Light Journeys Launches!!

At last, after lots of work, Light Journeys has launched into cyberspace. Checkout our first feature artist, Melbourne based photographer Georgia Metaxas.

Many thanks to those who submitted and for those who haven’t we are now accepting submissions on a rolling basis. Spread the word and be sure to add us to your feeds or even better, subscribe to keep up with the myriad of amazing work being made by Australian women working in photography.

New Year… New Goals and some Light Journeys

Well, first post for 2009 and I can report that it’s HOT! The weather that is… but also for projects planned this year.

It’s my final year at uni and I’ve already warned family and friends that it’s gonna be hell (though preferably in a baby-blue Karmann-Ghia rather than the proverbial handbasket!). Lots of writing and shooting still… I’m getting worried that I could just end up doing a W.Eugene Smith with his Pittsburg project…. Belco is too interesting to stop and I admit I have difficulties knowing when a project is done. My instinct – along with advice from others – is that I’m not there yet. I guess I’ll know when I get there? It’s all about the editing…. a photographer’s toughest challenge it seems…

On another note, my co-conspirator U.K Frederick and I have also put out a call to Australian women photographers to submit to a new initiative we have set up called Light Journeys. Our first submission date is March 8th (International Women’s Day) so if you are an Australian woman working in the field of photomedia please visit our temporary site for details by clicking on the banner below:

And spread the word, this project is about supporting each other, getting some of your work out there and promoting the amazing (often underrated) talent we have in Australia!

More exciting  news, I’ve been asked to exhibit some of my work in an upcoming group exhibition about family at the ACP in Sydney. This comes as a result of my recent portfolio review so definitely a worthwhile experience as you never know what opportunities can come out of being persistent. The show is scheduled for July and I’m currently going through images to see what might fit. The theme is an interesting one and it’s been a challenge to decide which way I want to interpret the idea of family, especially since Family is something I photograph a lot of, both in the term’s traditional sense but also in its various other social and cultural manifestations.

And finally, since every new year requires some sort of resolution, I resolve to be less frantic about my work and to enjoy every aspect of the process more (not that I already don’t but being more zen about it might help?). Since I’ve been out bush for the last 2 weeks – back to our favourite place in the world, Bristol Point – I am feeling refreshed and feel a little spring in my step…. now if only it would cool down a little…….

Below are a few still-lives that I have begun working on with fellow photographer Carolyn Young. We shot them large format and they make a refreshing change to portraiture. Interestingly the genre of still-life is a loaded one (more than I initially realised) but it’s an interesting one to explore nevertheless and I dare say we’ll continue with the project throughout the year.

Still Life II (in collaboration with Carolyn Young)

Still Life IV (in collaboration with Carolyn Young)

Love is 4 ever

My friend and fellow artist Ursula are planning to co-curate another show for next year, at the Foyer Gallery of the Canberra School of Art. The theme this time is lurrve. We are calling it Love is 4 ever: what’s love got to do with it? Here is a work-in-progress poster (these are cool fun to design!).

It’ll be good to curate without the restrictions we had for Suburban Zeitgeist. This time, we’ll be selecting the artists and it’ll be smaller. I’m looking very forward to it…. should keep me busy with everything else I have going! And now that I only have about a year to go, I guess I’ll be re-writing my sub-thesis as well somewhere in there (urgh…). My supervisor has very gently reminded me of a looming deadline which I really thought might go away but it hasn’t, and between the guilt (which remains like the proverbial albatross around my neck…. really you’d think I was Jewish or a Catholic with all that guilt!!), I figure I might as well bite the bullet and write the effing thing!

So no more procrastinating! But for anyone reading this, a parting treat before I hit the books – it’s Spring! Lots of very cute and fluffy baby animals…plus it’s all about love! Awh…..

Lily la pooch

Moto-Foto

Continuing my obsession with human endeavour and the way we arrange our domestic and social spaces, I’m finally looking at Motels. Well, I’ve already started but am looking to work collaboratively with my friend and fellow photographer U.K Frederick (whom I mentioned a few posts ago), who is writing her thesis about the car in popular culture.

We are due to photograph the Embassy Motel in Deakin, a Canberra icon which sadly will be knocked down to pave the way for, you guessed it, more ugly apartments. Prime real estate of course and in a fairly exclusive suburb, it still retains all the charms (and most importantly, dagginess) of yesteryear.

I’m actually excited about working creatively with another artist. I’ve generally avoided this in the past as I like to work alone, you know “in the zone dude”, but I have a hunch that this collaboration will be a fruitful one. We work along very similar themes but with completely different viewpoints which is all the more amazing since we actually have very similar aesthetics too. Plus we don’t shit each other. Can’t get better than that hey?

Anyway, will undoubtedly have some work to post from this venture over the next few weeks. Here’s a few teasers in the meantime:

Room 241

Motel parking lot

Motels are bizarre kinds of places and from my limited research to date, they come in all flavours, shapes and sizes. Misty Keasler did a nice series on Love Hotels in Japan and her compatriot, Alec Soth’s genial oeuvre on Niagara is also situated in forlorn and antiquated Canadian motels. There’s something kinda dirty about these love motels which is really attractive but I think kind of sad too because they seem to represent a forbidden space where the lonely or isolated share fleeting moments of intimacy that they don’t seem to find in their everyday lives. Only the furniture stays the same… and perhaps the routine staining of bedsheets…..

Love Hotel, Japan (courtesy Misty Keasler)

Fairway Motor Inn, 2005 (courtesy Alec Soth)

Now, I wonder if there are any no-tell motels around here?