David Lynch is a man of many talents. Although he is best known for his cinema, over the years he has branched out as far as his own brand of coffee, the production of music, various interior design projects and basically everything that's moldable into his moody enigmatic and subversive aesthetic. His latest form of expression, although he has been doing it throughout his life, was the exhibition and publication of his photographic series called 'The Factory Photographs' at the London-based Photographers' Gallery. The series reveal Lynch's self-confessed love of industry, machinery, man-made objects, and 'people hard at work'. The dark and brooding series of black and white photographs were taken at derelict factories in Germany, Poland, New York and England, among other places. His unique cinematic style is much in evidence in his depictions of labyrinths of passages, detritus and decaying manmade structures slowly being taken over by nature. [ Continue reading ]
We have been a fan of the work of Todd Selby from the moment he stepped into the limelight. His latest work 'Fashionable Selby' is his third collaboration with publisher Abrams books, in which the photographer moves his gaze onto the world of fashion. The book features profiles of today’s most interesting designers, stylists, models, shoemakers and other fascinating figures. The subjects are wonderfully curated; with some very familiar faces and others totally unexpected. Chapters on individual artists bring readers into the utmost inner circle of the artists, and include Selby’s signature photographs and watercolors of not only the artists and their environments, but also the things that inspire them, the materials they use, their creative process, the people who work alongside them, and the final pieces. From the showroom of the incredible Dries van Noten, the studios of Central St. Martins in London to 'techno fashion designer' Iris van Herpen's studio: Selby continues his wonderful documentation of highly inspiring people and their environments in his signature bright aesthetic. [ Continue reading ]
The conceptual photographer Carl Kleiner recently released this amazing series named 'Postures'. Known for his often-times colorful still lifes in which Kleiner finds interesting and humorous positions for the photographed; in this series the Swede selected tulips as his subject. Mounted on constructions of wire, a technique one sees more often in his work, the tulips are positioned in different somewhat melancholic angles, without losing the aesthetic of the natural characteristic of late blossoming tulips which bend over because of the weight of the petals. The beautiful lines of the flowers remind of ballet dancers gracefully performing their dance, spotlighted on either a grey or black backdrop, with one tulip having lost a single petal inevitably marking the final moments of blossoming. We love how Kleiner found all these emotional forms and sentiments through his immaculate positioning, next to the already apparent beauty of the tulip. [ Continue reading ]
We have been a fan of the work of New York-based Mikael Kennedy for some years now and really appreciate his latest series 'California'. The series captures one week in California in which the photographer is clearly on the move. The beautiful photographs with the familiar toned down color palette show the wide landscapes of the American state with only sometimes allowing traces of civilization to play a minor role within the frame. A road, roadside fences, an electrical cable, the inside of the car a photograph was taken in, and just a little glimpse of a house. Kennedy places the geographical entity of the state of California first and its inhabitants second. The pictures therefore evoke somewhat of a lonely and melancholic sentiment within the beauty of the depicted landscapes, making the urge to visit the beautiful area even greater. 'California' has been published by Done To Death Projects in a limited quantity zine of 100 pieces which sold out within four days. [ Continue reading ]
We really appreciate the work of Copenhagen-based Englishman Alastair Philip Wiper and love his recent series in which he combines two of our favorite concepts: aesthetics and craftsmanship. The beautiful series shot in the familiar clean aesthetic of the photographer shows the factory of another favorite of ours: Danish company S.N.S. Herning located in Herning and famous for its knitwear. The company was founded in 1931 by Søren Nielsen Skyt, and enjoys worldwide recognition for producing their iconic fisherman sweater using a bobble technique developed by Skyt, intended to help with insulation. The company has had it’s ups and downs, and the collection has grown and shrunk, and until just a few years ago it had shrunk so much that it was almost non-existent, surviving only by selling a few of the classic fisherman’s sweaters. That is when the grandson of the original Søren Skyt, also Søren Skyt, decided to quit his job and focus on reviving the company after which the factory depicted by Wiper was taken into use. [ Continue reading ]
'Ezekiel 36:36' is a beautiful and fascinating series by photographer Nick Ballon, portraying Bolivian Lloyd Aéreo Boliviano (LAB), one of the world’s oldest surviving airlines, in an almost surrealistic fashion. Founded in 1925, it has played an important role in every stage of the country’s history. Since its privatisation in 1994, LAB has suffered at the hands of successive administrations, becoming gradually dismantled due to chronic mismanagement and corruption. Currently under threat of closure and with its downed of aircraft slowly crumbling away, this airline continues to survive through the loyalty and faith of its remaining 180 staff. Sensitive to this poignant and transitional time, Ballon has spent six months recording the present day story of LAB. Due to the circumstances of the airline and the angles chosen by Ballon the photographs suck the viewer in, reminding of the cinema of David Lynch or the work of Philip-Lorca diCorcia. [ Continue reading ]
The Latvian photographer Inta Ruka is famous for her portrait photography. She has portrayed fellow human beings in their daily lives throughout her career, with great honesty and curiosity. The background to her intimate imagery are long conversations she has beforehand with her subjects, helping her to convey "the whole picture." She also complements her photographs with texts; anecdotes, comments, stories from their calls. That way she pushes the idea of the limits of the photograph and what can be included in a photographic work. The text helps to capture the whole picture of the people she meets and portrays. Following Inta Ruka's exhibition 'You and Me' at the Stockholm-based Fotografiska, which took place from the 5th of October until the 8th of December 2013, and in her honor, the book The Bigger Picture: A Photo Book Without Pictures was published. A highly fascinating publication carrying just Inta Ruka texts written for her photographs, without the actual images. The ambition behind this fascinating project is to challenge the reader with the question what the intrinsic qualities of photography are. [ Continue reading ]
In his project '52 Weeks, 52 Cities', developed exclusively for German museum Marta Herford, my brother Iwan Baan takes the spectator on a one-year photographic journey around the world. Always on the lookout for ingenious homes in unexpected places and outstanding construction projects. Süddeutsche Zeitung described the influence of Iwan: “our image of architecture like no other”. He has been working, very successfully, worldwide for architects including Rem Koolhas, Herzog & de Meuron, Toyo Ito or Zaha Hadid. A characteristic of his pictorial language is the engagement with the close relationship between human and architecture, between social use and the various spatial situations. [ Continue reading ]
Copenhagen-based photographer Adam Jeppesen's work challenges the boundaries between documentary and fiction. He is seen as one of the greatest talents in contemporary Danish photography, and we discovered his work during the last Unseen Photo Fair, after which Jeppesen's work by far resonated the most. His photographs inhabit a blurred territory where the real and the fictional become interchangeable. Even if the Danish artist seems to remain faithful to what is in front of his camera, he doesn’t seem to be too concerned about objectivity. The highly impressive work we saw at Unseen was part of the The Flatlands Camp Project. A series of work, recorded on a journey from the Arctic through North and South America to Antarctica. For 487 days Jeppesen travelled in solitude and from this long journey a series of melancholic, evocative landscape pictures have emerged. [ Continue reading ]
On the 31st of March a tremendous collection of photographs by famous English photographer Derek Ridgers will be published by Damiani. Taken in the streets, clubs, basements and bars of London between 1978 and 1987, the photographs in the book named 78–87 London Youth show a broad scala of youth cultures caught through Ridgers' lens. The photographer has documented the perennial youth ritual of dressing up and going out since he first picked up a camera in 1971, and has been drawn to virtually every subculture London has produced. His photographs capture punk’s evolution into goth, the skinhead revival and the New Romantic scene, and the eventual emergence of Acid House and the new psychedelia. Ridgers’ work is both from a anthropological viewpoint, as style-wise of the highest standard. Next to the excellent work of the photographer a foreword by John Maybury is featured in the book, who himself was a mainstay of the times the book documents. [ Continue reading ]
We love this photography series named 'Traffic Lights' by 20-year-old Landau-based photographer Lucas Zimmermann. The series was captured during a foggy night at an intersection close to the historical German city Weimar. Zimmermann created the images taking 5 to 30 second long exposures. Consequently, the colours and lights melted together and a highly surrealistic aesthetic was created. Shot with a fairly reliable camera when it comes to low light, the Canon 5D Mark II, the photographs show, next to his keen eye, also the craft of the young German. When the exposure would become too short, too much noise would occur. At the same time, too long exposure washed out the colors. This balancing act made the project a test of patience, which in the end produced these beautiful images. [ Continue reading ]
We are very thrilled to give another fantastic preview of a feature story by the highly inspiring online platform Jungles in Paris. This story focusses on the environment of the Weddell seals and is an outtake of the beautiful book The Last Ocean by photographer John Weller. Weddell seals live in Antarctica, and unlike other large animals there, like for instance whales, other seals, or penguins, they don't migrate North during the winter. No other mammal on earth lives this far south. They have extraordinary diving abilities, can go as far as 700 meters below the ice in their search for fish, and stay underwater for as long as an hour. [ Continue reading ]
On the 2nd of December a major exhibition of the work of photographer Vivian Maier opened in London-based gallery Beetles and Huxley. The incredible story of Maier started in 2007, when a real estate agent called John Maloof purchased 30.000 negatives taken by the then anonymous Vivian Maier, a reclusive nanny from Chicago. Bought on a hunch, he had inadvertently stumbled upon an undiscovered pot of gold. Born in New York in 1926, Maier spent her youth in France before returning home to The States in 1951, where she spent the next five decades looking after various families and their children. As well as following in the footsteps of Mary Poppins this eccentric, highly intellectual and heavily opinionated lady was also a serious street photographer. [ Continue reading ]
We love the beautiful photography by Copenhagen-based Englishman Alastair Philip Wiper. Over the last six years he has been the house photographer for designer and artist Henrik Vibskov, traveling, building and photographing all the different disciplines Vibskov moves between. Overall Wiper focusses with his photography on the weird and wonderful subjects of industry, science, architecture, and the things that go on behind the scenes. The things that human beings create, seen with an anthropological approach is how Wiper observes the world. A great series from this same sharp angle is his second visit to The European Organisation for Nuclear Research, CERN in Geneva. [ Continue reading ]
We really like the new and improved Protein Journal by the inspiring people of Protein. The subject of the first revamped issue is The City. It features articles including a write-up by design critic and author Stephen Bayley on the true value of urban living, a stunning photo piece from film maker Will Robson-Scott chronicling gang life in Chicago named 'Chi Raq' and The Urban Think-Thank piece by Tag Christof featuring the series of pictures of Torre David by my brother. A chat with Nelly Ben Hayoun, the wildly inventive mind behind NASA’s International Space Orchestra, can be found in it as well as a 30 page Insight section featuring extensive investigations into the nature of modern, urban life around the world. [ Continue reading ]
After going for a month to India, a few weeks in Patagonia, and a few in Nepal, the idea grew in 24-year-old Ruben Brulat's mind to go for a long and unstopped journey, an aesthetic travel, leaving from Gare de Lyon, Paris. Brulat decided to go East. From Europe to Asia by land only, through Iraq, Iran, onto Afghanistan, Tibet until Indonesia, Japan and Mongolia. Inspired by his first trips, Brulat realised that he wanted to see and share the experience of giving yourself away to nature in a photography-project. Early january 2011 the Frenchman asked the first person to pose naked in a landscape for him to photograph, trying to create a symbiosis with the surroundings. Last September Brulat succeeded in finding funds to release a beautiful self published book of this series of photographs taken all over the world which was named Sharing Paths. [ Continue reading ]
We are highly inspired by the online platform of writer Darrell Hartman, writer for among others New York Magazine, Travel + Leisure, Details, and the Wall Street Journal, and his brother Oliver Hartman, called Jungles in Paris. It aims to redefine armchair travel using a global network of professional photographers and filmmakers, it produces and presents short, focused stories on culture, craft, geography, and wildlife around the world. Instead of splendour the Hartman brothers aim to go small and observe with an highly critical eye by focusing on the unexpected surprises uncovered by the careful traveler, from ritual skin-piercing in Ethiopia’s Omo Valley to the beautiful aesthetic of the colourful house fences one finds in Rwanda. [ Continue reading ]
We really like the 5th issue of Modern Matter which was created around the concept of stellar. This is a homonym for its cover star, Stella Tennant on the first place, but is also a word to describe her. 'The interior space of a magazine is defined, by and large, by its writers, its artists and its photographers, while the outer space is often defined by a cover model. Here, Stella Tennant, iconic, playful, a born performer, and above all, independent, embodies the interior and the ethos of Modern Matter magazine, in its first truly unisex issue.' [ Continue reading ]
Some people don't travel, they explore. They explore new ways of crossing the world, they explore new places and new boundaries. Rob Lutter is one of those people. Two years ago, on a windy day in London, Rob Lutter got on his bike and cycled down the road, and he didn't stop. Day after day, for 24 months, he cycled more than 15.000 kilometer all the way to Hong Kong to raise money for charity. As he has reached his initial destination and his hunger for exploration hasn't been stilled, Lutter is now raising funds from Hong Kong for the next stage of his journey. The aim is to cross South East Asia, Indonesia, Australia, the US from west to east, with a final stretch from Scotland to England. [ Continue reading ]
We are delighted that our good friends at Habbekrats have just released their second feature film in the Netherlands after they debuted with road movie Rabat in 2011. Where the collaborative effort of Jim Taihuttu and Victor Ponten had a bright and positive tone, follow up Wolf, written and directed solely by Taihuttu, shows a different side of life. In grainy black and white frames the fierce climate prevailing in life on the streets of a nondescript suburb in the Netherlands is depicted in a style reminiscent of the work of Nicolas Winding Refn and Jacques Audiard. Center point of the narrative is Majid (Marwan Kenzari) who tries to pick up his life after six months in jail by focussing on kickboxing, but as his star rises due to his relentlessness in the ring, he gets sucked into the world of organized crime. [ Continue reading ]
After a hot summer full of travels, seeing beautiful places and meeting amazing people, we are very happy to share this series of images, taken on a glorious day at Lake Como, Italy, by Sydney-based photographer Akila Berjaoui. Her work is very much a reflection of how she feels whenever she takes the photographs. As she states it herself: "it's a visual diary of my ups and downs." When the photographer chooses location, subject matter and model, her personal sentiment always shows one way or the other. [ Continue reading ]
The series Coney Island, shot on the namesake seaside resort, by Montreal and New York City-based Michael Ernest Sweet reminds in many ways of the great black and white street photographers now holding iconic status. After seeing the photographs names like Weegee, Louis Faurer, Garry Winogrand, Bruce Gilden and Mark Cohen come to mind. Not quite coincidental as they are both a major influence on Sweet and photographers who also visited the seaside resort with their cameras. With the great photographers, especially Bruce Gilden, clearly in his mind, but still holding on to a personal vision Sweet started shooting on the beach: "I wanted to be unique in my approach. I didn’t want to be just a copycat". [ Continue reading ]
In 2008, the young photographer Pieter Henket took a picture of upcoming artist Lady Gaga, which eventually became the cover of her multiplatinum album The Fame. Basically from that moment Henket was a household name in contemporary glamour photography. In 2010, confirming this major status, the photograph of Lady Gaga was exhibited as an icon of the 21st century in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Twelve years had passed since Henket arrived in New York City in 1998 as a 19-year old to take up studies at the Film Academy. Instead of his original goal to become a filmmaker, Henket now officially was a major still photographer. [ Continue reading ]
The latest series of Croatia-based photographer Katja Kremenić named 'Rip Currents' is a lovely one. The series documents Kremenić' stay in Costa Rica over the course of January to April of this year. Kremenić beautifully translated the abandoned and romantic scenery of the beaches of Costa Rica, creating the feeling that she and her companion were there only to be greeted by palm trees, tropical butterflies, and playing dogs in the water. The aesthetics of documenting and editing the story follows the concept which was started by Kremenić in her earlier series called Corse Noir shot during a month in Corsica, and recently awarded an honorable prize at the Slovenia Press photo awards. [ Continue reading ]
