Space, Time, and Perception

The Hirshhorn Museum is currently exhibiting a career survey of Hiroshi Sugimoto (b. 1948, Tokyo), a master of using photography to explore the nature of space, time and perception. The exhibit runs between February 16, 2006 and May 14, 2006.

Sugimoto is known for his starkly minimalist, conceptual images of seascapes, movie theaters, natural history diaramas and architecture, that often border on the mystical. While, at one level, his images are "simple" (his seascapes for example sometimes offer little or no contrast between object and background at all!), at another, deeper level, they all compell the viewer to ponder such questions as "What is time?", "What is space?" and "What is real?"

According to the Hirshhorn site, the Smithsonian's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery will feature Hiroshi Sugimoto: History of History (from April 1, 2006 through July 30).

Here are two online galleries of some of Sugimoto's work (the first includes an interview with the photographer): Eyestorm & Robert Klein Gallery.

A generous sampling of his images (that require much time to slowly digest, emotionally, cognitively, and spiritually) appear in the book Hiroshi Sugamoto, by Kerry Brougher.

Harry Callahan: The Photographer at Work

Harry Callahan: The Photographer at Work, is a magnificent new book by Britt Salvesen (with an introduction by John Szarkowski) on the creative life of one of the 20th century's most creative photographic artists. It is so much more than a "mere" biography.

What sets this biography (which a generous sampling of Callahan's work) apart from other books in this genre, is its elegant focus on the creative aspects of photography. In discussing Callahan's dedication to constant experimentation, choice of subject matter, his visual approaches to a particular shot, selection of themes and improvisations, sequential ordering, and the all important print process, the book provides a rare invaluable resource to the inner reflections of an artist at work (and play). Callahan's lifelong body of work is testament to the fact that an artist need not travel to the ends of the earth to find beauty; beauty is not just in the eyes of the beholder, but in the dedication and loving attention to craft and creative experimention in one's backyard.

Bytes of Science

A good friend of mine, David Mazel, who is extremely well versed in science and engineering (indeed, he is making a comfortable living with a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering), has a wonderfullly informative and entertaining site called Bytes of Science.

On it, you will find commentary and links to such topics as infinite minimal surfaces, satellite tracking, chaos for encryption, and video fly-bys of some of M.C. Escher's graphic works (among many others).

What makes the Blog special is David's passion for all things relating to math and science, and a unique gift for teaching and writing; you will likely not even notice how much serious math or science you've picked up while you're simply immersed in the shear pleasure of reading one of David's short passages. Highly recommended.

Gregory Bateson and "Seeing" with the Mind's Eye

Some of the most important basic lessons of learning to see in photography do not come directly from the masters of photography (though they obviously impart quite a bit of wisdom;-) For example, consider a deep lesson that is taught by anthropologist, Gregory Bateson...

Bateson was one of the last century’s most original thinkers. Trained as an anthropologist, Bateson made deep and lasting contributions to biology, cybernetics, and systems theory. He was also a gifted teacher. One of Bateson’s central ideas is that of the “Pattern that Connects,” or metapattern, which means, literally, a pattern of patterns.

This idea was first introduced in Bateson’s masterwork — Mind and Nature — in a story about how he sometimes pulled out a freshly cooked crab out of a bag and asked his students (who were typically nonscientists) to argue that the object represents the remains of a living being. The object of the Socratic exercise was to force his students to ponder the question, “What is the difference between the living and nonliving?” To answer this question, the students had to learn such concepts as relationship, symmetry and topology as they apply both within an organism (or object) and outside an organism (on higher levels). The deeper lesson was taking their first step toward appreciating the need for “discarding of magnitudes in favor of shapes, patterns, and relations.”

What does this have to do with photography and seeing? Well, one can begin by drawing a lesson from Bateson’s concept of metapatterns. A uniquely personal aesthetic grammar may be developed by following these three steps: (1) recognize that all conventional distinctions between objects are essentially arbitrary (i.e. learn to see the world as shape, pattern and relation rather than purely form), (2) draw your conscious attention to the visible boundaries between conventional forms that make up a photographic scene, and then (3) use your unconscious intuition to guide the camera, as a compositonal tool, to recompose the scene as if it were made up of visual elements of your own choosing. In short, decompose the world into its basic building blocks, then build it back up the way you really see it.

Another great book by Bateson (coauthored with his daughter Catherine Bateson, is Angels Fear: Towards An Epistemology Of The Sacred.

Photography and the Creative Process

Three exceptional new DVDs, released by Arte Video (and a coproduction of Arte France, KS Visions and The National Center for Photography), explore the creative process behind the works of some master photographers. Each DVD consists of about 10 short (10-15 min long) "essays" focusing on one photographer, using images (contact sheets, proofs, prints, or slides) with commentary by the artist himself. Together, these films provide an unparalleled excursion into the creative process of photography.

Contacts Volume 1: The Great Tradition of Photojournalism includes Henri Cartier-Bresson, William Klein, Raymond Depardon, Mario Giacomelli, Josef Koudelka, Robert Doisneau, Edduard Boubat, Elliot Erwitt, Marc Riboud, Leonard Freed, Helmut Newton, and Don McCullin.

Contacts Volume 2: The Renewal of Contemporary Photography includes Sophie Calle, Nan Goldin, Duane Michals, Sarah Moon, Nobuyoshi Araki, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Andreas Gursky, Thomas Ruff, Jeff Wall, Lewis Baltz, and Jean-Marc Bustamante.

Contacts Volume 3: Conceptual Photography includes John Baldessari, Bernd & Hilla Becher, Christian Boltanski, Alain Fleischer, John Hilliard, Roni Horn, Martin Parr, Georges Rousse, Thomas Struth, and Wolgang Tillmans.

Brilliant Lectures on the History of 20th Century Physics

My Ph.D. thesis advisor (back in the 1980s!) was Max Dresden, whose career as a theoretical physicist spanned both many decades and many countries. Max was born in Amsterdam in 1918, and earned his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1946. During his long career (he passed away in 1997), he made made important contributions in statistical mechanics, superconductivity, quantum field theory and elementary particle physics. Another of his empassioned interests was the history and sociology of modern science. Though all of his lectures, technical and otherwise, were always a delight to listen to and behold (he was quite a showman!), it was his lectures on the history of physics that were something truly special, and his unique gifts as expositor shown brightly. Aside from his ebullient, infectiously joyful, style of presentation, his lectures were infused with personal knowledge of some of the greastest physicists of the 1920s and 1930s.

Here is an incredible collection of videos of some of Max's lectures on the history of physics (delivered between 1990 and 1996 at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center). One would be hard pressed to find better examples of love and intimate knowledge of subject matter, and simple unabashed joy at sharing it with anyone willing to listen!

During his life, Max published articles in over 35 scientific journals and was the author of a well received biography of physicist H.A. Kramers, titled Between Tradition and Revolution. As all of us who were graced by this gentle soul know well, Max was a profoundly gifted and inspiring teacher. He is intensely missed.

Here is an article, In Appreciation: Remembering Max Dresden, by Peter B. Kahn, that appeared the May 2003 issue of Physics in Perspective. Max's obituary, as it appeared in Physics Today in June 1998 appears on this page (from the State University of New York, Stony Brook).

Fine Art Photography Portfolios

Here is a real treat for aficionados of fine-art photography, in the classical tradition: an exquisite set of on-line portfolios of some of true masters of fine-art photography, including those of Ansel Adams (19 photos), Brassai (17 photos), Edward Burtynsky (20 photos), Harry Callahan (17 photos), Andre Kertesz (20 photos), Josef Sudek (12 photos), and Edward Weston (46 photos); among many others. The reproductions are relatively small, of course, but a delicious treat to the eyes and soul nonetheless.