Obsession and Intuition

The Dementia Code by Dean Nimmer

After my last post about AIPAD and their exhibition of guaranteed-to-sell photographic art, I started searching for fresh art made because artists are obsessive about making art. It’s just what they do whether or not they can sell it. I’m not implying that Dean Nimmer doesn’t sell his art. After all, I bought The Dementia Code and his work is in a pile of museum collections. I just know that he is obsessed with making art. He writes books about making art, specifically about what he calls intuition art. He asked me to contribute to something he is working on about abstract/intuitive photography. I immediately thought of Ellen Carey who teaches at Hartford Art.

Polaroid Pull, 2002 by Ellen Carey

And next, I remembered seeing Alison Rossiter‘s developments of out-of-date photographic papers in the Stephen Bulger Gallery at AIPAD.

From the series LAMENT, Expired Papers by Alison Rossiter

Polaroid 20X24 film is gone, Kodak Kodabromide graded paper is gone, and abstract photography is alive and well based on the work of these two artists alone. 

Qiu Yang has a unique take on making art inspired by history:

Qiu Yang puts a smile on my face with his elaborate use of art speak. Yesterday, before I saw Yang’s stimulating work, my class photographed a model holding a Gowlandflex 4X5 twin lens reflex. Peter Gowland invented the camera to make it easier to interact with the model when he was photographing Playboy centerfolds in the 50’s and 60’s. On a somber note, Peter Gowland died on March 17th, 2010. He was 93 years old. A few years ago, I talked to him on the telephone about my Gowlandflex. He was a trip to talk to. It is appropriate that we send him a thank you for his glamour photography and for his wonderful camera.

The Gowlandfex was designed to be a hand held 4X5 camera.

Direct from the annals of my most embarrassing moments, this picture reminds me of the time I was photographing a figure model with my 8X10 inch Deardorf view camera. That’s a 40 pound wood and metal box that fell off the tripod and onto her lap as I was hovering over her. I was so glad she didn’t bruise.

I have one more image I want to share from a series by Sofia Hulten.

From the series, Points in a Room Condensing by Sofia Hulten

Points in a Room Condensing Objects of increasing size are placed inside one another, beginning with a ball bearing (2 x 2 x 2mm) and ending with a cupboard (120 x 110 x 50 cm) which then contains all the objects.
11 Photographs 32 x 40 cm
Object 120 x 110 x 50 cm, mixed media 2006

Check out the whole series here.

I would like to thank I Like this Art for some of the links in this post.