Camera Review - Panasonic DMC TZ5

A completely unsolicited review. Last night was my daughter's class performance of "The Pirates of Penzance" so I grabbed a camera I bought about a year ago, the Panasonic DMC-TZ5, and shot a bunch of pictures with the flash off. I didn't think much about it, until I downloaded the pictures, and then I was completely amazed by the quality of these totally automated snaps.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves (you can click on the images to see them at full size) but technically speaking, I was zoomed about halfway in, shooting at the full picture size of 9MB, in regular automated shooting mode. I have not done anything to the files and bear in mind that posting a picture somehow always seems to slightly flatten out and diminish the image.

The camera is just slightly bigger than a deck of cards and when closed, the lens protrudes about 3/8 of an inch from the body, making it just out of true pocket size. That quibble is of course more than compensated for by the quality of the pictures. And it takes pretty good video too!

Animal Planet

Alexander Safonov.
 Common dolphins charging a 'ball' of bait during the sardine run off the east coast of South Africa.

Here at The Year in Pictures, we always enjoy a good animal picture (and we've been incredibly busy setting up the new gallery) so to keep things fresh and for a change of pace are a selection of some of the shortlisted wildlife images from the Sony World Photography Awards.

Ken Conger. A gathering of bald eagles in South Alaska.

Alejandro Jose De Oliveira Sanchez. Jellyfish.

Federico Veronesi. African elephants in Amboseli National Park, Kenya.

Lisa Maree Williams. 
A joey koala clutches a fake substitute mother at the Australian Wildlife hospital, the largest wildlife hospital in the world, Queensland, Australia.

Tanyth & Grace

Grace, 2008.

I first met Tanyth Berkeley in 1997 when she was working as an intern to Sheila Metzner who I represented at the time. The Metzner Studio was always a fun place to visit – imbued with Sheila’s zen spirit and good humor – but I never really knew Tanyth in any way other than as Sheila’s assistant.

Fast forward to 2005 and I was passing by Bellwether Gallery on 10th Avenue and saw that Tanyth Berkeley was about to have her first solo show opening that night. I went in to get a sneak preview and was literally stunned by how good the work was. The show was called “Love Parade” and consisted of a room lined with portraits of unusual looking young women Berkeley had met and persuaded to pose for her outdoors in city parks. She called her subjects "Orchidaceae" and the photo-
graphs looked at these women as rare blooms - inviting the viewer to ponder their own response while questioning traditional notions of beauty.

Berkeley's unique style combined both painterly effect and photographic clarity in new and distinctive ways. Influenced by artists from Toulouse-Lautrec and Egon Schiele to Diane Arbus - the work signaled the arrival of an original and wholly contemporary new vision, and was recognized as such when the Museum of Modern Art selected Berkeley for their "New Photography" show in 2007.

While Berkeley moved on to various other subjects – she continued to regularly photograph one of her original "orchids", Grace Longoria, a striking albino of Mexican descent who Berkeley once described as "a combination of Marilyn Monroe and the moon". Their initial chance encounter set the stage for an ongoing relationship which has now lasted seven years. It occurred to me a while ago that this might make for a strong and original show.

I put the idea to Tanyth and Bellwether’s owner, Becky Smith, and everyone was eager to do it. By a happy coincidence, it is also the inaugural exhibition of my new space at 534 West 24th Street. So, again, please try to see the show and if you’re anywhere near please come to the opening on Friday, March 13, 6 – 8 p.m. where you’ll get to meet Tanyth and Grace and see the new gallery.

For people not used to working with the photographers, their articulateness can sometimes be surprising, so I’ll end with what I thought was a lovely thing Tanyth had to say about Grace – that she saw her “as a symbol of the infinite and unique possibilities of the natural world”.

From Berkeley's first shoot with Grace in 2004.

One of the photographs exhibited at MoMA.

One of the most recent photographs taken less than a month ago.

Weekend Video - Nouvelle Vague, Part 2

A while back I posted the band Nouvelle Vague's video cut to the dance scene from Godard's "Bande a Part". It was a big hit and now either the band (or perhaps Matthias Heuermann who posted the above) have set another Nouvelle Vague song to Godard - in this case putting N.V's version of "Dancing with Myself" to the dance scene in "Vivre sa Vie".

Yo can see the original scene from the film below, and at the very bottom for any who missed it, the Nouvelle Vague/"Bande a Part" video that started it all off.

A Masterpiece by Helen Levitt

New York, 1988. Helen Levitt

While my inbox is flooded with images every day, it never bothers me as a picture takes so little time to look at. The only problem is that most of the images rarely stand out or move me. Yesterday, however, this Helen Levitt popped up advertising a new show at the Kahmann Gallery in Amsterdam and it just struck a chord with me.

Levitt, now 95, has been photographing for 70 years and is best known for her black and white street photographs of children at play. Cartier-Bresson was her friend and mentor and like him, she bought a small Leica camera in 1936, which enabled her to move quickly and freely through the streets of New York. Her color work only came to light recently, but like her fellow New York School photographer, Saul Leiter, the color work is a revelation, bringing a wonderful painterly quality to what is otherwise highly photographic work.

There's so much going on in this picture - the children's dilemma, the fabric of the woman's dress, the incidental action outside of the rectangle of the phone booth and the strange way it breaks up the picture, the intersecting lines of color, the abstract texture of the sidewalk, and of course above all the humor of the situation. Now that's a picture!

Oh Baby!

People often ask me for recommendations for a wedding photographer - which is way too much of a responsibility for me to take on – and so I always pass. When it comes to baby pictures, however, I have no hesitation in recommending Edward Mapplethorpe (yes, he is Robert’s younger brother) who has always been a talented photographer in his own right as well as having made largely unsung contributions to his brother’s work. Edward has tackled just about every subject – nudes, abstracts, conceptual work – but he’s been photographing children for close to 20 years. He insists on taking the pictures on or about the child’s first birthday. (He likes them sitting up.) And while he only shows the parents one or two frames from the shoot, as far as I know, he’s never had to show more.

What I like about his children is that they’re neither cutesy or little adults, but somewhere in-between. And if you get a crying picture, there’s always a smiling one to go with it.

You can contact Edward at edward@edwardmapplethorpe.com.

Goodbye to all that...

About six months ago, the photographer Joseph Holmes e-mailed me to see if I would let him photograph my workspace for his ongoing series of that name. As I like both my workspace and Joe's work, I was happy to co-operate and now his picture (above) is about to be all that remains as a visual record of where I've sat for the last five years, often writing this blog!

I'm indulging in a reflective moment because today is my last day sitting here before I move the gallery two blocks south to a new street front space on West 24th Street. (I'm following Rahm's advice and going counter economic trend!) The collage of pinned up images, notes, etc., are the accumulation of that period of time - a combination of to-do's, invitations, and memorable cards and images. I guess it's what is generally called an "inspiration board" and I've always thought a book of different people's inspiration boards would be a worthwhile project to put together. (Any publishers who like the idea should feel free to contact me!)

It's been a swell five years at 521 West 26th Street, but I like change (and hope). So I'm looking forward to another five years at 534 West 24th Street and you can be sure I'll be keeping you posted on my own shows as well as the other stuff that grabs me. (Nevertheless, I was pleased to see that on The Photo Blog Triangle recently posted by Jorg Colberg I was halfway between "Comment" and "Curate" and far from "Promote".)

But mark this Friday, March 13th, in your books and if you're anywhere near please come by our opening of our Tanyth Berkeley show - which will open Danziger Projects' program on West 24th Street.