The Archive
Andrew Hetherington
Exhibitions: Anne Wilkes Tucker Finds Treasures, and America's History, at the Library of Congress
For nearly two years, Anne Wilkes Tucker, Curator Emerita of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, practically lived at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. She was searching for buried treasure. Tucker, who was named "America's Best Curator" by Time in 2001, eventually selected 440 rare images for "Not an Ostrich: And Other Images from America's Library," an exhibition on display at Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles through September 9. The show reveals America's history and the development of photography itself.
Spotlight: Best of May
Rocker Dave Matthews wants to save elephants from poachers. So does photographer Ami Vitale. The two recently teamed to make a short film at the Reteti Elephant Sanctuary in Kenya. It's one of our highlights from May, along with a film about a photographer -- the colorful Miles Aldridge -- and a number of new-style travelogs making use of satellite and Google street photography. We've got time lapses of London and a remarkable view of a tornado forming over Kansas. There's also a film about a Texas grandmother who's both a quilter and activist, as well as a powerful film using poetry to reflect on racism.
Rose Wylie, OBE
Every year, it seems, another woman well beyond “a certain age” emerges from the shadows as a most talked about newcomer to the art world. This year it is surely Rose Wylie, who received an OBE on Queen Elizabeth II’s annual Birthday List. Wylie received the Order of the British Empire medal in recognition of her unique artistic practice, which draws on cultural areas such as film, fashion, literature, mythology, the news, and people she meets to create colorful, exuberant comp...
Spotlight: A Tender Look at Colombia as Elections Near
Matthew O'Brien says he is drawn to beauty, no matter the circumstance. "I like to create work that is affirming and has the potential to lift spirits," said the San Francisco-based photographer in a 2017 interview, when he debuted his book "No Dar Papaya," a collection of Polaroid images from Colombia that provide what he calls an "alternative to the stories and imagery in the media of conflict, violence, drug trafficking, and assorted horrors" associated with the country. His work, which was also on view at the Colombian consulate in New York, offers a broader context for the country's presidential election this weekend.
Profile: Hope Wurmfeld's Memory of Rome, 1964
Hope Wurmfeld's love of Rome began 53 years ago. That's also when she discovered her love of photography. As she came to discover, the two passions -- Rome and photography -- are abidingly linked. In 1964, Wurmfeld moved to Rome after marrying her college boyfriend, who was there for year on a Fulbright scholarship. In the city's black market she bought two Leica cameras, several lenses, and a light meter, and then photographed everything she saw. Wurmfeld went on to become a noted fine-art photographer, but recently went through her archive and rediscovered her old images of Rome -- a Rome that is no more. Now they are collected in a new book.
The SONY a9: What the Pros Have to Say
"Eventually you knew it had to happen. Sooner or later cameras would get so good at what they did that basically your job as a photographer would be to look for interesting things to shoot and then try not to get in the camera's way as it did it's thing capturing them. I mean, imagine if a camera had pretty much flawless exposure capability, flawless focusing and could fire and focus so fast it never missed a frame?" So writes Jeff Wignall in todays Street Test of the Sony a9 full-frame mirrorless camera. Sony Artisans of Imagery Katrin Eisman, Andy Katz, and Pat Murphy-Racey join in with their takes on the 24.2-megapixel camera that has caused an uproar in the photo industry.