photography – Page 16

Posted on 26 November 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Boris Mikhailov

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I can not make a better blog than the information which is given on the Saatchi site at:

http://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/boris_mikhailov.htm

but what i know from a personal point of view is that Mikhailove for me is arguably the best photographer from the last 3 decades. Raw and tender at the same time and a very personal point of view.

Here is the short Biography on Mikhailov :

Born in the former Soviet Union, Mikhailov lived and worked for several decades in his hometown of Kharkiv, Ukraine. He received an education as an engineer and started to teach himself photography. Today he is one of the most successful and well-known among the photographers who were already active in the Soviet era. His work combines conceptual art and social documentary photography.

Mikhailov had his first exhibition at the end of the 1960s. After the KGB found nude pictures of his wife he was laid off his job as an engineer and started to work full-time as a photographer. From 1968 to 1975 he shot several series documenting everyday scenes, the best known of them being the Red Series. In these photographs he mainly used the colour red, to picture people, groups and city-life. Red symbolized the October Revolution, political party and the social system of Soviet society. It is often said that within those works critical elements toward the existing political circumstances can be found.In Mikhailov’s Klebrigkeit (1982), he added explanatory notes, or diary-like text. In Case History, considered an important part of contemporary art, he examines the consequences of the breakdown of the Soviet Union for its people. He systematically took pictures of homeless people. It shows the situation of people who after the breakdown of the Soviet Union were not able to find their place in a secure social system. In a very direct way Mikhailov points out his critique against the “mask of beauty” of the emerging post-Soviet capitalistic way of life.

There were some classic Mikhailov books published during the last 20 years and some of them can be found at:

www.ftn-books.com

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Posted on 16 November 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Henk Tas and his staged photography

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A dutch master in the art of staged photography is Henk Tas. Inspired by many great classic ( Pop & Rock) songs, he places objects from (his) childhood around him in a special setting and instantly it is recognizable as “HENK TAS”. Definitely a personal signature.

The photograph is taken and then , compared with the original setting, enlarged to enormous proportions. It makes you feel like an intruder in the staged scene, participating in it and encountering the figurines which populate it.

In 2001 the Henk Tas publication “Why me Lord” is chosen for the competition ” BEST VERZORGDE BOEKEN 2001″ and is one of the contenders for Best.

The book called ” WHY me LORD ” is still available at www.ftn-books.com.

This is what the jury said about the book and his staged photography:

Best Dutch Book Design 2001

Henk Tas, photographer and grabber at life’s banquet, belongs to that select band of cultural indefatigables. His work has never been completely in vogue, for reasons difficult to fathom, but never completely out of it either. It was relevant during the days of both staged photography and postmodernism, and went down well in New Age circles too.
The theme of Henk Tas’s work is pop music, with the occasional foray into rock’n’roll and blues. Henk Tas is the Rotterdam cowboy. He is second to none in taking plastic figures, artificial flowers and other generally unsightly accessories and infusing them with life. He is, besides, a great colourist. The staged photographs are exuberant in their hues, their synthetic extras embodying the passion of the professional artiste along with the fame and the impermanence immutably bound up with that passion. A great many photographs by Henk Tas and a text apiece by Els Barents, Roel Bentz van den Berg, Ute Eskildsen and Greil Marcus have been brought together by the book’s designer, Rick Vermeulen.

www address: www.henktas.nl

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Posted on 5 November 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Maria by Lee Friedlander

It was 10 years ago that i encountered a remainder stock of books published by the Smithsonian museum. Among them…. one title that immediately caught my interest, because its photographs were by Lee Friedlander. For me personally this is one of the very best photographers from last century and this title particularly was all about his wife MARIA. At the time of publication i did not know of any exhibitions on Friedlander, but i was so happy to have found this little stack of Maria books and the number of them ( over 20 copies), that the first ones i sold way to cheap. Over the years i sold many of them to different locations in the world.

What remains now are only 4 copies of which the last 3 are still for sale. One i will keep for my photo book collection and as a souvenir of the stack of Friedlanders i found, bought and sold.

A future classic and a highly collectable photo book. This book is available at www.ftn-books.com

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Posted on 22 September 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Josef Koudelka….not only a Magnum photographer.

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Czech nationality and now 78 years of age, spanning a photography career of over 55 years, multiple exhibitions all over the world, Koudelka has become one of the most important photographers in modern photograph. Street scenes and the Romani ( Gypsies from Romany) are subjects he has become famous for. Not only a Magnum photographer but also a photographer who found his subjects among people he cared about. They were not only his subjects. In the photographs you could see that he could come very close by and had become more of a friend than the photographer who followed his subject.

I thought about Koudelka because i found a very interesting article about Koudelka in which is explained what the 10 most important lessons were Koudelka has taught a fellow photographer.

http://erickimphotography.com/blog/2013/03/28/10-lessons-josef-koudelka-has-taught-me-about-street-photography/

this is what the author Eric Kim says about Koudelka and i totally agree with him.

“To me, Josef Koudelka is one of the most brilliant photographers out there and a true master of black and white. Not only does his work carry a strong sense of composition, form, and geometry but they also carry an emotional impact. His photos are raw, gritty, and show both the hope and melancholy of life”

If you are interested in modern photography you must look at these breathtaking and intriguing photographs and certainly you will agree with me that this is a true master of black and white photography.

wilfried

book below is available at www.ftn-books.com

Posted on 17 September 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Picked a book from the shelf and it is…. MAN RAY

The book i picked is the book published by the Boijmans van Beuningen Museum and it reminded me of the exhibition we visited 2 years ago in which the sculptures by Brancusi were combined with the Man Ray’s the Boijmans had on loan and from their own collection. Impressive exhibition in which the Brancusi’s stole my heart. The setting and the sheer volume of the sculptures made this the best “outside Paris” exhibition on Brancusi i have ever seen. Man Ray and Brancusi both have been presented regularly in the Netherlands during the last 50 years, but there are only a few works in the collections of the Dutch museums. The Kroller Muller has bought one some 20 years ago. A “head”, but this was the last acquisition by a dutch museum .

So the fact that both were combined in the Boijmans van Beuningen museum was a sheer joy. I started with mentioning Man Ray, but ended with Brancusi ….and yes ,this is also how i feel about these artists in my personal ranking….first there is Brancusi and then there is Man Ray.

wilfried

www.ftn-books.com

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Posted on 13 August 201612 February 2018 by ftnbooks — Leave a comment

Lucien Clergue….a photograph

A few days ago i wrote about ARTA . A small gallery in Den Haag in which they sold editions by graphic artists. Immediately i remembered the Lucien Clergue photo i bought with them. At one time they had a small number of photographs from an edition by Lucien Clergue…. a naked woman … in the Mediterranean sea. A very beautiful body which attracted me, not only because it was one of the first nude photographs that was offered to me , but also because of its quality. At that time i even had no idea that photographs were printed in editions too, but looking at the back of the photo and seeing the stamp, signature and edition number i realized that this was the reason it was so affordable. It was one of the great purchases as a collector, because now these photographs are worth 200 times as much and are collected by photography collectors all over the world.

Lucien Clergue (1934-2014) proved to be one of the greats in photography from the last century and this sereis of naked women in the sea are among his best. . I still cherish this photo and even remember that i picked the perfect copy for my collection. There is no place for it anymore to hang it on the wall , so now and then i think about the selling it and maybe in the future i decide to do so.

SInce i am a full time antiquarian bookseller i regularly encounter Lucien Clergue publications and put them up for sale at www.ftn-books.com and on each such occasion i remember this beauty in the sea by Lucien Clergue.

There is a great selection of photographs still available at www.anneclergue.com, but the one i have in mycollection i did not encounter anywhere on the web.So this is to share it with you .

wilfried