as seen: balance

toy horse © kjm

collect.give: lacey terrell

© Lacey Terrell

Photographer Lacey Terrell offers a print today on collect.give. The photo is from her series, The Passing Ring, in which she travels with and documents the Culpepper & Merriweather Circus. Lacey pledges to donate 100% of her print profits to School on Wheels, an educational program for homeless kids in Southern California.

visit

grave of my grandmother, who died before I was born © kjm

I hadn't been there in many years, and a maintenance worker offered to help me find row 50. He found the gravestones before I did, and kindly brushed dirt off of them with his gloved hands as I made my way over.

as seen: upside

plane reflection, Lake Harriet © kjm

memorable

© Eugene Richards

Thank you to Pete Brook, who recently discussed my Camp Home project and the Tule Lake internment camp on his blog, Prison Photography. I'm also grateful to Pete for his Facebook page link to this World Press Photos talk by Eugene Richards. It's a bit long, so watch it in bits and pieces, as I did, or settle in with a favorite beverage. Richards' work is so compelling and thoughtful - and the structure/composition of his photographs is remarkable. In his talk, he discusses the subjects in the photo above, which I have to say is one of the most memorably powerful pictures I've ever encountered. I saw it (15?) years ago, as a double-truck in Life Magazine, and it simply blew me away. In the documentary realm, photos from Larry Towell's book The Mennonites had the same impact at first view, as did Duane Michals' This Photograph is My Proof.

It's great when a photo stops you in your tracks, but even better when it stays with you.

collect.give: david wright

Peter, 2009 © David Wright

Today David Wright offers this lovely print on collect.give. 100% of the proceeds from the sales of Peter, 2009 will go to A River Blue, a school in northern Uganda providing psychosocial counseling and intense vocational training in topics like tailoring, agriculture, and arts to vulnerable youth. David is also the co-founder (with Ethan Jones) of a wonderful project, Pause, to Begin.

new acquisitions

Abandoned Apartment, Konigsbrucker Strasse © Fredrik Marsh

One of the fun benefits of membership in the Milwaukee Art Museum's Photography Council is the annual party, where members get to cast their vote for a new acquisition. Last night, we voted on three pictures selected by curator Lisa Hostetler, who discussed the artists, their individual pictures and how they would fit into the museum collection. The winner was a beautiful picture by Anna Shteynschleyger, but my vote was cast for this interior by Fredrik Marsh. Happily, it was also added to the museum collection when several generous members stepped forward to donate the funds.

within reach: splash

water in the bathroom sink © kjm

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

art chicago snapshot

A tardy recap of some of the photo goodness spotted at Art Chicago:

Jason Hanasik at Aperture; Curtis Mann at Kavi Gupta and in conversation with Brian Ulrich, Karen Irvine and Leslie A. Martin; André Kertész at Vintage Works; Timothy Briner at Humble Arts Foundation; Laura Letinsky in conversation with Stephanie Smith; Colleen Plumb at Photo-Eye; Yoshihiko Ueda at TAI Gallery; Jennifer Ray and Leilani Wertens in the New Insights show for MFA students; Jonathan Blaustein at Zane Bennett; Suzanne Opton and Lisa M. Robinson at Light Work and Barbara Kasten at Monique Meloche.

within reach: sit

chair shadow in the office © kjm

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

collect.give: elizabeth fleming

Hammock © Elizabeth Fleming

Elizabeth Fleming offers a print today on collect.give, in an edition of 20 at just $40 each. All profits will benefit the Austin Children's Shelter.

within reach: union

prop on unidentified photo book © kjm

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

within reach: button

living room couch © kjm

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

within reach: drip

unwashed mug © kjm

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

within reach: saturation

mold on organic tangerine © kjm

In my defense, I've been traveling a lot lately.

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

as seen: flags and fathers

in st. louis: hardware store, left; museum, right © kjm

annie marie musselman on collect.give

Angel in Blue, 2008 © Annie Marie Musselman

Annie Marie Musselman offers up a beautiful print today on collect.give. The photo comes from her series Finding Trust, in which she photographs animals at the Sarvey Wildlife Care Center in the Cascade Mountains. Annie has pledged to donate 100% of the funds raised from her print sales to the center.

i love this photo, #38

© Michael Wolf

I love this photo by the Hong Kong-based photographer Michael Wolf. While there, I thought of his images often - in his project work, he has captures the details, faces and the density that is Hong Kong as I experienced it. This particular photo comes from a series of portraits of copy artists.

[See past 'i love this photo' entries here.]

as seen: fin

pond, Nan Lian Garden © kjm

as seen: bow

Causeway Bay escalator © kjm

jon feinstein on collect.give

8 Grams © Jon Feinstein

Jon Feinstein, photographer, curator and co-founder of Humble Arts Foundation, today offers a print on collect.give. Funds raised from the sale of his print, 8 Grams, will be donated to Housing Works, a community-based AIDS service organization supporting homeless and low-income New Yorkers living with HIV and AIDS.

Simply

shop on Tin Lok Lane © kjm

I'm working in Hong Kong this week, and this is my first trip here. As always, I can't show any of the images I'm making for the editorial assignments I'm working on, and my brain is a little drained to make many personal pictures. But I'm so amazed and impressed by this city. For its size and density, I find things wonderfully organized (maybe the best subway system I've ever been on?), calm and non-threatening. Tonight a police van buzzed by me, and I realized that I've been here for 5 days, and it was the first siren I'd heard. More thoughts to come...

as seen: flight pattern

flamingos and shadows, Kowloon Park © kjm

absence

S. Broadway Avenue Location, #3 © kjm

within reach: crinkle

after the thin mints © kjm

As gastronomic traditions go, this may be my oldest: I believe I've indulged in thin mints every year since I bought my first box from Lisa Purcell in the third grade.

[within reach is a series of photographs examining the environment of home in detail]

Kelly Shimoda on collect.give

Before lunch: Flaccanicco, Italy © Kelly Shimoda

Kelly Shimoda offers a beautiful 11x14 print today on collect.give. I've been a fan of her work for quite a while, and Marilu and I own one of her 20x200 prints. And if you haven't seen Kelly's text message project, it's worth a visit: I guess you don't want to talk to me anymore.

beginning

© Heinz Kluetmeier, left, © E. Jason Wambsgans, right

This past weekend, I was a judge and speaker at the Wisconsin News Photographers Association convention - a gathering of newspaper photographers from around the state. I spent my first 10 years working in newspapers, and I still feel a kinship to the industry. Fellow judges for the year-end contest were Erv Gebhard, a retired photographer from the Milwaukee Journal, whose work I admired for many years in my hometown paper, and Chicago Tribune photographer E. Jason Wambsgans, who brings artistry and a unique eye to daily newspaper stories and multimedia pieces.

The biggest pleasure was reconnecting with Heinz Kluetmeier, the longtime Sports Illustrated photographer and keynote speaker at the convention. For several years during high school, when Heinz still owned a house in Milwaukee, he was very kind to this young, want-to-be photographer. He had me assist at games for him and for other photographers, lent me camera gear, and generally encouraged my interest in the profession. His life experience was certainly inspiring, and I realized later that his generosity of time was, as well.

One of the most interesting things he said to the group of daily newspaper photographers, was this: "The most important pictures you make are often within 10-15 miles of your home."

The same can be said for sources of youthful inspiration.

325

© Tom Owens (junior at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design)

If you haven't visited MIAD-FA382 lately, I don't blame you - the Professional Practices class concluded with the Fall semester, and the blog won't feature new student work until this coming August.

But do you like reading photographer interviews? I ask because we're continuing to post them to the site. We're up to over 378 links to interviews with photographers and industry professionals, from terrific sites like Feature Shoot, NYMPHOTO, American Suburb X and Too Much Chocolate.

How about one per day over your morning coffee?

i love this photo, #37

© Roderik Henderson

I love this photo by the photographer Roderik Henderson. It comes from Henderson's series, Transvoid, for which he recently won a World Press Photo award. Henderson describes the series below.

Transvoid is a series of portraits of individuals sheltering in their vehicles at snow covered parking lots in British Columbia. Together with my family, I lived in the wilderness of British Columbia, Canada for some years. A place without grocery stores, electricity, phone, television or neighbors. Weeks would pass without seeing anyone. We became a crowd of four when our baby Sid was born. To get to the nearest town, we drove almost three hours one way through mud, snow or ice.

I started photographing other people who had to spent lots of time in their vehicles. A Native family from a first nations reserve going to town on Friday. A priest giving a sermon in a small church in a remote valley. A couple who couldn’t afford the rent of their apartment anymore and were now actually living in their car. A guy slowly dying on a parking lot. A guy traveling to see his sick brother on the other side of the continent.

The time spent waiting interests me, the void between point of departure and destination. In Transvoid, I regard the vehicles as solitary domains in time and space.

[See past 'i love this photo' entries here.]

Max S. Gerber on collect.give

© Max S. Gerber

Max S. Gerber offers this print, Mother Nature Doth Provide, today on collect.give. Max is the author of an amazing and compelling book, My Heart Vs. The Real World, and is known for his editorial and commercial portrait work in Los Angeles.