Re: Control at the basement of The Oubliette, 8th of January, 2010. (photo: Peter Watkins)

The photography show Re: Control will be closing it’s doors on tuesday 12th of January together with the latest base of The Oubliette art house.  Unfortunately, the magnificent space on Shaftesbury Av. in central London will be once again vacant for rat’s and pigeons to do their thing.  It has still been a fruitful month for everyone involved in the shows, exhibition’s, performances and gigs that were organized by the fantastic crew of the Oub.  I look forward to the next interim base.

The Oubliette is currently located at 136 Shaftesbury Av.
If you wish to attend to the show, call the number on the door (open till late)

Desert Storm (12)

Hope to see you at the show !

I will have my series Portraits, with a few new additions to the ones on my website, at Re: Control, a photography exhibition curated by Lorenzo Durantini as part of the cultural agenda of The Oubliette art house.

Private View:
6pm, Thursday 6th of January
136 Shaftesbury Avenue
W1D 5EZ

A London Dandy’s Afternoon Tea?

Click to Enlarge

The second portrait is of Sebastian, a London based sculptor.  I suppose that this is a less obvious photograph as it does not explicitly scream fashion, but none the less, it is quite posed and directed.  I really like this photograph.  When I look at it I have the feeling I’ve seen it before (as with the previous one, clue: HN), but again, it is very general and I can’t relate it particularly to one photographer.

The expression of Sebastian is somewhere in between thoughtful, worried, and contemplative.  His awkward position, the coffee and the newspaper place him in an indeterminate time, a pause perhaps, which we both know wont be very long.

The photographs around him, seem to be people that are in his mind.  The mirror only shows us more photographs and he appears to be only in their company.  The wood and the chairs have a french feeling.  Is he in France?  As we look at the top left, the blackboard is written in english and the prices in pounds.

Click to Enlarge

Any more thoughts? Please feel free to comment.

Doug Rickard, A New American Picture

This year’s trip to Paris was great in many ways. If it is Paris Photo you want to know about, unfortunately there is not much to say about it.  I was hoping that at least there would be some interesting books and publishers, but not really.  Regarding books, publishers have turned to Offprint, a small in size, large in content independent book fair. (Here is a list of the publishing houses at the fair).

Amongst my favorite books was “Winning Mentality, Victor Starr” by Mishka Henner, “A New American Picture” by Doug Rickard.  Unfortunately due economical reasons I wasn’t able to get A New American picture… so if someone is feeling generous…

Then there was “Anonymes, L’Amerique Sans Nom: Photogrphie et Cinéma” at Le Bal curated by David Campany & Diane Dufour.  It included work from Walker Evans, Anthony Hernandez, Bruce Gilden, Sharon Lockhart (80′ brilliant film), Jeff Wall and Doug Rickard amongst others.

“Unamed America in Photography and Film
Since the 1930s the mainstream culture of America has celebrated individuality and the self, while nearly all its important image makers have addressed the nondescript, the flattening of daily experience and the pervading sense of anonymity. These have been the country’s twin gifts to the world’s visual culture and their contradictions and tensions are now experienced everywhere. Anonymes brings together work by some of the several generations of significant photographers and filmmakers of the post-war era who have found innovative ways of addressing this situation.”

-David Campany & Diane Dufour

The exhibition will continue until December 19, so if you are in Paris before that, I highly recommend you go have a look.  But don’t order the Ox tail at the restaurant if you happen to eat there.

I am extremely excited I will attend the screening of this documentary on Alec Soth‘s latest book Broken Manual.  The film by Laure Flammarion and Arnaud Uyttenhove follows Alec Soth around the USA while he produced the book.  Broken Manual is a book on people who want to escape from society and civilization.  Get a copy before it sells out.

There is a screening on Thursday at 8pm and one on Sunday at noon at the Pantheon theatre (13, Rue Victor Cousin, 75005).  I think it’s a bit late to get a ticket but you can always try to email them through the website.

Ricky, Brereton Heath Park, UK

I’ve always kept my distance towards portraiture in photography and thought “man, I really don’t like doing that”.  Having done a few portraits already, I realize that there were two reasons I was not inclined towards this faction of photographic practice.  The first reason is that while living in London, my most common place to practice portraiture when practiced, was the studio.  Boring. I did not go from studying Chemistry to Photography to stay inside a studio (or laboratory) for many hours a day and not enjoy the fresh air and sun.  The reasonable alternative to the studio then, became the city where I live in.  Central London, Zone 1.  Impossible again, too many people, no engagement with anyone, everyone is always in a rush, and people are too self aware and paranoid.  There is always something dodgy about a photographer who wants your photograph these days.  That’s how I feel about it.

Matthew, Bristol, UK

I’ve always done portraits of people I know.  I feel that the intimacy generated, and the connection that is created from what the sitter wants, and how I want to shoot the portrait, always culminates in an interesting photograph (Matthew, Bristol, UK).  It is true that as Avedon and Soth have said that portraits say more about the photographer (and the spectator), their reaction towards the “sitter”, than the person portrayed.  But then again, I’ve always thought that my friends are my friends because I see something of them in me, or something of me in them, so in this way, portraiture can say more about the “sitter” than conventionally it is thought to.

On the other hand, I wanted to say that I am now inclined to portrait photography.  Last week I was around Manchester shooting for my new project on the Mancuspia and approached some people randomly.  It was the first time I really felt comfortable photographing someone who’m I didn’t know (English Boy, Holmes Chapel, UK), and didn’t spend much time with either.  It was the curiosity that drove both the person being photographed and myself to a short relationship and interaction that I admittedly enjoyed.  I will continue doing portraits.

English Boy, Holmes Chapel, UK

Deira, Holmes Chapel, UK