Ellen Susan, who’s participated in ACP’s Portfolio Review in years past, is teaching a Wet Plate Collodion Workshop in Savannah in June. Click the image for details!

Elliot Erwitt – © Tim Mantoani

Exhibited during this month’s Month of Photography Los Angeles, Tim Mantoani’s 20×24 polaroids of photographers with their photographs are featured today on NPR’s photo-blog Pictureshow.

New York photographer Suzanne Opton, whose Soldier’s Face billboard graced Marietta St. last year via Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship last week.

© Susan Hadorn

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS
A LECTURE ON DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY with SUSAN HADORN
Wine & Hors d’œuvre Reception
MORRIS GALLERIES – GALLERY EDUCATIONAL EVENTS
111 N. Main Street, Sweetwater, TN 37874
Phone: (423) 351-0101
Friday, April 17th at 6:30pm – 8:30pm

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words…but you need to know how to evaluate the image to gain an understanding of its content. A dramatic photograph can alter our perception and appreciation of the subject matter at hand. It can raise awareness about threatened environments, social concerns or endangered cultures. Join Susan Hadorn as she shares her notions on the subject of documentary and fine art photography.

Susan will talk about evaluating images as it applies to documentary photography, her own work, her process and what her plans are for future work. Susan is a photographer based in Atlanta, GA and a Morris Galleries’ Artist. She received her MA in Photography from Savannah College of Art and Design. Susan has begun documenting disappearing architecture and landscapes in the Tennessee Valley. You can use her wonderful presentation to learn to document your own history. You will also enjoy her enthusiasm for her art. We look forward to seeing you for this enjoyable and informative evening!

(Ed note: Susan Hadorn is a board member of Atlanta Celebrates Photography.)

Atlanta-based artist Danielle Roney is part of a group exhibition in Chicago called “The Edge of Intent” at the Museum of Contemporary Photography. Curated by ACP10 Portfolio Reviewer Natasha Egan, the show includes work by Liset Castillo, Dionisio González, Andrew Harrison, Tim Long, David Maisel, Simon Menner, Danielle Roney, Christina Seely, Eric Smith, and Joel Sternfeld.

“Moving from sand to animation, Danielle Roney’s (American, 1968) single-channel, three-section video eGoli imagines a fantastical landscape in a mythical “city of gold,” once an alias for Johannesburg, South Africa. During a 2007 residency in South Africa, the Atlanta-Beijing–based artist documented her experience through photographs, video, and sound recordings. Collaborating with animator Jeff Conefry, Roney crafts a hyper-real cyber city and its environs. The result implies a city struggling to find both its own ideal and its desire to become part of a global community. eGoli explores the African countryside and Johannesburg’s environs, and also the molecular structures of the city’s built environment.”

Laura Noel, “Resuscitated” 2008

Athens, Ga.—An exhibition featuring artwork by graduates of the University of Georgia’s Masters of Fine Arts program will be on display at the Lamar Dodd School of Art building from April 1 to April 17.

The exhibition provides an international showcase for new and noteworthy talent in the field of contemporary art. The visual artists of the UGA MFA program employ a wide range of subject matter in their multi-disciplinary practices. Each artist has spent years studying the representation and analysis of human experiences through creative research in visual art.

“The MFA exhibition is the highlight of the academic year,” said Georgia Strange, director of the art school. “Historically, the MFA exhibition commands the largest community turnout of all of our exhibitions. The students who will be graduating have been working toward this exhibition for three years. They will remember the MFA show all their lives.”

The exhibiting students are Wes Airgood, Jon Barwick, Maury Gortemiller, Joshua Dudley Greer, Jennifer Hartley, Nick Helton, Stacy Isenbarger, Soon Bae Kim, Erin McIntosh, Samantha Mosby, Laura Noel, Jon Roy and Tiffany Whitfield.

An opening reception, free to the public, will be held from 6 to 9 p.m. on Friday, April 3, at the Lamar Dodd School of Art Galleries 101, 307 and Orbit galleries. All galleries are handicap-accessible; gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

The Lamar Dodd School of Art is located at 270 River Road, next to the Georgia Museum of Art and the Hugh Hodgson School of Music on South Campus. Parking for the event is available across from the building in lots E07 and E11.

For information on the MFA artists featured, visit http://ugamfa.blogspot.com/. For additional event information, contact the Graduate Art Office at 706/542-1636 or 706/542-1624 or by e-mail at gradarts@uga.edu. For information on the Lamar Dodd School of Art, visit art.uga.edu.

Great article today in the Guardian about whether or not Caravaggio may have been the first photographer, using his entire studio as a camera obscura, and beginning his drawings with light sensitive materials. This follows-up on David Hockney‘s book “Secret Knowledge” about the introduction of mirrors and camera obscuras in the manufacturing of realistic painting, pre-dating “the invention” of photography.

“The Italian artist has long been suspected of turning his studio into a giant camera obscura, punching a hole in the ceiling to help project images on to his canvas. But new research claims that Caravaggio also used chemicals to turn his canvases into primitive photographic film, “burning” images he then sketched on to for works such as St Matthew and the Angel.”

“Was Caravaggio the First Photographer?“

This isn’t an Atlanta-specific story, but the problem it illuminates, of non-profit arts institutions suffering through the economic downtown (with culture and the creative community being a key to recovery) is a nationwide issue, for sure. [Link: Philly mayor supports arts groups even amid cuts"]

“There is something about art and music and culture that enhances the quality of life of this city,” Mayor Michael Nutter said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I think, even more so in these economic times … it helps us to cope and to deal with the madness around us, which virtually none of us can do anything about.”

ACP supports lens-based public art, so here’s an example (beyond Atlanta) of a subway stop that’s been remade by Mike and Doug Starn. Courtesy of the Coolhunting video podcast.

Christopher Sims, who’s attended the ACP Portfolio Review the last 2 (or more?) years has a show of photographs from Guantánamo Bay opening in DC this weekend. Great news, Chris!

“Civilian presents photographs by Christopher Sims depicting everyday life at the naval base and joint detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. It took Sims nearly three years to gain access to the base, which can be visited by civilians determined and patient enough to find the right channels to gain entry. A condition of his visit was that he was only permitted to shoot digital images, not negative film. Upon leaving the base, his work was inspected by military personnel and, with the exception of a few images, was deemed acceptable.”

© Christopher Sims

A laugh about the danger of photographing Amtrak trains, via the Colbert Report.

Last week, Robert Frank was interviewed on XM on the Bob Edwards Show, to coincide with his show at the National Gallery in DC.

Have a listen:

Aperture has just posted a Todd Hido lecture from April of ’08 at Parsons, in NYC.

Listen along, here:

Since the LIFE Magazine archive is now available on Google Images (along with outtakes that have never been published), blogs have sprung-up to curate the best of the bunch. “The Best of LIFE” is one to watch. This picture, from Margaret Bourke-White.

ACP co-founder Corinne Adams has a show in Chattanooga at Lookout Mountain Gallery that opens on January 30th. Mark your calendar if you’re up that way!

Daniel Cooney Fine Art in New York has another auction of photographs from emerging photographers, featuring a few participants from this year’s ACP 10 Portfolio Review. Bidding ends on January 21st, 2009.

Jeffrey Rich

Chuck Hemard

John Mann

New Yorker staff photographers Martin Schoeller and Steve Pyke talk about their work that’s currently at the National Portrait Gallery. If you like portraits, or take portraits, you might appreciate their insight(s).

There’s a substantial article about Sheila Pree Bright‘s latest exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

“Tapping into common racial and socio-economic stereotypes, Bright challenges viewers to examine their own preconceptions and to consider the idea that relationships between race and lifestyle are often misrepresented in the mainstream media.”

Ed note: Sheila is a member of ACP’s executive board.

Photographer Dawoud Bey is at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts on Thursday night, just up the road in Nashville, for those of you who like road trips on a school night! [State of the Art Lecture: Dawoud Bey—Representing the Human Subject]