Singularity » London

London Shop Fronts

Bohoe — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 23:00:51 +0000

This is a rather interesting ongoing collection of photographs of London’s shop fronts. Well, perhaps not your high street average shop front, but that makes it even more interesting. Would love to see that done in many other european cities that still enjoy some really old ones. Its all Eugène Atget allover again. Great!

via Emily Webber

Tiina Itkonen – Ultima Thule

Bohoe — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 01:11:24 +0000

3rd September – 7th October 2008

MICHAEL HOPPEN CONTEMPORARY
3 Jubilee Place, London SW3 3TD
www.michaelhoppengallery.com
Tues-Fri 12noon – 6 pm . Sat 10:30am – 5pm

“On my first trip to Greenland, I was told I would definitely be coming back. According to a Greenlandic tale, a human being can turn into a qivigtoq, run around the fells, live there and finally die there. My desire to return to Greenland goes beyond reason. On one of my trips there I tried to shake off this madness and leave wandering in the northern landscapes, like a qivigtoq. I did not succeed.”

These large-scale colour photographs capture the artist’s fascination with the cold, barren and infinite landscape of Greenland. Steeped in blue light many of these photographs show the human outposts, the dog sledges and brightly coloured houses, in this Ultima Thule, border of the known world.

There are no roads between towns in Greenland so travel is not easy. Itkonen journeys by helicopter, small plane, hunter’s boats and dog sledge but only if the weather permits, if not then maybe tomorrow – “immaqa agaqu”. She will wait for the right moment to shoot, sometimes for hours, sometimes for days, preferring to photograph when it is cloudy or foggy due to the variations in light quality.

“It is fascinating and comforting being able to see far away. No trees or tall buildings to block the view. A broad view can be hard to capture in a single frame. The picture does not tell what is far and what is near, nor what is large and what is small. An iceberg is the size of a house of flats. An island that looks like it is two kilometers away is actually ten times further. Even my eyes cannot tell these things.”

As global warming closes in on Greenland the shrinking glaciers reveal new land masses, the winters are milder and the ocean does not freeze for long periods. At Illulissat, where many of these photographs are taken, the ocean has not frozen for years and the ice in northern parts of Greenland is getting thinner. The ice now only supports the weight of a man for a few months a year, putting hunters and fishermen with their dog sledges in danger. This makes Itkonen’s photographs more poignant – she is now capturing a vanishing landscape.

Tiina Itkonen (b. 1968) lives and works in Helsinki where she studied photography at the University of Art and Design. Exhibiting in Finland and abroad since 1996, Tiina’s work has most recently been seen in Switzerland, Germany, Norway and England. Her works are held in collections at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Fundacio Foto Colectania in Barcelona, Helsinki City Art Museum, the Finnish State Art Collection, DZ Bank in Germany and the Saastamoinen Foundation Art Collection/EMMA amongst others. Winner of Finnish Young Photographer of the Year 2003 and a Fotofinlandia finalist in 2004, Itkonen has been photographing Greenland for the past ten years and her first book, Inughuit, was published in 2004.

Portraits taken in Greenland between 1998-2002 by Itkonen will be exhibited at the Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge, from 3rd September to 8th November 2008. www.spri.cam.ac.uk/museum/

ANNIE LEIBOVITZ: A Photographer’s Life, 1990-2005

Bohoe — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 01:02:29 +0000

National Portrait Gallery
16 October 2008 – 1 February 2009
Wolfson and Ground Floor Lerner Galleries
St Martin’s Place
London WC2H 0HE
Admission £11
Concessions £10/£9

A Photographer’s Life presents over 150 images by one of the world’s best-known photographers. Leibovitz’s celebrated portraits of public figures, including her famous images of Queen Elizabeth II, and the then-pregnant actress Demi Moore, are shown alongside personal photography, which documents intimate and moving moments from her life, including the birth of her children and rites of passage with her parents and extended family.

Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer’s Life, 1990–2005 includes over 150 photographs by the celebrated photographer, encompassing well-known work made on editorial assignment as well as personal photographs of her family and close friends. “I don’t have two lives,” Leibovitz says. “This is one life, and the personal pictures and the assignment work are all part of it.”

The exhibition features many of Leibovitz’s best-known portraits of public figures, including actors such as Jamie Foxx, Nicole Kidman, and Brad Pitt; athletes preparing for the 1996 Olympic Games; George W. Bush with members of his Cabinet at the White House; and her famous 1991 image of then-pregnant actress Demi Moore, one of the most recognisable photographs of its time. The show also highlights images of artists and architects such as Richard Avedon, Brice Marden, Philip Johnson, and Cindy Sherman. Leibovitz’s assignment work includes reportage from the siege of Sarajevo in the early 1990s and the election of Hillary Clinton to the U.S. Senate.

At the heart of the exhibition, Leibovitz’s personal photography documents scenes from her life, including the birth and childhood of her three daughters, and vacations, reunions, and rites of passage with her parents and extended family.

Annie Leibovitz: A Photographer’s Life, 1990–2005 threads together the two sides of Leibovitz’s work both chronologically and creatively, projecting a narrative of the artist’s private life against the backdrop of her public image as one of the world’s best-known portrait photographers.