosen camera angles, Diaz shows us "resemblances of natural landscapes . . . metaphors, . . . indications of a transformation and act as painful reminders of a natural grandeur that no longer exists." He goes on, "I photograph these mounds to remind the viewer of the beauty that has been lost to progress. Not only are we losing what our society finds aesthetically pleasing, but more importantly, we are rapidly degrading what sustains us."

Diaz' work is a reminder that part of what concerns photographers today is the effect of photographing something on the way we see it, or the ways the act of photography shapes the reality we see, or think we see. The effect of this work requires, in part, holding together the image we see and the thing we know intellectually we are seeing photographed, as well as the tradition of landscape photographs to which Diaz' work alludes.

More of Diaz' work is on view at his website, http://alexdiazphoto.com/home.html.

Fall Line Press Opens in Atlanta

Fall Line Press, a new photo book publishing enterprise created by Atlanta photographers William Boling and Michael David Murphy, is opening officially this Thursday, June 30th, 2011, at their headquarters at Brickworks, 1000 Marietta Street, Suite 112, in Atlanta, GA.

Fall Line publisher William Boling says the press is dedicated to the belief that the book is the way to combine photographs and writing, a combination that in his view has "from the beginning struck the central chord of the photographic medium."

He goes on: "Each generation of artists, photographers, writers and their audiences" has "turned to the book to communicate and explore . . . extended forms and complex statements" about the world. "Fall Line is devoted to working closely with contemporary artists, photographers and writers to produce works in books and editions that connect with these times and our community to move ahead the conversations that shape how we think and feel."

Fall Line's inaugural publication is the launching of a quarterly called Free Fall, which will feature each year the work of one photographer. Each volume of Free Fall (four issues) will be published in a limited edition of 50 signed copies, at a cost of $50.00.

The first volume will feature the work of Atlanta photographer Laura Noel and will be available at the official opening of the Press on June 30th. Volume Two will feature the work of  Maury Gortemiller, yet another member of the thriving Atlanta-based photography community. It will begin to appear this fall. 

The Fall Line Press facility also includes a photography book reading room, a true treasure in this or any age. Fall Line also has a blog you can follow, here --http://blog.falllinepress.com/  And you can read more about Fall Line here, from the GrapeHouse blog.

The Fall Line offices would seem to me to be the place to be if you are in Atlanta this Thursday. Fall Line Press seems to me like a courageous act of faith in the power of the book and of paper and ink when the trend of history in photography seems to be going on-line and electronic. Best wishes, folks, and keep me posted on your plans.

The South on Facing Change/Documenting America

We've just learned about a new website called Facing Change/Documenting America which describes itself as the work of a "non-profit collective of dedicated photojournalists and writers coming together to explore America and to build a forum to chart its future."

The photographers include David Burnett, Alan Chin, Debbie Fleming Caffery, Danny Wilcox Frazier, Stanley Greene, Brenda Ann Kenneally, Andrew Lichtenstein, Carlos Javier Ortiz, Lucian Perkins, and  Anthony Suau.

Of this group, only Debbie Fleming Caffrie (as best as I can tell) is formally a Southerner -- and she has first-rate work on this site -- but a number of the other photographers have done projects in the South for Facing Change.

These include Lucian Perkin' series on Christmas in Central Texas, Alan Chin's soulful images in the Deep South series, Andrew Lichtenstein's Civil War Anniversary portfolio and his West Virginia portfolio The Battle for Blair Mountain, and of course Debbie Fleming Caffrie's portfolio Louisiana.

FCDA takes its inspiration from the Farm Security Administration's work during the Great Depression and intends to "cover and publish under-reported aspects of America’s most urgent issues and distribute the work through a innovative online platform while highlighting the efforts of individuals and organizations working to affect positive change." 

To do this, it will "embed photographer/writer teams in communities across America to vividly illustrate the nation’s most pressing concerns-from health care to immigration to the cost of the war on terror. The result will be an unparalleled collection of visual and textual narratives accessible through an innovative online platform-called the Public Sphere–enabling a direct dialogue with America on the stories and issues"

The writers involved with FC/DA are also first-class. They include Dan Baum, Katherine Boo, Alan Burdick, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Eliza Griswold, Margaret Knox, Alex Kotlowitz, Andrew Meier, and David Samuels.

There is strong work here, and we will try to keep up with work they publish that has a Southern focus. All the best, folks, in your ambitious undertaking.

South X Southeast Photo Magazine about to Launch

Nancy McCrary, Publisher of the new magazine South by Southeast, announces that her magazine will appear on July 1st, 2011, and monthly thereafter.

Nancy describes the magazine as "a new online monthly and in-print quarterly magazine that will bring you anything and everything about photography in and of the Southeast. From galleries of work by our established masters to interesting series by new emerging artists—you’ll be covered. You will also see feature videos of the artists discussing their work while bringing you into their studios, as well as beautiful imagery they've created in motion."

She promises that Issue One, launching July 1st, will include Images from Shelby Lee Adams's new book Salt and Truth (see image above), Anderson Scott's Civil War Re-enactors photography, and Brandon Schulman's landscape photography, as well as interviews with photographer Jack Spencer and Marilyn Suriani,  videos of William Eggleston and Larry Fink, and reports on festivals, museums, and (as they always say), much, much more.

In addition to Nancy the Publisher, John A. Bennette is serving as Artistic Director.

You can learn more at sxsemagazine.com, their website, or by contacting nancy@sxsemagazine.com.

All this good stuff doesn't come free, but they are offering a special introductory rate of $12/yr for the online version of the magazine.

I've already signed up for a subscription and look forward to seeing what the future holds for this new venue for photography in the American South.

Southerners Figure Large in PDN's Fine Art Issue

PDN has published its Fine Art Issue for 2011, and Southerners figure prominently throughout the issue.

Especially significant is the selection of a portfolio of work by Virginia-based photographer Matt Eich as one of six bodies of work featured in the section called The Curator -- The Search for Outstanding and Undiscovered Fine Art Photography.

One of Matt's images in this portfolio is the image On the Corner (see above) from his ongoing portfolio Sin and Salvation in Baptist Town, made in Greenwood, Mississippi. Matt is certainly not unknown to readers of this blog, and we salute him on this exceptional recognition of his craft.

Also included among five photography collectors under the title "What Collectors Want" are comments from Houston's Joan Morgenstern (who says she wants photographs that make her "hands start to itch") and Wilson, NC's Allen Thomas (who wants photographs from living photographers that are either one-of-a-kind images or prints from small editions).

There is also an announcement of a forthcoming show of work from Lexington, KY photographer Ralph Eugene Meatyard at the Art Institute of Chicago, opening on July 2nd of this year, as well as a new book of essays on Meatyard by Eugenia Parry and Elizabeth Diegel, entitled Ralph Eugene Meatyard: Dolls and Masks, out from Radius Books.

I had not thought of Meatyard as a Southern photographer, but it makes more sense the more I think about it. I wish he and Flannery O'Conner had been able to collaborate on a book together.

Finally, of course, and on a much sadder note, is the tribute to Raleigh, NC photographer Chris Hondros, who along with Tim Hetherington, died earlier this year in Libya. So lets end with an image by Chris that won the Robert Capa Gold Medal in 2005 -- One Night in Tal Afar.

May he rest in peace.

Catching Up: Notes at Midsummer

I've been dealing with connectivity issues recently, so I'm a bit behind in my work. I will try to catch up a bit by pulling together some brief notes on several items of interest.

1. Tommy Kha, Memphis-based photographer, has an essay on his photographic influences on the OneOneThousand blog as a part of their ongoing Visual Influences series.  Tommy has a number of interesting things to say about Southern culture, and on the challenges he faced in constructing for himself a sense of a lineage as a photographer. 

2. Jennifer Schwartz, of Atlanta's Jennifer Schwartz Gallery, has started a program called THE TEN in which she selects a photographer, provides and promotes an online show on THE TEN website, and sells all the pieces in the show for a set price of $250.00.

The current artist featured on THE TEN is Rachel Barrett, whose work looks like it was photographed in the South, but it wasn't.

3. There is a new arts magazine from New Orleans, called Pelican Bomb, and this issue features an essay on the work of photographer Jonathan Traviesa, along with examples of his work, including the image above. 

More later.

Andy Levin's Students in 100Eyes

New Orleans-based photographer Andy Levin conducted a workshop at PhotoNOLA in 2010 for photographers interested in documenting the homeless in New Orleans. He's published the work of his students in his 100Eyes blog, in an essay entitled Homeless in New Orleans, featuring the work of photographers Kenneth Marti, Meryt Harding, Sarah Hawkins, and Levin himself.

There is powerful work here, well worth your attention. Frustrating, though, that the photographers aren't more fully identified. I can't distinguish the work of one photographer from another in Levin's essay, nor can I find links to their websites, and i can't find their websites through my usual search processes.

If Andy happens on this blog entry and can send me more information, I will be happy to add it to this entry. The work is well worth seeing and the shooters deserve the recognition.

100Eyes is definitely an on-line photo magazine to keep up with, and Andy himself is doing strong work.

Andy grew up in New York City, but moved to New Orleans in 2004. Since then, he as devoted his work to documenting the struggle of economically challenged people for their rights and opportunities and to the relationship between a changing environment and the economically challenged. He was a finalist for the Eugene Smith Prize in 2008.

Coming Home: Or, Cultural Change in the South

Atlanta-based photographer Erik S. Lesser's image of New York real estate agent Danitta Ross looking at her new home in Atlanta illustrates an intriguing story in today's New York Times about African-Americans who are moving back to the South.

The Times describes this phenomenon as a major reversal of the Great Migration, during which millions of Southern African-Americans moved to cities of the North seeking economic opportunity and freedom from the oppression of post-Civil War Jim Crow laws and Southern apartheid.

Now, however,things seem to be reversed. The Times quotes Spencer Crew, a history professor at George Mason University who was the curator of a prominent exhibit on the Great Migration at the Smithsonian Institution, to the effect that "blacks see more opportunities in the South."

The South now represents the potential for achievement for black New Yorkers in a way it had not before, Professor Crew said. "New York has lost some of its cachet for black people, During the Great Migration, blacks went north because you could find work if you were willing to hustle. But today, there is less of a struggle to survive in the South than in New York. Many blacks also have emotional and spiritual roots in the South. It is like returning home.”

All I can say is, welcome home. Hold us accountable. Help us live up to what the South can be.

Pamela Pecchio in Women in On-Line Photography Show, also in FlakPhoto

Charlottesville-based photographer Pamela Pecchio has a portfolio of work called  On Longing, Distance and Heavy Metal  featured now on the Women in Photography section of the Humble Arts Foundation's website. 

 Pamela says this body of work comes from a period of time when she was commuting between North Carolina and Virginia, making a 3 1/2 hour journey to connect these two places in her life. Reconnecting with her love of heavy metal music as she drove, she also began to make images of the landscapes through which she passed.

Working at dawn and dusk with a large format camera, she sought to make images that are "complex and dissonant, sometimes barren, sometimes lovely, and densely layered like both heavy metal and my internal state. "I have drawn upon the history of landscape photography," she says, "to project my psychological condition onto the natural world. My goal is to evoke in the viewer a response to the work that is equivalent to the response I had to my surroundings."

Pamela Pecchio was born in Massachusetts in 1974, but was raised in Atlanta, Georgia. She received her BFA from the University of Georgia in 1998 and her MFA in Photography from the Yale University School of Art in 2001. 

Pamela is having great success with the increasingly important world of online exhibitions. In addition to the show on the Humble Arts Foundation website, she also has an image from this portfolio on Flak Foto, as their featured work, HERE.

Catching Up -- Southern Photography, Eggleston on NBC

The second Southern Photography issue of the journal Southern Cultures, from UNC-Chapel Hill,  is out, go HERE for more. This promises to be a fine issue, with a rich collection of articles by Tom Rankin and Susan Harbage Page, and others, and featuring this work of William Eggleston, William Christenberry, and Eugene Smith.

Thanks to Fraction Magazine for a link to an interview on NBC's Today Show with Memphis photographer and photographic legend William Eggleston HERE.

REMINDER -- Look3 in Charlottesville, also Southern Views Show

Pamela Pecchio writes to remind us that Look3 begins June 9th, 2011 and runs through June 11th, 2011,  in Charlottesville, Virginia, and that the show now up at the University of Virginia's and originally scheduled to end soon has been extended through Look3.

The show, SOUTHERN VIEWS, is up at the University of Virginia Art Museum, 155 Rugby Road, in Charlottesville, through June 11th. It includes work by Southern photographers Emmet Gowin, Sally Mann, and Pamela Pecchio.

The Look3 Festival features Mary Ellen Mark, Sally Mann, Massimo Vitali, Antonin Kratochvil, Nan Golden,Steve McCurry, and a whole slew of other photographers.

Downtown Charlottesville will be transformed into a photographer's dream destination, with exhibitions, workshops, talks, and informal gatherings everywhere you turn.

If you are going to Look3, make sure to stop by the Museum to see the show. It will be well worth your time.