Quitzow

Well, all of these posts are about great women, so here is one that I met when I was just a young lad, Erica Quitzow, musician/singer extraordinaire. I met Erica and her boyfriend Gary, in 1998. I had just moved to San Francisco with $500.00 to my name. That was one of the craziest things I have ever done, it was the height of the dot com era, and it was the most expensive time to move there ever! What was I thinking? Anyhow, through a service called "roommate referral" I met these lovely people, and they seriously changed the course of my life!! This is her song, and d.i.y. video. That's what was most inspiring about her when I first met her. I'd never met anyone who actually did everything themselves from scratch. Erica is always pushing herself, and guides her own creativity and path from every direction, and I don't know how she does it. It's very inspiring!

PJ is the King

I can't even say anything. She is amazing!!!
She has been my favorite for a long time, and sometimes, I just have to take it back old school to remember my roots.

Interview with Cecilia Gavia

I recently revisited an interview I did with one of my classmates, aka Postmodern Cat Lady, and wanted to share this with ya'll. I really love writing, and this was a fun piece. Also I am going to be directing a film that features her and her photography, which is why I am looking back at what I have worked on with her before. Unfortunately, I cannot direct anyone to photo link right now, because she is still working on her website, but this will give you some insight.

That girl is poison. Never trust a big butt and a smile. Poison.
She’s dangerous. Poison. Oh yeah. Poison. Bell Biv Devoe, now you
know you’re slick blow. That’s what band Cecilia Gavia’s photographs would be if she translated them into a sonic experience. A throw back to 90’s hip hop, gold grills and shiny props. Her inspirations range from LOL cats to craft culture. She’s an avid knitter and likes to incorporate pink and yellow into here repetoire of elements. She describes her work as funny, tacky and cute. Which would explain her love of Rosewood, a font that only few can pull of with the sophisticated mash up of gaudy, humorous, clever know how that Gavia imbibes her work with. Her work is a reflection of pop cultural mythologies and feminine archetypes while she is intereseted in constructing images that are at once confrontational and celebratory. The hyperreal becomes the point of interest in a world where suburbia meets the underbelly, but in a way that isn’t angry, that’s very important to Gavia. She leads her viewers to a place of the uncanny, rather than down the back alley of teen angst. She is interested in exploring themes that deal with the politically incorrect and in your face aspects of femininity. The work she makes is meticulously planned, and every detail is accounted for.
Essentially, she seeks to bring her audience a vision of the “other”, but not from a place like Diane Arbus, who she sees as having a more pessimisstic view of the world, Gavia wants to celebrate the giant in the room. She wants to celebrate eating the popsicle after it’s been dropped on the ground on a hot summer day and take your picture while loving all the grime the comes with eating a dirty treat.

Vanity Fair Portraits

So I made it to the closing weekend of the Vanity Fair Portraits at LACMA. I had seen the show a while back, but I didn't get to spend as much time as I would have liked, so I went back today with my old friend Sandra. We were in there for probably 2 hours, looking carefully at every piece in the exhibit. Anyhow, there were a couple of pieces that really stuck with me from the show. One of the shots being of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. with Joan Crawford, by Nikolas Muray on Santa Monica beach. The photograph really made me start thinking about a narrative, and symbolism, and all the things you want a viewer to get into when looking at your work. Something that is interesting is that neither of them are looking at the camera, yet there is so much happening. Also, the image is very still, and again so much to think about. In the image, the horizon line creates so much of the narrative. It separates their gaze from each other, other than the fact that they are looking in opposite directions. His gaze breaks the horizon just above the water, while her face falls just below the horizon line. His body acts as the anchor, while she lies with a dreamy pose against his back. It's so interesting to think about what that means, as if he is the protector looking out over the sea, and she trusts him to stay in her own dreamy state. His pose is active, and hers is passive. It's really interesting that so much can happen in a single still pose. The second image that I found myself really wanting to look at was of Madonna, by Mario Testino. I just couldn't get over the color palette, and her glamorous, yet vulnerable gaze towards the lens.

Baby Elton

So I just bought the new 5d Mark II, and it is amazing!!!! My first shoot was of baby Elton, who is the cutest little baby who's hair grows almost in a little mohawk. His parents were kind enough to let me in and shoot with their family, even though I had only met them 2 days before. An old family friend has written a book about babies and communicating with them, so she asked me to shoot some little ones for her book. Lets cross our fingers that I can get something for the cover. Apparently Elton is too old for the cover, so I am still looking for a baby to shoot, under 6 months of age if anyone knows.

The Greatest Guitar Player in the World

My friend Jen visited me this weekend from New York, and I made sure to get a photo shoot in while she was here. I knew I wanted to do something somewhat monochromatic, because her skin and hair color really lend itself to that sort of thing. I really like how they turned out, and once again, I used shoot through umbrellas.

Skip

So, I did my much anticipated shoot this weekend with the fleetline that I found on craigslist. For a moment, it seemed like Skip was not going to show up, but he did, and he was so awesome!!! Skip was a real pleasure, and he was promptly on time, but had to leave to make sure to catch the hokey game. Anyhow, this is him in his super awesome car. I can't show the photos from the shoot yet, because I have to wait until the show goes up, but everything worked out very well!