rocktober.

Today we took a visit to the Oakland museum for a private curator talk on the museum's photography collection. In the gallery of the f64 images, i decided it would be interesting to start a new show series called 1/1000. Or something. A new representation of contemporary themes in west coast photography. What themes and genres would be focused on? I would want it to be a serious survey of 20th century photography and its basic themes, much like the f64 group was focused on a square or rectangle format, mostly 8x10, black and white aesthetic that Photography historian Naomi Rosenblum describes as:

"...what surrounded them in such abundance: the landscape, the flourishing organic growth and the still viable rural life. Pointing their lenses at the kind of agrarian objects that had vanished from the artistic consciousness of many eastern urbanites - fence posts, barn roofs, and rusting farm implements - they treated these objects with the same sharp scrutiny as were latches and blast furnaces in the East. However, even in California, these themes look to a vanishing way of life, and the energy contained in the images derived in many instances from formal design rather than from the kind of intense belief in the future that had motivated easterners enamored of machine culture."

I think it could lead to a very interesting movement. I just strive to create more of a bond between photographers in the bay area, like the one that was evident in the early part of the century. I do worry how it would be received among critics and older photographers... food for thought!

I am positive, however, that such a survey would include many modern photographic trends that i am not particularly a fan of. ah well.