Sneak Peek: The Gallery Changes.....

Its Friday and we are taking the weekend as an opportunity to make some changes in the space, will all be ready for Ed Kashi's show being hung Monday ready for his talk Monday night, and then reception opening Tuesday evening, so do come and join us for a glass of something....
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Kurt Tong: Memories, Dreams; Interrupted

Good news, HOST Gallery now has selected works from Kurt Tongs seres Memories, Dreams; Interrupted available in the gallery, prices starting at £350.00, do get in touch if you wish to see the work....
Here is some background from Kurt about the project:
This series explores the concept of memories. Scientists have suggested that memories are stored like jpegs, broken down into small pieces and stored. When we recall an event, the pieces are then put back together, any parts missing are filled in automatically by our brain, thus altering our memories of the event. The images are taken at places where I spend a lot of time with my daughters, where memories are made. These spaces are familiar to them and yet are shared, beyond the security of our home and constantly changing beyond our control. They are interpretations of our memories.
The spaces are shot using films, working with different lighting conditions and several other technique to 'degrade' the film, the images are then reconstructed through digital means.

Ed Kashi and Colin Jacobson on the sofa

An evening in the gallery, Monday the 8th to mark the opening of Ed Kashi's show, Curse of the Black Gold, more info here...

Last few days of the Eggleston at Victoria Miro

Yikes, if, like me you have not seen it yet, hurry down there..

Book Launch: Defiant Images 18/02/10

Tomorrow, Thursday the 18th, we are hosting the UK book launch of Darren Newbury's Defiant Images: Photography and Apartheid South Africa... Please join us for a drink from 6:30 Pm....
More info here...

Cowboy up Cupcake...

I have just started reading The Legend of Colton H. Bryant by Alexandra Fuller, which so far is great, anyway it reminds me of Jane Hilton's Dead Eagle Trail work (which is currently being made into a book) Jane's work as I have mentioned before will be showing in the gallery in April....
But on a wet, dark Tuesday evening a nice end of the day quote from fullers book seems apt:
"Cowboy up Cupcake, everyone has their freakin problems....."
Photograph: Jane Hilton

Taking Portraits

Just a quick link to a great article on the Concientious blog, its based on Franz Fiedlers books Portrait photography, well worth a read here....

Teenage Years

Here is some work in progress by photographer Soraya Hocine, its from a body of work called Teenage Years, which is being shot around a skate park in London's Camden.. Its a little bit Jo Szabo and a little bit Ed Templeton...

The pictures Seamus didnt take....

The Telegraph has done a nice little questionaire with Seamus Murphy here.... Well worth a read...
Photograph: Seamus Murphy

a language still in its infancy

A rather nice quote from a while back by the late Mr Leonard Freed:
"Photography is a visual language still in its infancy. Just as the poet adds meaning to words, so the photographer adds to visual symbols. But, whereas the other arts developed in time over centuries, photography has yet to mature and define itself. The fact that millions of people can see the same visual images on television, in films or photography is communication. It is a language. To be a poet-photographer is both saddening and challenging. Saddening to think that literary traditions are being lost to a language that is only in its infancy. Challenging in that one is free to be original...."
Photo by Bill Jay

Cry Wolf......

The Natural History Museum's Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award has had an interesting turn of events when judges it seem cried WOLF! ... Read more here....

Camera Club

JM Colbergs blog recently posted Chris Verene's work, which reminded me what an important photographer he is...
I became aware of his work simply through the fantastic books which Twin Palms publish...
I cant recommend highly enough looking at this book....
Anyway below is from his body of work Camera Club, it speaks for itself really but here also is an explanation from Verene's website....
"..In the mid-nineteen nineties, Chris Verene sought out photography clubs that advertise to aspiring models offering them a career in the modeling industry. These clubs have been in the US since the 1940’s—often seen as groups of male photographers huddled around swimsuit models in studios and on beach locations.

The project sought to document the photographers who join a club as way of access to women who would be willing to pose in lingerie, swimwear and nude. Verene joined these clubs in a number of American cities and surreptitiously made pictures of the men and their equipment while they were distracted by the models. Verene also conspired with a female friend who applied to the clubs as an aspiring model as a way of investigating the system that drives the organization. The two found that the clubs were never a real route to becoming a fashion model, and such promises were often offered in lieu of payment.

Verene’s “Camera Club” project is unstaged, and is a real document of how the clubs truly feel. It stands as a caution to young models—suggesting to all such people that they be careful who they trust with taking off thier clothes for pictures, and that they not always believe all the stories that such clubs tell..."

Stephen Gill: Haiti Appeal Print

Stephen Gill has produced an editioned print from his series Hackney Flowers whereby all proceeds will go to aid the people whose lives have been devastated by the earthquake that hit Haiti on January 12th...
From an edition of 100, 12"x10" print...
And great value at £40.00
More info here....

Dead Eagle Trail

Here are some examples from photographer Jane Hilton's work Dead Eagle Trail, which excitingly will be in book form early next year, and also will be exhibited in the gallery in its entirety in April 2010, so watch this space....

28 Stories...

28 Stories if the MA in Photojournalism and Documentary Graduate Degree Show at LCC, it opens next week, It runs from the 10th - 23rd December, and then the 4th to the 15th January 2010, and is sure to be well worth a look. More information can be found here...
The picture below is by Poulomi Basu from the series To Conquer Her Land...
Also on the 9th December David Campbell, Telegraph Picture editor Lucy Davies and Photographers Ed Kashi and Simon Norfolk will be discussing The New Ecology of Photojournalism from 6pm.
From the series Tsang's Odyssey by Lee Wing Ki