Posts from the “Books” Category

Kirk Crippens & Gretchen LeMaistre: Live Burls

Posted on July 4, 2017

Photo: Semper Virens, © Kirk Crippens and Gretchen LeMaistre, courtesy of Schilt Publishing.

The redwood trees of Northern Pacific Coast are among the oldest living things on earth, with life spans that average 1,200 to 1,800 years. Also known as Sequoia sepmervirens, they include these evergreens include the tallest trees on the planet, reaching up to 379 feet (115.5 meters) in height and 29.2 feet (8.9 meters) in diameter. Simply put, they are majestic beings that have fallen victim to the greed of wo/man.

The First Peoples of American lived in the forest for thousands of years, able to create a symbiotic relationship with the land without destroying it. Their spiritual beliefs, combined with knowledge of the natural world, allowed them to cultivate the resources of the forest and live in harmony with the earth.

All of this changed with the arrival of an imperialist force that traveled across the Atlantic Ocean and took land that did not belong to them. As the descendants of Europe made this country their own, they ravaged the landscape without thought to the consequences of their actions. They began decimating the forests to build homes, tearing down trees with no effort to replace the forests they destroyed.

The size of redwoods made them highly prized, for their could provide prized timber known for its durability and workability. By 1853, nine sawmills plowed through the glories of the earth, threatening the very existence of this ancient species of tree.

Read the Full Story at Feature Shoot

Categories: Art, Books, Feature Shoot, Photography

Dandy Lion: The Black Dandy and Street Style

Posted on June 27, 2017

Photo: Photo: Arteh Odjidja, Red Square Moscow, Russia, 2012, from the series Stranger in Moscow; from Dandy Lion (Aperture, 2017). © Arteh Odjidja/Arteh Creative.

The dandy first appeared on the scene in late eighteenth century Britain just as the bourgeoisie was coming into vogue and a new leisure class was becoming a la mode. They aspired to the aristocratic aesthetic and lifestyle, seeing themselves as a cut above the working class in all manner of things. But it was in sartorial pleasures that they distinguished themselves, drawing attention to their status through garb.

For many, clothes make the man—but the dandy makes the clothes, so seamless is his style that he embodies the timeless spirit of chic. The bourgeoisie grew in power and influence at the same time European imperialism conquered the globe. With political and economic oppression and exploitation came an unexpected twist: the transmutation of dandy culture into new realms.

In black culture across the globe, the dandy was more than a symbol of middle class yearnings—it was a radical act of self-expression and independence. The black dandy takes from the traditions of European fashion and subverts the aesthetic by infusing it with elements of the African diaspora. Where the European aesthetic has come to embrace subdued tones, clean cuts, and understated effects, the African sensibility embraces color, pattern, and contrast. The result is visually daring and dedicated to distinction.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Photo: Omar Victor Diop, Alt + Shift + Ego, 2013; from Dandy Lion (Aperture, 2017). © Omar Victor Diop, Courtesy Galerie MAGNIN-A, Paris.

Categories: Africa, Art, Books, Crave, Fashion, Photography

Devin Allen: A Beautiful Ghetto

Posted on June 19, 2017

Photo: © Devin Allen, courtesy of Haymarket Books.

Photo: © Devin Allen, courtesy of Haymarket Books.

The Constitution will not protect you from the government of the United States. Laws have no power when they are willfully disregarded on the streets, in the police stations, and in the courts. With each and every passing day, the evidence grows clear: we live in a police state that enforces the practice of slavery under the 13th Amendment.

Every day, those sworn to uphold the law murder innocent men, women, and children—and they get away with it, as juries agree that extrajudicial assassination is rightfully warranted. At the same time, city and state treasuries payout wrongful death suits in the millions, acknowledging a crime has committed while protecting the criminals.

You can just about hear Marvin Gaye’s plaintive cry, “Make me wanna holler, throw up my hands” over and over again—but despite the pain, sadness, and rage, resignation is impossible. We know the truth about the government of the United States, from Thomas Jefferson, who kept his own children as slaves to Hillary Clinton, who proudly acknowledged in her book It Takes A Village that she and Bill had slaves in the Arkansas Governor’s Mansion. Ain’t a damn thing changed.

Okay, that’s not entirely true. The practice of slavery has transformed from a chattel system to use of the prison industrial complex, hiding it away from the public view, so that all we see are the murders, day in and out. Invariably, it all becomes too much—there is only so much injustice people can stand before an uprising erupts.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Photo: © Devin Allen, courtesy of Haymarket Books.

Categories: Art, Books, Crave, Photography

Miron Zownir: Berlin Noir

Posted on June 7, 2017

Photo: © Miron Zownir, courtesy of Pogo Books.

In 1978, photographer Miron Zownir arrived in West Berlin. At the age of 25, he was coming into his own while the capital of his native Germany was a mecca for artists and anarchists alike who had been drawn to the seamy, seedy underbelly of a city that seemed to be knocking on death’s door. And yet, within the chaos of poverty, new life came forth, as the culture was nourished by creative thought.

From cinemas to sex clubs, drug dens to publishing houses, nightclubs to demonstrations, Berlin was alive with the most nourish of pleasures—and through his camera, Zownir captured it all: the highs, the lows, and the glorious madness of squalor.

His photographs have been collected in Berlin Noir (Pogo Books), spanning nearly four decades, taking us up to 2016. In passionate black and white photographs that are as gritty as they are gripping, Zownir shows us Berlin as we’ve never seen it before. Here is a city filled with derelicts that haunt us with their zest for life and their taste for the edge.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: 1970s, Art, Books, Crave, Photography

Stephen Shore: Selected Works, 1973-1981

Posted on May 17, 2017

Photo: Stephen Shore, Ginger Shore, West Palm Beach, Florida, November 14, 1977. © Stephen Shore, courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.

In 1982, Aperture published Uncommon Places by Stephen Shore, a collection of large-format color photographs exploring the American vernacular landscape from an entirely new point of view—one that embraced the ethos of mid-century populism. It offered a fresh take on modernism, embracing the spectacle of the mundane, the glorious humdrum of the nation under soaring blue skies and wide open terrain. It enlivened the eye and the mind to a sense of the sheer magnificence of that which we see everyday though we may never really look.

Uncommon Places, which has since been expanded and reissued several times over the past 35 years, has influenced a generation of photographers to look at the landscape where they are. In the past five years Shore has returned to his archive to delve more deeply within the works that he produced during the period from 1973 to 1981. He then brought the unseen works to Aperture, who invited an international group of 15 photographers, curators, authors, and cultural figures including Wes Anderson, Francine Prose, Ed Ruscha, Taryn Simon, and Lynne Tillman to select ten images each to create a series of portfolios collected in the new book Stephen Shore: Selected Works, 1971-1981.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Photo: Stephen Shore, East Fifth Street and Main Street, Fort Worth, Texas, June 17, 1976. © Stephen Shore, courtesy 303 Gallery, New York.

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Crave, Photography

Berenice Abbott: Paris Portraits 1925-1930

Posted on May 16, 2017

Photo: Lucia Joyce (Irish/Italian, 1907-1982). © Berenice Abbott, from Paris Portraits: 1925-1930, published by Steidl

Paris, 1925: Berenice Abbott stood on the balcony of Man Ray’s Paris studio with his camera in her hands, taking photographs that would become the very first portraits in a long and legendary career.

Four years earlier, she arrived in Paris at the age of 23. Within two years, she was working as a darkroom assistant to her friend Man Ray. With his encouragement she stepped into the light and began producing work of her own. A selection of 115 works from this period now appear in the luxurious tome, Berenice Abbott: Paris Portraits 1925-1930 (Steidl), giving us an unfettered glimpse into the early years of a natural.

“The first [portraits] I took came out well, which surprised me,” Abbott is quoted as saying in the book’s introduction. “I had no idea of becoming a photographer, but the pictures kept coming out and most of them were good. Some were very food and I decided perhaps I could charge something for my work. Soon I started to build up a little business and I paid Man Ray out of the money I made for the supplies I used, but eventually I was paying him more than he was paying me and that’s when it started to become a problem.”

Read the Full Story at Feature Shoot

Photo: Pierre de Massot (French, 1900-1969). © Berenice Abbott, from Paris Portraits: 1925-1930, published by Steidl.

Categories: Art, Books, Feature Shoot, Photography

Alice Neel: Uptown

Posted on May 16, 2017

Artwork: Building in Harlem, c. 1945. Oil on canvas. © The Estate of Alice Neel. Courtesy David Zwirner Books and Victoria Miro.

Artwork: The Black Boys, 1967. Oil on canvas. The Tia Collection. © The Estate of Alice Neel. Courtesy David Zwirner Books and Victoria Miro.

Alice Neel’s New York is disappearing—but it is not yet gone. It lives in the spirit and the souls of those who persevere against all odds. Like the artist herself, the New York she once loved was made up of people who triumphed over tragedy, trauma, and loss. Perhaps her personal struggles imbued her with a profound empathy to those she painted with exquisite sensitivity and feeling, capturing the depths of their humanity.

This month, Alice Neel, Uptown (David Zwirner Books/Victoria Miro), a new book authored by Pulitzer Prize winning critic Hilton Als, looks at the portraits the artist made while living in Spanish Harlem and the Upper West Side throughout the twentieth century. The book is published in conjunction with an exhibition of the work opening at Victoria Miro Gallery, London, on May 18 after debuting earlier this year to critical acclaim at David Zwirner in New York.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Artwork: The Spanish Family, 1943. Oil on canvas. © The Estate of Alice Neel. Courtesy David Zwirner Books and Victoria Miro.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Crave, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Painting

John Ingham: Spirit of 76

Posted on May 12, 2017

Photo: The Damned opened 1977 at the Hope & Anchor, a pub in Islington with a history of live bands. Comfortably holding about 100 people, there were double that number crammed in. Sweat was running down the walls. 2 January 1977. Photography John Ingham.

A dark cloud swept across England in the mid-1970s, washing away the buoyant optimism of Swinging London. The bright promise turned bleak, as the recession pushed more and more people into unemployment. Couple this with strikes, power cuts, and IRA bombs, and the only fitting response was to burn the whole thing down.

More than music and style, punk was an attitude. It gave no fucks as it seized the moment and made its way out of the art schools and on to the world stage in 1976. Journalist John Ingham, who was writing for Sounds, conducted the first interview with the Sex Pistols and got hooked on the raw energy, soul, and nerve. He began covering the scene, which accelerated rapidly as punk ignited a movement across the U.K.

New bands like the Clash, the Damned, and Subway Sect began to appear – but no one was photographing them until Ingham picked up a camera. His photographs, which include the very first color pictures of punk, have been collected for the very first time in Spirit of 76: London Punk Eyewitness (Anthology Editions). Ingham reflects on what it was like to be in the front row of a wildfire.

Read the Full Story at Dazed Digital

Friends and countrymen at the Sex Pistols, Notre Dame de France, 15 Nov 1976. Viv Albertine Siouxsie Sioux smoking cigarette, Steve Severin, Kenny Morris, Sarah Hall, one of the two ladies who came with John to the first interview in April. Photography John Ingham

Categories: 1970s, Art, Books, Dazed, Music

Most Influential Artists of the Last 20 Years

Posted on May 2, 2017

Photo: Kusama’s Peep Show or Endless Love Show, 1966. Hexagonal mirrored room and electric lights. Installed at Castellane Gallery, New York, 1966. No longer extant. Courtesy of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

“This idea of art for art’s sake is a hoax,” no less than Pablo Picasso observed, recognizing the bourgeois mentality that drove narcissistic self-indulgence into the creative process was merely fraud.

Indeed, art does not exist for itself; the greatest works are those that transform understanding into wisdom while revealing the truth of the times as not only a matter of the moment but of the underlying human condition. The best art is always one step ahead of where we find ourselves, predicting the future by bringing it to our attention today In celebration of the most influential artists of the last 20 years, Crave has compiled a list of men and women from all walks of life who work in a wide array of mediums, speaking truth to power.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: Art, Books, Brooklyn, Crave, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Japan, Painting, Photography

Frieze A to Z of Contemporary Art

Posted on April 25, 2017

Photo: Wolfgang Tillmans, Lutz and Alex, sitting in the trees, 1992, photograph. © the artist, courtesy Maureen Paley, London.

In June 1991, frieze magazine appeared on the scene. A slim 32 pages, the pilot issue gave a taste of things to come. Inspired by the great British style magazines like Arena, The Face, and i-D, editors Amanda Sharp and Matthew Slotover decided to bring the same sensibility to the world of art. In doing so, the revolutionized the art world on two fronts, with publishing leading the way for art fairs on both sides of the pond.

With the sixth edition of Frieze New York coming up for May 5-7, 2017, we’re celebrating a look back at the magazine’s first 25 years in print with the publication of the handy new guide, Frieze A to Z of Contemporary Art (Phaidon). Drawing on the magazine’s incredible back catalogue of work, the book is organized in a simple to follow collection of essays that take you from Avant-garde to Zeitgeist, with stops along the way in a marvelous potpourri of topics that run the gamut, from Critics, Economics, and Jargon to Nostalgia, Taste, and Visionaries.

With essays like Glenn O’Brien on Andy Warhol for the chapter on Fame, Christian Haye on Kara Walker for History, and Jim Lewis on “Ren & Stimpy” for Television, there is something for everyone. Because that’s what frieze does best of all: it takes the obscure and the sublime and makes them accessible.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Crave, Photography

Ryan McGinley: The Kids Were Alright

Posted on April 24, 2017

On a chilly night back in February 2003, Ryan McGinley: The Kids Are Alright opened at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Ryan McGinley, then just 25-years-old, was the youngest artist to have a solo show in the museum’s seven decades on Madison Avenue.

I’m not entirely sure the Whitney knew what to expect, as the denizens of downtown piled into the tiny gallery. I overheard a security guard say, “Excuse me, ma’am. Do not lean against the art,” to blonde in a faux-fur coat with slurry eyes. Moments later a security guard said, The blonde shoved on, disappearing into the throngs that jostled their way in and out of the exhibition. The lurid, glamorous and grizzled characters in McGinley’s photographs were there in the flesh, celebrating the artist’s quicksilver rise to the top. In a period of just five years, McGinley documented the luminous tail of the bohemian comet that swept New York throughout the second half of the twentieth century.

McGinley hung with a squadron of graffiti writers, artists, and personalities that made their own rules – and what remains of those days and nights are the photos. Some 1,600 pictures made between 1998 and 2003, most never-before-seen, have just been released in the new book, The Kids Were Alright, (Rizzoli) to time with an exhibition of the same name now at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver through August 17, 2017.

The documentary-style photographs and Polaroids are raw, sexy images of intense intimacy. Whether partying, having sex, or just hanging out, McGinley’s photos present a portrait of his generation at their most uninhibited peak. McGinley spoke with Dazed about coming of age in True York.

Read the Full Story at Dazed Digital

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Dazed, Exhibitions, Graffiti, Manhattan, Photography