Collection: MOCA’s First Thirty Years (11/15)

Think of if MOCA was a record label and they've been kickin' it for 30 years, thus, they now release a 30th anniversary box set with all the trimmings. That's pretty much what you get when MOCA brings out the big guns to MOCA Grand Ave and Geffen Contemporary at MOCA this week to showcase over 500 works by more than 200 artists such as Jackson Pollock, Diane Arbus, Larry Clark, Lee Friedlander, Nan Goldin, Helen Levitt, Claes Oldenberg, Robert Rauschenberg, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Edward Ruscha and many, many more (to see complete list, check here.)

Best part is the opening week of exhibition is FREE to the public ! Yes, MOCA ♥ YOU ! (Just remember they close on Tues & Weds).

1940s-1980s MOCA Grand Ave
1980s-Today Geffen Contemporary @ MOCA

MOCA Grand Ave
250 S. Grand Ave
Los Angeles CA 90012

Geffen Contemporary @ MOCA
152 N. Central Ave
Los Angels, CA 90013


LINK

Locating Landscapes: New Strategies, New Technologies @ Sam Lee Gallery

Paho Mann "Mr. Formal" Phoenix, Arizona, 2006


Margot Anne Kelley "N 36° 14.381 W 115° 18.746 (Lone Mountain, Nevada)" 2002


Lewis Baltz "Hidden Valley, Looking South" 1977


Locating Landscape showcases artists working at the edges of photography, landscape, technology, and geo-location, and includes work by Lewis Baltz, Christiana Caro, Andrew Freeman, Frank Gohlke, Margot Anne Kelley, Mark Klett, Paho Mann, Adam Thorman, and Byron Wolfe.

Inspired by the current revival of the influential and critically acclaimed New Topographics exhibition from 1975, which will be concurrently on view at LACMA, Locating Landscape highlights some of the most interesting young artists at work in Los Angeles and the Southwest today, linking their work with the New Topographics generation. This earlier generation has proven decisively influential for the artists in the show, sometimes directly so. Margot Anne Kelley and Christiana Caro studied with Frank Gohlke; Andrew Freeman studied with Lewis Baltz; and Paho Mann and Adam Thorman studied with Mark Klett as well as Bill Jenkins, the original curator of New Topographics at George Eastman House in Rochester, New York.

October 30 – December 5, 2009

Sam Lee Gallery
990 N. Hill St. No. 190
Los Angeles, CA 90012-1752
(323) 227-0275

LAT review

Wed (11/11)

+ Do you know Martin Schall of You Are Here ? His website is a collection of Los Angeles architecture photo gallery. It's been online for at least a decade and boost a great number of images of Los Angeles. I stumbled upon it years ago while researching. The thing I love is that the photographer is just a German service engineer working in the oil biz. On his off-time he travels around taking photos. He's been to Los Angeles many times, and just last week was here hanging out with LAObserved's Kevin Roderick .

+ Black Star Rising is starting a new thing on their site called "Ask the Photo Business Coach" with Beate Chelette ! Y'all may remember her from BeateWorks some number of years ago and I see her out at times such as at Smashbox functions. Go Beate !

+ Blogdowntown reports Downtown Art Walk Executive Director Richard Schave resigned his position along with his wife Kim Cooper who was Treasurer. Things have been rocky with the Downtown Art Walk leadership when it changed hands earlier this year. Personally I felt the Downtown Art Walk jumped the shark about 9 months ago. I've been to the Art Walk several times over the past 5 years.

+ Ugh ! This really makes me wish I was in New York. *sigh*


:: LINKAGE ::
+ Another photographer vs police in the LA subways
+ Protect Your Flickr Photos !
+ A Photo Credit Doesn't Pay Rent
+ People of Public Transit
+ Life World Library - Switzerland, 1964
+ Evolution of the Mobile Phone

Clive Barker "Imagining Man" (11/11)

"Photography has become a fruitful meeting place for a number of my passions. In these pictures you will find my love of the theatre and of fantastic cinema; of masks and of painting; and of course, centrally, of the naked male body. " - Clive Barker

Opening Reception Wednesday, November 11, 6-9 pm

Note: During this exhibition no persons under the age of 18 years old allowed without parent or guardian.

Bert Green Fine Art
102 West 5th Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013
213-624-6212 (recorded info)
213-842-8574 (direct line)


Also the same night, there's a preview night over at Todd/Browning Gallery with JOHN SANTERINEROSS first solo show. Wonderfully dark and reminds me many of Joel-Peter Witkin's work, it feels like a perfect companion piece to Barker's show which is just a block and a half away from the Todd/Browning Gallery. The preview show is from 6-9 pm. 211 West 5th Street (between Spring & Broadway)
Los Angeles, CA 90013

John Santerineross (11/12)

"Everyone always asks me what my images mean. My response is to figure it out for yourself. Though I do have a very specific story to my images, I would not want to limit the viewers' imagination by telling them what that story is. I believe in making the viewer work a little."

the first Los Angeles solo exhibition of neo-symbolist works by John Santerineross, the author of Fruit of the Secret God (1999) and Dream (2004)

Opens Wednesday Nov 11th but the party will be on the 12th as part of the Downtown Art Walk

TODD / BROWNING GALLERY
211 West 5th Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013


UPDATE : Found out he won't be flying in for the opening - he's stuck at home with a flu.
UPDAte 2 : Just found out tonight there's a preview show tomorrow night (11/11) 6-9 pm - just the same time as Clive Barker's exhibition just down the street at Bert Green Fine Art.

Douglas Kirkland "Homage to Classic Italian Cinema" (11/12-11/27)

Homage to Classic Italian Cinema is a series of photographs Douglas Kirkland created for Vanity Fair Italia. They are “remakes” of 25 famous scenes taken from Italian classics, with well known contemporary Italian actors like Monica Bellucci, Giovanna Mezzogiorno and Pierfrancesco Favino playing the legends of the past like like Gina Lollobrigida, Sophia Loren and Eli Wallach. An exhibit of black and white portraits of those same actors accompanies the show.

In conjunction with the Cinema Italian Style film series going on here in Los Angeles from Nov 10-18, Douglas Kirkland's series will be on display at the Italian Cultural Institute located over in Westwood area. Their hours are : Mon.- Fri.10.00am-1.00pm, closed for lunch, then 2 pm-4 pm. Up for exhibit until November 27th.

Italian Cultural Institute
1023 Hilgard Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90024
(310) 443-3250

The Sum of Myself: Photographic Self-Portraits @ BCAM

Robert Mapplethorpe, United States, 1946–1989, Self-Portrait, 1988

The Sum of Myself: Photographic Self-Portraits from the Audrey and Sydney Irmas Collection

This exhibition presents the visually compelling and psychologically charged terrain covered within the enduring theme of self-portraiture. Spanning photo history, included are works by Edward Steichen, Diane Arbus, Andy Warhol, Cindy Sherman, Catherine Opie, Douglas Gordon, Walker Evans, Irving Penn, and Robert Heinecken. Concluding with Testament, an installation by LA-based artist Natalie Bookchin, a revealing edit of video blogs and diaries from the web that analyzes contemporary expressions of self.


October 25, 2009 - January 3, 2010

BCAM @ LACMA
5905 Wilshire Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90036

“Sport: Iooss & Leifer” (11/12) @ Annenberg Space

Oooh boy, this Thursday over at the Annenberg Space for Photography in Century City opens "Sports : Iooss & Leifer". Even if you're not a sports fan, these two names should get your photography ears a-buzzing : Walter Iooss Jr and Neil Leifer.

For Neil, he will forever be known for this photo.




"Well, I was lucky. I don’t want to sound like I’m just being modest about it. Most good photographers I know, sports or any other kind, have pretty healthy egos and I’m certainly no exception to that. But sports photography is a matter of being in the right place. You’ve got to be in the right seat. A great example is to the Liston Ali picture. The photographer you see between Ali’s legs is Herbie Scharfman, the other Sports Illustrated photographer. It didn’t make a difference how good he was that night. He was obviously in the wrong seat. What the good sports photographer does is when it happens and you’re in the right place, you don’t miss. Whether that’s instinctual or whether it’s just luck, I don't know." - Neil Leifer.

For Walter, well, he's gotten a dream job. Shooting for Sports Illustrated, he gets a chance to photograph celebrated sports figures as well as celebrated super models for the SI Swimsuit Issue.







Here's an interview I found with Iooss on YouTube.

Anyways, the exhibition opens this Thursday Nov 12th. Walter Iooss speaks this Saturday (11/14) @ Annenberg also. I believe it's all booked right now so stand-by will be your only option. They usually release seats 10 minutes before it starts. The lecture is 6:30-8 pm this Sat.

Annenberg Space for Photography
2000 Avenue of the Stars
Century City, CA. 90067
Tel: 213.403.3000

INFO

What is PIX Feed LA ?

Okay, I noticed my numbers are going up so I figured I'll run through what this site is for newcomers. I briefly mention the history of the blog before but what is really simply put is a "feed" of photo-related events here in Los Angeles.

We all lead busy lives here especially those of us in the creative freelance world. What I hope is to give really quick mini-listing of events here in LA. There's blogs out there that read like an article and honestly if I had time, I would bookmark that later to read but in our everyday lives, we just need information - quick & easy.

So the PIX Feed is to give you nuggets of info - click on the date and see what is going on that day. Opening receptions to photo exhibition that week are posted that week. Seminars, workshops, and so forth are posted usually as soon as I find out. And in between I do little quick photography links of what I hope you find interesting. Once in a while I'll mention something related to PIX either holiday hours or if we have something for sale. In most cases, I try to keep PIX stuff down to a minimum.

That said, I know my boss will kill me if I don't mention that we do deliver equipment/sales items here in LA starting at $5 (see pixcamera.com and that we have the longest business hours in town. We're up at 6am and close at 10 pm during the week. Yes we are open 16 hours a day. On weekends our hours are 8 am to 6 pm. And yes, for those of y'all out there who remember us from the 90s, we used to be open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year. I mention this before but if you buy our old night manager Sam a drink, he'll be glad to tell you tales who folks wandering in at odd hours of the night. Or the time an shall be unnamed New York magazine was in town shooting at night and they had to run out of polaroid (you can tell how old this story is by the usage of Polaroid) , so they sent an assistant here to pick up some.....well, you know what ? Ask him to tell you the rest :)

Other features of this blog is I've also posted up lists of photo assistants here in town along with digital techs, studio rentals, camera repair shops, equipment rentals, etc. Stuff that I think a working photographer would be looking for.

If you're an assistant/digitech/retoucher/studio or want to be added to any of the lists I have up, just email me your name/phone/email/website/what list you want to be on to PIXFEED *at* gmail.com.

And of course you can be a Facebook fan over here or follow our tweets here.

ASAKO NARAHASHI "Coming closer and getting further away" (11/14)

Asako Narahasi stir up some attention a few years ago with her "half awake and half asleep in the water" series which she had been working on since 2000. "Coming Closer and Getting Further Away" opens November 14th at Rose Gallery over in Bergamot Station. The series seems to have some images from here "half awake" series along with new images.

The author will be signing her book on Jan 23, 2010 6-8 pm


Saturday, November 14, 2009 - Saturday, January 30, 2010

Rose Gallery
2525 Michigan Ave # G5
Santa Monica, CA 90404-4091
(310) 264-8440

Hennessey + Ingalls 20% off sale All WEEK !

If you're like me, you like wandering through H&I either in Santa Monica or here in Hollywood going through their photography books. And yup, here's your chance to go and stock up as Hennessey + Ingalls is offering 20% off ALL THEIR BOOKS. No, you can't call and hold a book and is limited to what is in store right now. Oh, you can also get the discount ONLINE at hennesseyingalls.com

Ends Nov. 14th.

Santa Monica:
214 Wilshire Blvd
Santa Monica, CA 90401

Hollywood:
Space 15 Twenty
1520 N. Cahuenga Blvd., Ste 8
Los Angeles, CA 90028
(on Ivar side of complex)

Harlem of the West: Jazz, Bebop & Beatnik @ CAAM

“Harlem of the West: Jazz, Bebop and Beatnik” currently on display at the California African American Museum until January 2010, celebrates San Francisco’s Fillmore District in the 1940s, ’50s and early ’60s, “where Bebop Jazz cross-pollinated with the Beat Movement and avant garde film making to make a dynamic scene,” a press release states. Numerous photographs from the era, with celebrities such as Louis Armstrong, John Coltrane and Billie Holiday, make up the exhibit, which also includes films by Harry Smith, who was an ethnomusicologist, archivist and beatnik during that time.

September 24, 2009 - Feb 28, 2010


California African American Museum (CAAM)
600 State Dr.
Los Angeles, CA 90037

LINK

Los Angeles' Berlin Wall comes down

About a thousand people gathered for the 11 p.m. ceremony, which featured videos, speakers and music, all in anticipation of midnight when a 6-foot portion of L.A.'s wall would come down. As that moment grew near, the crowd's insanity intensified. Finally, artists and officials tore down the wall, complete with concrete looking pieces of styrofoam. Then... celebratory chaos.

Leading up to the event, 10 segments of the original wall were installed on the grass at 5900 Wilshire, across from LACMA. Noir, along with L.A. muralist Kent Twitchell, Marie Astrid González and Farrah Karapetian, added their own works to it, which will remain on display until next Saturday.

LINKAGE
+ LAist : The 'Berlin Wall' Comes Down on Wilshire Blvd.
+ LAT : The Berlin Wall : 20 years Later, Los Angeles Remembers
+ Slate : And the Wall comes down

Maria Luisa Morando (11/14)

"... By overexposing the camera, my world becomes clutter free, enabling the viewer to experience the moment and therefore really see it, feel it and connect with it. Like memories, these images have the seemingly counter-intuitive qualities of being highly defined, yet at the same time, being impossible to get close to, no matter how much the viewer tries.

By removing the clutter, the viewer is freed up to respond to the work almost as if they can hear the image. Without the surplus detail, the other senses can come into play, making it easier to hear the waves, feel the heat of the sunlight and taste the salt air. The lack of clutter gives tranquility about the work. "

November 14, 2009--January 16, 2010

Reception: November 14, 2009, 6-8pm

DNJ Gallery
154½ N. La Brea Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90036
323.931.1311

Michael Lavine "Grunge"

Can ya believe it ? Grunge is now 20 years old ? I was just starting high school and yes, I bought Nirvana's album and Pearl Jam and heck, I even bought the soundtrack to Singles, that Cameron Crowe film that sort of mixed grunge + Melrose Place (OG, not the reboot). Okay, the soundtrack sill rules, I still listen to it while the movie, alas, does not stand the test of time as well.

In that era, I do remember Michael Lavine's name. I believe it was SPIN magazine that I first saw name under the photo credits. He was definitely one of the "grunge" photographer guys in that time. In 1996, he came out with his book Noise From the Underground which I remember reading and looking through the photos while I was in college.

Now just last month, he's released his new book Grunge, over 160 pages of seen and unseen photographs from that time. For me, it'll be a treat. A chance to revisit images I've seen before at that age 15 and how they'll look now that I'm 35.

Michael has set up a gallery on his site with some photos from the book here. And you can hear him and Thurston Moore being interviewed below by WNYC.



Just for kicks, remember this ?

Yousuf Karsh

I admit it, this is the third time I posted about Karsh on the blog. Why am I posting this again ? Simply, I found a video of his images from APE and decided to repost and mention to folks that yes, you can see Karsh's work currently over at the Central Library in Downtown LA.

In celebration of the 100th birthday of renowned photographer Yousuf Karsh (1908-2002), the Los Angeles Public Library and Library Foundation of Los Angeles are hosting an exhibition of the great portraitist's work. The selected images offer a visual biography of this twentieth-century legend.

Karsh made a career photographing the world's most distinguished statesmen, artists, literary figures, musicians, scientists, actors, and actresses. Traveling the globe, he gained access to virtually every great figure of his time. Among his most famous iconic images are the ones he made of Winston Churchill (1941), Albert Einstein (1948), Pablo Picasso (1954), Ernest Hemingway (1957), Jacqueline Kennedy (1957) and Sophia Loren (1981).

I first heard of Karsh in 1999. When I started at PIX, there was a camera salesman by the name of Larry who worked the sales counter (well, besides Diana - anyone remember this gal from the mid-late 90s ?) For many of y'all here in LA, you know Larry. He used to work at Pan Pacific over on La Brea. He's been around the block more than a few times and been selling cameras for lord knows how long. I asked him once who his favorite photographer was and he said simply "Karsh"


Love this video interview of Yousuf Karsh’s wife Estrellita - especially about Karsh and his experience with a young photographer at the airport. Man, wow.....


August 2, 2009 - January 23, 2010

Central Library – First Floor Galleries
630 W. 5th St.
Los Angeles, CA 90071

INFO

LINKAGE
Interview (1988)

Closing Shows

Instead of listing new opening receptions, I decided to touch on a few shows ending today (Saturday 11/7/09). Click on the link for the hours of operation of the gallery.


seeing things : an exhibition of ghost polaroids @ drkrm gallery



Jona Frank "Boys: In Progress" @ DNJ


Chris Verene "Family" @ DNJ


Gerald Förster "Nocturnal" @ Stephen Cohen Gallery

An Evening with Walter Iooss (11/14)

Walter Iooss on Charlie Rose, 1999

On November 14, the Annenberg Space for Photography will offer a special Saturday night lecture by Walter Iooss, one of the photographers featured in the upcoming exhibit SPORT: Iooss & Leifer.

Walter Iooss is best known for his nearly 300 Sports Illustrated covers, as well as his portraits of famous athletes like Michael Jordan, Ken Griffey, Jr., Brett Favre, Joe Montana and Wayne Gretzky. In his career, Iooss has covered virtually every major sports event, including all 43 Super Bowls, and has also photographed performers like the Rolling Stones, James Brown, Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin while working as an in-house photographer for Atlantic Records.

RSVP here. They released tickets in two waves. The first was just on Friday (11/6) and the next one is Monday (11/9) at 9:30 am. And of course there is a stand by list which will open 10 minutes before the lecture starts.

A few days before this lecture, Anneberg Space for Photography presents their next exhibition "Sports : Iooss & Leifer" opens on November 12th.

Saturday, November 14th 6:30-8:00 pm

Annenberg Space for Photography
2000 Avenue of the Stars
Los Angeles, CA 90067

UPDATE : By now I assume the event is completely booked so your best bet is stand-by. They usually start releasing seats about 10 minutes before it begins.

Mark Edward Harris

Found some interview with LA photographer Mark Edward Harris. Love how he talks about assisting - yes, I totally believe in assisting - it is a great way to learn the real world and honestly the time I spent assisting in Dallas and Los Angeles definitely influence me. Anyways, great little interview.

Amanda Milius "Family Jam" (11/7)

"The point was to just feel it under the surface, teeter on the edge of love, fear, life and unlife, to blink twice at something beautiful, to see trails, have a shared experience, and in that to sense the happiness and freedom amongst friends who were and are, searching and striving for the same things the girls were....These photos are about the beginning of that story, when they wanted the same love and freedom we sing about still. Right before everything went wrong."



Saturday Nov. 7th opening reception 7 - midnight

Ghettogloss Gallery
6109 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90038




Read more of Amanda's thoughts on this project here.

David Williams "Experience the Ballona Wetlands" (11/7)

Renowned Culver City Photographer, David Jordan Williams showcases his photo art show entitled “The Ballona Wetlands” in 18th Street’s project room. His photographic art offers just a taste of some of the most stunning and revealing images of this special, and somewhat hidden, place along the Los Angeles coast, known as the Ballona Wetlands.

Williams photography debuts as a month-long show in November that highlights features from the book, Celebrate Ballona, written and compiled by Susan Suntree, Marcia Hancom and Robert Roy van de Hoek. The book will be available as part of a multiple year celebration of the amazing citizen initiative of preserving more than 600 acres of land in the Ballona Valley. The “Ballona Wetlands” photo art exhibit is sponsored by the Ballona Institute and is a project of the International Humanities Center in Pacific Palisades.

Saturday November 7th Opening Reception 3:30 PM - 6:30 PM

18th Street Arts Center
1639 18th St.
Santa Monica, CA 90404

Josef Hoflehner

First thing that jumps to my mind is In & Out burgers.

Yup. In & Out. Why ? Simply if you ever gone to the In & Out over on 9149 S. Sepulveda Blvd. and sat by their windows facing south, you'll see planes coming in for the landing. Perhaps not as dramatic as Josef Hoflehner's images but thrilling all the same.

I'm curious just how those folks managed to just be hanging out at a beach with constant flights overhead - I imagine the jet noises wouldn't be too helpful if you wanted to sleep :)