Join us in ARCHITECTURE AND PHOTOGRAPHY at the School of Visual Arts

If you have been enjoying this blog and are in the NYC area, join me in the classroom at the School of Visual Arts for my favorite class of all time to teach, ARCHITECTURE & PHOTOGRAPHY at the School of Visual Arts. Combining lecture, in-class shooting time, special assignments, and critique, this class will give you a solid basis from which to appreciate and create architectural pictures. We look at lots of amazing fine art and commercial photographers such as Ezra Stoller, Julius Shulman, Edouard Baldus, Andrew Moore, Richard Pare, and Robert Polidori. Sign up now as class begins next Friday September 23. Hope to see you there!



© Julius Shulman

EZRA STOLLER at YOSSI MILO

As some of you may know, there's not much more I love than a great architectural photograph. I even teach on the subject at the School of Visual Arts here in New York. This said, what a pleasure to experience Ezra Stoller's work in flesh and blood at Yossi Milo Gallery this past Thursday. Debating on a daily basis whose work is speaking to me more on that particular day---Ezra Stoller or Julius Shulman---Stoller definitely took my breath away with this excellently curated collection of black and white prints. With extreme rigor and precision, Stoller created crisp, abstract renderings of important modernist architecture. The resulting photos are a pleasure to meditate upon, and it is obvious why Stoller is considered one of the greatest of the century.

In addition to the transcendent experience the exhibition provided, I had the pleasure of meeting Erica Stoller, the head of ESTO, the prestigious architectural photography agency to which I contribute some of my own work. It was great to meet the woman who controls Ezra's all important legacy. For any lovers of architecture this is a must-see.















© Ezra Stoller TWA Terminal at Idlewild (now JFK) Airport, Eero Saarinen, New York, NY
Gelatin Silver Print
1962

Fine art vs. Editorial: Is There Really a Difference in 2010?

In this economy, I have been struggling---like many people---with making ends meet, especially as I have made the decisions in life that: 1. I am a photographer. 2. I am an artist---not necessarily in that order. In fact, these 2 sentences are one and the same, as I have an MFA in photography and am a photographer. However, I have been coming across an attitude lately that these are not in fact one and the same, that a photograph is either editorial / commercial OR fine art. This seems like a curiously antiquated view, but I have been giving it some thought. For my own work, I look both to the high and mighty art-photography gods and goddesses as well as photographs considered more 'editorial.' As I photograph mostly architecture and architectural subjects, I have spent a lot of time researching such creative masters ad Ezra Stoller and Julius Shulman. I feel through their technical execution and passion for the subjects they photograph, the work is both fine art and editorial. It is a document and it is concept, as well as being exemplary of certain schools of thought on modern architecture and the built environment.



© Robert Polidori


Other photographers whose work I greatly respect are Robert Polidori and Andrew Moore---they also execute extreme technical precision while alluding to contemporary topics through their choice of subject. I guess ultimately for me, one must master technique in order to show concept; otherwise a photograph can be a sloppy snapshot with a whole lot of theory and photography history lumped onto it. And I just don't buy into that. I feel that ultimately, if passion, knowledge, and technical ability all come together in a photograph, it is a success, and can therefore be labelled editorial or fine art or whatever, but it works as an image. Isn't that what is most important? Interested to hear your thoughts on this one, my dear readers.





(Here is a new picture I photographed of Erie Basin, a beautifully curated little shop in Red Hook, Brooklyn. Is it art? Or is it editorial?)