As usual, I’m surprised at how fast time passes. It’s a damn pity Singapore doesn’t get seasons. I’m quite sure that time, when seasonal, is a much more magnanimous entity. I’m of the popular opinion that everyone fares better when regarded against the backdrop of an impending summer (rather than a continuous one). 

Running from Camera. I don’t think I’ll get very far. 

After browser-shopping on Amazon for a week or so and getting nowhere, I decided to pay a visit to the library. Libraries are also forgiving creatures, so I paid my fines and am myself a good library citizen again. And surprisingly, our libraries have quite a satisfying selection of photobooks. In hardcover, no less, and since no one ever borrows them out, most are in pristine condition. No dubious stains, nor is there any dried booger stuck between pages. I took out three books, one of which was Grim Street by Mark Cohen. I haven’t really heard of the photographer until now, though I do remember having seen a few of the images that are in the book elsewhere previously.

Mark Cohen – Bubble Gum

He definitely has (had?) an interesting style. A tad confrontational – I consider anyone who does street photography with a flash confrontational and brave – and I like that his photographs don’t conform to what I would expect from street photography. You get (intentionally) faceless or headless shots, close up shots of hair, tweed coats or teeth etc; there is seldom a ‘decisive’ moment or an obvious significance that you can pinpoint straightaway, but there is almost always something alive (and lively) and immediate about the images.

Mark Cohen – Boy in Box (left), Girls Playing under Box (right)

There isn’t a lot of information online, but here’s a decent selection of his works.

(Images from here)

Tierney Gearon’s Exposure. It was so hard to pick just two images since I quite adore every single photograph. Filing this under exhibitions I want to see. These will be quite quite gorgeous to see in real life. 

From the press release:

But instead of taking single shots she creates surprising, chance-narratives using the classic technique of double exposure in camera that she then prints without retouching or post work. By superimposing two, quite unrelated images into one, she invents scenes that are startling, surreal, and engaging yet also fleeting and ephemeral. They are vastly different in character from all of her previous photographs in that they present a multi-dimensional (sometimes kaleidoscopic) view of Gearon’s world that challenges perceptions of time, scale, and space. Her method of composing creates, within each work, contrasts of settings and the juxtaposing of themes.

[...]

Because Gearon’s complex, layered compositions simultaneously capture elements taken at different times and places, they subvert the conventional idea that a photograph represents just one instance. She evokes the chaos of life, exploits the allowed unpredictability of photography, and distills the “organized accidents” that result from her unusual approach to picture-making.

(link via Conscientious)

Good things about this weekend:

- Watching The Wrestler. I used to watch wrestling when I was younger and could not wield control over the tv remote. It interested me for a while, then I got terribly bored with it. So it got rather nostalgic yesterday when I saw The Wrestler, and while that might had contributed to my favourable reaction to the film, it was still a very fine picture. The acting was splendid and painful to watch, albeit in a good way. I wonder why this wasn’t nominated; I found it much much better than the other nominated stuff (save for Milk). Or maybe, I just like tragedies.

- Accomplishing the goal of watching all the 5 films nominated for Best Picture before the Oscars ceremony. Finally! It’s been a personal goal for the longest time. Since it has always been 2 films out of 5 for the last seven years, I’m mighty pleased with myself this year. Well, it does help that the films this year did not include 1. fighting in the middle ages, 2. an excessive number of guns and ammunition, 3. banned and/or heavily censored films.

- Finding a heavily discounted copy of this (in hardcover too!). Marked down from $95 to a mere $20! I had the most satisfied grin on my face for at least an hour afterwards.

And now, bad things about this weekend: Feeling that there is no way I’m going to pass my final theory driving test tomorrow.

Updated: I did pass my test! Woohoo!

In certain parts of Eastern Asia, particularly in Japanese culture and Vietnamese culture, a sneeze without an obvious cause was generally perceived as a sign that someone was talking about the sneezer at that very moment – a belief that is still depicted in present-day manga and anime. In China, Vietnam and Japan, for instance, there is a superstition that if talking behind someone’s back causes the person being talked about to sneeze; as such, the sneezer can tell if something good is being said (one sneeze), something bad is being said (two sneezes in a row), or if this is a sign that they are about to catch a cold (multiple sneezes). (from here)

I’m quite inclined to believe that for now, because my room is not that dusty.

Anyways. Have been suppressing the most recent bout of wanderlust by browsing photography sites. They aren’t necessarily all about travel photography (none were, actually), but since a good deal of photography takes place in countries foreign to the one I reside in, I shall be unreasonable and regard them as such. By the way, what’s the defining distinction between travel photography and a photo essay (all serious artistic and/or journalistic connotations included) on a place/country/region? Not to say that the former isn’t serious, or harbours no artistic cred at all, but I do think that most people do not view travel photography as having as much clout as say, a photo essay on Bilgoraj even if the photographs from the two series might essentially be of the same subjects, etc. Intent? Exposition? And that photo essays are usually the result of continual visits to the same place, and the result of an accumulative understanding of its people and culture? Hmm, if we are to place travel photography on the other end of the spectrum, it would be rather disparaging and inaccurate. no? Maybe, I should just let them be. Digression ends.

Well, but it was a digression that started me on looking at photobooks anyway. Have been browsing the online stores of several photography sites and Amazon, and it is an increasingly uphill task of refraining from clicking the Add to Basket button. Why are photobooks so expensive? Why are the ones I want out-of-print? Why! Previous nights have, yes, been punctuated with moments like those. Why! 368 pounds! Currently unavailable! Out of print! Rare! Buy it now at 199! Whatever! Discouragement likes company. Reality is harsh.

Bulleted updates, because I’m 1., lazy, and 2., (see point #1 below).

- I hate my internet connection.
- I hate price stickers that don’t come off well. You hear me, Harris? Huh, huh huh.
- I want a portable Amazon.com, preferably one that resides in my head.
- I think it’s Wednesday already, though it still feels like Monday.
- IIII’s.
- I shall not ebay.
- I think.
- I want and am tempted. Where’s my Kino sale? It seems like every time I renew my membership, their sales cease.
- I, most of the time, am more inspired by words than images.
- I shall not think.
- I shall reread this, and try not to buy any more books before I finish.
- I shall not sit on my magazines at work.

Have started on a new photography project. There, I said it. Now I can’t pretend that it doesn’t exist.

- Ani Difranco on Tuesday was awesome. Amazing energy, amazing voice, amazing guitar prowess. More when I get my photos back. And she did do “You Had Time”, which was just fantastic and stunning and absolutely beautiful.

- Slumdog Millionaire was decent. A bit overhyped, and I thought that it was a tad depressing. Am quite sure that after the credits have rolled, both will be hunted down and shot. I have yet to watch Frost/Nixon, but I want Milk to win Best Picture.

- Ah! I agree completely.

- February is now well underway.

- I need a new book.

PhotoEphemera – photography-related ephemera. Now, that is a redundant description. But, an interesting site; I really do not mind having that Eggleston flyer. I used to collect these as well, but there was this time when I decided that my life could be better led if my room was neater (uh-huh) so I threw the bulk of them out. I still have a few; my favourite is a namecard-sized gallery announcement of an art show. Loved the photograph, and adored the title of the exhibition “Working like a tiger”, for reasons still undetermined. I digress. (link via 5B4)

Ahorn Magazine – an online photography magazine. Very promising, and I really enjoyed what I’ve seen so far. This had me very close to breaking my Paypal abstinence. (link via Conscientious)

Kathryn Parker Almanas – Okay, the site loads exasperatingly slow, but her photographs are gorgeous.

Mindfuck Movies – Yeah, pretty much about those. Mindfuck movies are terribly, and can be annoyingly unrewarding (and loooooong) at times, but sometimes you can’t help but be drawn to them. Sometimes. Like Drowning by Numbers by Peter Greenaway. I don’t exactly remember much of it at all, but I do remember being weirded out and fascinated at the same time – which is a nice combination in my books.

Installation of Sato’s works at Haines Gallery, Photo-Respiration, 2007

An insightful piece on Japanexposures.com on Tokihiro Sato:

With exposure times of well over an hour any traces of the human element, or even the natural world in motion, become stillness and emptiness. People in a crowded intersection don’t become blurs, they simply Un-become, and waves in a seascape turn into a vague and hovering mist.
[..]
In an interview he has said, “I only photograph landscapes, certain objects, and light. The light becomes corporeal, while the traces of light that I create as I move embody passing time, creating a sculpture in time.”

Rather mesmerising images. I almost feel like playing connect-the-dots, in the hope that that might reveal something if I keep at it long enough. Oh well. I like how his images are installed too. I’d like one in my room, please.

Here’s a review of his photo book Photo-Respiration.

(All images from here; installation images from here)

Indeed. Spent the better half of the day wanting to just sit down and draw, and then spent the better half of the day being unable to do that. Then spent the lesser half of the day not wanting to sit down and draw, and then spent the lesser half of the day sitting down and not drawing. 15th February looms like doom. Ha, ha.

The White Tiger is fun to read. It took me more than two weeks to get through 1/4 of The Little Friend, but less than one week of MRT return trips to be more than midway through the former. Maybe I just like books that don’t have a size -2 font. Maybe I just prefer witty writing. But, who doesn’t?

Am grudgingly fending off attacks of wanderlust. Note to self: your room is still in an utter mess, you have not found a driving instructor, you have not taken a photograph you like in weeks, you have a horrific backlog of books and dvds, you have not even gotten through this February, so quit visiting airline and travel sites. I am my own discipline mistress.

20-21 February: On The Wall – Photo Bazaar at 2902 Gallery.