We couldn’t be happier about the fact that it’s time to begin accepting listings for the ACP Festival Guide! As the largest annual community-oriented photography festival in America, ACP relies on your great ideas and initiative to create memorable exhibitions and events across the city! It’s time to dream big!

(We sent out an email last night with the details.)

If you’re considering an exhibition of your own work and are looking for a venue, consider locations in your community that mean the most to you. In the past, successful exhibitions have been held at nail salons, donut shops (!), pizza restaurants, and community centers. As always, if you have a venue and are looking to connect with Atlanta’s wide community of photographers, photography collectors & fans, hosting an event or exhibition during ACP is a great way to plug-in to an amazing month (and a half!) of photo-inspired audiences.

Plus, we’ve changed the layout of this year’s online Festival Guide to match the design refresh we made across the rest of the site this winter. The new design is more readable, more accessible (responds automatically to whichever device you’re using), and best of all, highlights your photography like never before.

We can’t wait to hear what you’re planning, and we’re just as eager to share with you the ACP Programs we’re organizing for the fall. Printed Festival Guides will be available earlier than ever this year (around Sept. 1st), so be hasty in listing your event or exhibition, as the deadline is June 30th.

The Center for Book and Paper Arts will mount a second iteration of an exhibition exploring print-on-demand photo books. Originally curated by Barbara Tannenbaum for the Cleveland Museum of Art, DIY: Photographers and Books (2012) was the first museum show to focus on the impact of print-on-demand publishing on contemporary photographic practice. This is a juried exhibition focused on photobooks that move beyond the monograph. How do photographers engage the book form in ways that are experimentally visual and conceptual, while pushing the possibilities of print on demand publishing?

Download the Call for Artists

Entries Deadline
June 20, 2013

Jury
Greg Harris, Associate Curator, DePaul Art Museum
Karen Irvine, Curator & Associate Director, Museum of Contemporary Photography
Jessica Cochran, Curator of Exhibitions and Programs, Center for Book and Paper Arts
Steve Woodall, Director, Center for Book and Paper Arts

This winter, we re-launched ACPinfo.org to better-reflect the photographic nature of the Festival, and to feature a design that was responsive to whichever device you might be using to view the site, from your phone to the widest TV screen.

We’re carrying this design into this year’s Festival Guide, and we’re excited that your photographs will really shine this year (on the Web, in print, and in the ACP iPhone app!). Here’s a sample listing below from last year’s Festival, presented with the new design.

As you prepare your event or exhibition for this year’s Festival, remember to prepare a great jpg that will make your listing shine. Your jpg will need to be at least 1000 pixels wide. Here’s an example.

Local photographer Stephanie Calabrese Roberts worked with local teens this spring at the John H. Harland Boys & Girls Club to “learn the art of mobile photography”. Fulton County Arts Council & the Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Atlanta made the workshop possible.

Check out the press release below, and the examples of work from the students can be seen at Lens on Life.

© Reginald Carter

© Marquis Thomas

© Stephanie Roberts

In this Instagram-era of smartphones and “selfies“, you never know where you might run into a discussion about photography. It could be Brian Williams’ shout-out to Kodak for their invention of digital photography, which contributed to the arrest of the suspected Boston bomber.

NBC’s Brian Williams gives shout out to #Kodak for it’s invention of digital photography, citing role in identifying suspects in Boston.

— Will Mansfield (@WillMansfield) April 20, 2013

Or it could be comedians on their podcasts, discussing the allure of the analog print. Jeff Garlin, an actor and comedian known for his role on “Curb Your Enthusiasm“, is a producer of the forthcoming documentary on Vivian Maier, and hosts his own live podcast called “By the Way“.

In his podcast’s first episode, an onstage interview with Larry David, Jeff talks about his Leica M3, and how Larry apparently has never taken a photograph.
(Photography discussion starts at 5min 07sec elapsed.)

Steve Agee, an actor and comedian whose six-second constructions on Vine are as funny as they are photogenic, talked about photography on a recent “Professor Blastoff” podcast. “Instagram really ruined the joy of taking photos for me.”
(Photography discussion starts at 25min 50sec elapsed.)

Wednesday, May 15, 7:30 p.m. – APG Gallery, Dorothy O’Connor, Speaking of Photography

“Dorothy O’Connor is a photo-based installation artist living in Atlanta. Her fantastical, life-sized installations, which include a live model performance in the style of a tableau vivant, have been featured during Atlanta Celebrates Photography and FLUX Night. Her latest tableau is currently installed at the Cheekwood Botanical Garden and Art Museum in Nashville, and her work is represented by Nashville’s Tinney Contemporary Gallery. She will be discussing the craft, inspiration, and history of her “Scenes” body of work.”

“Please join us for the opening reception of Safe, photographs by Sandra-Lee Phipps at whitespace. For Safe, Sandra-Lee Phipps’ first exhibition at whitespace gallery and in Atlanta, Phipps presents two series of photographs that deal with the quest for safety in our cultural environment of fear. These works are set in the untamed forests and rural farmlands of Maine, a place of personal reflection and security for Phipps. Interweaving archetypal images with a symbolic color of power, protection and danger – orange, Phipps explores the fragile sense of self, self-preservation and her role as an artist within this expansive landscape.

“[I]nside the word emergency is emerge; from an emergency new
things come forth. The old certainties are crumbling fast, but danger and possibility are sisters.” – Rebecca Solnit

In the second set of works, two figures emerge and a tension is revealed between what is known and unknown in times of transition. Though identical, the young girls wear colors signifying their difference, but also their bond – orange and blue. Wearing complementary colors, though visual opposites, the figures are intrinsically bound together.

Sandra-Lee Phipps is an Atlanta-based artist whose work explores the representation of self in both documentary and fine art photography. She has shown her work in exhibitions along the east coast and is recognized for her archival prints of the band R.E.M. She received her BA in communication arts journalism/photography from University of Georgia and a MA in studio arts/photographic and computer arts from New York University. After completing her master’s program, Phipps taught at NYU and later Rockport College in Maine. She is currently a professor of photography at Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta. In addition to her work as an educator, Sandra-Lee Phipps was a contributing photographer for the Village Voice and published a bi-weekly column, “streetstyle.”"

Exhibition Dates: Friday, May 17th – Saturday, June 15th, 2013
Opening Reception: Friday, May 17th | 7pm to 10 pm
Gallery Hours: Wednesday – Saturday | 11am to 5pm
Location: whitespace – 814 Edgewood Avenue NE | Inman Park

Vincent LaForet presents “Canon EOS Cinema Cameras”
May 13, 2013 7:00-9:00PM

Location: Mariott Century Center
2000 Century Blvd. NE
Atlanta, GA 30345

On Monday evening, May 13 from 7-9pm we will host one of the premier imagers working today. Pulitzer Prize winning photographer, Vincent Laforet will speak at the Marriott Century Center in a program sponsored by Canon EOS Cinema and hosted by Showcase Photo & Video.

In 2008, Laforet directed “Reverie”, the first widely available short film shot with the Canon 5D Mark II camera. The video has been cited by proposers of the use of DSLR cameras in digital cinematography and has been heralded as one of the films that launched the HDSLR movement.

In 2011, he was chosen by Canon to be one of the first 4 filmmakers to shoot with their first cinema camera, the Canon C300, and he directed the film “Mobius” which premiered at Paramount Studios. The opening was attended by Martin Scorsese, Ron Howard, Robert Rodriguez, and JJ Abrams.

This will be unique opportunity to hear about the transition from still to cinema by this truly accomplished imager.

Seating is limited and registration is required. There is a charge of $25 for this event, and each attendee will receive a $25 Showcase Photo & Video Gift Card.

A Period of Juvenile Prosperity
Mike Brodie

Book Release & Signing at Get This! Gallery
Saturday, May 18, 2013 from 2-4 p.m.

Get This! Gallery
662 11th St. NW
Atlanta, GA 30318

The first edition of Brodie’s book is almost sold out. We have exclusive access to a limited number of first edition books through the publisher, Twin Palms. The pre-order price for the book is $65. We will have copies available for $75 the day of the event.

Here’s Sebastiao Salgado’s TED talk from February, which was just posted today.