street + urban

Appropos to one of our threads of conversation on Monday, here is Susan Barnett’s Comments (0)

Just a reminder that we do not have class on July 5th because of the holiday weekend.

We’ll meet again next on July 12th.

Keep an eye on the blog for street photo tidbits to keep you tied over until then.

There were two assignments given this past Monday:

• Go to the intersection of 57th Street and 5th Avenue, shoot 75 pictures or more at that intersection. You may shoot from anywhere at the intersection within a half block in any direction. As always, bring in a selection of 5 to 15 work prints for a critique on July 12th.

• I want everyone to brainstorm ten or more ideas for your self assigned project. You can let yourself go crazy on the brainstorming, but be sure that some of your ideas are accessible. From out of the brainstorming, choose one project that you are going to pursue through the rest of this class. Write four to five sentences describing why this project is interesting to you and how you might/will approach shooting it. E-mail both the brainstorm list and this short paragraph to me by Monday the 5th for me to make comments.

For those feeling a little invasive or shy during the first assignment, check out the video of Bruce Gilden on WNYC’s Street Shots page. He’s pretty in your face and unapologetic. I’m not suggesting you be this aggressive, but hopefully you’ll see that there is plenty of room for you to become more aggressive than you are now and to move in closer to people on the street.

Link to WNYC.

I’m a little slow getting posts going for the summer class, but a day before week two here is post number one.

First a reminder: assignment one is due tomorrow. Please bring in 5 to 15 work prints from the 11 Step assignment. Extra credit if you bring in contact sheets of the entire assignment.

Next, a heads up: Will Steacy, whose work we looked at quickly in class, has a show up at Michael Mazeo Gallery in Chelsea. MMG is showing a selection of prints and ephemera from Steacy’s Down These Mean Streets project. The show runs through July 16th, so you’ve got plenty of time to see it if interested.

If anyone has cable with HBO On Demand, there is a documentary running now called “Smash his Camera.” The film is about Ron Gallela, an eminent or infamous paparrazi photographer–one of the first. Many of his photographs are iconic. As a paparazzi, he works at the edges of street photography in a way that borders on the invasive. Lawsuits between he and Jacqueline Onnassis Kennedy in the 1970’s are still talked about and referenced today.

I think that’s about it for this post. More after tomorrow’s class. See everyone tomorrow.