all images © harlan erskine.
all rights reserved.
my pictures
Over the next, few days leading up to the festival on the 14th I hope to complete this compilation of portfolio websites for yours and my photographic surfing pleasure. If you have any comments of portfolio suggestions, requests for additions and or removals please email or comment in this post’s comment section.
2008 Nominees
Harlan Erskine, “Guest Bedroom. Vero Beach, Florida” © 2007
The image above was my submission to the Student Personal work / fine art - Single category that is now a nominated work.
From the events Press Release:
| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
The New York Photo Festival is pleased to announce the
Friday, May 16, 2008 After Party Begins at 9:30pm Sponsored by PhotoShelter Inc.
The nominees for New York Photo Awards have just been announced! View the list at www.newyorkphotoawards.com One Award and two Honorable Mention certificates will be presented in each of the following categories: Editorial (series/single), Personal Work/ Unpublished/ Fine Art (series/single), Advertising (series/single), Books, Multimedia (photo/audio and video/audio), and in each of the Student categories: Editorial (series/single), Personal Work/ Unpublished/ Fine Art (series/single), Books, and Multimedia (photo/audio and video/audio). Each category winner will also receive a Canon PowerShot G9 Digital Camera, courtesy of Canon USA. Located in the St. Ann’s Theater, designed to accommodate 500 persons, the ceremony will feature guest speakers, a/v projections of winning works, presentation of the awards and subsequent acceptance speeches. Award Presenters include: Tim Barber (tinyvices.com and New York Photo Festival curator), Michelle Bogre (Parsons New School for Design), David Friend (Vanity Fair), photographer Lauren Greenfield, Bill Hunt (Hasted Hunt Gallery), Meagan Keane (PhotoShelter), Charlie Melcher (Melcher Media), Alison Morley (International Center of Photography), Jules Naudet (Hachette Filipacchi), Evan Nisselson (Digital Railroad), Jody Quon (New York magazine), David Schonauer (American Photo), Mary Virginia Swanson (Marketing Consultant and Educator), Lauren Wendle (PDN), and the festival founders and co-chairmen, Frank Evers of VII Photo Agency and Daniel Power of powerHouse Books. The New York Photo Awards After Party will be located at The powerHouse Arena and will begin at 9:30pm. Classic soul tunes courtesy of the legendary DJ Disco Wiz. Drinks will be served. Admission to the Awards Ceremony and After-Party is included in the Evening Programming ticket. About the New York Photo Awards: All Award Winners and Honorable Mentions will enjoy unprecedented visibility for their work. In addition to the New York Photo Awards ceremony, their work will be showcased on the New York Photo Awards and New York Photo Festival websites, and published in leading photo magazines. These artists are also automatically eligible for inclusion in a beautifully produced New York Photo Awards Annual by powerHouse Books. The Annual will be published in November 2008. Jury: A separate set of jurors from the multimedia industry will judge submissions in the Multimedia category, including the Snorri Bros. (famed Sprint commercial directors), Bjarke Myrthu (Magnum In Motion), Meredith Birkett (MSNBC) and Greg Clayman (MTV), as well as Lauren Greenfield, Frank Evers, and Daniel Power. As part of PhotoShelter Inc.’s sponsorship of the event, the PhotoShelter Personal Archive will be used to store each photographer’s images, distribute galleries to jury members, support the process of filtering and the ultimate selection of winning images. The Personal Archive is PhotoShelter’s solution that allows photographers to archive, organize, distribute and sell their images online with powerfull tools including slideshows, lightboxes, ecommerce capabilities, and website customization. DJ Disco Wiz, (born Luis Cedeño), is credited with being the first Latino DJ in Hip-Hop music. Wiz teamed up with Casanova Fly (Grandmaster Caz), to form the Mighty Force crew in the mid-70s in the Bronx. Wiz is also credited for being the first DJ to create a "mixed plate" in 1977 (hip-hop’s first mixed dub recording) when he and Caz combined sound bites, special effects and paused beats. The creator of The Hip-Hop Meets Spoken Wordz Series, a hip-hop and poetry performance series that gives a voice to up and coming Latino talent in New York City, Wiz has performed as a poet at the Apollo Theater and the landmark Nuyorican Poets Cafe. A major contributor to the Experience Music Project in Seattle, Washington, Wiz is also a board member of the Universal Federation for the Preservation of Hip Hop Culture, chaired by Afrika Bambaataa of the Universal Zulu Nation. At present time Wiz is co-authoring his memoirs with Simon |
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For more information, please contact Sara Rosen, Publicity Director
New York Photo Festival, 37 Main Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201 Tel: 212-604-9074 x105, Fax: 212-366-5247
email: sara[at]nyphotofestival.com
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Ansel Adams, “The Black Sun, Owens Valley, California,” 1939 From the book “Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs,” page 124.
Last fall, after the bulk of my Black Sun Project shooting was complete, I began researching and writing about the work. I looked into symbolic and historical meanings of a Black Sun, the history of photography as well as the more recent artist manipulations with glitches. Its quite amazing how research can help you more fully understand what you were doing in your work.
harlan erskine, “Black Sun 0181,” c-print on diasec in wood frame, 48" x 64"
I hope to discuss the symbolic meaning of a Black Sun and glitch art in other posts. Now, I want to discuss the biggest revelation in my research; two historical photographers have come up with very similar Black Sun pictures. The first image I came across is the image above by Ansel Adams that was made in 1939 and the other is by Minor White produced in 1955.
Through a bit of Google image searching I came upon several blogs that mentioned an Ansel Adams’ image called “The Black Sun, Tungsten Hills, Owens Valley, California.” There is very little web information and virtually no good images floating around but Ansel talks about this image quite thoroughly in his book “Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs,” starting on page 124.
My first negative was planned for development in Kodak D-23. The film was Kodak Super-XX, a fine material of the "thick emulsion" type. The sun flared strongly in the sky, and in the center of the flare was a small circle of slightly gray value, representing a partial reversal of the sun's image. The second exposure was identical to the first, but compensating development was planned for the desired reversal effect. It was gratifying to see both negatives as experiments and one, The Black Sun, as a striking surrealistic image. It was proof that the subject may prompt ideas, ideas crave visualizations, and craft makes their realization possible.
Ansel does a nice job of talking about where the technical and the aesthetic join up and work together. I am not sure if he imagined the outcome before the negative was produced, like he claims, or if it was a happy accident. Either way his image stunned me when I first found it in his book.
“The Black Sun” by Minor White, 1955 from Time-Life’s “Great Photographers,” ref. 163, p. 185 via “Solarization Demystified” by Professor and artist William L. Jolly.
Another surprising discovery happened more recently, when I came across an article on solarization by Professor William L. Jolly. Apparently “Adams claimed that the reversal was anticipated and previsualized. White admitted that, in his case, it was an accident and rhapsodized, The sun is not fiery after all, but a dead planet. We on earth give it its light.”
Another contemporary photographer working with similar content of sun images with a different method to get there is Chris McCaw. Chris has been harnessing the sun to literally burn the photographic medium and has been getting some breathtaking results. I look forward to seeing the real prints in person someday.
Sunburn GSP#039, by Chris McCaw 2006.
