With work dating between the 1970s up through the 21^st century, Cindy Sherman can best be described as an ever-changing artist with a constant message. She was a child of the New York/ New Jersey area in 60s and influenced by the work of Dali and Picasso.

In the 1970s, Sherman began creating her intriguing black and white film stills, mainly consisting of images of herself. Though only being images of Ms. Sherman, they were far from being self-portraits. Each still contained its own character. Each separate image depicted a different female character typically found in the press: a young girl, house mom, fragile grandmother, etc.

Later, in 1980s, the look of Cindy’s images changed with the decade. Beginning in 1981, Sherman started playing with color in her images. With the increase of color, came an increase in tone. Her work from this time period would leave the viewer with an uneasy feeling. By playing with makeup and shadows, Cindy adds a “look what you created “ tone to these abnormal depictions of a woman in the public eye.

When the 1990s hit, Sherman’s work took a turn for the bold. She began including sculptures whose aforementioned Dali and Picasso inspiration rose to climax. These newer images toyed with the ideas of human sexuality, body image and gender roles, but with a surreal twist.

Sherman’s newest work brings the focus back on her former caricature-like portraits now with new age quality to them. Full body costumes, makeup extremes, and school picture day backgrounds seem to me to be the fulfillment of an extremely creative woman’s ideas. When presented with Cindy Sherman’s full body of work, you see her thought process very clearly and how each of the former eras of her work were stepping stones for her to create the statement pieces she creates today.

1970s: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/cindy-sherman-untitled

1980s: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/cindy-sherman-untitled-number-130a

1990s: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/cindy-sherman-untitled-61

2000s/10s: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/cindy-sherman-untitled-39

Source: http://www.cindysherman.com/biography.shtml

Bill Brandt also known as Hermann Wilhelm Brandt was born on May 2nd, 1904 and passed away on  December  20, 1983. He was a British photographer as well as a photojournalist. He was orignally born in German but later moved to England, where he received recognition for his images of the British society under the magazine brands such as Lilliput and Picture Post, and eventually leading to his distorted nudes, along with portraits of famous artists and landscapes. He is famously portrayed to be at the top of the list of important British photographers in the 20th century.

http://www.billbrandt.com/bill-brandt-archive-print-shop/sp04-grand-union-canal-paddington-c1938

One of this pieces was the “Grand Union Canal, Paddington c1938” which shows a waterway, that was engineered by William Jessop and James Barnes, it established a link of London, via Brentford and the Thames, with the canals of the Midlands. This piece is actually quite beautiful of a black and white photograph which has a sense of repetition and perfect flow of the water and buildings creating a sense of depth of perspective. Its really composed shot.

Man Ray (1890–1976) was a innovator of the Dada crusade in the United States and France and a vital leading role of Surrealism. Man Ray found motivation at the Armory show of 1913, which introduced the works of Pablo Picasso, Wassily Kandinsky and Marcel Duchamp. Ray moved to Paris in 1921. He became to be well-known for his photographs of his creative and literary allies. He also established a flourishing career as a fashion photojournalist, by taking pictures for such publications as Vogue. His testing with photography comprised of experiencing how to create “camera-less” pictures, which he named Rayographs. These photographs were prepared by employing and influencing objects on pieces of photosensitive paper.

Ray’s prominent works from the 1924’s “Le Violon d’Ingres.”

Man Ray remained a fan of the portraits of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and completed a successions of pictures, motivated by Ingres’s languorous nudes, of the model Kiki in a turban. Placing the f-holes of a stringed instrument on the photographic print and then re-photographing the print, Man Ray transformed what was initially a standard nude. He also decided to add the name Le Violon d’Ingres, a French idiom that means “hobby.” The alteration of Kiki’s physique into a harmonious instrument with the simple accumulation of a little brushstrokes makes this a hilarious image, but then again her armless form is also alarming to consider. The photograph upholds a tautness among objectification and appreciation of the female body. I would interpret the photo as the women body can be great as to listening to music.

Arbitrating after Ray’s presence of this image in other photographic arrangements, he required to have considered Tears one of his most triumphant photographs. A cropped version of it with a single eye also appears as the first plate in a 1934 book of his photographs. The woman’s lamenting rising glimpse and mascara-encrusted lashes seem envisioned to raise curiosity at the source of her suffering. The face, however, belongs not to a actual female but to a fashion mannequin who cries tears of sparkling, rotund glass drops; the result is to aestheticize the feeling her tears would usually express. Man Ray finished this photograph in Paris about the time of his collapsing with his partner Lee Miller, and the woman’s false tears may narrate to that occasion in the artist’s life.

Sowon Jung

Elliott Erwitt was born in 1928 in the beautiful city of France, Paris. When he was ten in 1939, his family originally from Russia shifted to the United States. There, from the New School for Social Sciences and Los Angeles City College, Erwitt learned photography and filmmaking until 1950. During the same decade, Erwitt worked as an assistant photographer.Erwitt was hired by Stryker who used to be the Director of the department of photography at Farm Security Administration, to do a project for Standard Oil Company. Once done, Erwitt started a freelance career in photography and worked for Life, Look, Holiday, and Coiller’s. In 1953, Elliott Erwitt joined Magnum Photos and this gave him a chance to do international projects.

Elliott Erwitt, Santa Monica, California (1955)

This is one of well-known photographs among Elliott Erwitt’s famous works. According to Elliott Erwitt’s biography, he describes taking photos as “just composing all the parts in a rectangle” I personally think that this photo is very harmonious that shows strong impact by playing composition within the rectangle frame. As you can see, the objects in this photo is not special and unique at all, but somehow it is so beautiful because the photographer tried to find something interesting in the ordinary. Putting the object (the couple) in the lower side of rectangle is well composed and the blurry images of background also helps to focus well. Moreover, this photo is so impressive because audiences can feel the same emotion through the woman’s smile which implies what the photographer might want to say.  The photographer might want to share his thought that life is not always special as everyone expects but, life can be happy in our ordinary daily moments.

Holding a small camera and shooting photos on streets, Andre Kertesz is considered one of “the seminal figures of photojournalism” (Wiki). Kertesz was born in Hungary in 1894 (died in 1985). He got his first camera when he was 18. After finishing his Hungarian period of life, he immigrated to French in 1925. Since that, Kertesz started to shine on the world stage. Even though his life got a low point when he moved to the United Sates, he published a book named “Sixty Years of Photography, 1912-1972.” Kertesz’s special photograph style also strongly influents Henri Cartier-Bresson, the master of candid photography.

The first photograph of Kertesz is “The Circus.” It was shoot in 1920. At that time, Kertesz was still at Hungary and he liked to photograph the Hungarian peasants around him. Here we can see, there is a couple peeking at concealed circus performers through cracks in a wooden fence, and the man appears to have only one leg. This is Kertesz’s early work and it’s easy to see his clarity of style. This couple is centered and all the fence is geometric patterning in this photo. As Kertesz recorded, “I photographed real life-not the way it was, but the way I felt it. This is the most important thing: not analyzing, but feeling” (Blog). Here we can see, Kertesz was trying to make connection between his emotion and his subjects by using his special geometric photograph style. For me, I think the angel of shooting photos can arouse audience’s curiosity about what this couple is peeking there.

 The Circus, Budapest, 1920

Another photography of Kertesz is “The Lost Cloud” which was shoot in New York. As described, “One afternoon he observed a solitary white cloud lost in a huge blue sky, dwarfed by the monolithic presence of the Rockefeller Center” (Getty). Kertesz said this cloud represented himself. Here we can directly feel his emotion through looking at this photography. Kertesz endowed this cloud with a personal, emotional dimension. That exactly conformed to Kertesz’s photography style. The white space conflicts to the geometric building shape, which gives audience a feeling of Kertesz himself. In my opinion, this photo is fresh and vivid while it represents Kertesz’s real life situation. I think no matter what kind of photography skills we focus on, as long as we shoot objects by our hearts and feel them, we will experience the quintessential spirit of Andre Kertesz.

 The Lost Cloud, New York, 1937

Eric Heo

Professor Klein

ART 4900

July 26, 2016

                                                Paul Outerbridge

Born on August 15, 1896, Paul Outerbridge was an American photographer who was well known for his early use of color photography. In 1922, Outerbridge’s work began being published in Vanity Fair and Vogue magazines, jumpstarting his career as a photographer. After working for the French Vogue magazine for a couple of years, Outerbridge returned to New York City in 1929. Having photographed mostly in color and nudes, he was way ahead of his time in technicality and conceptually.

Some of Outerbridge’s works that involved both color and nudity are The Shower and Woman with Claws. The Shower is a photograph of a naked woman behind a clear shower curtain, both covering and revealing the subject’s body simultaneously. With a higher exposure on the upper right corner of the photograph, the subject’s face and upper body is more visible than her lower body. The baby blue hue of the shower wall gives the photograph a playful tone; however, the nudity of the subject juxtaposes the playfulness with a charismatic tone. In a sense, the technicality of the photo is mirrored by the tone of the photo. The slight blur mirrors the playful tone given by the blue color, suggesting a hint of innocence, while the blurred but obvious nudity shines.  

Woman with Claws is another one of Outerbridge’s photographs taken of a nude woman in color. Unlike The Shower, this one is not blurred and reveals the upper body of the subject in detail. In this photo, the model is photographed nude, wearing a pair of sharp-tipped gloves pressing against her breast and stomach. Part of her legs and face are cropped from the photo, while her breast and stomach are covered by the gloves. The tone of the photo is gloomy because the background wall is a deep blue with a shadow outlining the subject. When looking at the photo, you also get a sense of satire due to the pointed gloves covering a breast and part of her stomach while exposing an area where she lacks pubic hair. Outerbridge reveals explicit parts of the body while covering parts that are not as explicit. From this photo, it is as if Outerbridge wishes to reveal nudity to the audience, but at the same time is shy of what the viewers might say.

Overall as an artist, Paul Outerbridge was very ahead of his time period and his photographs show this as he produced vivid color nude photos that were not up to par with the standards during his time. His two works of art, The Shower and Woman with Claws are very interesting photographs due to the juxtaposition of tones and considering his early approach on a more contemporary style that was frowned upon.

Berenice Abbott was an American photographer, during 1940’s, best know for her black and white photography of New York City architecture and Science. She received the International Center of Photography’s Lifetime Achievement Award, two years prior her death, in 1989.

One of her most famous projects was called “Changing New York,” which she started after returning from Europe. She saw America with a “fresh and enriched perspective” and began to photograph the rapidly evolving urban landscape of the city. Her captivating photographs of new bridges and skyscrapers, replacing older structures, as well as the juxtaposition of evolving modes of transportation with those of the past and crowded street scenes evoke an exciting combination of realism. You could imagine yourself standing in the streets and absorbing the streets “feeling.” Through her project I could feel the changes that were happening in the city by the way she portrayed her subjects in the pictures.

 In 1939, she began experimenting with scientific imagery and capturing the movement of physics, mathematics and chemistry in her dramatic black-and-white photos, and called her project “Documenting Science.” As her photographs illustrate the latest technology, which makes them modern, however the principles they show came before her period, which makes them timeless. In this project the photographer is trying to take us both backward and forward in time. Abbott pictures depict a spellbinding pattern of colliding and overlapping circular forms. If you stare long enough you start to see faces or other forms in the picture. In her project, I got the feeling of being tricked, when I first looked at the picture I saw one thing and few moments later I saw something else. It was interesting trying to figure out what she was trying to show or how she took the picture without reading the captions. The project gave the feeling of mystery and blurred the lines between facts and fiction. Other photos show multiple exposures of items moving through space, an enlarged view of penicillin mold, and beams of light passing through a prism.

https://www.google.com/search?q=berenice+abbott+photography+science&client=safari&channel=mac_bm&biw=1230&bih=648&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwi63bbXuZbOAhXDPB4KHWVICBcQ_AUIBigB#imgrc=_

GarryWinogrand-Photographer

Martin Lee
Professor H. Klein
July 28, 2016

Robert Frank

Robert Frank was born in 1924 and is from Zürich, Switzerland. He was raised during a time where Hitler was everywhere and he wanted to get away from all the negativity. Robert is an American photographer and documentary filmmaker. He’s most known for his work in 1958 for which he had made a book titled The Americans. He is still alive as of today and is 91 years old.
Looking through some of his work in The Americans I can really see why he has won so many awards and got famous off this book. Most, if not all of these shots were taken in the 50’s.
I can tell that he takes every photo with reason and everything is done on purpose. A lot of the shots are candid and tell a story. None of his photos are every static. Although you may think that some of his photos are very still, if we look more closely, there is something lurking that. He focuses a lot on juxtapositions, symmetry, patterns, and depth. He times his photos so precisely and to think that this was all done on film is unbelievable. He has also gotten in very difficult angles to get the right shot.
It’s truly inspiring looking at a lot of his work. I can tell that he was never afraid to just shoot. His street photography is amazing. Most of his work with people show a lot of emotion yet they’re mostly all candid photos which amaze me even more.
Something interesting I find in his photos personally is that the contrast sometimes is very harsh. It really gives me chills sometimes looking at these photos as if the people in the photos are looking directly into my soul. I can feel so much “aura” off the black and white.
He also did a lot of work on the social class divide and the segregation that was still happening at the time. He finds ways of framing and composing his photos in such a way that is quite obvious what he wants the viewers to portray but he sometimes slips an Easter egg in there sometimes if you look more closely to photos.
He’s also done quite a few landscape/scenery photos but they all make me feel something about the photo. I feel like I am there with him while he is taking the shot.
Ultimately, looking at his work inspires me to continue shooting. With this age in digital photography, we can shoot more than ever. I am inspired to try newer things but at the same time, notice everything around me. There is fine art everywhere. It’s up to us to see it through the camera’s lens.

Juan Romero

ART 4900

Professor Klein

Herb Ritts was born in Los Angeles in 1952. Before getting into photography, he went into the family furniture business before going to college for economics and art history. It wasn’t until he and his friend Richard Gere decided to shoot in front of an old Buick that he really became interested in photography and found success. Following this, he soon became a very well known commercial photographer and also became known for directing award-winning music videos.

This photograph exemplifies the style that Ritts would come to be known for in his career. Here Richard Gere stands in front of an old Buick with not much else going on. Portraits are meant to emphasize the subject of the photograph, which he accomplished by going with simple environments. He also mostly kept his photographs in black-and-white, which I feel also helps accomplishes what a portrait is meant to do. Instead of bright colors possibly drawing your focus to something that’s unimportant in the background, you are forced to really look at and examine the photograph before being drawn to the most prominent element. I also feel as though the black-and-white allows for more emotions to come through.

While most of his photographs were of celebrities, Ritts also took photographs like the one above. These were meant to truly emphasize and show off the human physique. The lighting along with the black-and-white creates contrast on their bodies and emphasizes the crevices on their bodies. The detail on their bodies resembles what you would expect when seeing a statue like Michelangelo’s David or other similar Greek statues. This Greek influence probably came from his previous studies in art history.

Overall, I find Herb Ritts’ photography to be very interesting. The lack of color and lack of elaborate environments or props makes it easy to identify what it is that he wants you to look at.