Online Group Exhibition - "Solitude” November 2019
"Storm“ by Susanne Klostermann | Seagull Medium Format Camera + Fuji Velvia Cross-Processed Film
Analog Forever Magazine is pleased to showcase 35 images in this month’s online exhibition entitled "Solitude". Curated by our founder and photographer Michael Behlen, these photographs explore the ways and places we find ourselves emotionally and physically escaping from our daily lives by finding and embracing our freedom via solitude. Michael had this to say about this month’s exhibition:
Michael Behlen writes: Solitude is defined by the Merriam Webster dictionary as “the quality or state of being alone or remote from society”. Though the definition is important to understand, it’s more important to experience it first hand via direct experience to fully grasp its implications. I believe that one of life’s greatest pleasures is the calm exhilaration we achieve when we are able to unplug, step away from our carefully constructed lives, and ponder why we don’t always feel this way. Occasionally, life grants us a rare epiphany that allows us to see through our cluttered lives that bestows on us a temporary serenity that is often fleeting.
For a lot of us, these moments can become less impermanent when we capture these moods, places, and feelings in photographic form. Although we can’t go back and experience them directly, we can relive them via film negatives and prints that allow us a small taste of those moments and mental states we continuously strive to achieve. The photographs I selected for this exhibition all explore this idea of solitude either in the scenes they present or in the moods they convey. The images range from peaceful quiet displays, to emotional one frame stories of isolation. The best part about these photographs is that it is up to the viewer to determine which images fit into each category as they explore their inner hunger to escape their confinement from our modern world.
The winning image, "Storm“ by Susanne Klostermann, displayed everything I was looking for (and still am) while I was judging this exhibition. Her image shows us the colorful journey we must take to reach our final destination of zen. Through her lens we can see a storm brewing on the horizon and know that this beautiful display of light won’t last forever, but for now, everything is perfect. The vignetting of the image pulled me into the dark figure on the beach and made me think to myself, “I wish that was me”. I want to be in that exact moment, feeling the salt infused breeze on my lips as I feel everything around me in the world grind to a halt. It’s moments like this that we should be living for, no matter how brief they are. Thank you Susanne for giving us a taste of this alluring moment of your life.
-Michael Behlen
The Prize - ARS-Imago Lab-Box
Congratulations to Susanne Klostermann for winning this month’s exhibition! You will be receiving a Lab-Box courtesy of ARS-Imago!
The ARS-Image Lab-Box is the easiest and quickest tool to develop your own films in full day light, anywhere and at anytime, bypassing the need for a darkroom! This multi-format tool is perfect for beginners, but also meets the needs of experienced photographers.
Light, transportable, and resilient, Lab-Box is made from ABS plastic and stainless steel parts that allow it to be used with a wide range of photographic chemical agents with all the temperatures needed to develop your film!
Make sure you visit the Lab-Box website to learn all about their amazing products for developing your own film!
Sponsored By:
Gallery
About the Curator
Michael Behlen is a photography enthusiast from Fresno, CA. He works in finance and spends his free time shooting instant film and backpacking in the California wilderness, usually a combination of the two. He has self- published two Polaroid photobooks-“Searching for Stillness, Vol. 1” and “I Was a Pioneer,” literally a boxed set of his instant film work. His latest book, Searching for Stillness Vol II is now out via Static Age. He has been published, been interviewed, and been reviewed in a quantity of magazines and online publications, from F-Stop and Blur Magazine to the Analog Talk Podcast. He loves the magic sensuality of instant film: its saturated, surreal colors; the unpredictability of the medium; it’s addictive qualities as you watch it develop.
For the last 5 years Behlen has become a serial entrepreneur involved in independent publishing projects which included PRYME Magazine and PRYME Editions, two enterprises dedicated to the art of instant film. Through these endeavors he has featured and published 200+ artists from around the globe via his print and online publications. Today, Behlen is the founder of Analog Forever Magazine, a brand new online and print publisher of contemporary analog photography.
