Soramimi Exhibition

Roxana Azar has done it! I can tell you right now my friends, this is going somewhere. A few months back I wrote about this project and now it has been turned into a show. Soramimi is here in Photo, a live exhibition of various artists around the world who have all responded to Roxana's call for collaboration. Also, meet the curator in the flesh before she is too famous to remember you! Come check this out!
Friday March 2nd 5-7 p.m.
Tyler: Lower Level
Photography Triangle Gallery
Major props to this Zine-Turned-Reality
xoxo,
Charlie

SORAMIMI

BANG--March 2nd, 6-9 p.m.

BOOM! Baa-ZING!
Tyler MFA Crew is having a group show. This is a chance to see what this phenomenal gang of off- kilter art-heads are truly made of. We are lucky here at T.S.A. to have such a brilliant slew of Grads, and I can only speak from what I know.
Don't forget-- there is an opening and closing reception! Show your support-- see your competition-- or just plain enjoy yourself!

xoxo,
Charlie

I am broken

There is a price we pay, working with chemicals, manual labor, and other weird stuff. When you pick your poison just remember there is a cost to pay. Sometimes the price is high and you find your mind in a constant state of chaos, "what to do, what does it all mean? bbllaahh life!" or it can be physical; our poor bodies hunched over teeny tiny keyboards and squinting at images under a dark cloth. I for one seem to be without feeling in my right hand... MY RIGHT HAND. After cutting 400 (FOUR HUNDRED) paper hearts, I have pinched a nerve and am in a sort of blissful state of ignorance. See how I'm still typing? Look how dedicated Charlie is. In any case, once again I will quote our favorite Photo-head, Rebecca. This is a lifestyle people. Please don't pinch your nerves, that is a sign of my stupidity more then anything (I mean c'mon paper hearts?!)
But in a silly way my heart belongs to the paper world, and perhaps I would even take a bullet/pinched nerve for it.
Love what you do, don't loose the dream, don't let being realistic take something from you.
All the best, from my fingers to yours,
xoxo,
Charlie

A.S.S. (annual student show)

Congrats to all the Photons who entered the Juried Show and a special woot woot to those who got accepted!

We have a really great gang here in Photo, and I think I speak for everybody when I say "Hell yea brosky! Look how far we've come!" or something like that.

Here is the part where I shout out to the Photo Krew-

Assiran, Emily

Bellitto, Juliana

Dixon, Sarah

Gaber, Keristin

Giacomucci, Matt

Hojat, Roxana

Mariano, Sophia

McCafferty, Samantha

Richter, Haley

Shelly, Tiffany

Stewart, Jessica

Suchecki, Christian

Rock on little Photons, Rock on

xoxo,
Charlie

Movies For Photographers: Persona

Before I begin writing, I would like to thank Brittany, who continuously pressured me to watch this feature.

Being, Nothingness, Existence, Consciousness, Collection, Relation, Reality... Concepts. All Concepts. The foundations of our message. The kindle of a medium. Exerted from the pillars of philosophy, psychology, and social thought, Ingmar Bergman's Persona reveals it's horrifying intention within the first five minutes. The light is sparked, the film accelerates, and the curtains begin to roll back revealing a congruence of images, which is the cinema. Bergman's prelude to Persona acknowledges the origins of the medium, while also memorializing the state he was in during his recovery from pneumonia. It was his role as a patient that enacted the writings for Persona's eventual script. Within this context, which is clearly represented at the end of the prelude in the form of a boy laid out on what seems to be a hospital bed, the story discloses itself not only to the recovering auteur, but also to us: the audience.

The principle story follows the relationship of two women. An actress named Elisabet, who has recently become mute, and her nurse Alma who is summoned to take care of her. Without any delay, the viewer is made keenly aware of the minimalist aesthetic set forth. Graced with the magnetic allure of black and white photography, Bergman repeatedly captivates the viewer with enigmatic close ups of the two actresses. It is here, without words, that we get ingenuous insights from both Alma and Elisabet. Bergman stated himself that “…the human face is the great subject of cinema. Everything is there.” Clearly poised to convey such emotionality, the director makes it a goal to capture the sometimes-banal transformations that can occur within frantic movements that usually go unnoticed. The film’s fundamental demeanor can be symbolized by the nominal attributes of a human face.

The basic marker of Persona is the Singular. The act of one Role. Bergman’s scheme however, is the act of one role played by two. The Patient and the Nurse, the Listener and the Speaker, the Thinker and the Actor. Though his representation of this is rather literal (there is nothing hidden in this film), the squares we reside ourselves in is often obscured and indefinite. The actual roles precede our inhabitance of them. Therefore there is an elusive delineation of who is who and if it concerns the eventual outcome. Throughout the film, there are great scenes of social transcendence. The generally known is unforgivably a façade for the unknown. Bergman sets a sterile environment, a house on an isolated beach, for this experiment to enact properly. The two women fall in and out of identity, creating fervent reprisals as well as cathartic hospitalities to one another. These emotive swings are visually astounding to witness.

As reality tries to resurface towards the third act, one forgets that reality has already been present throughout the whole experience. The cinema screen is the retina of our imagination. There are instances when one must give the ambiguous characteristics of an art certain freedoms to direct one’s consciousness to wherever it decides to go. This film is no exception. Full of mystery and meticulous animation, Ingmar Bergman’s Persona sends us through a perilous course reminding us of the dysfunctional ties to these deceptive roles we submerge ourselves in.

Brittany told me while watching the film she could of paused at any moment and taken a screenshot.

I’d have to agree.

xoxo,

George

The Fall of Mankind...

How does Art function in Academia? I have moments every now and then where my mind is blown that there are professors who are giving grades for what artists are doing in school. Okay, so this sounds like a basic fact of life, why question it? Typically I don't, I struggle through the process of making and thinking and not thinking just like everyone else, the end result of a grade always seemed like a footnote. But then you find yourself in new territory, all the sudden you end up in a class or a system where it isn't about trying, or deeply learning (mistakes being 90% of that activity). You find yourself being aware of calculations being made against you (or for you) and how do you respond? Do you fight it, or do you wave the bleak flag of surrender? I know you might be thinking that this is a ridiculous dilemma, but I think it would also be a huge surprise to see how the tone of your work shifts when you are allowed to feel that knowledge and experience trumps the satisfaction of a paper devoid of red ink. I would never say that grades shouldn't be involved, (only in a perfect world) but I do think there should be a hierarchy of value. I have been lucky, and truly feel that for the most part I was gifted the chance to believe and pursue work that I desperately needed to make, and was supported in my endeavors. However there is always the time where I am confronted with the other world and I can feel it grate like sandpaper against my insides.

xoxo,
Charlie

Submissions- Conveyor Magazine

I believe I can speak for all of the department when I say it was a pleasure to have the MFA students of Parsons come over to share their talent and creative work with us. I was fortunate enough to meet and talk with some of their artists including the head of the MFA program. Needless to say, there was some great art on the walls but I honestly believe many of us can be right there with them. In response to their show, I think everyone in our BFA program (especially the seniors) should submit a piece to the magazine CONVEYOR.

Photography lies. It’s supposed to.

Harnessing the sophistry that is inherent in the medium, collaboration between artful deception and red herrings can transform a gritty alleyway into a golden field of wheat, make ghosts appear on the horizon, or portray a wolf as the proverbial sheep. The employment of deceptive clues, false emphasis, symbolic meaning, and other tricks of the trade is befitting photography; whether through enigmatic questions disguised as assertions, ambitious and decadent arrangements, or that which appears deceptively effortless and simple, photographs often mislead the eye.

We are seeking photographic and print-based work that interprets the theme of Smoke & Mirrors in a unique and provoking way. As always, the theme is open-ended. However, submissions should be thoughtfully considered before submitting.

The Deadline is March 4th.

Submit WORK!

xoxo-George

Visiting Alumni!- Gabe Fredericks

Just when you decide that you will never have a job, the Photo Department starts throwing uber successful alumni at you. Gabe Fredericks, owner of Philip Gabriel Photography came to Photo to dazzle us all with charm, only kidding, but enthusiasm was in no way lacking. I don't think I have ever seen (or ever will see) someone as excited about wedding pictures as this guy. Sure some of you may be saying "I don't want to do weddings! Am I destined to be just another wedding photographer?" Gabe isn't just another wedding photographer, nor does he seem to do it in a cop-out way, he genuinely and wholeheartedly loves it. This, my fellow photons, is the key. You are off the hook, you don't have to do weddings, do something that fits you. He fits exactly where he is. Do I think I fit there? No, I don't... but like Gabe, we have to be willing to search for our niche.
I know I am kinda side-tracking here, but in any case, it is pretty cool to get to see some fellow T.S.A. grads, I hope I get asked to come back in 10 years and wow everyone with my stories of being...a librarian...or something.
Stay tuned-- we had 2 other Alumni come in this week.

xoxo,
      Charlie

Haven't we talked enough?

Today I spoke about a body of work I have discussed hundreds of times. Now, I love to talk about art, my own, yours, that random person sitting over there... but there is only so much I can take! This is what was running through my mind, the dread of repetition. In retrospect I know it was really the dread of the unknown, the vulnerable, the truth. As I was talking and pointing and listening to various people I realized that once again it was different; the story had changed and revealed another little piece to me, the artist.
Epiphany siting: The more I speak to a live audience about my work... the more honest I can be with myself about what it truly means.
I know this seems like a simple idea, but whenever I feel disappointed, disenfranchised, disillusioned by a critique it is almost always because I lacked the honesty with my viewers and just as often, myself.
So, I hope for you what I also hold as my goal... to be an honest creator, or perhaps to be honest in your dishonesty.

“To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be credible; credible we must be truthful.”-Edward R. Murrow

xoxo,
Charlie