Phillip Robertson (The Hindu Kush, The Siege of Najaf and the Impossibility Theorem)
Carte Blanche is pleased to invite you to its third artists' talk and book signing event featuring photographer Phillip Robertson's work 'The Hindu Kush, the Siege of Najaf and the Impossibility Theorem'.
Since 2001, Phillip Robertson has covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq for a number of news organizations including the BBC World Service Radio, National Public Radio in the United States and the Christian Science Monitor. Over the past 10 years, he has published more than sixty feature articles in Salon, using first person narrative to communicate the effects of conflict on ordinary people. In 2003, Robertson was a finalist for the USC/Annenberg award for online journalism in the breaking news category.
During the August, 2004, siege of Najaf, he collaborated with photojournalist Thorne Anderson to document the devastating course of the war in the Shia holy city. After crossing through the US cordon and Mahdi Army forward positions on foot, Anderson and Robertson remained in the Shrine of Imam Ali for three days, interviewing and photographing the Mahdi Army fighters as their lines collapsed under the American offensive. After returning to Iraq in 2006-7, he wrote a series of three articles about the accelerating sectarian conflict in Iraq and the evolution of Shiite death squads in Baghdad. The story, "In the Mosque of Imam Ali" was chosen by David Foster Wallace to appear in THE BEST AMERICAN ESSAYS 2007. Phillip's investigative story about cocaine smuggling and Chiquita brands, "The Octopus in the Cathedral of Salt," appeared in the Virginia Quarterly Review's fall 2007 issue and resulted in the extradition of a death squad leader to the United States. In August 2008, after assignments in Colombia and Burma, he returned to Iraq for the Associated Press covering violence in the northern city of Mosul. Phillip received a Fellowship from the New York Foundation for the Arts in 2009 for Non-Fiction.
on the web: http://www.philliprobertson.com
Bruce Haley (Sunder) & Tomas van Houtryve (Behind the Curtains of 21st Century Communism)
Carte Blanche is pleased to invite you to its second artists' talk and book signing event featuring photographers Bruce Haley and Tomas van Houtryve.
Join us at 973 Valencia Street, San Francisco on Thursday July 5th from 6pm for their introductory presentations followed by a fascinating discussion about Communism and its impact on the 21st century by Luis Delgado.
Selected photos of Cuba from Tomas van Houtryve's book "Behind the Curtains" will also be on display.
So take this opportunity to meet the artists, get your book signed, and collect amazing limited edition prints while enjoying a glass of wine.
Sunder
Taken between 1994 and 2002, Bruce Haley’s photographs reflect the complexity of land and life in the former Soviet Bloc. Decaying industrial sites and toxic landscapes, rich farmland and traditional villages: his images capture the joys and challenges facing these newly independent nations, as they struggle to leave behind the legacy of Communism for an unknown future.
Bruce Haley
Bruce Haley is the recipient of the Robert Capa Gold Medal, one of the most prestigious photography awards in the world. Haley received this honor for his coverage of Burma‘s bloody ethnic civil war.
Behind the Curtains of 21st Century Communism
In several nations across the globe, the Communist Party has managed to hold on, mutate and adapt to the 21st century. Whether due to unaddressed class inequality, nostalgia or the steel fist of totalitarianism, these places continue to resist against the tides of history. Over the course of seven years, Tomas secured unprecedented access to North Korea, Cuba,China, Nepal, Vietnam, Laos and Moldova. He discovered a secretive world of revolutionaries, spies, opposition fighters and ordinary workers. His photographs explore the gulf between the high ideals of communism and its complex present day reality. “Behind the Curtains” is the winner of the 2012 POYi World Understanding Award.
Tomas van Houtryve
Tomas is a member of VII. He is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards including POYi Photographer of the Year,
the Bayeux Prize for War Correspondents and the Perpignan Young Photographer Award. Solo exhibitions of his work
have been shown in Paris, New York City, Spain and Italy. Many of his photographs of intense political actions are, paradoxically, distinguished by their intimacy. Tomas is part of Carte Blanche's permanent collection.
(Curator’s Voice: American Photographic Artists (APA) Fine Art Photography Exhibition curated by Gwen Lafage )
June 22, 2012 to July 18, 2012
Opening reception June 22, 2012 6.30-9pm: RSVP to apasf.com
The initial idea behind (Un) Familiar was to explor how photographers adapt their perspectives to the scene they are capturing. However, the photographs shown here go further and reveal how photography transcends reality. Through the eyes of talented photographers the Familiar and the Unfamiliar can become one. Photographers can discover the most familiar details in unknown territories and expose intriguing sides of places we believed so familiar. A living room in Cuba can feel more familiar than the escalator we take everyday; the theme park of our childhood more surprising than a stranger's bedroom.
The Familiar and the Unfamiliar are right next door as much as they are on the other side of the world. Photographers have a unique way of looking at the world and that's why they can bring to light details, situations and emotions we won't normally see or we won't pay attention to. More than capturing a moment or a place they interpret it to reveal its beauty. A face, a ray of light, a gesture, everything in life can bring comfort, a memory, can intrigue or even frighten you. (Un)Familiar is an individual state of mind.
First Place Winner: Meg Griffiths - Second Place Winner: Carla Richmond.
Third Place Winners: Manu & Greta Schnetzler.
Honorable Mentions: Rosa Basurto, Timothy Burkhart, Brett Deering, Joshua Hobson, Erin Hoffstetter, Anthony Kurtz, Mike Narciso, Paccarik Orue, Eleonora Ronconi, Julia Schiller, and Cynthia Wood.
Beth Yarnelle Edwards (Suburban Dreams ) & Frank Yamrus (I Feel Lucky)
Saturday June 16th, 5.30pm-8pm
Carte Blanche is pleased to announce the first of its series of artists’ talks and book signing events featuring photographers Beth Yarnelle Edwards and Frank Yamrus. Join us at 973 Valencia Street, San Francisco on Saturday June 16th from 5.30 for their introductory presentations followed by an opportunity to meet the artists and get your books signed while enjoying a glass of wine.
Beth Yarnelle Edwards (Suburban Dreams) : Since 1997 photographer Beth Yarnelle Edwards has been making photographs in idyllic suburban middle-class settings in America and Europe. The first photos in this series were created in California’s Silicon Valley, where the artist lived, and subsequent pictures were made in Germany, France, Spain, Iceland and the Netherlands. Edwards approaches scenes of everyday life with a mixture of documentary interest and cinematographic staging. She combines real-life settings with philosophical truths, thus conveying images of loneliness, of constant media exposure, of minor escapes and major yearnings. Without making any value judgments, the pictures give us a revealing glimpse of interpersonal relationships, domestic rituals, customs and leisure pastimes.
Frank Yamrus (I Feel Lucky): Originally inspired by the onset of a midlife crisis, “I Feel Lucky” is Frank Yamrus‘s highly personal series of self-portraits, revealing the joy and sorrow of passing through his 47th to 53rd years. Initially titled Less Than or Equal to 50, this series began with a looming deadline of his 50th birthday, as if on this milestone his midlife crisis would magically resolve itself. At the time, typical midlife crisis issues — relationships, faith, career, health and mortality — were producing classic midlife crisis symptoms — moodiness, exhaustion, the desire to make change and some deafening private politics of self-identity. With his camera, his constant companion during this time, Yamrus contemplated a lifetime of choices and created present-day images to evaluate his past with the hope of glimpsing his future.
(Aela Labbe, Julie Cerise, Saya Chontang, Deborah Parkin)
April 20, 2012 to June 21, 2012
Opening reception April 20, 2012
‘This is your world’ takes us on a poetic journey from the innocence of childhood to the mystery of growing up as a woman. Inspired by French songwriter Emilie Simon’s universe, the images of ‘This is your world’ mirror Emilie’s distinctively soft, childlike voice and the dreamlike experience of a little girl and a big machine. Featuring photographs by 4 European women, Carte Blanche’s new exhibition creates an ephemeral world. It explores the spirit of dreams through images that refuse to give in to reality. From fairy tales and suspended moments appear memories, desires, motives and uncertainties of 4 unique and feminine minds. From sweet washed-out colors to aging black and white tones, Saya Chontang, Julie Cerise, Aela Labbe and Deborah Parkin have 4 distinct photographic styles, but they have in common a unique ability to read women’s minds. Their photos offer an intangible vision of a romantic world. Neither fiction nor reality, they reveal human beauty. They keep the essence of past memories and the hopes of a future where everything is possible alive. This is their world, this is ours.
(Un)Familiar
(A group show – on submission in partnership with APA: apasf.com)
Submission: April 9, 2012 to May 7, 2012
June 22, 2012 to July 18, 2012
Opening reception June 22, 2012
As photographers how do you explore and interpret the familiar and the unfamiliar? How do your vision and photographic perspectives vary from when you face places and people you know to when you are confronted to the unknown and strangers you meet by chance? Traveling, discovering new places and meeting new people creatively stimulate many photographers while others find inspiration in the comfort of their own town, their home or with their close friends and families.
This competition invites photographers from anywhere in the world to submit project proposals interpreting the theme ‘(Un)Familiar’ along with a series of photographs supporting their entry. We’re looking for proposals that will help us understand how photographers adapt their photography based on their relationship and intimacy with the subject or the environment they’re depicting. Your projects can be visualizations of the Familiar, the Unfamiliar or both. Your statements need to quickly present your project and explain why you believe it fits with the theme.
*We are looking for a wide interpretation of the theme and a wide range of imagery.
Poland & The city sleeps
A solo show by Lukasz Biederman
February 2, 2012 to March 29, 2012
Opening reception February 2, 2012
Lukasz Biederman’s Polish land- and city-scapes convey the cold and solitude of his home country, but, more importantly, they also spread its unique beauty to the rest of the world.
‘The city sleeps’ documents small-town Polish streets after dusk. The empty pavements, and the peculiar lighting reveal the calm and magic of the late hour when almost everyone is asleep…
Carte Blanche in Asia
(Shinya Arimoto, Pierfrancesco Celada, Tim Franco, Wang Yuanling)
November 25, 2011 to January 31, 2012
Opening reception December 15, 2011
Carte Blanche in Asia, Carte Blanche gallery’s inaugural show features the work of 4 photographers from the permanent collection and presents four distinct visions of Asian lives and landscapes. From Tim Franco's Urban Shift in Shanghai to Shinya Arimoto's Portraits of Tibet, from Pierfrancesco Celada's i wish i knew your name, japan to Wang Yuanling's River Basins in China, each photographer explores a different angle of this fascinating and fast-changing continent.