August 2013 – New Landscape Photography

Many would think that dreams are completely fictitious, simply creations of our imaginations. However it is curious that, as revealed by psychologist Sigmund Freud, dreams are solely based on real experiences. When dreaming our minds play with different fragments of our lives, and change details in them to create spaces and events that appear to be unrecognizable to many.

Freud proposed that since the moment our hearts start beating and our minds begin to wonder, all instances are permanently recorded in our minds. And although we might consciously forget about most of them, they are embodied in our minds for “eternity.” For some reason there are moments that in a certain way have an impact on us as individuals, and so recur in our unconscious and are constantly relived in dreams. This series is a photographic research of these powerful moments in my day to day. And although some might appear to be somewhat insubstantial, they are all spaces in time that have a certain magic that appeals to my personal unconscious and so in a way make me who I am. They are all moments worthy of reliving in dreams.

— Alejandro Medina, Guatemala City, Guatemala

August 26, 2013August 22, 2013

Dave Reichert

www.DaveReichertPhoto.com

There’s a time at the outset of some days, when for a few moments I exist in that narrow zone between dream and waking reality. During that gradual rise to consciousness, the dream reality becomes dim and recedes into the distance, and I often struggle to imprint the disappearing image of it on my memory.

I’m very interested in these half-remembered scenes: landscapes that exist in waking reality and later in dreams, filtered by my unconscious in service of some narrative that my brain has created to maintain itself; but these images can’t be captured by any conventional photographic media. Once appropriated for dreams, they exist only as memories or suggestions of the physical world. They fade quickly.

There are occasions though, while out looking for pictures, when a scene will present itself to me with elements that are evocative of a future dreamscape. In Dreams is an open-ended collection of images where I’ve been guided by that suggestion.

— Dave Reichert, Pecos, New Mexico, USA

August 22, 2013August 16, 2013

Gian Paul Lozza

www.LozzaPhoto.com

The journey leads into the depth of the human psyche. A place of darkness and melancholy. A place where the observer is at the mercy of himself. He wanders alone through the alleys of his imagination; traverses unreal places and encounters strange thoughts and dreams. The film of inner images captivates the observer and leads him into unknown corners of his consciousness.

My photography is meant to be mysterious and secluded. Soft and pale, like an air draught, the light sweeps throughout the pictures and bestows the scenes with vague apprehensions. All the senses are alert. They capture sharpened contours; feel the weight of the objects. Light sources captivate the eye and drag it to the picture. Objects approach and poise. The curtain is drawn, the objects are mantled, apertures closed. As if just fallen from the sky, a box and a capsule are standing in a landscape. Questions shall arise from the strangeness of these scenes and draw the observer down into unknown places.

The locations of my photography are not staged, but searched for intuitively. Every day and everywhere they are waiting for our eyes to be seen. I deliberately fade out shapes, remove impedimenta and adjust superimpositions. The pictures remain deliberately empty and melancholic, working like film stills, by suggesting stories, which are searching their way through the observer’s associative array of images and thoughts.

— Gian Paul Lozza, London, United Kingdom

August 19, 2013August 16, 2013

Robert Knight

www.RobertKnight.com

Attendance at traditional religious services in the United States has declined dramatically in recent years. Meanwhile, immigration patterns since the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act have markedly altered the ethnic and religious landscape of the United States. As a result, mainline Protestant and Roman Catholic churches, and Reform and Conservative Synagogues that used to comprise the majority of the religious landscape of the Northeastern US have taken on new uses.

Sacred Spaces in Transition examines the sustainability of religious communities in Central New York, alongside their ethnic and linguistic identities. Religious communities, throughout history, across the world, have set aside built structures for purposes of ritual gatherings, just as these spaces also reaffirm the identity and cohesion of the group for themselves and to mark themselves toward the “outsiders” in the proximate area. Through photographs and video documentation of spaces, and interviews with religious officiants, we hope to explore these changes and reveal the complexities of contemporary religious culture in our communities.

— Robert Knight, Clinton, New York, USA

August 16, 2013August 3, 2013

Jordan Sullivan

www.Jordan-Sullivan.com

The Young Earth is set in Iceland. The story follows two Americans in the last days of their twenties, one them terminally ill, as they explore one of the youngest bodies of land in the world. The men immerse themselves in the idyllic and remote corners of the Icelandic countryside (a place completely foreign to both men), where they are forced to confront their own mortality and a past love triangle that briefly destroyed their friendship.

Through meditations on death, the loss of youth, and the beauty and complications that come with love and friendship, The Young Earth explores how two men attempt to move on and find courage and calm in the face of oncoming tragedy.

— Jordan Sullivan, Los Angeles

August 14, 2013August 3, 2013

Tamim Jamshed

www.TamimJamshed.com

Ireland has a high dependence on oil, presently 56% of its energy comes from it and 25% is from gas. Off the west coast of Co. Mayo, the Corrib gas field is now owned by the exploration company British Dutch Shell (BDS) and contains at least 1 trillion TFC of natural gas. They are laying a high-pressure gas pipe 9KM long through Rossport village to carry the raw and liquid material to the refinery in middle of the local forest. The organization named Shell to Sea, with the help of local villages, is protesting against BDS to save their local environment that is threatened by the company. But it’s not easy to get anything positive where the authorities are involved. To build the refinery and the gas terminal Shell bought 400 square km of state forestry land from Coillte, the state forestry.

The high-pressure gas pipeline is planned so close to homes; schools and local places could seriously affect the community in the event of pipe failure. On the other hand BDS already discharged liquid aluminum into the only resource of natural drinking water of several villages. The local economy is based on a small amount of tourism, fishing and farming. Now they believe their livelihood and jobs are being directly threatened by Shell’s project in their village.

The Irish people stand to gain nothing from the exploitation of their own natural resources, while seeing only detriment to their economy and environment. All the profits and benefits from this project will end up in the hands of the multinationals.

— Tamim Jamshed, Dublin, Ireland

August 12, 2013August 3, 2013

Ian van Coller

www.IanvanColler.com

Once known as “The Richest Hill on Earth,” Butte is not your typical mining town. At the end of the 19th century, Butte mines were the largest producers of copper in the world, with the dominant share of copper wire used to electrify the United States coming from this one mountainside.

Butte’s colorful and controversial history includes the murder of union activist Frank Little, the establishment of one of the first successful mine unions in the nation, the bulldozing of worker neighborhoods by the Anaconda Mining Company in the 1950’s, and the eventual abandonment of the copper mines in 1974, leaving behind the largest superfund site in the United States.

Butte is struggling to redefine itself as a place of interest, based largely on its epic history, as much as it is to its current status as the epitome of man-made ecological devastation. In conjunction with Anaconda, Butte and its surrounds constitute the largest historic preservation district in the nation, with over 6000 properties. How does a community of 30,000 people cope with this legacy and define for itself a plan for future sustainability? By focusing on Butte’s landscapes, vernacular architecture and portraits of local residents, I hope to inspire viewers to consider how the impacts of a community’s past shape its present state of cultural, economic and ecological health.

Ian van Coller, Bozeman, Montana, USA

August 9, 2013August 3, 2013

Ashley M. Jones

www.AshleyMJones.com

The mass production and relative affordability of the automobile in the early 20th century resulted in considerable changes to our nation’s infrastructure and the need to intersect highway systems with urban neighborhoods. As a resident of Savannah, Georgia, I am fascinated by the rich history and historic architecture of the city. However, there is a stark division between the restored and legally protected buildings within the central National Historic Landmark District and the struggling, run down neighborhoods that surround it. I am specifically interested in the at-risk neighborhoods along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and the ways in which they have been impacted by the construction of the Interstate 16 flyover.

This elevated section of Interstate 16, the Earl T. Shinholster Bridge, held its official ribbon cutting in 1967. The construction of the interstate coincided with several other large-scale urban renewal projects including the construction of Kayton and Fraiser homes south and east of the flyover. It intersects with the Westside of Savannah in the historically African American “Frogtown” neighborhood — a neighborhood that has been on the decline since the interchange was completed.

In 2010 I began photographically documenting the homes, businesses, and churches in the area immediately surrounding the flyover. My documentation has since expanded to include neighborhoods south of Frogtown and extending several blocks south to Victory Drive. This area includes Cuyler-Brownsville, a neighborhood similarly impacted by connection of 37th Street to I-16.

My photographs depict the current state of this community and the architectural structures that remain to provide an understanding of the historic and contemporary context of this community. I am further exploring local movements to renew and revive Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and the neighborhoods immediately impacted by the Interstate.

— Ashley M. Jones, Savannah, Georgia, USA

August 7, 2013August 2, 2013

Buzzy Sullivan

www.BuzzySullivan.com

This body of work is an exploration of the rapidly-changing landscape of the American West, devastated by the depletion and manipulation of water and water rights. This work focuses on the engineered ruins of California: I aim to pose a series of questions about the sustainability of agricultural and population booms in the semi-arid state.

I shot the images that make up The Smell of Success / The Effects of Decay as 8×10 wet-plate ambrotypes, which is the same photographic process used by the post-Civil War photographers who traveled with government-sponsored surveys to document the then uninhabited West. Their 19th-century images created a sense of what could be tamed and owned in the American West. My photographs emulate my predecessors’ images, allowing the viewer a vantage point to contemplate how we as a society have managed resources in some of the most environmentally-fragile areas over the past century.

Buzzy Sullivan, Portland, Oregon, USA

August 5, 2013August 2, 2013

Tony Murray

www.TonyMurray.ie

I am drawn and excited by the transformation that happens when the seemingly banal and everyday is transformed into an abstraction by the intervention of the camera. For me, the camera always lies — it is not about truth or fact but “story.” Imagined Lands documents the idealized landscapes that were created to lure and sell property during the boom years of the Celtic Tiger era. The images appeared on hoardings [temporary walls] that were erected to lure potential house buyers and promised a life of bounty and fulfillment. My images create an ambiguous and sometimes wry juxtaposition between the “real” and the “imagined.”

— Tony Murray, Dublin, Ireland