“Still Life” at Jennifer Schwartz Gallery is reviewed by Felicia Feaster ArtsCriticAtl.com.

“Some artists use form to work out ideas. And some artists get lost in it, clinging like drowning men to their rainbow of colors, technology and mixed-media kit bag. Like Mr. Kurtz gone native in the jungle, such artists couldn’t cut themselves out of the tangle with a machete, even if they tried. And often, they don’t want to.

The artists in “Still.Life” – an exhibit at Jennifer Schwartz Gallery through May 28, which explores the connection between photography and painting in the digital age — are knee-deep in form and giddy from the fumes. What Julie Blackmon, Michael Marshall, Aline Smithson and Maggie Taylor have in common is a certainty that more is more. Sometimes they’re right.

Exhibition to Feature Eleven Recent Acquisitions for the High’s Photography Collection

“The Resonant Image: Photographs by Chip Simone”
June 18–November 6, 2011
ATLANTA, April 11, 2011—The High Museum of Art will organize and host an exhibition of 64 color photographs by Atlanta-based photographer Robert “Chip” Simone. Having worked as a classic black-and- white street photographer for most of his career, Simone embraced digital technology and color output in the year 2000, moving his experimentations with the medium into fresh and invigorating territory. This exhibition will showcase the results of Simone’s recent explorations, presenting a tightly focused retrospective of the past decade of his work. “The Resonant Image: Photographs by Chip Simone” will be on view at the High from June 18 through November 6, 2011.

The prints to be featured in this exhibition reflect Simone’s long-term quest to “invest the print with the emotional resonance that I felt when I first saw the picture.” Made largely in and around Atlanta and the photographer’s home state of Massachusetts, the photographs showcase Simone’s sensitive response to the visual rhythms of his environment. Simone describes his work as spontaneous and improvisational: “Like jazz music, the photographs resonate with the eccentric impulses and private curiosities that led me to them. These are the most intimate images I’ve ever shown, not for what they depict but for what they reveal.”

“Simone’s dedication to reinventing his visual approach to the world in recent years has resulted in a remarkably poetic and sophisticated body of work. This exhibition is a fitting way to celebrate his longstanding, thoughtful and coherent contributions to the craft of photography,” said Brett Abbott, the High’s curator of photography. “The show is also very important for the High, as it allows us to showcase the work of a significant Atlanta-based artist?a resident in our own community?who is contributing to the city’s growing cultural scene.”

Press release here.

From “Photographer Laura Noel, at Hagedorn Foundation Gallery, perfects the sideways glance”

“Noel, who originally wanted to be a writer, goes in for oblique narratives as well. Her latest pictures are diptychs of seemingly unrelated images. (“Fallina/Fame,” below.) She writes: “The line where the two images meet becomes the seam between fact and fiction, reality and longing, the universal and the personal.” In these images, Noel gives you leave to find your own epiphanies.”

Vee Speers “Immortal”, Carolyn Carr’s photographs, and “Iconic Photographs” from Henri Cartier-Bresson will be on view at Jackson Fine Art on April 15th. Opening reception is from 6-8pm, and there will be an artist’s talk from Carolyn Carr with Carol Thompson (curator of African Art at the High Museum of Art) on Thursday, April 20th at 6:30pm.

It’s always great to see exhibitions that leverage photography’s strength alongside another art form, like poetry, and the current show in Arnall Golden Gregory’s exhibition space (open through April 1st) takes its name from poet Adrienne Rich‘s book from 1978, “Dream of a Common Language“.

The exhibition is part of a three-year partnership between AGG and Hammonds House, and features work from Sheila Pree Bright, Lucinda Bunnen, Lynn Cymone, Doris Derby, Kathryn Kolb, Lynn Marshall-Linnemeir, Sue Ross and Angela West. The exhibition is a curatorial collaboration between Anne Lambert Tracht from AGG and Kevin Sipp from Hammonds House.

Kevin Sipp remarked that the Rich book (and poem) was a personal favorite, and just as Rich is focused on “women’s perspectives of work and art”, the pieces within the exhibition reflect Rich’s general inspiration.

From AGG:

“The art exhibit, entitled “Dream of a Common Language,” will feature a selection of work by female photographers, and is inspired by renowned poet and essayist Adrienne Rich’s poem of the same title, which explores the universal themes of sisterhood and the common language of self-discovery, love and achievement. The exhibit is presented in partnership with the Hammonds House Museum, located in Atlanta’s West End.

More information on agg.com

The High Museum opens on Saturday with the Henri Cartier Bresson “Modern Century” exhibition, after its successful stops at the Museum of Modern Art and SFMOMA. Here’s (an unembeddable) recent interview between Charlie Rose, Martine Franck and Peter Galassi.

And an earlier video; another Rose interview, with Henri Cartier Bresson himself, in 2000.

On February 26th, the High Museum will be screening “Rules of the Game” a film for which Cartier-Bresson was the 2nd Unit Director. And on March 19th, Jason Francisco will speak about Cartier-Bresson and his influence.

…After The Suburbs
by guest curator Karen Tauches
After all, the suburbs promised to be a neat, new, affordable Eden. It was that in-between station where middle class, industrialized citizens could be part of the city and yet breathe a little easier with the countryside nearby. Now, the spacious suburbs hold a position of great potential for a population needing to reconnect with Nature.

KIANG GALLERY
Curator talk at 3pm
1011-A Marietta Street.
(404) 892-5477
www.kiang-gallery.com

“Sun City is a paradise, but it’s a paradise — like the one in the film “Never Let Me Go” — with a catch. Like some sci-fi Stepford, everyone is alike (old) and life appears to have a tamed and tidy sameness. Brinson captures that sense of order and routine in “Aerial,” a view of the carefully laid-out community whose homes radiate like rings around Saturn from the community center and social space at its center. The price of all that tranquilizing comfort: separation from the world of the living. And maybe, just maybe, that’s not such a bad thing.”

From Review: Photographers David Walter Banks, Kendrick Brinson explore “Escape” at Jennifer Schwartz Gallery on ArtsCriticAtl.

Roger Ballen has a current exhibition that’s open for a few more days at Jackson Fine Art. Atlanta photographer (and ACP Board Member) William Boling has been interviewing Mr. Ballen via email, and is publishing the interview a question at a time at p7q.blogspot.com.

“Beginning in the mid nineteen ninties, I began to interact with the subjects in almost theatrical way. Whilst the environment that I was working played a role in defining the environments I felt free to alter it according to the demands of the situation.”

- Roger Ballen, on p7q.

“Point of View: Photographs from the Collection” is the brainchild of Danielle Avram, Curatorial Assistant at the High Museum, and will be opening January 29th. Artists include: Eugène Atget, Garry Winogrand, Walker Evans, Lewis Hine, Mark Steinmetz, Xaviera Simmons, Chip Simone, Jim Dow, Richard Buswell, and Emmet Gowin.

ACP Participating Venue Twin Kittens is having a fundraiser auction on Saturday night, December 4th.

“In the coming year, TWIN KITTENS plans to:
-begin an artist residency, where the artist resides upstairs during his/her exhibit and engages the city through programming; lectures, tours, dinner parties, discussions, and more.
-host 6 incredible solo exhibits by artists from all over the country. Their work will range in terms of idea, medium and presentation.
-launch sponsorship opportunities for local businesses, organizations, and individuals allowing them to fiscally catalyze the exhibits and residency.”

“Abstract By Design” opens at Jennifer Schwartz Gallery on Thursday, December 2nd from 6-9pm. Artists in this group show include Christine Carr, Denielle Nigretto, Adam Gruszynksi, Laura Griffin, Kyle Petersen, Judith Pishnery, Tari Beroszi & Ryan Nabulsi.

HE SAID SHE SAID, a group show at the Atlanta Fulton County Public Library has a reception on Sunday from 2:30 to 4:30. Photo above from Judy Kuniansky.

Please note that Atlanta photographer Jane Kerr’s “Seeing Red” opens this Sunday, Oct. 17th, at Church of the Atonement. The reception begins at 4pm.

Jason Francisco looks at Chris Verene’s “Family” on view at Marcia Wood Gallery through November 4th.

“As an heir to Riis, Verene delivers messages from across a social barrier, images that only a photographer with special access and with special effort could make. In his case, it’s derived from the privilege of his membership in a particular family. Following Riis’ example, the pictures do not just inform us but address us. They seem almost to speak what they show, expecting us to understand, or at least not to deny that we share a language — a social world — in common with his subjects. In Verene’s case, his own voice hovers around the pictures through plainspoken, handwritten captions — one of the work’s most distinctive features. Also in the spirit of Riis (not to mention Galesburg’s most famous native son, Carl Sandburg), Verene’s images play on a theme of civilizational struggle, in which everyday life is situated in the foil of an American dream—not of consumerist transcendence, but of an unafflicted dignity to accompany pain when it comes, or at least a right to one’s own grief. All of these structuring elements lend Verene’s work the aura of classicism, and quietly endow him with a measure of heroism.”

If you’re interested in more info about the upcoming Jay Maisel event on October 12th, please contact Nancy Suttles at (770) 883-9507 or nsuttles@mindspring.com.

JAY MEDIA 3

The ACP Visionairies exhibition at the Bank of America building will be publicly viewable on Thursday, Sept. 30th, not Wednesday, as previously stated in the online and printed Festival Guides.