Jay Maisel’s New Book – Light, Gesture & Color

Maisel_LGCbook


You might be tempted to think less of this book because it’s not hard cover, because the reproduction is fine but not stellar, because of the typography is extraordinarily average, or because despite that fact that the title is the stock phrase Jay that is most known for and the selection of images is not definitive.  But you’d be missing the point. Light Gesture & Color is one of Jay Maisel’s best books.
Light Gesture & Color is like having an intimate conversation with a master photographer about his enduring passion. Short and sweet. Direct. Pithy. That’s how Jay Maisel serves up a lifetime of hard-earned wisdom. Most of the pages with text have half a dozen lines. One has two – and it’s enough. Better still, each page builds on the other.
You could read this book in a single sitting. I did. I recommend the experience. But I also recommend you read it again – and again. Mark the pages you want to return to for in a few simple lines there are life lessons to be found and refound. It is not that you have to think long and hard to figure out what he’s saying; Jay’s already done that work for you. It is that you’ll need more time to truly internalize what he has found and shared, until it is deeply felt; he did. Do this and you will be a better photographer. You’ll learn to see more. What could be more important?
Find Light Gesture & Color here.
Find out more about Jay Maisel here.
Read 20 Questions with Jay Maisel here.
Read a collection of quotes by Jay Maisel here.
Read Jay’s favorite quotes here.
Here’s an example of Jay at his best.
IMG_9648_425 IMG_9647_425
IMG_9650_425 IMG_9649_425
IMG_9652_425IMG_9651_4254

21 Quotes By Photographer Harry Callahan

 
Here’s a collection of my favorite photographs by photographer Harry Callahan.
“I think I came alive when I started photography.” – Harry Callahan
“To be a photographer, one must photograph. No amount of book learning, no checklist of seminars attended, can substitute for the simple act of making pictures.” – Harry Callahan
“You only do exercises in art school. That’s not the real thing. A little bit tells you so much. You have to find your own self. And you don’t know what you are! But that’s what you have to search for.” – Harry Callahan
“Every time I talked about making a picture I didn’t do it. I had already done it – talking about it! I quit talking.” – Harry Callahan
“I photograph continuously, often without a good idea or strong feelings. During this time the photos are nearly all poor but I believe they develop my seeing and help later on in other photos.” – Harry Callahan
“I guess I’ve shot about 40,000 negatives and of these I have about 800 pictures I like.” – Harry Callahan
“In terms of art, the only real answer that I know of is to do it. If you don’t do it, you don’t know what might happen.” – Harry Callahan
“Experience is the best teacher of all. And for that, there are no guarantees that one will become an artist. Only the journey matters …” – Harry Callahan
“It’s the subject matter that counts. I’m interested in revealing the subject in a new way to intensify it. A photo is able to capture a moment that people can’t always see.” – Harry Callahan
“Photography is an adventure just as life is an adventure.” – Harry Callahan
“I wish more people felt that photography was an adventure the same as life itself and felt that their individual feelings were worth expressing. To me, that makes photography more exciting.” – Harry Callahan
“If man wishes to express himself photographically, he must understand, surely to a certain extent, his relationship to life. I am interested in relating the problems that affect me to some set of values that I am trying to discover and establish as being my life. I want to discover and establish them through photography. This is strictly my affair and does not explain these pictures by any means. Anyone else not having the desire to take them would realize that I must have felt this was purely personal. This reason, whether it be good or bad, is the only reason I can give for these photographs.” – Harry Callahan
“The photographs that excite me are photographs that say something in a new manner; not for the sake of being different, but ones that are different because the individual is different and the individual expresses himself.” – Harry Callahan
“I realize that we all do express ourselves, but those who express that which is always being done are those whose thinking is almost in every way in accord with everyone else. Expression on this basis has become dull to those who wish to think for themselves.” – Harry Callahan
“The mystery isn’t in the technique, it’s in each of us.” – Harry Callahan
“I can tell you for me it goes on forever. There are some things you can’t ever find out. You can’t find out in one life either.” – Harry Callahan
“I think nearly every artist continually wants to reach the edge of nothingness – the point where you can’t go any further.” – Harry Callahan
“I can’t say what makes a picture. I can’t say. It’s mysterious.” – Harry Callahan
“A picture is like a prayer.” – Harry Callahan
“I do believe strongly in photography and hope by following it intuitively that when the photographs are looked at they will touch the spirit in people.” – Harry Callahan
“I like the simple things. I don’t know why. I’m that way. I came from a simple place.” – Harry Callahan
Read my conversation with photographer Harry Callahan here.
 Find more quotes in The Essential List Of Photographers Quotes.

Alumnus Sam Krisch's New Exhibit Elements

Krisch_425

Disko Bay #4, 2013

Sam Krisch’s new exhibit Elements opens at Virginia Tech in Blackburg, Virginia Friday, December 5, 2014 (5-7 pm) and runs through Sunday, February 1, 2015.
“The sheer power and splendor of nature in far-away places is the subject of Sam Krisch’s photographic practice. Over the last five years, Krisch has journeyed to remote locations ranging from the Mohave Desert to Antarctica to capture stunning images of ice formations, the raw force of turbulent waters, and empty expanses of desert landscapes. This exhibition presents a selection of the artist’s digital photographs created between 2013 and 2014, in which his approach to composition verges on the abstract, taking the work beyond documentation into a world of pristine, yet daunting, beauty. These are gorgeous, even idyllic landscapes, tinged nonetheless with the terrifying knowledge that these worlds are slipping away in an irreversible trajectory caused by human forces. Krisch lives and works in Roanoke. He is the adjunct curator of photography at the Taubman Museum of Art.”
Find out more about the exhibit Elements here.
Find out more about Sam Krisch here.

Seth Resnick’s New Sketches From Namibia

20141116_deadvlei_0061
Seth Resnick and I just returned from two stellar Namibia photography workshops that focused on its world class dune fields. Here’s a selection of my favorites.
20141115_sossusvlei_0383
20141115_sossusvlei_0063
20141103_sossusvlei_0066
20141115_sossusvlei_0117
20141102_sossusvlei_0022
20141105_swakopmund_0093
Seth shared his working process and ranking system.
“When I am in the field I rank my images and create rough drafts or sketches. From the sketches I create my best images for my portfolio and galleries. In order to get to a point that I can clearly call an image a portfolio piece I must live with it for awhile and have it stand the test of time. I have assembled all of my “sketches” from Namibia soI I can start making final selections for prints and exhibition.”
“The editing process is very important to me. I shot close to 8000 images. I rank all the images and my ranking is essentially a 1 is an idea that doesn’t quite work. They get deleted instantly. A 2 is a solid idea that has a stage but no actor or an actor and no stage but the idea is solid. They are also deleted. A 3 is well a good college try. It is a solid image but it is lacking something. Three;s that can become 4’s are kept. I want to see if a 3 may be come a four with processing. A three that stays a 3 is deleted. A 3 that can become a 4 is kept. A 4 is a truly solid strong image and one to be proud of. A 5 is portfolio image that will have a long life. I make a gallery with the images that have a 3+ or greater ranking and then I live with them and narrow it down. In the end I will likely take 5 of these into exhibitions and portfolio.”
View more of Seth’s images here.
View more Namibia posts here.

Sketches From Nambia’s Skeleton Coast

IMG_8774
Namibia’s Skeleton Coast is famous for its near omnipresent fog, which is created by the confluence of hot Namib Desert sands and cold Benguela Current waters that flow north from Antarctica.
When access to the big dune fields was cut off, play helped me find my way along the coastline.
Here’s a collection of recent iPhone sketches from Namibia’s Skeleton Coast.
View more Namibia posts here.
Find our more about my Namibia digital photography workshop here.
IMG_9623
IMG_8773
IMG_8766
IMG_8772
IMG_9622
IMG_9618