Designed by the architect Mario Botta, the Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio, which stands on the Campus in Mendrisio – Università della Svizzera italiana, is a place capable of receiving and engaging in dialogue with the products of creativity. This is also the case with photography, whether it’s the show WHAT MAD PURSUIT. Aglaia Konrad, Armin Linke, Bas Princen, characterized by exhibition choices that mutually shape the photos with the spaces designed by Mario Botta, or rather the images of the Swiss Architectural Award 2022. In short, until 22 October, the Architecture Theatre Mendrisio offers a double exhibition proposal.

WHAT MAD PURSUIT. Aglaia Konrad, Armin Linke, Bas Princen

The project analyzes the relationship between architecture and photography, and how the latter relates to the exhibition context, in a constant process of dialogue and negotiation. A selection of photographic works by Aglaia Konrad, Armin Linke and Bas Princen are on show, questioning the documentary function of photography, as a device that records and transforms reality at once, while contradicting its essence of a two-dimensional image by exploring its materiality.

Indeed, the images on display are conceived as objects, so retaining a relationship with both the space inside the frame and with the external space, too. Inspired by the essay of the same name by the British neuroscientist Francis Crick, the title of the show suggests the issues of intersections, combinations and confluences as a crucial element in the enhancement of a “system” as a whole, fostering exchange (multitude) over isolation (uniqueness).

In Shaping Stones, Aglaia Konrad combines buildings by well-known architects with anonymous works, linking them by the use of the same material and by a mode of representation (black and white photography). Armin Linke re-uses the pre-existing images in his archive and mixes them to create a new narrative that goes beyond the original context of production, challenging the notions of chronology, linearity and uniformity. Bas Princen photographs other representations, questioning what happens to them once they are duplicated and converted into two-dimensional images. In his work, these artworks undergo a process of interpretation, resulting in new and independent images, capable of disengaging from the original ones.

WHAT MAD PURSUIT. Aglaia Konrad, Armin Linke, Bas Princen, which aims to express the complexity of photography and its layered character, is curated by Francesco Zanot and promoted by the USI Academy of Architecture.

The Swiss Architectural Award 2022

The Auditorium of the Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio hosts the exhibition of the projects selected for the eighth edition of the Swiss Architectural Award. Selected by a jury chaired by Mario Botta, the project by the winner, Xu Tiantian, founder of DnA Design and Architecture (China), includes works that Tiantian describes as “acupuncture” interventions aiming to revitalize historic settlements or pieces of landscape. It also focuses on civic instances (as they intend to serve local communities) and the quality of the proposed architecture, with their “marked attention to the context, by a precise and poetic attitude at the same time, and by the blending of different scales and themes, between architecture and infrastructure, permanent and ephemeral, reuse and ex-novo intervention”.

The exhibition, curated by Marco Della Torre and Stefania Murer, shows the works of 26 candidates from 14 countries and, along with more technical parts, also an interesting photographic section. 

Paola Sammartano

WHAT MAD PURSUIT. Aglaia Konrad, Armin Linke, Bas Princen
April 7 – October 22, 2023
Swiss Architectural Award 2022
May 5 – October 22, 2023

Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio
Via Turconi 25
6850 Mendrisio
Switzerland
www.tam.usi.ch/en

The Mid-Atlantic Regional School of Professional Photography is a nationally recognized, nonprofit organization providing a quality educational environment to professional and aspiring photographers in all areas of photographic imaging.

Attendees of MARS 2023, held at the Hyatt Place in Dewey Beach, were able to advance their photography skills through the teachings of internationally recognized instructors. This knowledge helps photographers in attendance become more proficient and more creative, and acquire skills to help them be better business professionals.

This year, close to 100 people from 17 different states and Mexico received inspirational, hands-on training in the art of photography.

The school offers more scholarship money, raised through fundraising and benefactors, than any other event of its kind.

“We want to provide a learning experience where camaraderie and education go hand in hand. The friendly, casual atmosphere in a boutique setting, along with the shared knowledge of attendees, provides an inspirational journey for all,” said John Capone, Mid-Atlantic Regional School of Professional Photography executive director.

For more information, go to MARSschool.com.

OK, now that I have your attention, let’s get something out of the way: I’m not trashing your photography. I’m sure it’s all fantastic, and I sincerely hope you keep creating those amazing images. 

That said, chances are good that I don’t want to see any of it unless you’re one of a handful of photographers I actively follow. No offense. And, lest you think otherwise, I should say that the sentiment definitely applies to my own work, too – probably more than most, actually. The fact is, the vast majority of the relatively small number of people who will ever see any of my work, simply could not care less about it. And I’m perfectly ok with it. 

I wasn’t always a blissful inhabitant of the land of IDGAF, however. As a younger photographer, I fell into the same trap that many do, enamored at every snap of the shutter, wide-eyed and eager to share my incredible photos with anyone and everyone. Thankfully, I started on film in the 1990s, and the worst early evidence of my naivety is lost forever. Sadly, though, it took a while for me to learn, and my photographic delusions lasted well into my transition to digital. For a while, there wasn’t a forum, group, social media site or app that was safe from my incessant posts. My camera went everywhere with me, the world was my subject, and everything was photo-worthy. 

Or so I thought.

I took my first college-level photography class when I was a sophomore in an unremarkable community college program in a speck of a city in Oregon. It was a photojournalism course, and I remember being excited because I’d always heard that every photo should tell a story, and I was ready for the teacher and my classmates to see what an amazing storyteller I already was. We got our first assignment, and when it came time to share for group critique, my work landed with a resounding thud. My images weren’t great, everyone definitely did not love them, and it turned out I sucked at image storytelling. And the same was true for all of my classmates. Fortunately, the teacher took the opportunity to encourage us to keep going, even if we sucked and nobody cared.

As time went on, my photography began to improve, I started getting hired to do photography, and something incredible happened: people still didn’t care!

I remember my first front-page photo in the local newspaper. It was coverage of a stabbing and included all the drama we’re taught drives the news. I was over the moon, and of course, I went out and bought not one, but several copies of the paper that day. I got home and triumphantly plopped the papers down in front of my girlfriend at the time, announcing my arrival as a big deal photographer. She gave me a kind “cool,” then asked me how else my day had gone. Arrived, indeed!

A few years ago, Fstoppers’ own Lee Morris and Patrick Hall put out a fun little video where Lee played a prank that had Patrick and Mike Kelley critiquing some images, including a handful of cleverly unattributed images by Ansel Adams. They didn’t absolutely trash Ansel’s work, but they were pretty critical and seemed to assume the images were from an average amateur. I think it’s fair to say that Ansel Adams is one of the most celebrated names in photography and quite possibly the most known name in the history of the medium. But, as Lee’s experiment suggests, the work of Ansel Adams can be overshadowed by his celebrity. That is to say, when his name is removed from association, the work itself could easily get lost in the sea of images that came before and after. People stop caring.

The fact is, the world is saturated with images. Good images. Bad images. Mediocre images. Images in advertising, on social media, from our family and friends. Images are everywhere in today’s world, and they’re all vying for our ever-diminishing attention. We are all up to our eyeballs in images (pun intended). And honestly, very little of it matters. And of the minority that has any relevance whatsoever, an even smaller subset matters for more than a relatively brief moment. In an era when nearly every adult human on earth has a camera on them at all times, most images are ubiquitous, temporary and meaningless.

The above image is of the Norhtwestern National Life building in downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was designed by the famed architect, Minoru Yamasaki, who also designed the former Twin Towers buildings in New York. While not a tourist attraction per se, among architecture enthusiasts, it is considered one Minneapolis’ architectural gems.

I had moved to the area in early 2020, just in time for the pandemic. Then, following the civil unrest after the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police, the city all but completely shut down. Long story short, I found myself with an abundance of time to explore the city on long walks, and on one of those walks I happened to notice the reflection of the building in its adjoining pool. I investigated a little further, seeing that the pool perfectly framed the building’s reflection when viewed from a specific position and angle, and ran home to get my gear. 

After I set up and got the frame I was looking for, I was blown away. I got my shot, and before I even broke down my gear, I started scouring the internet for the same shot, certain that I’d see it was popular. To my surprise, there were tons of images of the building, but none from the perspective I’d captured, framed in the way I framed the scene. Again, I was blown away and promptly began planning my new career as a famed architectural photographer. I got home, did my processing, then proceeded to upload my new magnum opus to every conceivable place I could find. And then… nothing. Crickets. No accolades, not even a smidgen of recognition among Minneapolis’ surprisingly large community of cityscape photographers. Nobody cared, even among fans of Yamasaki’s work. My career as an architectural photographer was over before it even started. I was devastated. 

Then, a friend who is also a photographer reminded of an important lesson: it doesn’t matter what others think or don’t think. If we’re lucky, we find something to do that we love and we just do it. Sometimes, we become part of a community of others who enjoy the same thing and that community can support us, but at the end of the day, it’s the love of the craft that drives us. That’s what drove Ansel Adams, not the celebrity (I think), and that’s what drives meaningful work as a whole.

A couple months later, that friend and I were out shooting cityscapes again, and I made the following shot kind of just as an aside, on a whim, handheld, and with a telephoto lens – things you are taught to never do in landscape photography. It’s turned out to be one of my most requested images for print, even though I don’t market it and don’t market myself as a landscape photographer.

For some inexplicable reason, this image found an audience. But, in the grand scheme of things, it still doesn’t really matter. Yeah, it’s cool, and the unconventional color grade and the way the late afternoon light and deep shadows play across the buildings are striking, but ultimately, it’s just an image of some buildings that’s nice to look at. And that’s okay, because it doesn’t have to be anything more than that.

Nobody cares about your photography. Nobody cares about my photography. People care about experiences, especially their own. 

When people request a print of the Foshay Tower image above, I usually ask them what it is about the image that appeals to them. Almost everyone answers that they had some kind of special experience associated with the building, like a memorable dinner in its attached popular steakhouse, or they got engaged overlooking the city on the tower’s observation deck. It’s always about a feeling and memory that the image evokes, not the image itself. So, while I look at that image and just see what could have been improved, some others see it and are transported back to a meaningful part of their life.

With the other image, as striking as I may think the perspective is, as unique as it is and as proud of the technical achievement it was at the time, it’s still just an image of a building. And, that building doesn’t have a popular steakhouse, or an observation deck. People don’t get engaged there. It’s just an office building, albeit one that looks cool. 

And that speaks to the true power of photography: the power to open the door to experiences both had, and to be had. The very best images either remind us or encourage us. They transport the viewers to the golden days they’ve already lived, or to the dreams of their future. Everything else is just noise.

Today, I work as a commercial photographer, and the bulk of the images I produce are for some form of marketing or advertising. And while conscious that we are quite literally adding to the above-mentioned noise, I and the creative professionals I work with actually work very hard to rise above the impersonal nature of advertising, and try to connect with people. We do it through cultural touchstones, through stories, through things people can relate to their own lives. It’s never about, “hey here’s a thing. Buy it.” And it’s definitely never about the photography, because nobody cares about photography.

Tando Allahyar, Pakistan

Champa Chanbeli, who trains others to make earthen stoves lifted off the floor, comes out from her flood-resistant hut at Sanjar Chang village. Architect Yasmeen Lari is helping to fortify Pakistan’s rural communities, who are living on the frontline of climate change. The few pilot settlements already constructed are credited with saving families from the worst of the catastrophic monsoon flooding that put a third of the country underwater last year

Photograph: Asif Hassan/AFP/Getty Images

“Honestly, it scares me, lol,” says photographer Joe Schmelzer to the Phoblographer in an interview when asked about AI Imagery. “But at the same time, I am thinking it could evolve into just another tool. When something NEW emerges as a way of ‘image making’ there always seems to be a rush, and then a fear that everything we used to know is going to go out the window.” He continues to state that this may or may not be true, but the same thoughts on how to create a successful visual will always apply. Of course, Joe, who has been shooting for many years now, hasn’t used AI before. And those images are currently being shown at Sunset House in LA.

Famed photographer Joe Schmelzer will be exhibiting five stunning new images from his personal project Life With Nick, in the exhibition In That Moment: Photographs From Then & Now at Sunset House, Los Angeles.

All images used with permission by Joe Schmelzer. Follow him on Instagram: @treasurbite & @joeschmelzer. Also, be sure to check out his website, Twitter, and Facebook page.

How Joe Schmelzer Started in Photography

“I have been interested in photography from a very young age,” Joe tells us. “I think I got my first camera at 10 years old. I went on to be photo editor of my high school yearbook, earn my BFA in photography from Rochester Institute of Technology.” After this, he moved to NYC to work for Mary Ellen Mark (among others), before moving to Los Angeles to earn an MFA at California Institute of the Arts.

His work would’ve been completely different has it not been for Mohammad Ali. In his childhood bedroom was a black and white portrait of Ali shot by photographer Yousuf Karsh. Joe’s father bought it as a “solid investment,” apparently. Staring at the photo in his room, Joe eventually got into photography. He shoots editorial, commercial, travel, and hospitality work amongst celebrity portraits. And now, his work is in Architectural Digest, Elle Decor, Vogue UK, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, amongst others.

“I’m not a huge gear and tech guy,” Joe tells us. “I don’t think the camera system is what makes a great photograph. You can make a wonderful image with an iPhone. It shouldn’t matter the gear to remember the composition and the moments that need to be captured.” He believes that the choices all depend on the job. And for those, Joe shoots on the Canon 5Ds, the Fujifilm GFX 100S, and the Fujifilm X100v.

The Creative Side

Lots of photography is about visuals. But with Joe, the work also involves things like hospitality and travel. That typically needs to be all-encompassing. Folks need to be able to smell the photos, so to speak. “I want people to not only know what something LOOKS like, but the image should give you a sense of what the moment FEELS like,” he tells us. In fact, when he’s out enjoying food or looking at this, he often thinks about conveying the experience of the food, the space, the people and the moment, to be able to tell the right story.

I think the question I get a lot, kind of sums this up:

How do you take the perfect sunset picture?

My answer is always the same. You don’t. You take the moment to enjoy the experience. You will never be able to capture it the way you remember it. But you can use the experience you gained by watching to tell the story you want to tell at some other point. You have to experience something to be able to tell the story.

Joe Schmelzer

On AI Imagery

Joe already shared a bit about his thoughts on AI earlier in this interview. He also loves the idea of maintaining humanity throughout the imagery. He likes to think about how someone uses a space, feels in a space, and the photographer themselves draws from the energy of the space to make their vision. “I hope we do not lose the idea of actually experiencing something,” he states. “These experiences give us the tools to create.”

The couple first met in the summer of 2016 after being set up by a mutual friend.

The civil unrest that erupted in Newark, New Jersey, over six days in July 1967 has come to be thought of as an uprising rather than a series of riots. The immediate cause was the arrest and beating in custody of a local cab driver, John William Smith, but the sustained outpouring of anger that followed was an expression of lifetimes of ill treatment of the city’s majority Black population at the hands of the police and the courts. At the height of the conflict, the national guard was called in to occupy the streets with tanks and troops. By the time peace was eventually imposed, 26 people were dead and hundreds severely injured.

Bud Lee was a young photographer on his first major assignment with Life magazine. He brought those events to the national conscience, in particular with a cover photograph of a 12-year-old boy, Joey Bass Jr, who was wounded by the round of gunfire that killed another man, Billy Furr, shot in the back by police for looting a six-pack of beer. Lee’s pictures opened up a nationwide debate about police violence. A new book, The War Is Here: Newark 1967, collects those images, many of them unpublished, and reinhabits not only the fear and the violence – but also, as in this image, the defiance of that bloody week in Newark history.

Bud Lee died in 2015. In an introductory essay to the new book, the journalist Chris Campion describes how the photographer always felt strangely implicated in the death of Furr and the shooting of Bass, whom he visited throughout his months of recovery in hospital. He was traumatised by the idea that Furr might have been provoked to steal the case of beer to impress the man with the camera. Lee won a prestigious national “photo story of the year” for his Newark pictures, but he subsequently moved away from frontline news photography into portraiture and teaching.

• The War Is Here: Newark 1967 is published 22 May by Ze Books