The New York Museum of Modern Art’s New Photography ’05 features some dynamite recent work. My wife and I checked it out last Sunday following PhotoPlus East.
Robin Rhode brings a new spin to stop motion animations–literally. He sometimes works on vertical surfaces but other times rotates the scene 90 degrees, as in He Got Game (here’s a closer view of one frame) and Brick Flag.
We also enjoyed the work of Carlos Garaicoa, who explores structure, progress, and the lack thereof in his native Cuba. He combines 2D photography with extremely delicate 3D pin-and-thread overlays that outline the architectural vision, contrasted with what remains of it. For example, the uncompleted half of an abruptly halted circular apartment block hangs in space, carefully laid out in silver thread. I can’t find examples online (not that they’d do it justice, actually), so it’s well worth seeing in person.
Obligatory computer dork remark: These ethereal overlays struck me as uncannily similar to the grids one can create in Vanishing Point. And the process of drawing by combining pins and threads seemed like a literal interpretation of what people said about early vector-editing software.
One other bit: The Morning News has posted New York Changing, a gallery and interview with photographer Douglas Levere, who rephotographed Berenice Abbott’s pictures of 1930s New York. If you’re interested in the city, the site is well worth a look.