Hudson Valley

In this week's photos from around New York, a community mourns the loss of two siblings in the Bronx, New Yorkers enjoy a cookout at Governor's Island and a Louis Vuitton store is covered in artist Yayoi Kusama's polka dots.

I have always viewed fog as an aesthetic friend. Cozy like a blanket. Mostly I like fog because it turns my color pictures into black and white. Well, almost. One can simply de-saturate the color, but for those of us who shoot color film or who like to print it as we saw it, fog is a blessing welcomed for softening a landscape or simply taking the color out, rendering the photograph monochromatic. For me, the less “color”, or the fewer the band of colors, the better. Besides I love the romance and mystery of fog. It is not just about light dispersion. You can touch fog, smell it, feel it.

So when I see fog, I grab a camera. Fast. As I did here while eating my cornflakes in a hotel buffet breakfast and saw this out the window. Gotta move on it. For those little water droplets will evaporate quickly with a rising warming sun. Pictures are everywhere, all the time. If you are in the right mood, there is for sure a picture right in front of you. Any time, all the time. It is never necessary to go someplace else. Where you are is THE place to be.

I know this. I teach this. Yet I must re-learn this every day of my life. Why can’t I just learn a lesson and then that is that? Life just doesn’t seem to work that way. I think all of us must constantly re-learn the obvious. What is right in front of us. Hidden perhaps by a “fog” but right there. Or right here. Or both.

Some of you were on hand last week in Perpignan for the launch of Burn 02. By all accounts, the buzz on Burn and Burn 02 was palpable. In all my years in the business, I never saw quite this sort of “big warm”. Was it the slide show? Was it the new in print magazine? Perhaps those things helped. But it was way more than a function of display. It was about YOU. This audience. This audience who supported new and original work by Paolo Pellegrin and Alisa Resnik and Bruce Gilden and others to be seen now first in Burn 02.

Burn 02 is not a repeat of Burn online. Burn 02 is its own original work. A 1500 copy limited editon. Online is terrific, but when you hold 02 in your hand, you will know what photography is all about from our perspective. I am not published in it. I wish I was. The place to be published for sure.

Yes, 02 was a collaboration. But there is always one person who is THE driving force. Diego Orlando, our special projects editor, is that person for 02. Anton and I were in the background on this baby. Designed and printed and bound with loving care in Italy by the very best, you will quickly see why there is pride all around.

I am proud of this magazine/book…I can say this in a way I could never say with my own work. That requires silence. But I can say that this feels like my best effort so far  as the director/coach and not in it as a direct “player”…Yet  I made something happen..Put the talents of others to work..Gave them all the rope they could handle. Kept an eye out..Mostly to set a standard….And to push everyone just a bit further than they wanted to be pushed..I knew they would thank me later …laughing…I will say no more now. On the front flap I wrote this:

We are the photo equivalent of the garage band. Can this last/should this last? No. There is a curve on any creative endeavor. We are not at the peak yet. When we get there, then we will do something else and start the whole process over again. Could be an evolution, or could be a revolution. So let’s enjoy this moment. Now is the time to appreciate what we have, seek out new ways of doing things, celebrate our mutual language and push it just as far as we can possibly go.

-dah-

Buy BURN.02 here:

USA, Canada, Mexico
Rest of World

Shipping will commence on September 15.

For volume puchases (over 10 copies), please contact Diego Orlando directly at diego@burnmagazine.org

American artist Lee Price paints photographs of women and food. Working with her photographer Tom Moore, the images are painstakingly reproduced using oil on linen canvas’ to create a soft milky tenderness to a series of works exploring the deeper aspects of feminine nature. In this line of work, Lee develops her ideas by focusing on the nurturing traits conditioned in women to look after the needs of others before tending to their own. Continuing her observation of feminine conditions through this singular technique, Lee talked to Dazed Digital about the process…