April 2020 - Page 2 of 3 - s2z Photography Blog

Technology in the time of the pandemic

Screengrab from my gallery page — My gallery page on the 18th of April 2020

I have been housebound for about 4 weeks now. My energies were primarily focused on digital work and projects while on term holidays. One of those projects was resurrecting my domain [stunik.com] and website. I use 2 tools to make pages for my website Dreamweaver by Adobe, and GraphicConverter, by Lemhke Software. I added some new content, primarily in the gallery section. I also added some content in new personal sections of the site, pets and house. The other setting up and creating this blog.

Exploring GraphicConverter I discovered I can build html galleries quickly and easily. This means many plans I had for my website in terms of galleries can be expanded and sped up. Every time I publish a photobook now I can add a digitised version of each page easily too. I updated my photobook section as well.

The last big project I hope to undertake is to archive my Movable Type blog it was originally hosted at http://blog.stunik.com. The new uri will most likely be, http://stunik.com/MvT/. This is going to be a big long job, there are many broken links. I used to use flickr extensively to host images there. In the interim I had a major purge of my flickr stream, this broke many links on the blog. At the time I was also using a piece of software called Skitch made by a company called Plasq, it was bought by Evernote in 2011 and this also broke many links on the blog.

Screen grab from the wayback machine archive of my old blog note the missing links in the right column.

Throwback Thursday [Pandemic Edition #2]

An film shot image from nearly 10 years ago says a lot about where I was at in my image making — Highly designed urban living in the Docklands. A source of fascination for me in the early 2000s.

In 2009, it seems I was working in and around the Docklands precinct of Melbourne. Using colour film and my Hasselbald. This work is likely to sit in my archive its use undetermined. I had begun working there as early as 1993 or so. In those days the site was still a lingering industrial wasteland. See image below shot on 5×4 and black and white film.

The Doclands circa 1993 — An area of the docklands undergoing reclamation. This time shot on 5 x 4 black and white film.

Watching videos in the time of the pandemic?

The Audience Will Come from Doc League on Vimeo.

Documentary featuring photographer Tod Papageorge.
Part of the documentary series Viewpoint.
Director: Nicholas Panoutsopoulos.
Producers: Lena Anastasiadou, Tassos Rigopoulos.
Research and Consulting: Sam Barzilay

Hat tip to Luke*

Wordless Wednesday [Pandemic Edition #1]

Richmond, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. 2010-04-15, 18:12:42

Reading in the time of the Pandemic [Quote for yesterday]

What seems to be real in the photograph is always a simulation of something else. We have shown how this way of thinking provided a theoretical basis for simulation methods in contemporary art and photography. The exploration of staging, quotation, repetition, copying and plagiarism typifies the postmodern trends of the 1980s. These anti-realist strategies found a rationale in the conceptual art movement’s critique of documentary methods and the emergence of sceptical attitudes to the truth claims of photography.

pg 169. RETHINKING PHOTOGRAPHY: Histories, Theories and Education, by Peter Smith and Carolyn Lefley published 2016 by Routledge, 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN, ISBN: 978-1-315-72241-2 (ebk)

Vale Tim Brooke-Taylor

The Goodies TV show was one of several shows of English comedians that had a lasting impact on me in my youth.

The Goodies was a British television comedy series shown in the 1970s and early 1980s. The series, which combined surreal sketches and situation comedy, was broadcast by BBC 2[1] from 1970 to 1980. One seven-episode series was made for ITV company LWT and shown in 1981-82.

The show was co-written by and starred Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie (together known as “The Goodies”). Bill Oddie also wrote the music and songs for the series, while “The Goodies Theme” was co-written by Oddie and Michael Gibbs. Directors/producers of the series were John Howard Davies, Jim Franklin and Bob Spiers.

Sadly Tim Brooke-Taylor passed away recently.

A funny little vignette of their work surfaced on facebook this morning, I both chuckled and cried.

Here is the video:-

Here’s another:-

The other major English comedians and shows that impacted me were, Spike Milligan, and by association The Goon Show, as well as Monty Python.

I have most of Spike Milligan’s books but hope to have the complete set one day. The most memorable for me were his War Memoirs.

1 Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall (1971)
2 “Rommel?” “Gunner Who?” (1974)
3 Monty: His Part in My Victory (1976)

I own the entire Monty Python TV series on DVD and several of their movies as well.

Read the Guardian’s fine obituary on Tim Brooke-Taylor

TYAT [2010-04-13]

inside a panel beaters workshop ten years a go today — 2010-04-130 10:16:06 [Ten years ago today]

Currently reading RETHINKING PHOTOGRAPHY Histories, Theories and Education

Street Art?

I listened to this ABC broadcast about Street and and Graffiti. this morning

“Street artists, advertising agencies and the authorities are in the middle of a space race.

It’s a lot less about little green men and much more about spray paint and stencils. But the stakes are still sky high. Artists are busy commandeering as many city surfaces as their paints will allow, authorities are trying to neutralise the threat, while advertising agencies are keen to clone the potency of hand painted art.”

I have a small series of work that looks at much more ephemeral art of peeling advertising posters. Which is a kind of street art.

Creativity in the time of a Pandemic?

Bore Beach San Remo, Victoria, 2020-03-29 14:00:03

I made the picture above on the Sunday before stage 2 restrictions were brought into effect. We had taken a Sunday drive to explore real estate.

Autumn in Melbourne is usually a prolific time for me. The light is beginning to change for the better. I have a two week break from my job, and with a reliable steady income it is easy to be spontaneous and often drive somewhere for the sake of it.

Not so this year.

Despite this lack of movement on my part there have been many, many, emails from all kinds of cultural organisations with ideas for keeping creatively busy. There has been funding support and peer support across every level of the industry. Of course this could only happen because of the internet. This is a wonderful thing. I have submitted a project to HAFNY’s online callout “walking” as a consequence. Not to mention the Ballarat International Foto Biennale is partnering with FORMAT International Photography Festival and Gallery of Photography Ireland to create a visual record of the COVID-19 crisis on Instagram. [Use the tags, #massisolation and #massisolationAUS].

Still; I hanker to go outside follow my intuition while driving with a car load of equipment or walking with some equipment.

I guess I will hibernate in my darkroom.