Online Group Exhibition - "Winter” December 2019
"Untitled" by Chris Bennett | Mamiya 7 + B&W Film
Analog Forever Magazine is pleased to showcase 56 images in this month’s online exhibition entitled "Winter". Curated by Los Angeles based visual artist, writer, and Founder and Editor in Chief of Lenscratch, Aline Smithson, these photographs explore the people, places, and memories that make the season of winter special in individual and creative ways.
Aline Smithson writes: Los Angeles, the city that I call home, isn't known for it's Winter scenes. In fact, rain during holidays is about as good as it gets. But I just got off a plane from snowy environs and so enjoyed revisiting the sensations of snow covered landscapes with the Winter submissions for Analog Forever. Photographing a season blanketed in white creates the opportunity to tell stories that are striped down to the basics, graphic and devoid of color, highlighting objects and elements that are overlooked when the world is in full bloom.
As a life long film photographer, I so appreciate the the slowed-down tactile nature of making work with analog processes. I find that shooting film creates a more thoughtful consideration to the subject matter as we limit the amount of images taken, bringing a particular reverence to the act of making photographs. I appreciate the color shifts, the moody blues of instant film, the sun glares and overlaps of toy camera imagery, and the pristine capture of large format work--all giving a unique variety to fine art photographs. For this exhibition, I first looked for work that fit the theme and then for images that held a bit of magic, through composition, presentation, or consideration of the subject matter, with an ability to elevate the miraculous or the mundane. Thank you for sharing your work and wishing you warm and wonderful holidays.
I selected Chris Bennett's stellar capture of a frozen railing in front of the ocean for a First Place nod. I was at once taken by the quality of the work, but also the ability to photograph something that in warm weather would be banal or commonplace, where he was able to see the magnificence and beauty in nature's sculptural gesture. There is a quiet simplicity and formality to the composition that makes for a meditative experience.
-Aline Smithson
The Prize - LomoMod No.1 DIY Camera Starter Kit!
Congratulations to Chris Bennett for winning this month’s exhibition! You will be receiving a LomoMod No.1 DIY Camera Starter Kit courtesy of Lomography!
Arriving in flat-packed cardboard sheets with a double-sided pattern, the LomoMod No.1 is a medium-format camera you build completely from the bottom up and is completely customizable, meaning you can truly put your stamp on your camera!
The Sutton Liquid-Filled Lens, accompanied by the Shutter and Aperture unit, is an invitation to experimentation, exploring different effects through filling it with different liquids that work as filters, as well as the special aperture plates.
Not only an environmentally conscious way to build a camera from scratch, but a combination that invites endless creativity from the very start..
Make sure you visit the Lomography website to learn all about their amazing products for making your own medium format camera!
Sponsored By:
Gallery
About the Curator
Juror Aline Smithson | Photo by Eliot Dudik - photographed with Kodak Ektachrome E100
Aline Smithson is a Los Angeles based visual artist best known for her conceptual portraiture and a practice that uses humor and pathos to explore ideas of childhood, aging, and the humanity that connects us. She received a BA from the University of California at Santa Barbara and was accepted into the College of Creative Studies, studying under artists such as William Wegman, Allen Ruppersburg, and Charles Garabian. After a career as a New York Fashion Editor working along side the greats of fashion photography, Aline returned to Los Angeles and her own artistic practice.
She has exhibited widely including over 40 solo shows at institutions such as the Griffin Museum of Photography, the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, the Shanghai, Lishui, and Pingyqo Festivals in China, The Rayko Photo Center in San Francisco, the Center of Fine Art Photography in Colorado, the Tagomago Gallery in Barcelona and Paris, and the Verve Gallery in Santa Fe. In addition, her work is held in a number of public collections and her photographs have been featured in numerous publications including The New York Times, The New Yorker, PDN (cover), the PDN Photo Annual, Communication Arts Photo Annual, Eyemazing, Soura, Visura, Shots, Pozytyw, and Silvershotz magazines.
Aline is the Founder and Editor- in-Chief of Lenscratch, a daily journal on photography and has been teaching at the Los Angeles Center of Photography since 2001. In 2012, Aline received the Rising Star Award through the Griffin Museum of Photography for her contributions to the photographic community. In 2014, Aline’s work was selected for the Critical Mass Top 50 and she received the Excellence in Teaching Award from CENTER. In 2015, the Magenta Foundation published her first significant monograph, Self & Others: Portrait as Autobiography. In 2016, the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum commissioned Aline to a series of portraits for the upcoming Faces of Our Planet Exhibition. Her work is currently on exhibition with the National Portrait Gallery in London as a finalist in the Taylor Wessing Prize. Kris Graves Projects commissioned Aline to create LOST; Los Angeles to be published in 2019. She is a dedicated film shooter.
