Tag: Minolta

Louder Click

On July 12, 2011

In art, artwork, interviews, music, Non-Classical Writing, popular culture

Photography has always been a great love of mine. I stood on O’Connell Street bridge years ago, with friends holding each ankle,trying to capture a rapidly-setting smudge of sun over the spires of a dull, charcoal-sketched Dublin. I loved walking around with my old SLR Minolta snapping bits of graffiti, odd sights, small moments and cherished ephemera.

The camera was put away at music gigs. The dance of sound, motion, and drama made that beloved piece of equipment feel like a demanding, distracting, high-maintenance lover I didn’t want to deal with. Even with the advent of digital photography, my non-photography stance at concerts remained resolute. I’m just not one of those people who pulls out the camera (or phone) to snap away when a favorite performer takes to the stage – I prefer to absorb the magic of the moment directly, taking a mental photo of that time, not just sights but smells, sounds, the pressing of excitable people and the slow-fast shuffle of feet.

Aaron Richter, however, is another breed. An accomplished music and fashion photographer as well as the art director for music magazine Self-Titled, his work is at once universal and yet very intimate and personal. It has an immediacy and vibrancy that points to a deep appreciation of both music and the modern, urban culture from whence it springs. Aaron’s work is being showcased at the W Hotel Times Square now through August 12th.

I had the privilege of exchanging ideas about music and photography -and the strong connections therein -with Aaron. His answers are sure to delight both photo and music enthusiasts.

How did you first get interested in photography?

I first started taking photos as a kid, doing B&W stuff in darkrooms, and, from probably senior year of high school till about two and a half years ago (I’m 27 now), I didn’t really take photos at all. I just sorta stopped for some reason and started focusing on being a writer instead. I moved to New York after college to be a writer and editor for magazines, and that’s what I did for about three years.

I started a magazine called MusicMusicMusic with friends and it was real cool. We only did one issue. But the model Erin Wasson was dancing to LCD Soundsystem on our cover in a photo shot by Kenneth Cappello. I also worked full time at a magazine called GIANT that had an incredible art department: iconic creative and art directors and amazing photographers—both well-established (like Ellen Von Unwerth) and up-and-coming (like Ruvan, Miko Lim and Cameron Krone)—shooting for us. I fell in love with that part of the job, and after I got laid off, as everyone working in magazines eventually does, I spent my severance on a camera and have been taking pictures ever since.

How does your work at Self-Titled influence your visual output?

Since I was young I’ve always sorta thought musicians were the coolest people in the world. And I think a lot of what gets lost in the over-blogged coverage of music these days is any sense of the artists behind the music being legitimately cool anymore—at least a sense of cool that’s actually captured and conveyed through the coverage, if that makes sense.

We know so much about musicians now because there’s more and more demand for more content and more interviews and more analysis of the music, so there’s less mystery, or maybe less intrigue, which makes it seem like you know all your favorite musicians all too well. Imagine if Kurt Cobain had to give a million blog interviews every week and had a Twitter account? We’d have probably all thought he was just a total dickhead, albeit one who wrote incredible songs.

So a lot of what I try to do with Self-Titled is present musicians in a manner that takes back that sort of cool exclusivity, unattainable yet aspirational—this very unarguable, visceral and immediate visual sense of “Wow, fuck! that’s cool!” Whether we achieve that from issue to issue, I dunno (it’s tough). But as far as my photography is concerned, that desire to make musicians look cool (whatever that means might change from band to band) is always my top concern. To a large extent, I miss that element of music, so I’ve take it as my job, both as an art director and a photographer, to bring it back as much as possible.

Who are you favorite photographers?

Cass Bird, Ellen Von Unwerth, Tim Barber, Guy Aroch, Ruvan.

How much is a relationship with your subjects important to you? I especially like your shots of Bootsy Collins & Kareem Abdul Jabbar at Bonnaroo.

Every photographer will tell you this is one of the most important elements to a good shoot. It just makes sense. If a subject feels comfortable around you, your photos will be better. My Bonnaroo photos are a weird example here. Most of the work we did in Tennessee for the festival was done very quickly and within a five-minute block of time while an artist was en route to another obligation or about to head onstage. Getting subjects comfortable was something that had to happen almost instantaneously.

You mention Bootsy Collins and Kareem Abdul-Jabaar. Both were instances in which I really didn’t get a chance to develop any sort of relationship with the subjects at all. Bootsy was great because we met up and he was immediately just a total ham for the camera. Kareem was tough. He’s notoriously a tough subject. He really didn’t even acknowledge me at all while I was shooting. And I sort of felt like a paparazzi stealing photos that weren’t mine. I actually connected with him pretty well only after we stopped shooting. I noticed he was carrying a book about chess and asked him if he played, and he loosened up considerably once he was able to start talking about something he loves.

As far as the rest of my Bonnaroo photos are concerned, two of my favorite series of images are with Smith Westerns and Alexis from Sleigh Bells. The guys in Smith Westerns were very welcoming to me coming into their space and hanging out with them while they got ready to play live, and they let me come up on the stage during their set to shoot. They’re very comfortable in front of the camera and are generally just sort of adorable. Alexis from Sleigh Bells I’ve known for about two years.

I shot Sleigh Bells’ first press photos but haven’t really seen either Alexis or Derek from the band since then, though we’ve kept in touch. At Bonnaroo, meeting up was sort of like a little reunion and I got to spend a longer bit of time (maybe 30 minutes) with her backstage. There was no need for any, “Hi. Nice to meet you. My name is Aaron. This is what I’d like to do…” and we were kind of just able to casually catch up, with me every once in a while taking a photo, before I had to head out for my next photo obligation that night.

What do you think of the resurgence of interest in celluloid photography?

It’s great that people love shooting on film. Whatever you feel most comfortable with taking photos is awesome. I shoot pretty much entirely digital–probably 90 percent. And I prefer it.

Film is fun, and not having the back of a camera to look at to check to see if the photos are turning out is an incredibly liberating limitation that does wonders for enhancing the mood of a shoot. But with film, I usually prefer point-and-shoot, and in general, I tend to concentrate too much on and get obsessed with imperfections in the resulting photos to let myself be OK with an out-of-focus or weirdly lit photo the way a photographer like Cass Bird can. One of my friends, Bryan Sheffield, has made the shift to shooting film almost exclusively, and his portfolio has just exploded with incredible work since then.

Another photographer I hire for work in self-titled is Caroline Mort, who shoots a very unstudied amateurish style of photography, quite often with disposables, that has such incredible heart and emotion to it. Pretty much every issue, my favorite photo is one of her shots. Again, I’ve always felt that film, especially the way I’ve been able to approach it since my darkroom days and compared to shooting whatever-mega-megapixels of a digital camera, is somewhat of an imprecise medium, and there’s this awesome charm to a photographer being OK with and having confidence in an image’s imperfections. Cass Bird is probably the best at this. Her Urban Outfitters catalogs lately and her T magazine stories… incredible.

Who would you like to photograph that you haven’t yet? Why?

Elle Fanning. My goal for 2012 is to become best friends with her. So my thinking is that if I somehow get to photograph her, I can spark our long friendship and then we can hang out all the time and watch Netflix and eat pizza and stuff. That’s not weird, right?

Chris Owens, from the band Girls. He’s seems legitimately genuine and honest, and he’s easily one of the best songwriters we have. All I’m asking for is a week crashing on his couch to follow him around and take photos. Also, Jason Pierce of Spiritualized. The epitome of rock-and-roll cool to me and kind of totally a mystery.

Swirling

By Catherine Kustanczy

On December 10, 2010

In inspiration, video

A little piece of inspiration, amidst the Christmas/holiday nutties.

The ocean has always been a source of inspiration for me. When I lived in Dublin, I used to have to take the DART south for work twice a week; I loved being along the Irish sea and looking out at the swirling waves. It was a hell of a public transit ride for a wide-eyed Canadian girl more used to seeing concrete and tracts of homogenous suburban town-boxes along commuter routes. I marveled at the many people who simply fell asleep on the ride. How can you miss this?, I thought. Maybe it’s something you get used to, and sick of, the way us Canadians are about snow and winter scenes.

On the (few) days the sun shone in Dublin, the watery landscape turned into a glinting kind of jewel; I only wish I had been painting then. Still, I had my trusty Minolta with me. The photos I took are languishing somewhere in Ireland. I don’t know if I’ll ever see them again; the feeling of seeing that dance of sky and sea will be with me, though, forever. Another ride along the DART is inevitable, both physically and otherwise.

Feel / Reveal

By Catherine Kustanczy

On December 5, 2010

In art, writing

Watching pieces of the movie Frida recently, amidst bites of crostini, answering emails, and half-sketching, was a strange experience -and not just because of the multi-tasking.

When I saw it in the cinema in 2002 I was bowled over by the mix of images, plot, and music within Julie Taymor‘s vision of the Mexican painter’s life. My initial viewing was at an early point in my own personal explorations into drawing and painting; after years of photography, including nearly two years spent in Ireland and England with an ancient, beloved manual-forward SLR camera, I thought it might be a good idea to strip the technology away to get to the heart of art-making. And so the drawing/painting/sketching odyssey began, and photography, however slowly, fell by the wayside, paralleling the dwindling of film stock and the rise of mobile (and, for that matter, internet) technology.

It was during a recent dinner party at my home that I felt a deep twinge of nostalgia for my old snapping days. I brought out the old Minolta at the request of one of my guests, a photo enthusiast. The weight of the camera, the ka-chunk of the shutter, the cylindrical beauty of the lens, the quasi-surprise of the prints… it was all magical to behold after so long away from it. Yet spying the light meter again created a small panic, a palpable sense of, what am I doing?! It was a curious mix of panic and passion.

Aside from the heart-stopping, beautiful viuals, what I love so much about Taymor’s film is that Frida’s struggles and doubts over her own artistic voice aren’t ever glossed over; in one scene, when she and husband Diego Rivera go to New York City so the latter can complete a commission for the Rockefellers, a reporter asks her, “Are you an artist too?” She demures -and keeps on stabbing her brush at the canvas. Yes, no, maybe. I don’t know. Keep on keepin’ on. Even when bed-ridden, she continued her output, never labelling herself or her work. Just doing it.

I’m a longtime admirer of Frida’s work -“admirer”, actually, feels too mild, but “fan” feels too slavish. She takes her place, like Patti Smith, in my mental curio cabinet of beautifully imperfect heroes: shriekingly female but defying categorization, always personal but ever-cryptic, physical but very heady, hugely experimental but deeply traditional. A mass of genius in contradiction, Frida’s work, like Patti’s, has the power to bring me to tears, and frequently has.

The timing of Taymor’s movie on television was curious on a personal level (never mind Taymor’s directing Spider Man: Turn Off The Dark, opening next month on Broadway. More on that in a future post.). I’d been berating myself for not being productive enough artistically lately. I should be drawing/painting/etc is a frequent mental mantra. It’s feels like a hard thing to go off and do, and yet it shouldn’t be. That old want-to-be-doing vs should-be-doing battle is raging. The other reason productivity falls away is that I have a genuine sense of not knowing what I’m doing, that it’s all for naught, that it’s all horribly amateur and pointless and stupid. That voice of doubt is sometimes louder than the calm, quiet one that asks me to keep going.

And so, it was appropos that, looking through a bookshelf for something else entirely, Peter London’s No More Secondhand Art (Shambhala Publications, 1989) popped out at me. I opened it, as if my magic, to a page with the following header: “Am I Good Enough?” That would be my other mantra, a much older one that applies to several areas and pursuits. But I was fascinated by London’s dissection of this question to self as applied to art-making, one that works whether you love drawing, painting, photography or performance:

We can never win the encounter with such a question, because the very underlying assumption of “Am I —— enough?” is a faulty appraisal of the human condition and a false understanding of what it does take to engage in creative enterprises… Rather than paralyzing ourselves with the existential bone-crusher “Am I good enough?” we would do better to ask ourselves question that invoke no comparisons. Instead, we could become interested in describing the new terrain being uncovered or invented.

I dream of the day that voice stops -or at least softens. I dream of the day I’ll have the most precious things any artist could ask for -time, space, resources -to do what I want most to do, when my heroes smile and say, see? It wasn’t so hard after all. Because really, it’s not.