Giancarlo Mori | Blog

LACMA Reading Room Online

LACMA has just created an online portal for its extensive collection of exhibition catalogs from the past. On Jan 25th the first set of electronic catalogs was put online in a dedicated section of lacma.org.

Check it our here, and read about it at UNFRAMED, the museum blog.

Photo LA

Last week, from Jan 14th to the 17th, the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, downtown Santa Monica, hosted the XIX Annual Photo LA. You can peruse the official site here. 

Others have written about all of the surrounding events, from seminars on collecting to lectures with star photographers, and portfolio reviews (a few links at the bottom of this post.) As a photographer, I was interested in spotting trends in the market, and and these are my quick impressions from that angle...

Right from the start the event felt smaller. The venue is cozy, lacking the sprawling feel of previous editions... the sense of an industry in crisis was tangible from the beginning. The general sense - and others have picked up the same scent - was one of a more introspective Photo LA: B&W was prevalent, both in contemporary works as well as in classic/vernacular ones, and missing where the walls after walls of the very large color photographs that we have seen in the past as the staple of the event. There were a few exceptions, interestingly many of them from abroad, but most boots were showing smaller prints, classically in feel, classically framed, some of them impersonally classically composed and inspired too.

I for one, was happy to see such a reversal of trend. The end of the ubiquitous monumental color print's age is not one I will decry.

A few other Photo LA 2010 reports and commentaries (more coming soon...)

@ LensScratch

@ The Onine Photographer

 
 

New Color Studies

Some new color photograph are also now on my website here.

(© Giancarlo A. Mori, 2009)

 
 

New Project

Pictures from my new project entitled "In Praise of Shadows", inspired by the work of Japanese novelist Junichiro Tanizaki, are now on my website here. The project is still under way, and has been shot in the neighborhood where I live during the summer month of 2009. The project is a reflection on the poetics of shadows and darkness, and their transformative effects on the familiar.

(© Giancarlo A. Mori, 2009)

 
 

Nov 1st Photo

Santa Monica store display (Aug 08).

(© Giancarlo A. Mori, 2008)

 

"America Swings"

Naomi Harris' "America Swings" has come to Los Angeles, at the M + B gallery in Beverly Hills. The exhibit displays the work of the young New York based photographer, who has spent five years traveling across America documenting the sexual habits of over three million Americans active in the swinging lifestyle. Taschen has recently published the project in book form, and you can see some of its pictures at Naomi's website.

This is a very interesting exhibit for clear social and documentary reasons... knowledge engenders tolerance, does it not?... although it is very likely to also beget controversy and strong adverse reactions. At first glance, and for a purely personal taste and artistic viewpoint, Harris' style is not, to my eyes, particularly exciting, but I will visit the exhibit and write more detailed thoughts of this show very soon. 

The show will remain open from Oct 25 till Dec 6th. The M + B gallery is at 612 North Almont Drive, Los Angeles, http://www.mbfala.com/.

Book cover (© 2008 Taschen and Naomi Harris)

Some of the pictures from the exhibit (all © 2008 Naomi Harris)

October 24th Photo

New picture for this week. A memento of the summer past.

(© Giancarlo A. Mori, 2008)

March 28 - Picture of the Week

From downtown Santa Monica...

Broadway, Santa Monica (March 2008)

Mar 15, New Picture

Doorway from the Main Street area of Santa Monica...

More Italian Photography...

Is there an Italian photographic renaissance in the US? Perhaps, but there is certainly a renewed interest in artists that, while very reputable in Italy and Europe, have been largely unknown to the photo public in North America.

I have already covered in previous posts the solo shows of Patrizia Della Porta and Massimo Vitali. Now, with the opening of the Nile Tuzun Gallery in San Francisco earlier this year, artists such as Gianni Berengo Gardin, Francesco Jodice, Patrizia Savarese, Franco Fontana, Patrizia Della Porta (see previous post here), and many talented others seem to have found a permanent home in the United States.

The gallery, and the photographers it represents, was showcased in issue n. 57 (Mar 08, pag. 24) of Black & White Magazine, which featured profiles of, and images by, most of the photographers represented.

It is very encouraging to see such renewed focus on Italian talent here in the States, beyond the laudable work the Italian Institute of Culture in LA has been doing for some time to promote Italian photographers in America. We, for one, applaud the effort.

Venezia (© Gianni Berengo Gardin)

Coney Island (© Francesco Jodice)

Acquaria (© Patrizia Savarese)

Buenos Aires (© Franco Fontana)