It's been a while (a year maybe) since we first encountered the ongoing photographic essay named 'The Western Lands' by American photographer Justin Clifford Rhody, but it never really left us since that moment. The Michigan-born, Oakland-based artist, who predominantly shoots on film, started the series in 2012 and one of the reasons for moving to the West Coast was to continue exploring the Southwest of America from his new home, being within a day’s drive of Southern California, Arizona, Nevada and parts of New Mexico. Through a friend, the photographer was even offered to built a cabin in Northern New Mexico, which he has been using as the pivot point to keep expanding his photographic study, while immersing himself both physically and mentally in the desert. In his own words; it was the staggering quality of light and the physical expansiveness of the American West —"brutally unforgiving and indifferent to one’s needs, yet this seems to only inflame our desire to go further and deeper within the interior"— that inspired him to start and grasp intrinsic elements of it in his captions. And that intrinsic passion seems to burn in him today as it did in 2012.

It is extraordinary how Rhody finds frames that are nothing short of iconic —reminding of his idol William Eggleston, although being more fixed— in an utmost beautiful sun-kissed color palette, succeeding marvelously in communicating (his?) deep romantic feelings for this unique area combined with the melancholia that belongs to finding oneself at a dead end. Beauty and sadness in one. The photographer is clearly at awe, but can't help himself, to see that this magical place named the American West has entered a chapter with the times of glory laying behind us.

We can only hope for more observations by Justin Clifford Rhody of the American West, as through his lens it is a place that continues to deeply move us like no other... [ Continue reading ]

At the beginning of this year, one of our favorite artists working today; Rinus Van de Velde, presented the impressive 'Donogoo Tonka' exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst in which he brought his one-of-a-kind, overtly rich artistic vision on the world around us —built up from many layers of signature charcoal strokes— to the contemporary art museum in Ghent. At the beginning of this month Van de Velde returned with already his next show (at the same time some of his work is also on display as we write this at Tim van Laere Gallery Gallery in the group show 'Take Care, Amigo'), this time at his Amsterdam-based gallery tegenboschvanvreden — forming a new, not to miss, chapter in the ongoing display of unique talent from the self-described drawing-obsessed artist. For the exhibition, named 'A Sunday as a Sunday', the Antwerp-based artist has created a new series of drawings, focussing specifically on the theme of the antihero, having stopped the prominent portrayal of himself in his works, which marks an important new direction. [ Continue reading ]

When in New York City tonight, make sure to drop by Printed Matter at 18:00 as the very talented Paris-born and New York-based photographer Clément Pascal will present his self-published book 'Strange Things Happen for a Reason' (made in collaboration with artist Edouard Nardon) to the world. Pascal is known for his exquisite intuition to catch the most interesting intimate moments between a photographer and his subject, resulting in a documentary-style photography, which he has been producing in a diverse field of assignments and series, ranging from portraits, fashion-photography and free work — of which the new book is a beautiful example. With a clear signature running through all of his work, the images the photographer creates in natural light are always delicate and intimate, whether it's a (gangster) rapper or, for instance, an artist on the other side of the lens: he seems to always succeed in creating the perfect playing field for his vision to blossom with all of them. Key in this, as stated by himself; is the fact that preparation and staging the imagery could lead to the absence or loss of ‘the opportune moment’ that defines his work. Anticipation leads his intuitive eye and lends suspense or a lack thereof for his images to arrive in the moment.

'Strange Things Happen for a Reason' defines that constant experimentation with photography. Much of the images included in this book point a finger to the context of the happenstance, a common arc in his work. The book serves as a modern-day instruction to forever entertain the appreciation of the unknown. The first quote in the book says it all:
Lose yourself once in a lifetime for God’s sake. Stop seeing your friends, you need a break. You need something new. Take a risk for God’s sake. [ Continue reading ]

Australian artist Bill Henson is the kind of maker that doesn't need any introduction and has been among our favorite photographers for more than a decade. He is one of those artists whose talent you almost take for granted as he's been around (and is regularly, often-times badly, mimicked) for so many years. Where instead you should always try to push yourself to take a minute and search for the feeling you once felt in the first, almost scary, encounters with his dark and brooding imagery — which he continuously has been producing over years, still living his mantra that he's only as good as his last picture.
Finding this insightful interview by ASX from 2015 by chance, caused one of those above mentioned moments, in which it occurred to us once more how unique and captivating Henson's artistic vision is. Without losing any of its relevance over the course of two decades, his masterful imagery, reminding of the work of a Flemish Renaissance painters, balances a deep shrouded darkness with piercingly enlightened, almost translucent corpse-like figures and objects. His photographs seem to stem from an interzone between day and night, nature and human civilization. His vision of the world around us is mysterious and cryptic and feels more relevant then ever in these confusing and ambiguous times we live in.
In the interview from last year, Henson talks about the theoretical and philosophical motivations behind his imagery, explains the creative workflow that's forced upon you when shooting analogue and confesses to have never shot a digital photograph with a camera(!) But more than anything it should stimulate to take a moment and another long and hard look at the mesmerizing work of one of the most interesting imagemakers of our time. [ Continue reading ]

For most of the last 15 years, Cali Thornhill DeWitt's name was only known in artistic circles, despite the fact that he's been deep in pop culture's (edgier) inner circle from a very young age. The Canadian-born grows up in the San Fernando Valley, goes on tour with Courtney Love's band Hole as a youngster, even briefly lives in Seattle —working for the royal couple of grunge as Frances Bean Cobain's nanny (plus appearing in drag on the actual cd of Nirvana's 'In Utero' album)— and at the age of 19 he moves to New York City. Two years later he returns to Los Angeles, where he starts working as an A&R at Geffen and eventually co-founds his label Teenage Teardrops, alongside Bryan Ray in 2006 (which now a days also houses a publishing branch and is run by the artist together with his wife Jenna). In this period, halfway the first decade of the 21st century, DeWitt also begins expressing himself visually, soon finding a signature genre of visual poetic work, which we feel could be best described as Gangster Holzer, also strongly reminding of the inspirational work of Eike Koenig. From that period on the multitalent has been creating a diverse field of output: from music video's, album artwork, photography projects to radio shows and numerous publications — establishing himself as an artist with the cool of a rock star, always pushing himself in finding new areas for his artistic expressions.

We fast-forward to 2014, when DeWitt creates a sweater for his friend Joerg Koch, founder and editor-in-chief of 032c. After having been a respected name in the LA art scene for about a decade, showing his work all over the globe, it is then that the name Cali Thornhill Dewitt would transcend its familiarity in just the art world, entering the pop cultural realm. DeWitt's present to Koch is one of the artist's creations inspired by the memorial sweaters worn mostly by Mexcian-Americans after a beloved family member or friend has passed away, which DeWitt had been creating for his art shows before, sporting his poetry in signature gothic letters on the back and front. For Koch he creates a commemoration to the late troubled actress Romy Schneider, because of their shared nationality. At the time, the leading German culture magazine is in the middle of getting its merchandise operation going, and Koch decides that he likes the sweater so much that a small run is reproduced for sale (including the typo in the German text). Today it's in its third (or fourth?) run, available at high end web-boutique ssense (before selling out, again) where Koch is editor-in-chief since 2015, and even though the sweater being not as scarce as it once was: it's still worn by some pretty cool people.

Some months after the Romy Schneider sweater is first released by 032c, another wearable creation of DeWitt becomes a prop in pop cultural history, when Kanye West wears a oversized 'DONDA' sweater to that launch of Jay-Z's music streaming service Tidal in March of 2015. Although at that time very few know that DeWitt has created that particular sweater, it forms the official start of the extensive collaboration between pop culture's current loudest (and most ambitious?) voice and the Canadian artist, so far including a commemoration to Kobe 'Mamba' Bryant and several complete 'collections' of The Life of Pablo merchandise, having had site specific pop-up sub-items all over the world in 2016. And although, even today, probably less than more people actually know who's the artistic visionary behind their much-hyped Pablo sweater, the name of Cali Thornhill DeWitt can be found all over the internet's pop corners since last year — for the first time making him somewhat alike the people he has been so close to since his teenage years (although maybe even being nolens volens...)

Fortunately his new status hasn't stopped the artist in putting his own projects (it probably helped/will help in the future) out in any way, with a new exciting body of work being presented at Copenhagen-based gallery Eighteen next Thursday the 13th of October. Named '29 Flags' the exhibition takes its departure in recent American history, with a prominent role for its most famous icon: the Stars & Stripes. The series consists of 29 vintage USA flags, with flock lettering, in various sizes and from various time periods and places. Each work refers to a specific iconic events in American (cultural) history; from the death of Marilyn Monroe, The Waco siege, Elvis comeback concert, The cult of the Manson family, Traci Lords’ underage porn, The Unabomber to the trial of O.J Simpson. [ Continue reading ]

Bringing Cult into Running Culture
In 2001 Brice Partouche became a prominent name (without ever stepping into the limelight) in the so-called ‘rock era’ in fashion when he founded Paris-based jeans brand April77, which played a pinnacle role in bringing the slim silhouette in menswear from the stages of pop venues and runways to the streets of the mainstream. Last Summer, Brice presented a new project named Satisfy, this time infusing a new cultural elan into the perfect, performance orientated, world of running gear. Inspired by Partouche's new exciting endeavor, with the second collection in stores at this moment, we gave Brice a skypecall —fresh out of the shower after his evening run— to ask him about his love for running, the differences between starting a brand now and 15 years ago and what his plans are with his subversive new movement in athletic gear. [ Continue reading ]

Last year we had a clear favorite out of all the graduates that left the Dutch art academies in the person of painter Jurre Blom, who we will write about again in the near future. This year is was a little bit harder to distinguish an undisputed favorite while visiting the different graduation shows, but after the passing of some months it is safe to say that artist and illustrator Jan Hamstra's project 'Manifesto of Doubt' resonated the most.

Hamstra graduated as part of a highly talented Illustration class of nine from the Groningen-based Academy Minerva, being the most politically outspoken artist of the lot. Having cut his teeth while interning at two artistic icons; Berlin-based illustrator Henning Wagenbreth and Oslo-based woodcut artist Thomas Kilpper, Hamstra's forsees a path somewhere in between the two, working with a raw impactful aesthetic signature focussing on precarious personal and societal (political) issues. The latter being an artistic ambition slowly turning into a rarity these days, with Hamstra proving the point that it continues to be amongst the most interesting and urgent fields for artists to reflect on.

His graduation project exemplifies all of his ambitions, having both a strong personal and political layer distilled into a captivating form. Every image of the book 'Manifesto of Doubt' is printed by hand, using intensive woodcut technique, which has been the technique Hamstra focussed on for the last two years at the academy. The left and right side of the diptychs form two components of a whole, standing in dialogue with each other. All images explore the theme of (political) resistance as found in the last 80 years of human history, portrayed from Hamstra's individualistic perspective, measuring ideology and terror with his conscience — resulting in a remarkable project promising a lot for the talented artist. [ Continue reading ]