Hipters of the Past

Scottish Cartes de Visites 1860-1889 (front and back) from my collection

©  Anne Bentley

It's the weekend - time for fun

and what a good time they had

image: (Harry Whittier Frees (1879–1953)

No surprises are the best birthday presents

Sometimes you have to give yourself permission to buy art - for the pleasure it gives you - first by seeing, then choosing, then buying, and when you bring it home, the pleasure begins again...
if your loved one doesn't know what to get you for your birthday - the usual at our place - suggest something, buy it & get reimbursed.  For one of my gifts, I chose Hosang Park's image of a park in Seoul from the friendly people at 20x200 - a one stop online gallery where art is cleverly priced and the only way we were going to afford one of his photographs.  The one pictured below we purchased in early June but because it was a birthday present, I had to wait until Tuesday this week to make it mine.

Howon (© Hosang Park)

There's more to see with the real thing (heh heh) than the online view.  The print quality is stunning - heavy cotton paper with sharp & crisp definition.

Hosang Park is a Korean artist who has made a series of bird's-eye view park shots -his website has the set (click on "A Square") - totally cool.

THEN!, in the mail a money note from my parents... gosh...and how excellent that 20x200 also has some Beth Dow work available - not quite sold out yet but I got a move on just in case I miss out as I did for a previous edition of hers. 

Check out her website too - she has a large series of formal English & Italian gardens -  including Sissinghurst where the people in the picture could be mistaken for Vita & Harold themselves, taking a morning stroll.

Passage - Levens Hall (© Beth Dow)

This image originates from a platinum-palladium print - hence the excellent tones but it's the way Beth has framed her shot that is also outstanding for me. 

I'm not going to write a film vs digital rave - each has it's place and Beth Dow's work, along with Gordon Undy, Lauren E Simonutti & Filip Przewozny, to name a few diverse artists on my want list, proves that traditional photographic film & hand printing is alive and well (and being drooled over).

As an initiative, the Jen Bekman project; 20x200 is inspired - it makes art accessible and really good fun to be a part of & art lasts a lot longer than chocolate & flowers.

Images here are reproduced with permission - copyright remains with each artist.

Long Weekend in your headspace

couch on an awning above a shop, King Street, Newtown

© Anne Bentley

AH & I haven't been total couch potatoes this weekend... We are yet to view the end of Sunday Bloody Sunday that I hired for Thursday night (someone who worked hard all week fell asleep with 15 minutes to go & it wasn't me - I fall into night owl mode often - I stayed up after 2am last night watching an only OK film because it had Isabella Rosselini in it...)
It's been weekend of local arts - AH & I have checked out both visual art group shows for Sheilafest - the first we saw was in Newtown - a mixed lot with a really cool video work by Hanna Buck
Yesterday we met* (*AH needs to ride her bicycle or she goes feral - I meandered over on foot) at Kudos gallery for Women In Piracy photography by the Kingpins, Penelope Benton and Tina Fiveash - all excellent & we really enjoyed the short films by Vicki Papageorgopoulos & Elizabeth Reidy and the doco/performance of Bronwyn Bailey-Charteris is very funny indeed. 
It's running until 10th April so drop by: Kudos Gallery 6 Napier St. Paddington 11am – 6pm Wed to Fri,  11am – 4pm Sat.
And, while in Paddington, it was a short walk to the Australian Centre for Photography to take in the excellent Amy Stein's latest works and the added surprise in the back gallery was Zed Nelson's Love Me - "a collection of images documenting how far people will go for the quest for physical perfection. Negotiating the boundaries of art and documentary photography, this series reflects a world we have created where enormous social, psychological and economic rewards and penalties are attached to the way we look..."  Everything from a jar of the results of liposuction to a beauty contest amongst inmates at a Brazilian women's prison - along with some carefully chosen quotes, presents a careful and provocative show.
Sadly, we ran out of time (and the sky fell in) to get to Blender Gallery.

Then it was art for dinner - fresh asparagus cooked in olive oil with fresh chilli, garlic, zucchini & rocket over organic wholemeal pasta with grana padano - yumarama
Today a photo collective show down the road and tomorrow we will be taking in the MCA's latest - I'm looking forward to The Gift of Ann Lewis

Between all this, I am slowly working on 2 new collage images: A Spanish Interior & The Scottsmen - tells you nothing I know but I am enjoying seeing the images in my head, which will probably look nothing like the finished picture - stay tuned.
Oh, and I have also just updated my 2 other blogs (links just to the right of this page)

Rather than watch the midday movie...

I thought I'd be better off posting an image I made yesterday morning:

© 2010 Anne Bentley

From my collection - One a Penny Two a Penny Hot Cross Buns

One a penny... (photographer unknown) circa WWII

I have a couple of World War 2 photographs in my small photography collection that I can only make guesses about. 
This one is a real favourite of mine and I've just scanned it larger (it's a standard 3x4 inch shot) & have begun to clean it up.
This image has such a story - Airmen between jobs resting - but where? I thought it was a classroom but the chairs tell me different.  The old English Hot Cross Buns rhyme on the blackboard could possibly give away the time of year (originally thought to be Polytheist or Pagan, Hot Cross Buns is also used by Christians & is thought to have first been mentioned in the early 1700s & the 4 squares represent the 4 phases of the moon) - the cursive writing next to the hotxbuns is not in focus.  The clock looks like it's just after 4.30.  The Airmen are reading & resting - the one on the far left looks like he is reading a letter or he could be flipping through photos taken by the person taking this shot. 
I especially like the boot in the window - do you think it's smelly & getting an airing or was it wet...
The hats suggest (and I'm pretty sure here) these are Australians.
It's printed on Velox paper (a standard Kodak paper of the time) but there is nothing written on the photo - I have no names, or providence except I acquired this one in South Australia over 20 years ago.

Here comes Mother

My Mother-out-law is visiting Sydney next week. Partner, AH has booked accommodation.

We considered Bates Motel but found something better.




Folks gave up a few years ago in thinking it's OK to stay with us.
Seems I'm really grumpy with visitors in our little house... works for me.

After The Cheerleaders - revisiting Enmore

Sunday 3 or more years ago, I took a winter walk with a camera loaded with black & white film to see if I could find some good shots - one from that productive day I called "Cheerleaders" Enmore - after the paste up paper image of cheerleaders next a doorway here it is (a crop of the original negative):



This Sunday today, I've just finished working on an image - this time colour / cross-processed slide film - took a while and my eyes are dry from the computer monitor (would help if I didn't get so distracted in Wikipedia, IMDb, Ebay, Youtube... oh, and googling me - but I couldn't find the soft porn lesbian (fake straight chicks of course - Kak!) German webpage that has a link to my website... yeah, I don't fucken' know either)


== on with the art moment - here's Cheerleaders re-visited Winter 2009:


think I'll call it 'After The Cheerleaders"

I'm really pleased with this shot & AH has given it her seal of feedback approval.
(love the alien shadow on the footpath at the left too...)

On the way back to Newtown...

I looked out of the bus window and spotted this image from City Road looking into Sydney Uni & got out the next stop, walked back & finished off a roll of old slide film in my little cheapie rangefinder (to be cross-processed at the lab by the weekend)

I also took a snap with the pocket digital for that instant gratification:



Wednesday 12 August 2009 @ 4PM EST
(image copyright)

Continuing on the loose subject of transport - some photos from my collection - early 20th Century

A favourite of mine - unknown photographer, Australia - early 20th Century
Shamefully, I kept this on a pinboard for many years (cos I used to ride motorcycles a lifetime ago) - this rider is making dust! I always thought he had a cigarette in his mouth but I guess it's just a mark on the negative... wish I had the negative

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Again, no idea - it's one of those make your photograph into a post card from the first 1/4 of last century - It has "post card" in 3 languages so it is from Europe somewhere - I reckon it's from English occupied India - there is one Indian looking fellow (the only one with a water bottle at his waist) and the tanned white boys are all wearing those silly English safari hats - as if wearing one of those will save them in a fall... Perhaps the hard hats are for the sun or really for bullets...

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Raphael's Motor Car Hire & Repair Company is a photo I've had, I think, the longest -since teen years. Again, photographer and place unknown - most likely Australia (the building suggests Aust)- and date? circa 1920s me thinks

I dunno

- Petersham, April 09

Slide show promotion - Anne goes international

that's my scribble on the flyer - wot a dork! (if you click on the picture, it will come up bigger & readable)


==
Siouxzi Mernagh has just finished her fellowship with Berlin ici (Institute for Cultural Inquiry) - an institution that organizes fellowships for people to work on projects that require lots of brains. Stuff like: Death Drive, Repetition Automatism and Seriality in the Intersections between Psychoanalysis, Cybernetics and Popular Culture
With thanks to Siouxzi up to 20 of my images (from the series I have posted online on my website (some other shots SM chose from here)will be shown as 3x4 metre slides during the course of a "Sydney" evening in Berlin she is putting on to celebrate the completion of her fellowship film. She wanted to show Sydney different to the usual Opera House & kangaroo look by presenting a quirky, inner west view - more like the Sydney she knows.
I share the Unseen Sydney part of the show with Megan Yeo - we are both rapt.
Lucky Megan leaves for Europe on Monday, just in time to catch the show - I'm looking forward to hearing all about it.

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Procrastination day as well

noodling about my folders, found a set of shots from 2 or 3 years ago - playing with orchids and cornflour mixed with water. gross, hey...
it wasn't a rainy afternoon when I did this. I was playing around thinking I'd come up with some fantastic art project and be held in awe and all that shit.
I had the idea of placing a dripping orchid in the hands of young men - one youthful beauty with ivory skin could hold it to his chest etc etc...
I saw the project run in my head, was duly entertained and left it at that.
I may watch the re-run one day.