An Interview with Malick Sidibé (2009)

“When I began to take photographs, I never imaged that my photos would travel around the world.”   Interview in Madrid for the PHotoEspaña Baume & Mercier 2009 Award Since 1960, Malick Sidibé (Mali, 1936) has produced photographs in his studio, Studio Malick, located in Bamako. These images with their pure gaze document popular culture […]

Richard Avedon’s ‘In the American West’

For Avedon’s program is supraindividual. He wants to portray the whole American West as a blighted culture that spews out casualties by the bucket: misfits, drifters, degenerates, crackups, and prisoners-entrapped, either literally or by debasing work. Richard Avedon’s “In the American West” By Max Kozloff “Sometimes I think all my pictures are just pictures of […]

Robert Hirsch with Milton Rogovin (2004)

From Lower West Side, 1972-1977 “My voice was essentially silenced so, I decided to speak out about problems through my photography.”   Milton Rogovin: An Activist Photographer; An Interview by Robert Hirsch (Editors Note: Milton Rogovin, the Buffalo social documentary photographer who was renowned for revealing the unsung stories and inherent dignity of the poor, […]

Pieter Hugo in Conversation (2007)

Pieter Hugo in Conversation with Joanna Lehan (21 February 2007), Published in Messina/Musina, Punctum Editions, 2007 JL: Musina is the northernmost town in South Africa. Its name has been changed, and this fact is highlighted in the overarching title of your project, Messina/Musina. What is its significance? PH: Musina is situated just south of the […]

Pieter Hugo and the Hyena Men – “The Dog’s Master” (2007)

“The first series of pictures had caused varying reactions from people – inquisitiveness, disbelief and repulsion. People were fascinated by them, just as I had been by that first cellphone photograph.”   The Dog’s Master By Pieter Hugo These photographs came about after a friend emailed me an image taken on a cellphone through a […]

David Goldblatt – Afrikaners Photographed and Revisited (1975-2006)

“The ideology and apparatus of apartheid and the overwhelming power of the state to crush opposition became ever more present in our lives.”   Some Afrikaners Photographed, 1975 – Some Afrikaners Revisited, 2006 By David Goldblatt, Johannesburg, South Africa, 2006 I was born and grew up in Randfontein, a gold-mining town 40 kilometres west of […]

Bill Brandt: A Personal View (1970’s)

Parlourmaid and underparlourmaid ready to serve dinner, Mayfair, 1936 Bill Brandt enjoys darkroom work and likes to experiment, printing the same shot in several different ways. ‘It takes a long time to produce a good print.’ No mass production. Bill Brandt: A Personal View Creative Camera Owner Magazine, 1970s Bill Brandt’s landscapes are truly creative. […]

Gil Blank and Thomas Ruff Discuss ‘Portraits’ (2004)

“In a way I wanted to blot out any traces or information about the person in front of the camera. I also wanted to indicate that the viewer is not face-to-face with a real person.”   Gil Blank with Thomas Ruff, originally published in Influence Magazine, Issue 2, 2004 Gil Blank: Many of the portraits […]

Some Sort of Place: Recent work by Roger Ballen (2005)

  Ballen’s pictures bring to life in a variety of ways what (Man) Ray illuminated: the impulse to externalise the chaos of the mind and emotions, and the possibility that the creative process may just as soon yield a monster as an object of beauty.   By Bronwyn Law-Viljoen, Art / South Africa, 2005 Certain […]

Surface Tensions: Judith Butler on Diane Arbus (2004)

Two men dancing at a drag ball, N.Y.C. 1970. By Judith Butler, ArtForum, February, 2004 The Diane Arbus exhibition “Revelations,” currently (2004) showing at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, is not difficult to attend. The crowds that circled the block to see the major Marc Chagall exhibition earlier this fall are now quite […]

Shelby Lee Adams – ‘The Napier’s Living Room’ (1989)

Getting out of the truck, this place felt like being taken back in time.   By Shelby Lee Adams, 2007 In the early ’80’s I was taken to visit the Napier family by a local preacher and friend Wayne Riddle from Leatherwood. I was advised not to drive my car, as the roads were rough. […]

Boris Mikhailov – A Terrible Beauty

 What does it say about us who look at them?   A Terrible Beauty By Sue Hubbard Boris Mikhailov is sixty-three, has dyed black hair, a white moustache and a young wife. Born in Kharkov in the Ukraine, he has recently exhibited at The Photographers’ Gallery, just been awarded the Citibank Photography Prize and is […]