Archive for the 'Politics' category
Thursday, November 10th, 2011
Tatiana Plotnikova, Christian Klinger and Oleg Videnin, Krasnodar, Russia, 2011. Photo by Sohei Yasui.
Photovisa is a ambitous fotofestival in Krasnodar, Russia, which was held the 4th time this year. By the shown photographers there were also some of my loved russian photographers like Oleg Videnin and also the unknown and mysterious russian photographer Georgy Kolosov. Georgy Kolosov is a very special class, because his photography is for foreigners a huge miracle. I never understand his work, which is always a good sign. In Krasnodar I had the possibiliy to view some of his photographs as orginal print. It was a touching pleasure.
The head of the festival is Irina Tchmyreva and a bunch of enthustiastic people organize this outstanding event. It is really a professional and hearty fotofestival. Dear reader, if you are interested to get in touch with russian photography, you should visit photovisa.
At October 22, 2011 our new film “THE RUSSIANS A Film about Oleg Videnin” was shown in Kuban cinema in Krasnodar as a Russian premiere. It was a great and marvellous experience, that the audience acknowledged our film with a long and (more…)
Fine Art, Photography, Politics, Review |
Wednesday, January 19th, 2011
Can we rescue great photojournalism?
David Drebin, Dallas, 2010
Photojournalists are yesterday’s heroes. True, there are still some big names out there, among them Gilles Peress and Sabastiao Salgado. But the significance of their work is unclear. Do they shape political or social opinion through their images? Or are they mostly regarded as imaginative artists who just happen to be drawn to tough, newsworthy subjects? Few photographers are any longer seen as providing definitive information about some national or international trouble spot, at least very few who are what used to be called professionals. The news magazines, which turned certain photojournalists into superstars, have been fading for decades, and the newspapers are in dire health. The proliferation of amateur photographs and videos on the internet has swamped whatever sense there was of photojournalists and their editors as gatekeepers, providing some judgment and oversight. The whole idea that photography has some particular purchase on the truth has been called into question in places high and low, from the writings of Susan Sontag to the rants on cable TV. Definitive is itself nearly a defunct concept. (more…)
Photography, Politics |
Monday, August 11th, 2008
Interview with Christian E. Klinger about Jock Sturges ….
The official filmwebsite:
LINE OF BEAUTY AND GRACE * A documentary about Jock Sturges
Here is a beautiful, silent and politically incorrect interview with our director Christian E. Klinger from John Lingan about women, Jock Sturges, filmmaking and love….
SPLICETODAY.COM: This is the second in a continuing series of Splice Premieres, articles that profile artists, musicians, and filmmakers that are making careers outside the mainstream media. Along with interviews and background information, these articles will contain samples of the artists’ work, including unreleased or newly debuting material. The first Premiere was Zach Kaufmann’s interview with St. Louis alt-country band Theodore.
Christian E. Klinger’s first documentary, Line of Beauty and Grace, concerns the controversial American photographer Jock Sturges, whose plaintive images of nude children and young women have attracted accusations of child pornography. Sturges shoots his photos in Montalivet, a town in coastal France noted for its hospitality to naturist vacationers, and Klinger traveled there to film the photographer and his models as he worked. Sturges typically works with the same models for years on end, and he brings his family to the shoots, as well. Line of Beauty and Grace therefore documents an artist who creates his own spare, comfortable worlds in both his work and life.
The movie aired on German television and is now available on DVD from the website for Klinger’s production company, Amadelio Film. It briefly mentions the controversies surrounding Sturges’ work (a phenomenon, Klinger points out, that only occurs in America), but begins with the assumption that his photography is inarguably important and viable artistically. (more…)
Fine Art, Interview: Art, Interviews, Photography, Politics |
Thursday, January 10th, 2008
These interview scenes are unused scenes from the documentary about Jock Sturges (not included in the DVD)
Interview with Jock Sturges (Quicktime-Video)
Deutsche Version
Official Filmwebsite (Trailer, Gallery, DVD, 99 minutes)
Jock Sturges and beauty
In the summer of 2007, we travelled to the French Atlantic Coast to meet an artist whose images stand out from the diverse pool of contemporary photography. His subject matter is the human being. His tool is a large format camera. His goal is the depiction of nothing less than beauty.
He demands the truth from his photographs. For over 30 years, the American photographer Jock Sturges has dealt with beauty and truth, an idea of art, unfortunately, which is often scorned today. In order to recognize and appreciate that, which distinguishes his work, we must focus on the definition of beauty.
Jock Sturges. Nikki. Montalivet. France. 1996.
Beauty is first and foremost an abstract definition, a concept, difficult to determine. It has always been governed by history and culture. However, there is a certain degree of global consensus concerning to the notion of beauty. Not only do we define physical matter, such as humans, animals, plants or objects as beautiful, but also abstractions, such as ideas or the notion of the soul. Even Schiller in his essay (more…)
Fine Art, Interview: Art, Interview: Photographer, Interviews, Photography, Politics |
Tuesday, February 6th, 2007
Interview: James Nachtwey (Quicktime-Video)
James Nachtwey : war photographer
It is said that as a war photographer, you either become cynical or holy. If there are indeed only these two ways of existing as a war photographer, James Nachtwey belongs to the holy. Nachtwey, a tall and elegant man, appears within the terror which he photographs as if he is surrounded by an aura of being untouchable. He has been everywhere where there have been wars and atrocities have been committed during the last decades: Somalia, Sudan, Bosnia, Rwanda, Chechnya, Kosovo, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Israel, Iraq and many other countries. But of course, he is not untouchable at all. Serveral times he has been severely injured or illnesses have torn him down. Nevertheless he continues working because of his strong belief that his pictures can make a difference. Nachtwey, convinced of the effect his pictures have on viewers, has never stopped hoping to fight war, hunger and poverty with his work.
What Nachtwey has seen can hardly be described. It is bare horror. And his pictures convey only a part of it, because a picture can not reproduce the sound of a machine gun and the stink of a rotting corpse. These pictures, though, are so strong and overwhelming that they burn into the mind of the beholder. And that is what Nachtwey wants. Nobody should forget the atrocities going on in the world every day, and everybody should — according to his abilities — do something about them: a sublime ideal and a powerful motivation.
James Nachtwey. Chechnya. 1996. Ruins in the center of Grozny.
(more…)
Fine Art, Interview: Art, Interview: Photographer, Interviews, Photography, Politics |
