News! Exhibitions! ...& other stuff!
John M.Grzywacz-Gray HOME

Dan Winters has a gallery show opening at Fahey Klien Gallery in Los Angeles at the end of July. I am hoping that he will come out and speak to our classes.

Former Moorpark College Student Dan Winters has recently published his book: "Periodical Portraits"

http://www.aperture.org/periodical-photographs.html

Periodical Photographs, the long-awaited first monograph from top editorial photographer Dan Winters, provides an overview of his assignment work as a contributor to some of America’s most prestigious magazines, including New York, Esquire, Rolling Stone, and the New York Times Magazine.
With an emphasis on his iconic portraiture, this volume considers the body of work of a top photographer whose unique sensibility is both adaptable and instantly recognizable. Winters is responsible for the definitive portraits of some of Hollywood's most photographed A-listers (Gwyneth Paltrow, Denzel Washington, Leonardo DiCaprio) and music superstars (Bono, Eminem, Willie Nelson). His voracious passion for the quirky and the creative also draws him to visual artists, scientists, architects, and everyday, extraordinary Americans.

Designed by Scott Dadich, award-winning creative director of Wired magazine, Periodical Photographs showcases a photographer at the top of his game.DAN WINTERS (born in Ventura, California, 1962) lives in Austin and Los Angeles. He is the recipient of more than a hundred awards, including the Alfred Eisenstadt Award for Magazine Photography and a World Press Photo Award. His work is included in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Austin, Texas.
LYNN HIRSCHBERG (essay) is editor-at-large for the New York Times Magazine. She has written for Rolling Stone, New York, and Vanity Fair.

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Take the time to look at Drawing the Classical Figure at the Getty Museum while you are there.

The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) has a variety of interesting audio and video podcasts about art at this URL.

There are always questions about the Visual Journal required in my classes. Here are a few url's that deal with the Visual Journal.
http://www.mbellart.com/visual_journals.html
http://www.lunajaffe.com/conceiving/bookimages.htm
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0835607771/kaymarieporterfi

http://www.flickr.com/groups/visualjournal/

You can purchase materials online … we have an arrangement with Freestyle Photographic Supplies that will give you free shipping. Sure beats driving down to Hollywood. Go to: www.freestylephoto.biz/students.php enter magic code 22014 to receive free shipping … If you go to the store you will get a 5% discount from your order

You can purchase software at academic/student prices.

Dan Winters, we found the home in the hills of Beverly Hills that William Faulkner lived in.

I have more former MC students whose work I am sure you will find amazing. I have many fond memories of Dan, and the previous two former students featured, Matt Mahurin and Jeff Widener. One of the delights of teaching is the incredible talent one gets to meet and appreciate. Incidentally the first URL below, contains an interview with Dan that offers insight into his humanity as well as his approach to photography. The second URL is his personal work at the Jan Kesner Gallery in Los Angeles.
John

http://www.pdngallery.com/icons/winters/

http://www.jankesnergallery.com/jkgartists/winters-dan.html

What follows is from his Online PDN biography:
“Dan Winters has nabbed virtually every photo prize there is, from an Alfred Eisenstaedt award to a World Press Photo Honor in the Arts Category. He’s also shot for many major publications, including The New York Times Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Discover, Vibe, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and GQ. His commercial work includes shoots for clients like Nike, IBM, Microsoft, Sega, Warner Brothers, Paramount Studios, and Twentieth Century Fox, as well as packaging for recording artists on Major Record Labels.
Winters has been taking pictures since the age of 11 and studied photography at Junior College (and filmmaking in Germany). The native Californian was a staff photographer at a Daily newspaper in his hometown in Ventura County before relocating to New York City to work as an assistant for photographer Chris Callis, a move that kick-started his career. While he is best know for his intriguingly lit, often offbeat celebrity portraits-the list runs the personality gamut from Fred Rogers and the Dalai Lama to Tom Hanks, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Sandra Bullock-Winters has also developed other bodies of work on his own, including one on Los Angeles. A portion of these photos were featured in September 2002 at L.A.’s Jan Kesner Gallery in an exhibition entitled “La Ciudad.”
He is working on a book of his photographs from the past 23 years to be published this fall.”
-Kristina Feliciano

Matt Mahurin, Director of films and Music Videos, Illustrator, Photographer
Matt Mahurin who was a student of many Moorpark College Faculty has a
new film opening in New York City. I have seen the film and thought it
was a terrific documentary and very entertaining.
I would love to be in New York and sit in an audience to watch this
film with a group.

You can check out the website for more info:
http://www.ilikekillingflies.com/
http://www.cinemavillage.com/chc/cv/
http://www.cinemavillage.com/chc/cv/coming_soon.asp

New York Times review of the film
http://movies2.nytimes.com/2006/07/28/movies/28flie.html

By the way the illustration/poster for the movie is terrific.
He has a second film "Fear" scheduled to open this year.
A very interesting interview and examples of his print work is on the
tastes like chicken site below.

http://www.tlchicken.com/view_story.php?ARTid=3345

Jeff Widener photographer
Hi, I invite you to look at the outstanding work of Jeff Widener, Jeff
was a photojournalism student first at Pearce College and then at
Moorpark College in the 1980s … he was also a student of Warren King/s
in High School.

Jeff took a very famous photograph that opens his web site: The
Chinese student standing in Tiananmen Square during the uprising of
1989 … Jeff was working for Associated Press at the time and he is
currently working on a book about Hawaii … a different kind of book …
and is a staff photographer at a Honolulu newspaper.

www.jeffwidener.com

Prof. Frank Sardisco, well known painter and Professor of art at Moorpark College for 38 years died last week. A scholarship is being started in his name. Contributions can be made at the Moorpark College scholarship office.

Sketches of Poland Web Gallery ||| Multimedia Club Presentation

“Sketches of Poland" is an exhibition of photographs made by photography Prof. John Grzywacz-Gray that will open on March 13 in the Moorpark College Administration Building Gallery.

The public is invited to a reception on Tuesday March 21st at 1:30 pm in the Gallery.

At 4:00 pm on March 21 in Communications Building Room 109 Prof. Grzywacz-Gray will present at the Multimedia Club meeting some examples of the process that produced the prints and his approach to digital photography workflow.

“Sketches of Poland" is an exhibition of photographs made during the month of May 2004. The photographs are part of a sabbatical leave project.

This project really began over 60 years ago when I sat with my grandfather as he watered the lawn in a Chicago neighborhood just outside the south entrance of the Stockyards. The pilgrimage was necessary to fulfill the promise my grandfather made to me … that one day he would take me to Poland. He never did, but his promise was enough to motivate me to fulfill it with what available resources I could secure.
The photographs were made in Poland from Zakopane, in the Tatra Mountains of the South to the Hel Peninsula at the extreme north of the country. The images reflect the Polish landscape both rural and urban. The exhibition is called “Sketches of Poland,” because it is impossible to make a coherent photographic series about a complex country in the 30 days that I spent wandering. I could easily spend 30 days in any one of the cities of Poland and still feel that the work was incomplete. These images are most often about quiet moments. It is a revelation to how the Polish people have survived many centuries of occupation and division by their neighbors. In 1795 Poland was partitioned out of existence by Prussia, Austria and Russia. When recreated in 1918, they were plagued by the menace of the Soviet Union’s version of Communism and World War II with all the atrocities committed on it’s soil by the Nazis. As a result Poland is a very complex country seeking to find its place in a world filled with contradictions. There is the Catholic Church which was able to sustain many Polish citizens through the Soviet occupation and World War II and a tradition of Science most famously represented by the work of Nicholas Copernicus who constructed an observatory and discovered that it was the sun at the centre of the universe, not the earth as previously thought. He published his findings in 1543.

I have come to understand photography as one method that I can use to explore and understand the world that I live in. My work, at it’s best informs me intellectually, emotionally and spiritually about the places and subjects I photograph. It is for that dialogue that I made photographs in Poland and put them together for this exhibition.

These photographs also represent my first substantive investigation of digital photographic technology from the camera to the final print. The prints are inkjet prints made on Hahnemuhle rag paper with Epson K3 inks which provide an archival permanence of over 150 years when properly stored.

Without the support of the Ventura County Community College District, my colleagues, friends and family this exhibition would have been impossible. For all their help I will be forever grateful.
John Grzywacz-Gray

Sketches of Poland Web Gallery ||| Multimedia Club Presentation

For Paul Strand and Rembrandt text scroll down

In 1977 I was made aware of the power of Sommer's work by Emett Gowin whose work was changing direction under the influence of Sommer. There is NO reproduction media ... book, website, whatever that can capture the incredible beauty of a Sommer photograph. Frederick Sommer said, "Poetry is the quality of our acts and art is the evidence that survives." Sommer's evidence is incredibly beautiful and he represents a talent so rare that one can only fail in attempting to describe his genius. There are some prints of his that I have seen at Tuscon which I wish were included in this exhibition but there is plenty to think about.

One of the exciting characteristics of Sommer is his spirit of experimentation which shines with images made as a result of smoke on glass, paintings with hypo, aluminum foil drawings and cut paper. A favorite of mine that I have been showing to classes for many years is his photogram titled Paracelsus. Paracelsus (1493-1541) is often credited with being the inventor of modern medicine because he believed that both the body and the soul had to be treated. Sommer painted on cellophane and used the the painted cellophane as the negative. Sommer also photographed constructed objects which many find elusive. Sommer said "If I could find them in nature I would photograph them. I make them because through photography I have a knowledge of things that can't be found." Julian Cox said "His photographs are the embodiment of his love of ideas and repreent his consistent investigation into new ways to extend what he referred to as 'the margin of the unknown, which is much more friendly than we can know."

Cynthia Minet,
Moorpark College Art Professor has a successful exhibition at the Solway Jones Gallery.
The gallery is located at 5377 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA —323-937-7354.

From the Los Angeles Times review on Friday, April 22, 2005 by Holly Myers
"Minet's are fascinating objects: spindly, biomorphic creations resembling tangled vines, stems, pods and blossoms, fabricated from glossy, sherbert-colored vinyl and fuzzy, girlish fabrics. Bound up with zippers, snaps and crazy diagonal seams, they're bursting with erotic energy. ... The political undertone of the work is subtle but suggestive, encouraging viewers to consider the more sinister side of fashion and to explore the ramifications of our consumer appetities."

James Baker

Our own James Baker is part of an exhibition called "Facing the Music" which was featured in
the Los Angeles Times Calendar Section, Sunday - April 17, 2005. The exhibition was curated by Noted Photographer Allan Sekula.

Facing the Music ... ends May 29... contact www.redcat.org

REDCAT Gallery, 631 W. 2nd St., Los Angeles

Magdalena Poprawska in Krakow, Poland 2004

Polish Photographer Magdalena Poprowska is featured in an exhibition of pinhole camera photographs at Moorpark College through April 25. There will be a reception for the exhibition on Monday April 25th at 4:00 pm. All are invited. I arranged for this exhibition while I was in Poland as part of my Sabbatical.

Magdalena writes about her work.

"The camera obscura gives a primitive view on things not just through the magic of the most basic image, but also through its irregularity. It is this technique that comes closest to the bold sense of sight; sight, which gives a clear impression without any respect for perception and sense of pre-selection of a physical object that exists in the outside world. The spectre of an independent reality appears in the subsconscious and thus creates a picture in the mind of the artist."

Jerzy Olek from "Charm of Nonchalance" April 2002

"In the age of the media the eye is often assisted by various equipment. The camera predominates a an instrument for taking photographs or making films and vidos. But this is not a neutral situation. On the one hand such equipment enriches our ability to see, but what we see isn't independent and has lost its sense of innocense. Well, to some extent each tool filters out the "taking" view and influences the shape that an eye can see. The present shows that the problem of media still impresses many artists. Magdalena Poprawska is also interested in that area, but dealing with that trend she is perversely nonchalant. She does it through negation. The realizations by Magdalena Poprawska aren't photography in the strict sense, but they are technologically and notionally dependent on it. Although they cannot exist without photography as a visual phenomenon, they don't belong in the area linked to photography. The essential feature of such an attitude is it's being a photograph. But it is still conditioned by...photography owing its sense and existence to it."

BODY WORLDS Body Worlds closes January 23, Body Worlds 2 opens January 29.
The Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies
Learning from Real Human Specimens
Throughout the ages, scholars and students have been striving to better understand the
insides of our bodies through the exploration of real specimens. BODY WORLDS
connects with this tradition by presenting a new look at the human body.
The specimens in BODY WORLDS are real. The exhibition features more than
200 authentic human specimens, including entire bodies as well as individual
organs and transparent body slices. Through the process of Plastination, the body
specimens are preserved with special plastics that allow us to view the many
layers and many systems that lie beneath our skin.
The authentic specimens show details of disease, physiology and anatomy that
are not effectively conveyed on constructed models. Moreover, because models
are generic simplifications, the real specimens demonstrate how each of us has
unique features, even on the inside. It is because the specimens are real that we
connect with them so profoundly. They let us get close to ourselves, to examine
and to understand. Through the authenticity of the specimens on display, we
experience the wonder of the real human body and marvel at its elegance and
complexity.
Welcome to BODY WORLDS. Discover the mysteries under your skin.

Jan. 15 - March 12
"Invoking The Muse: Portraits by DONNA GRANATA"
Studio Channel Islands Art Center
Reception: Saturday, January 15, 4:00 - 6:00pm
Artist Talk: Saturday, February 5th, 4-6pm
Invoking the Muse: Portraits by Donna Granata features over ten years of portraiture from the photographer's Focus on the Masters Portrait Series. The exhibition at the Studio Channel Islands Art Center will run from January 15 through March 12. The public is invited to join the artist at an opening Artist Reception on Saturday, January 15, from 4 to 6 p.m. Artists selected for documentation are widely respected by their peers and have made a substantial contribution to the development of our cultural community. They all reside within Ventura County or have traveled to our community and influenced our artists. The exhibition will include many new works never seen before. In addition, a special In Memoriam will pay tribute to those artists who have passed away.
Each portrait strives to capture the essence of the artist through careful study of the individual and meticulous research of the artists' lives and their work. The exhibit demonstrates the wealth of artistic talent that surrounds the residents of Ventura County. The extensive exhibition of over 70 portraits is funded in partnership with Jordan & Sandra Laby, the Jessica & Stanley Prescott Trust, The Image Source, Titus Paul Framing, Peterson Graphics, Dr. Rick Gould, Gerd Koch & Carole Milton, Tom & Gerri McMillin and Norman & Michele Leavitt.
Donna Granata will participate in an Artist Talk on Saturday, February 5, from 4 to 6 p.m. when the artist will share with the audience the evolution of FOTM and talk about the images on display.

Dr. David Suzuki has a web site dedicated to understanding our eco systems and doing something about it. Dr. Suzuki is a Professor, Department of Zoology and is currently an Associate, Sustainable Development Research Institute University of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada. http://www.davidsuzuki.org/

Dorothea Lange and Horace Bristol Photographs are on exhibit through Nov. 28 at the Ventura County Museum of History & Art, 100 E. Main St., Ventura. http://www.venturamuseum.org

I just finished a wonderful book about courage in the face of death. The author, Irene Gut Opdyke was the grandmother of one of my beginning photography students. "In my hands" the memories of a
holocaust rescuer, by Irene Gut Opdyke and Jennifer Armstrong. It is a very fast read and the first hand account of what it was like in Poland during the war is informative. Irene was 16 when she started to assist Jews in Poland. Published by Anchor books. ISBN 0-385-772032-7

I am back from Poland and have dozens of images to work through. I spent 30 days and want to go back. I was just beginning to understand what I was doing when it was time to get on a Lot airliner and return home. I am back and have started printing work prints and will post some work to this web site soon. In the meantime have a good fall and winter

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to email me at: johngrzz@aol.com

Museum of Photographic Arts,
San Diego Balboa Park
619-238-7559

Museum of Contemporary Art
250 S. Grand Ave
Los Angeles, CA

Los Angeles Museum of Art
5905 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles
323 857-6000

Pasadena Museum of California Art
490 E. Union St.
Pasadena,
626-568-3665

November 11, 2003

Photojournalism Ethics
In defense of photographer Patrick Schneider and the fictions of a "Code of Ethics," by Pedro Myer.

If You Think Dodging and Burning is a Problem Now, Just Wait October 2003
by Dirck Halstead

Media Arts Festival
California State University, Channel Islands, will host the 13th annual CSU Media Arts Festival Nov. 14-16. For more information call Jack Reilly, professor of art, at 437-8863. The Festival is a fillm video and interactive media competition established in 1991 to showcase the best work of the students of the 23 campuses in the system.

"Impressions of Santa Paula"
is an exhibit of photographs made by last summers CyberSummer workshop. Includes the work of Ben Dent, Amani Fliers, John Grzywacz-Gray, Nancy Haberman, Kathy La Force, Marie Payette, Kim Ramseyer, Brenda Russett, Bob Silberling, Sueann Valentine and Janet Wall. The exhibit is at the Blanchard Community Library: Monday and Wednesday from 10 am to 8 pm., Tue3sday and Thursday from noon to 8 pm., Saturday from 10 am to 2 pm

The Michael Dawson Gallery
currently has an exhibition of Eadward Muybridge motion studies and landscapes 1872 - 1885. Phone: 323 469 2186, counts for a gallery visit.

Aperture Magazine
Issue 171 has a piece by Fred Ritchin that is worth reading. The Moorpark College Library has a fine collection in photography. Spends some time there.

Digital Photography Resources
Go to the Class links page and scroll down there are a number of good resources uynder digital photography.

August 20, 2003

Pictures of the Year ... the 60th .. best of photojournalism

August 20, 2003
Photo Essay on Child Labor in China
by Freelance photographer Chien-Min Chung. A very moving series of images.

August 20, 2003
Lab Class reinstated!

Starting on Friday, September 12 ... we are offering lab class from 6:00 pm until 10:50. If you are interested please Register into the section which should be on line in the next couple of days.

Don Bartletti ... Pulitzer Prize winner for Enrique's Journey will be speaking in the Physical Science building ... PS 110 on Monday August 11 at 9 am.

Former Moorpark College Student Dan Winters is featured on the Photo District News Web Site.

http://www.pdn-pix.com/

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March 26, 2003

Support our troops
Bring Them Home Now!

Must see exhibition

Bill Viola "The Passions"
Through April 27, 1903

http://www.gracecathedral.org/enrichment/forum/for_20021020.shtml forum with bill at Grace Cathedral

From the brochure: Since 1970s Bill Viola's videotapes and installations have dealt with themes of perception, memory, and self-awareness. Emotions are the subject of the Passions, a series Viola has made over the past three years. In these new video works he grapples with one of the oldest problems in art: how to convey the power and complexity of emotion by depicting the faces and bodies of models—specifically, in his works, of performers.

Viola immersed himself in the conventions of expression during a period of study at the Getty Research Institute in 1998. His encounters with older painting and theories of emotional expression — codified in the seventeenth century by the French painter Charles Le Brun —led him to the challenge of showing in-between states: transitions and ambiguous or mixed emotions.

The Quintet of the Astonished, commissioned by the National Gallery, London, was inspired by Hieronymus Bosch's painting of a quartet of executioners surrounding Christ. Viola put five actors in a compressed space and filmed them undergoing a range of emotions, each unrelated tot he others. Shot on high-speed film to permit the action to be slowed drastically, the video is an intense taableau of shifting expressions and what Viola calls "momentary constellations" —unplanned relationships between figures that come and go.

Begin the year by protesting the War On Iraq.
Stop the war on Iraq!!!
I am interested in seeing some sort of protest developing here at moorpark college ... call me at x1875 if you are interested in participating.

KPFK Radio is developing a virtual gallery on their web site and is looking for ARTISTS: New, independent visual artists of all disciplines who are Southern California residents are encouraged to submit their works for showing. Artist submissions are accepted in jpeg, gif, or tiff form, by email to gallery@kpfk.org, or by mailing photos or slides to KPFK ART GALLERY, 3729 Cahuenga Blvd. West, N. Hollywood, CA 91604. PLEASE NOTE: photos and slides submitted will not be returned. Please include name, contact information, and a brief (one to two paragraph) bio with submissions. Artists selected for a show will be notified by the curation committee.

http://www.latimes.com/news/specials/enrique/

Zone System info:
http://www.btzs.org/ ... this is a terrific site for those of you seriously interested in the zone system.
Phil Davis has taken the zone system a bit further than Ansel Adams in terms of taking a serious look at all the issues involved in correct exposure and beautiful prints.