Bill Perlmutter - Through a Soldier's Lens

Seltmann und Söhne publisher, Germany just released a new book with photographs by New York based photographer Bill Perlmutter.

Through a Soldier's Lens - Europe in the Fifties shows for the first time in a book, the work Bill Perlmutter made in the years 1954 - 1957 while he was in Europe as a soldier.

This private photographs were taken in Germany, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain and are a historical and photographic discovery introduced to the public 60 years later in this book.

In December 1954, the 27 year old soldier boarded a troop carrier to Germany, to start his assignment as a staff photographer for the U.S. Army Magazine.

The photographer’s view of war-torn Europe is direct and intuitive. Without much background knowledge and with a somewhat biased opinion primarily shaped by films he had watched, the young GI set out to start his coverage. In a discrete way, humans shape his images. With an open mind and obvious interest for his contemporaries, he witnesses a Europe, which is marked by visual reminders of a war that had been fought ten years before. 

Bill Perlmutter was born in New York on September 5, 1932. He began his career with a Bachelor of Arts in Motion Picture Techniques from the City College Film Institute in New York.

In 1954 after graduating from the United States Army Photography School, he spend two years in Europe as a staff photographer for the U.S. Army newspapers based in West Germany. Since then he traveled extensively all around the world as a free-lance photographer. From 1978-1997 he worked as the Vice President of Rainbow Chromes, a company specializing in photographic and digital retouching.

His images have been collected and exhibited by fine art galleries world-wide and are in the permanent collections of MoMA, The Whitney Museum of American Art, the Smithsonian and the Museum of the City of New York. Bill Perlmutter lives in New York.

"Through a Soldier's Lens - Europe in the Fifties". is published by Seltmann und Söhne

Work from Through a Soldier's Lens can be seen in an exhibition at Galerie Hilaneh von Kories in Hamburg, Germany till July 17, 2013.

 Bill, age 23, 1954

 French Post Card Seller, Paris, 1955

 Front, Side and Rear, Spain, 1956

Soccer Fan, Germany, 1955

G.I. Baby, Germany, 1955

Couple in a Café, Paris, 1955

 Hitler-look-a-like, Augsburg, 1955 

 Pages from the book

Pages from the book

© copyright all images Bill Perlmutter and Seltmann+Söhne

Two Way Lens and Joshua Lutz

Two Way Lens proudly presents Joshua Lutz.

I am happy and exited that I can add another outstanding photographer and artist to my project Two Way Lens.

Joshua Lutz is a New York based photographer working mainly with large format photography and video. His work can be described as tender, sad, poignant and being a triumph of storytelling.

His latest book Hesitating Beauty, published by Schilt Publishing, is a meditation on his relationship to his mother's mental illness.

He writes about the book:

Holding so tightly onto what I believed was sanity while consumed by fear of depression and schizophrenia prevented me from being fully present to her reality.

My aunt was over recently, and she was telling the story of how I was born in a time of lucidity and love between my parents, when there was a small break in the hysteria and confusion. It was so nice to be in that moment and imagine that sense of clarity in their life. Maybe this is the truth, maybe there was a period when the clouds parted. Maybe not. My dad tells a very different story, and my brothers’ experience is as radically opposing as can be.

Looking back on the family archive for clues to understanding, my role in shaping that story began to evolve from my memory of how it exists into an overwhelming need to change it. Falling deeper into the psychosis, I imagined a time when the past, present, and future collided; a place where the weight of those memories is heaver than reality.

For “Hesitating Beauty,” I wanted to embrace this idea and rest in that place of uncertainty. There is not a declarative bone in my body that knows where the truth lies when it comes to understanding my mother’s illness and its rippling effect on my family.

More of Joshua's work can be found on his website.

The interview with Two Way Lens can be found here.

 Dead End

 Day Pass

 Thread My Needle

 Potentially Grateful

 California

 Failed Attempt

 Devil, Devil

 Hold My Hand

 In Cold Spring

 On The Past And Present Future

Sunrise At St. Francis

© copyright all images Joshua Lutz, all rights reserved.

Two Way Lens and Julie Blackmon

Two Way Lens proudly presents Julie Blackmon.

I am happy that I can continue the interviews on Two Way Lens with another exceptional photographer and artist.

Julie Blackmon was born in Springfield, Missouri where she still lives with her husband and three children. Her work is inspired by her experience of growing up in a large family, her role as a mother and the timelessness of family dynamics. A big source of inspiration is her love for dutch and flemish genre paintings by artists like jan Steen and others.

Julie Blackmon's photographs are wonderful staged fantasies, perfectly composed with a painterly eye for color and tableau like arrangements.

Her work is represented by major galleries in America and Europe and included in many public and private collections worldwide.

More of Julie Blackmon's work can be found on her website.

Her interview with Two Way Lens can be found here.

 Homegrown Food

 Loading Zone

Patio


all images © copyright Julie Blackmon, all rights reserved.

Capricious Magazine No. 13 - WATER goes to Sweden

Capricious Magazine Issue 13 - WATER goes to Sweden.

THERE IS SOMETHING ABOUT HOW IT FLOWS is an event by Capricious Magazine dedicated to their WATER issue.

The event will take place on April 20 at the Platform, Färgkontoret, Lövholmsgränd 12, Stockholm, Sweden with readings, performance and the photographs of the artists who are included in the WATER Issue are getting projected in the gallery. I am very excited being a part of it.

More info can be found here: 

Close to Heaven

I am working on the edit of my new series called Close to Heaven.

When I was a child, my parents and I drove every summer to Austria for our two weeks of holidays. For me it was the happiest time of my life. I felt so great and full of life and joy in this landscape.

The mountains were the most amazing thing I have ever seen and climbing up a mountain was just like being in heaven for me. When the end of our two weeks came and we had to go back, I sat in the car and the only thing I wanted, was staying near my beloved mountains. The closer we came to Munich and the landscape got flatter I had to cry because I couldn't see any mountains anymore.

A couple of years ago, I went back to Austria and the feelings were still as strong and intense as in my childhood. With this series I want to keep my memories forever, my feelings of being "Close to Heaven"

© copyright all images Michael Werner

Crusade for Collecting

Crusade for Collecting is the newest project of Atlanta gallery owner Jennifer Schwartz 

The campaign will be kicking off a 10,000 mile road trip around America this month, stopping in major cities to set up curbside pop-up galleries featuring national and local photography.

These events are meant as a grassroots campaign to engage communities, introducing people to the artists working in their hometowns, and drawing attention to the need to support emerging artists.

The photographs on display will not be sold, but instead given away to those who connect with them, for many their first opportunity at owning original art.

Lady Blue, The Tour Bus


About the Tour
The campaign will be undertaken in “Lady Blue,” a 1977 VW bus funded through Kickstarter, who
will serve as mascot, transportation and exhibition space.
At each destination city, the bus will park in a busy public space and open for “business.” Meant to attract not only fans of the project, who can follow the tour and find locations through a variety of social media outlets, but also unknowing passers by.

This guerrilla style exhibition is meant to reach the core of the nation’s public, allowing for spontaneous and genuine reactions to the available work and engaging people outside the normal art world audience.

Crusade For Collecting recognizes the skilled work of artists. The gesture of giving away art for
free is meant to incite a payitforward response and encourage future collecting by recipients.

It is not a statement on the value of the available work, but rather an act of art awareness and empowerment.


About the Participating Artists
Art available will include work from The Ten, an earlier project developed by Schwartz as a
monthly curated online exhibit of limited release, fine art photography.

Artists include: Chloe Aftel, Tami Bone, David Bram, Laura Burlton, Elizabeth Fleming, Laura Griffin, Warren Harold, Kat Kiernan, Heidi Lender, Clay Lipsky, Sarah Moore, Ryan Nabulsi, Jeff Rich, and Aline Smithson, Lori Vrba.

This group of internationally collected and widely exhibited photographers represent a
range of work meant to capture attention and inspire artistic connection amongst the diversity of
the American public.

Additionally, To Be Announced local emerging artists of each participating city will be included in
the pop up gallery space, and often be onsite themselves, allowing The Crusade to introduce
locals to the art and artists homegrown in their own communities.

More Information, a list of the cities and even more can be found here:


Twitter: Jennifer Schwartz @Crusade4Art
Facebook: Crusade For Collecting
Instagram: crusade4art
YouTube: Crusade4Art
Website: Crusade for Art
Blog: Crusade for Collecting

Someone I Know - Michael Werner

Yesterday I did a blog post about Stuart Pilkington's latest project Someone I Know.

I am honoured to be included in this incredible collection, together with so many outstanding photographers.

Here is my contribution to the project:

Dad and Blinky Bill, 2013

© copyright Michael Werner