PHOTOAUTOMAT

Bernd & Hilla Becher aka the modern typologists.
 

Collectors of dying architectural structures Bernd and Hilla Becher, a husband and wife German artist duo, spent over 50 years  photographing architectural structures of the industrial era. A project that started out of nostalgia as a way to preserve this "things", later became this huge body of work. 

They started taking a very large amount of photos using a 6x9 Linhof camera. After that they organize them putting an image next to another and that's how the typologies were born. Noting differences and similarities between each structure they were able to create harmonic pieces of 9, 12 or 15 images. And so, they started collecting their industrial structures as a biologist would collect butterflies or bugs.

The Bechers did not rush for any photo leaving nothing to chance. They took everything in consideration for each image, centered compositions for simple objects, using the horizon 3/4 of the space in the image. 

They waited for the perfect weather conditions; cloudy/foggy days so the background of the structure wouldn't get in the frame, little vegetation, apertures of 32 or 45 so the exposure was usually around 20 seconds, "is a lovely moment counting to 20 we are very concentrated and oblivious to everyone"

​ Bernd Becher said on an interview.

Bernd and Hilla Becher's work is fundamental for modern photography. They taught at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf (Dusseldorf Art Academy) were influencing photographers like Andreas Gursky, Candida Höfer, Thomas Struth and Thomas Ruff,  were their students. They also created the Düsseldorf School of Photography.

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The PhotoAutomat section is curated by the Brooklyn-based photographer Andreína Restrepo.  

IN DOG WE TRUST

Photo: the incredibly lovely Yogurt, via his Instagram.

Hello dog lover!

Hope you're having a nice weekend! Here are some links you may like to explore:

The Hope Project

Text from dog

Dogs Ink.
 

Confession

Run, dog, run!

Plus, two dogs you seriously need to follow on Instagram:

The sweet Toto

The adorable Yogurt  (The Pirate Dog)


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In Dog We Trust is curated by: Carola Melguizo from La Guía del Perro. 

OUR WEEKLY PROCRASTINATION

Photo: The Procrastinator (some) Times.

"Without a feel for the texture and function of the natural world, without an intensity of engagement almost impossible in the absence of early experience, people will not devote their lives to its protection.” George Monbiot

This past week we attended to an interesting lecture in the RSA called: Reaching into the Outside. The speakers were Dr Jo Twist, CEO at the UKIE (Association of UK Interactive Entertainment); Dr Maggie Atkinson, Children’s Commissioner for England; Jonathon Porritt CBE, environmental writer, broadcaster and co-founder of Forum for the Future and the Matthew Taylor, RSA chief executive.

One of the most interesting interventions was Dr Jo Twist's. She talked about the power of games to make young people understand complex systems and the notion of consequence. She also pointed out that nowadays keeping children 'locked digitally' is as much damaging as keeping them 'lock inside'. After all "being playful is the engine of innovation and creativity" Eric Zimmerman's Manifesto.

Dr Maggie Atkinson, on the other hand pointed out that given that life is anything but simple, so we need to teach children about complexity. I thought that is interesting how "complexity" is a word that used to be feared, everyone praised simplicity, and now is coming back, reloaded in all its complexity.

Finally Johnattan Porrit said that the climate change message it's been normalized in the last years. There is more awareness between kids in school (as opposed as with adults that simply chose not to 'believe' in climate change). That doesn't mean that all the children are going to become activists, of course, but they will be more open to an invitation to get involved.

It was a short and sweet lecture and if you want to watch it you can go the RSA You Tube channel clicking here.

TO DO (OR NOT TO DO) LIST

Image via Protein.

Internet Week Europe definitely will really interesting procrastination time during next week. We are going to three really interesting events: Protein "The Future of Journalism" forum, VICE Video Panel at the Blue Old Last, and Women in the Digital Economy and Culture networking organized by Creative Works London at V&A museum. Are you going to any of these events? Let us know!

Gravity still via The Hollywood Reporter.

Also Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity is finally in UK screens and that definitely sounds like the plan for a sunny Sunday like this Sunday (after the sun goes way at 4pm that is, of course). Read Peter Bradshaw review in The Guardian, he appears to have liked the movie A LOT: "Alfonso Cuarón's glorious creation, less sci-fi and more a thriller set in space, makes you breathless with excitement."

Bikers, 1967.

Double Standards, 1961.

Selfportrait. (All these Dennis Hopper were in my computer, as they are some of my favorites, so I don't know the source, but obviously the rights belong to whoever have the rights of Dennis Hopper photographs).

Everybody that like movies a little bit know Dennis Hopper (Easy Rider, Apocalypse Now), but just a few know that he loved photography and actually was an amazing photographer. Well now you have the chance to go and see for yourself! This is what the article in The Guardian says: More than 400 previously unseen photographs from the 1960s, which were discovered in cardboard boxes after the death of the actor Dennis Hopper, are to go on display in Britain for the first time. The Royal Academy of Arts on Friday announced details of an exhibition called Dennis Hopper: The Lost Album. Good news! Read full article here.

Procrastinator (some) Times Sunday 3rd of November Edition

EDITORIAL

It's already November... again. I know it's not only me who thinks (or feels) time is accelerating, and I also know it's not only me the one that cannot stop talking about it every time the month begins. I am working on this. I promise I won't mention December starting when December starts.

This edition of The Procrastinator is a compact but dense one. It includes articles about dictators in the Instagram era, sexist stereotypes in the era of hackers, the future of television in the era of Internet-based innovation, relationships in the era of Facebook and funerals in the era of Tumblr. We also have the second article of Andreína's Photoautomat, featuring the work of Irving Penn.

Hope you like this week's edition, happy reading!


NEWS

Photo via SyrianPresidency Instagram account

Did you know that Bashar al-Assad has an Instagram account? I didn't. I discover that thanks to this great article by Emily Greenhouse in The New Yorker called Dictators in the Age of Instagram. Social media, says Greenhouse, poses a problem for restrictive regimes, judging by the measures and laws imposed by countries like China, Belarus, Iran, China, and others. But that is not the only issue. "What does a social-media company do when a user known to be attacking civilians is blasting out feel-good content?" Greenhouse posed that question to Instagram about Assad’s user stream. If you want to know the answer, read full article in The New Yorker.

"We've hacked so many other spaces in our lives -- how we date, have babies -- and yet this space, gender objectification, remains stagnant." That's part of the lecture that actor and writer Natascha McElhone gave at Wired 2013. According to Wire's article, McElhone's feelings are shared by many of the women that make up 66 percent of our world's population, sexism is the norm, yes, but the good news is that lately we've been changing a lot of rules. Read full article in Wired and let's hack some gender stereotypes!

SCIENCE

Image: A graphical representation of one person’s network neighborhood on Facebook.
Cameron Marlow/Facebookvia New York Times.

So, love is not written in the stars but in your Facebook profile. Or at least that's what Cornell University's computer scientist Jon Kleinberg, and senior engineer at Facebook, Lars Backstrom, argue to have found. According to the New York Times "the pair used a hefty data set from Facebook as their lab: 1.3 million Facebook users, selected randomly from among all users who are at least 20 years old, with from 50 to 2,000 friends, who list a spouse or relationship partner in their profile. That makes for a lot of social connections to analyze, roughly 379 million nodes and 8.6 billion links. The data was used anonymously." Read full article here. E.T.P.: 3'20''

Photo: The Procrastinator (some) Times.

Memory is tricky. Most of us probably already experience that feeling of remembering something vividly but being unable to distinguish if that something is an actual memory or a dream. Well that happens to me, I always hoped it happens to someone else, and apparently so it is. Maria Popova recollects in a Brain Pickings' article some interesting reflections about memory, forgetting, plagiarism and creativity made by neurologist Oliver Sacks: "It is startling to realize that some of our most cherished memories may never have happened — or may have happened to someone else. I suspect that many of my enthusiasms and impulses, which seem entirely my own, have arisen from others’ suggestions, which have powerfully influenced me, consciously or unconsciously, and then been forgotten." Read full article here. E.T.P.: 8'.

DESIGN, BUSINESS & INNOVATION

Photo via Wikipedia.

Architect and writer Sam Jacob in his latest and very interesting Opinion column in Dezeen magazine, argues that objects tell us more about ourselves than literature or imagery and sets out his manifesto for understanding objects and for "a culture of design informed by archeology and anthropology". Sounds quite logical, right? Read full article in Dezeen.

Photo: Flickr user Aaron Coe via Fast Company.

What is innovation? David Brier in his latest article in Fast Company connected the dots between some iconic lectures and manifestos of three innovators: Richard Branson, Steve Jobs and Seth Godin and, discover one common action defining and promoting innovation: connecting the dots. Read his article here.

CULTURE & ENTERTAINMENT

Photo: shutterstock images via INC.

Scott Jones in his article in INC. raise the question what's the future of television in the era of Internet-based innovation. "Once upon a time, the entertainment industry had discreet business segments that rarely overlapped. If you wanted to see a movie (and this week's newsreel), you went to the corner cinema. If you wanted to watch television (on one of just three national networks), you sat in front of the big box and watched what the networks said you could, when they said you could. If you wanted to hear the latest music, you turned on the radio". Read full article in INC.

Photo: Selfies at Funerals via VICE.

Sophie Heawood writes an insightful article for VICE called: The selfies at funerals Tumblr tell us a lot about death. I didn't know that such a Tumblr exists, but somehow I am not surprised. "The problem with death, as I’m sure you’ll agree, is that people don’t take enough photographs of it. Which is why I have been looking at the Selfies at Funerals tumblr every day this week, transfixed by teenagers posing in front of their own phones, documenting their deep sadness (deep hotness) at a death in the family. These mini mourners face the camera, their faces sombre, their clothes surprisingly revealing for a day of death. Meanwhile, their captions reveal that Grandpa Bob, in a coffin somewhere in the background, has shuffled off this mortal coil. Beneath the caption they write a series of #hashtags, designed to attract the maximum number of new followers at this sensitive time in their lives." That's how Sophie's article starts, read full article in VICE.

Photograph: Titan Books via The Guardian.

Inside Guillermo Del Toro's sketchbooks. A new book by the Pan's Labyrinth and Pacific Rim director reveals how some of his most memorable monsters came to life. Have a look at some pages with commentary by Steve Rose in The Guardian.

PHOTOAUTOMAT

Marcel Duchamp, New York, 1948. The Morgan Library & Museum; 
Gift of Irving Penn; 2007.14.

 Georgia O'Keeffe, New York, 1948. The Morgan Library & Museum; Purchased as the gift of Richard L. Menschel
and with the support of The Horace W. Goldsmith Fund for Americana and The Margaret T. Morris Fund; 2007.67,

Marlene Dietrich, December 23, 1948. Courtesy of The Irving Penn Foundation.

 Igor Stravinsky, New York, April 22, 1948. Courtesy of The Irving Penn Foundation.

Joe Louis, New York, February 15, 1948. Courtesy of The Irving Penn Foundation.

Truman Capote (1948) by Irving Penn. © The Irving Penn Foundation. Exhibiting at Pace MacGill in The Art Show

Irving Penn - Portraits

1917 - 2009

Whenever I think of the name Irving Penn, old school fashion photography and Vogue comes to my mind. Nevertheless his legacy covers much more than that; from the numerous and also famous portraits, nudes, ethnographic studies, to his series of Still Live.

I want to focus on the "Portraits in a corner: 1948" that he created in the 90˚ intersection of two walls where the subjects had to place themselves. In a quote that I found on the web about this series, Penn says that the result of this peculiar placement was a very rich series of pictures. "This confinement, surprisingly seemed to comfort people, soothing them. The walls were a surface to lean or to push against. For me the picture possibilities were interesting: limiting the subjects' movement seemed to relieve me of part of the problem of holding on to them."

When I first saw these photos I wasn't really sure they all looked "soothing" but if you've ever been in front of a camera for a portrait session, you'll know that it could be an extremely awkward experience, so maybe you'll may find a small corner where you can get a "hug", friendlier than a large empty space.

One of the things I love more about this series, worth paying close attention, is the way people place themselves on the space, and what does that says about who they are, and how they felt. Alexander Lieberman, Editorial Director of Conde Nast Publications 1962-1994 and former employer of Penn labeled this series of portraits as "existencial images . . . in harmony with the tormenting isolation of [Samuel] Beckett." 

You can read more in Vicky Goldberg's article for The New Yorker Penn is difficult: 'Can't You Tell?'

And you want more info about Irving Penn visit these:

http://fraenkelgallery.com/exhibitions/portraits-in-a-corner-1948

http://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/penn.asp

Irving Penn - Voguepedia

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The Photo section is curated by the Brooklyn-based photographer Andreína Restrepo.