Art,Decoration and More, A Blog about Everything

French Quarter Musicians

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 23:35:07 +0000

Here are just a few of the Street Musicians I met while in the French Quarter. Royal Street is my favorite street for music, also for art galleries and for people watching. Many of the musicians are dressed in period clothing, like the 1930 and 1940′s, its adds another layer to the texture of the romantic illusion of the place.

Silver Painted Mime with Bugle

Music Man over the Mississippi River

Debbie Fleming Caffrey

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 14:59:02 +0000

Debbie Fleming Caffery had received the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, “Michael P. Smith Documentary Photography Award”. I studied with Debbie at the New Orleans Photography Workshop and she is truly amazing. She has been photographing people in Louisiana for over 30 years; the sugar cane workers, Cajun culture and the aftermath of Katrina. She completed a Fellows project for the Open Society Foundation that George Soros started in 1984 for the Fellows Project, in which she documented the effect of Katrina on the African American community, which can be viewed here.

Workers burning the sugar cane after harvest in Louisiana

Form 1995 Cajun Mardi Gras

Congratulations Debbie, no one deserved this award more.

Mannequins

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:08:10 +0000

I love photographing mannequins, especially the headless ones.

Ready for Winter

Time To Plug Myself

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:50:27 +0000

Spring took me into New York yesterday and I photographed in the library and buildings around it.

by Susan Grissom

The Library is a great source for subjects of every kind.

and fabulous architectural elements to shoot.

Unique People to observe at the library

Down the stairs

New Photographer Interview – UK Photographer,Deborah Parkin

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 01:59:15 +0000

I have had the pleasure of interviewing UK, photographer, Deborah Parkin for the first interview of 2010. Deborah comes from Hexham, Northumberland near the Scottish border.

Deborah’s images are black and white and she works with a medium format camera. What I am most attracted to about her work is the Film noir, Hitchcock quality in her images. Her surrealistic style is even more enhanced with her unique perspective and the way she sets up her shots. The unique contrast and tonal characteristics of her work sometimes remind me of Clarence John Laughlin and Eugene Atget. Her subjects are mainly her own children as well as architecture and the landscape of the Northumberland region.

Deborah’s book, Childhood Narratives is available for purchase here. ‘

I hope you will enjoy the interview with Deborah and also visit Deborah’ blog as well as her website

Devotion by Deborah Parkin

Tagged: "British photography", "Deborah parkin"photography, "medium format photography", black and white, english, Northumberland, UK

Deborah Parkin Interview

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 00:45:23 +0000

Photograph by Deborah Parkin

Photograph by Deborah Parkin

How did you get into photography?

I have been passionate about photography for about 10 years but I have loved photographs for most of my life. I have always been fascinated with looking at old photographs – especially of my own family. However, it wasn’t until my son was born almost 8 years ago that I was compelled to pick up my camera on an almost daily basis (I think this is a very common theme that runs with many photographers). I started with a 35mm film camera, progressed onto a digital slr and now I am back to using film – this time medium format and on occasion large format.

photograph by Deborah Parkin

Why black and white photography?

Simply because I love it. It is raw, it is romantic and it’s evocative. A lot of my photography is based upon my childhood memories, (fleeting moments and sensations) and black and white evokes this beautifully. For me, the black tones represent the actual childhood event – distant and hard to see in the literal sense. The white/grey tones are the memory held within the adult mind – that flash of light, that fleeting thought – intransigent and surreal.

Photograph by Deborah Parkin

How do I choose my subjects?

This is an easy one. My children. They are a huge and constant inspiration to me. They are beauty personified and perfection. My children are used in my photography in two different ways. First, I photograph them to record their lives – to keep that very important family history book going (my initial reason behind my love of photography). However, I also use my children as models for my own projected feelings of childhood.

photograph by Deborah Parkin

What is your work about?

Some of my images, such as ‘playtime’ are deeply personal and based upon childhood memories – I had a real feeling of being isolated from the world as a child. I had problems with my hearing – nothing physical but psychologically I would not hear anyone – it was my way of detaching myself from the world. This was largely due to the divorce of my parents when I was four years old. ‘Carousel’ is based upon a fairground day trip in which my alcoholic father put my younger sister and myself on a ghost train (we were aged 4 and 6 years old) on our own and stood laughing when we were stuck inside screaming with fear. I think a lot of my work is about examining the chasm that can exist between the parent/adult and the child. My photography, I hope, is about feeling – how I felt at the time as opposed to what actually happened. One thing I have discovered by sharing my work with others is that they are not just my feelings and memories but many other peoples too.

photograph by Deborah Parkin

What is your creative process?

My physical creative process is easy to describe. My emotional creative process is more difficult to define.

At the present time I am working with a Hasselblad 500c medium format camera. I usually use Ilford HP5 an d FP4 roll film. I develop all my negatives and originally would print in the darkroom, however lately I have discovered Giclee digital printing and hahnemuhle photo rag paper which is really beautiful and suits my work perfectly. Although I scan my negatives I would never alter my images in ways that I personally couldn’t do in the darkroom .. I will work on contrast … dodging and burning etc, but never change the original intention of the photograph. I find that being able to scan my negatives a great way of being creative as a mother of two young children and a university course to fit in. However, this will no doubt change again very soon as I am about to embark on a course on alternative printing and will go back to trying out large format photography – again something that I think will suit my work.

photograph by Deborah Parkin

As for the emotional creative process I think I have touched upon this already. As I have said, a lot of my work is drawn upon childhood memories. Images such as ‘playtime, isolation, Carousel, abandoned and waiting’ are all images that I had in mind before I pressed the shutter. The image ‘waiting’ was created for my university course. We had to do ‘constructed images’ for one of our modules. This image represents the feeling I would have waiting for my father to visit me on a Sunday afternoon .. that apprehension and finally disappointment I felt when he didn’t show up. Other work, such as ‘Standing in my Shadow’ and ‘Candlelight’ for example were moments seized .. I saw my son or daughter doing something in a particular light usually and I would be lucky enough to know to take the picture.

by Deborah Parkin

I suppose that is about it really. My work is deeply personal on one level and yet I am also distanced from it in the way that I am from my past. I have an odd relationship with life and photography … I love life on so many levels and yet I cannot fully become involved with it, photography allows me say how involved I want to be. Photography allows me to speak without opening my mouth. And I love that.

Echo Exhibition -Repetitive Marks and Images at the Center for Contemporary Printmaking

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 00:03:57 +0000

Echo Repetitive Marks and Images- Monica Ramirez- Montagut, Curator, The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum was the juror for Echo: Repetitive Marks and Images. The exhibit runs until March the 6th 2010

Tagged: Center for Contemporary Printmaking, CT, Printmaking

Workshop with the Master of Monotype – Ron Pokrasso

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 18:15:34 +0000

I recently studied at the Center for Contemporary Printmaking ( my new obsession) in a week long workshop with Ron Pokrasso. It was a wonderful workshop that has helped me take what I have thus far learned about printmaking in another direction. I learned from the MASTER, Ron Pokrasso. He taught me new ways to approach monoprinting as well as how to incorporate collage, intaglio and chine colle into a print succesfully. The other artists in this workshop were great fun, talented and I was stimulated just being in the same workspace with them. (maybe they will appear in future blogs). If you can’t get to a workshop you can go to Santa Fe where Ron lives, he has a new art making facility and you can stay in the guest quarters in Santa Fe .

Timberwick is a multi-functional non-toxic art making facility in the midst of hundreds of pinon and juniper trees on 3 1/2 acres just 7 miles from the Santa Fe plaza. The 2500 sq ft building includes an efficient classroom/ work space, a spacious multi purpose press and production studio, and a private guest apartment. It is the perfect setting to experience a true art making retreat. The flexibility of the facility lends itself to a variety of options ranging from fully assisted one on one private sessions to custom made workshops for up to 10 participants

Tagged: art, ART FINDS, artists, decoration, Printmaking, Ron Pokrasso

Changing Role for the Master by Ron Pokrasso

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:59:12 +0000

I love the style Ron Pokrasso works in, its the same way he teaches, and its inspiring to watch Ron in a workshop. I promise you will be liberated in the ways you make art after studying with him. “Stream of consciousness art making” is how Ron would describe it. Ron is in my opinion the Master of Monotype, he is also the originator of the printmaking event “Monathon” and he continues to play a part in it, he was just recently at Center for Contemporary Printmaking’s annual event.

Tagged: art, artist, decoration, Printmaking, Ron Pokrasso

Curtains for Values 6 by Ron Pokrasso

PRP Communications Committee Co Chair — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:44:02 +0000

: Monotype with Soloarplate Intaglio and chine colle

Ron has made an art of composition as you can see in this piece. He has layered graphics and a warm bright color to offset the coldness of the architectural elements . I was drawn to the way Ron juxtaposes unrelated elements together so successfully. To study with Ron

Tagged: art, decoration, painting, Printmaking, Ron Pokrasso