Kerry Kilburn Weekly Post 2/29/2016

Graciela Iturbide
Graciela Iturbide at the Getty
Graciela Iturbide at art21 (includes a great short video)

Graciela Iturbide

Graciela Iturbide was born in 1942, the eldest of 13 children. She attended the Center for Film Studies at the National Autonomous University of Mexico with the goal of becoming a film director. She became interested in the still photography of the modernist master Manuel Alvarez Bravo, and began to study photography under his mentorship instead. Since the early 1970s, she has traveled widely throughout Mexico, the US, and Europe working on various commissions and projects. Her work is held in a number of prestigious collections and she has won numerous awards, including a Guggenheim fellowship. She is especially well known for her work among several of Mexico's indigenous cultures. She tries to integrate herself into their communities in order to document them; she says her work cannot be objective because she isn't.

Iturbide's work attracts me on several levels. As purely documentary, ethnographic work, it allows me glimpses into cultures I've never seen, and does so in a very intimate and loving way - I never feel like a voyeur, although I am very aware that I am an "other" looking into a world very different from my own. It also reminds me that what we see now as indigenous culture is really a blend of original indigenous traditions with introduced Catholicism - so some things have already, perhaps, been lost. And it doesn't take a great imagination to understand that the traditions she has photographed are themselves being changed by modern life, although how that will play out is unclear. Iturbide is also keenly aware of the basic social justice issues - in particular the great disparities in wealth and class - that face Mexico, and while she doesn't hit her audience over the head with them, you can see them at work in her images.

Finally, I really enjoy just looking at the images and studying her technique, which is quite varied. She uses different kinds of lighting for different effects. She uses both candid and composed "people" shots. She creates evocative still lifes from the everyday objects in the lives of the people she's working with. She really does it all.

Yajaida, 6

I'd like to begin first with this image that is entirely new to me. This is not a part of my personal history, and is a custom centuries old that to this point had been unaware. This beautifully constructed edifice was excavated one layer at a time, so that people could walk down the steps and reach water. The ingenuity is incredible. That it is so visually appealing, structurally sound, and tragically abandoned, draws me to the image. The artist shows all the discarded glory of what has long since been supplanted by machines. Machines that pull water from the ground more efficiently at the expense of the water supply. They have now efficiently created a water shortage in the span of a lifetime when this monument to community and culture is relegated to a dump site.

 

 This next image is a narrative that I am familiar with. I have lived this image. I see it and breath in salt and spray. Th artist showcases a rhythm to the water that has smeared and soiled by man. The composition shows movement, color, and a simplistic message in a profound way.

 

This is a topic of which I am aware, but have not had the opportunity to see visualized in such a way before.This is an example of the artist work that takes the viewer a moment to understand what it is we're looking at. That was a real treat during the entire show. To stand and wonder first, understand and dissect second allows for an emotional connection to the piece before we know what we should feel about it. It's beautiful, and before we determine if that beauty is framed in hope or loss, we just appreciate the rolling points, the gradient, the textures, shadows and light.

Carra Roots- Water Post

Edward Burtnsky

First of all I want to say thank you to Edward Burtynsky for showing things I would have had the chance of seeing. When first entering the exhibit, it blew me away. The size at which the photos were shown played a vital role on the impact made to the viewer. One could one feel as though they could enter into the photo. The detail was so that you wanted to touch the photo as if it were a painting. Some may have seen similar pictures before and thought about the beautiful landscapes, but these works has us to view the photo in different ways. 

I feel as though overall he achieved his goal. Edward, showed water in a plethora of ways. I know that I look at water as a pleasure or if it will always be there, that I never think of it ever being scarce. Never thinking of water as something that could be controlled or molded. The three pictures that I chose show water in three different forms: Control, Agriculture, and Waterfront. These stood out to me the most because they are composed well. 

In the first one, I really enjoyed we are placed in the center but not distracted by it. Water is showed in a calm state but when the dam works its out of control. In the second one, my eyes are drawn to the contrast being made in the land which is controlled and the rigidness of the natural land. Finally, I am drawn to the negative and positive space in the waterfront. Showing that even in its natural state, we still find ways to control it. 

Overall I feel as though a message was passed through, and is still relevant today. With the newly discovered Flint situation, I feel that this can be taken from such a broad measure to an intricate situation. I also think of Hurricane Katrina hitting New Orleans and the damage created there. Water is one of the most powerful forces, and also one which is most malleable. He showed that very well throughout the entire collection. 

Bradley Manley Land

New Light on Land is an exploration on a collaboration of different artist's work and their shots of Land in correspondence to Edward Burtynsky's work Water. The Exhibit included many body's of work from many great artist and vary in size, color, and different techniques. Although using their own styles the one thing in common was that at the point of making the photo they we were capturing beautiful photos of the landscape.
This Exhibit includes work from different time periods, from past to present. With the focus on the land, the viewer is able to see the evolution of the land we humans have walked on for many years. It is hard to extract an exact point of the show. There are many different perspectives and stories for each of the photographs, its hard to say that the artist was even focusing on the land and not the subjects in the photo. The photos may be vague, but together have a powerful emphasis with land and work extremely well together.

There are many ways to tackle this subject. Vast wastelands are not the only photos that can emphasize land. This show has shown me that. There are many different examples to show land. Having so many great photographers in this body of work shows many different perspectives and allows me to compare styles.

Katelyn Curtis Water

 

 

 

 

 

Comments about Edward Burtynsky's Showing at the Chrysler Museum

 

By Katelyn Curtis

 

 

 

 

Rice Terrace #3a #3b, Western Yunnan Province, China, 2012, Digital Chromogenic Print

 

This one was appealing to myself because I was forced to look closer and see the lines of the rise fields pull me across the page from one side to the other. Forced to realize how much work is involved in the processing of rice and how important water is to making and harvesting this crop. People have to maintain this everyday and must be tiresome work day in and day out. I keep searching this picture and finding more and more detail that sucked me into this picture for a solid fifteen minutes. I really enjoyed all the little houses spread throughout and seeing were rice had started forming more heavily than in another area.

 

 

VeronaWalk, Naples, Florida, USA, 2012, Digital Chromogenic Print

 

The repetition in this picture, the vastness, and the ever so slight differences about each house was intriguing and slightly overwhelming. Overwhelming that a place look so cookie cuter, exact, and exists as a community. The angle this picture was taken at moves the viewer up and then circles the eyes to the top middle, and then I started branching out to each street. During this time I was noticing the repetitive double garages, how most had pools, but not all, how everything was in proportion to one another, and thought of how these people lives play out day to day but most importantly, how water plays as an essential role to these people that reside in this community. These people live on these manmade islands, numerous pools, and a view like no tomorrow, but yet, rain and storms must impact them greatly and destroy this idea of perfection from time to time. Made me reflect on what they must encounter from season to season and how it might not always seems so ideal.

 

 

Manikarnika Ghat, Varanasi, India, 2013, Digital Chromogenic Print

 

Personally, this picture struck me the hardest and at first glance I did NOT expect it to move me the way it did. At first I was wondering why the men on the left were walking around in this muddy, unclear water as if it was nothing. Then I noticed all the wood back along the buildings, ALOT of wood at that. Still wasn't getting the whole picture so I was forced to keep searching for  more details to give me more. Then you realize that the color of orange is repeated all over the picture and I keep searching until my eyes land on two rectangular shapes on the stairs. Taking it all in, absorbing all the facts, and realizing that those squares are probably bodies, waiting to be burned and put into the water as part of some ritual that I am completely unfamiliar with culturally. I then had to restudy the picture, then again, seeing some people wearing shoes, the peoples expressions, the animals moving about. Coming to realize that water is super intertwined throughout these peoples life all the way to death and expands greater than my mind at first glance could comprehend. For me, this was a mind blowing picture that had moved me.

 

 

 

 

Burtynsky's work is different in the fact that the viewer can chose to look at this piece and think its beautiful and keep moving if that's what they want, but the true pleasure, is stopping and working through the picture and gaining the info that is given like little pieces to a treasure map. He is zooming all the way out, giving the viewer all the info they need to understand his view or reflections. This is a Perfect example on why a tendency of zooming in would overall give a completely different meaning and would altogether be a different piece of work all together.

Bradley Manley Water

Edward Burtynsky

Edward Burtynsky tackles interaction between water and humanity. Burtynsky captures beautiful, large scale, aerial view photos over vast landscapes of water. Along with water he capture man made structures such as dams, large facilities, and highly populated areas.

Burtynsky choosing to make these photos large was a good choice. Through the large scale we are able to get a sense of how much impact mankind has on this world and the issue at hand. Being the photos are taken from the air, once again points out the mass effect. Although, in a sense, he is pointing out the negative effects mankind has had on nature. The beauty of the photos are not lost through the man-made structures and natural occurrence through water.

These photos are amazing. Its large scale was the right choice for the project to ,further push the intensity of the issue. Although the pictures were magnificent, I found the subject to be overdone. It is clear with the increase of the population, it will have a negative effect on the world, however i couldn't find a better way to tackle this global issue.

Victoria Garnett, Artist Post, New Light on Land, 2/22/2016

Vanishing Race, 1904. By, Edward S. Curtis. Platinum Print. 

This photograph spoke to me when I saw it at the Chrysler. Native Americans had been through many years of hardships, but we must remember that Native Americans still exist and still keep their heritage and culture very much so alive. The photograph shows us that they are on the move,  their backs facing us, and riding their horses along a dusty trail. This image to me isn't showing the actual people disappearing, but more so their land and homes disappearing and being taken over by others. I feel that it was very important to document their lives during this time that the photograph was taken. 

Railroads were being built on their lands and was constantly being approved to be built, forcing them to move.  This photograph makes you want to dig deeper and research their history and makes you imagine what their lives had to of been like during that time period. 

Men Cradling Wheat, Near Sperryville, Virginia, 1936. Gelatin silver print. 

After looking at the rural surroundings in the photograph, I read where this photograph was taken, it further interested me. It interested me because this photograph was taken in an area that I am very familiar with, approximately 20 minutes from my hometown. This hit home because my family, like many others, had to do work like this during this time period. This image makes me really think of the land of Virginia.