Photojournalism Now: Friday Round Up

September 12, 2014

Friday Round Up - 12th September, 2014

This week on Friday Round Up the festival season continues with Unseen Amsterdam Photo Fair opening next Thursday. Read Alison Stieven-Taylor's interview with Fair General Manager Sasha Stone about the new developments for 2014. Also this week new exhibitions for Melbourne and Sydney and the first exhibition in Australia of Don McCullin's work opens soon.

Fair:
Unseen Amsterdam

Last year while I was in Amsterdam, I interviewed Sasha Stone the General Manager of Unseen Amsterdam Photo Fair (pictured below). Now in its third year, Unseen is dedicated to showcasing new and emerging photographers alongside more established artists. With the emphasis on new and “unseen” works, this year more than 60 photographic artists will show work never before shown anywhere, including online.

Photography is a space that is constantly evolving. As a photography commentator, and scholar, I believe Unseen is one of the industry events that acts as a barometer for contemporary photography and as such, it is as much an example of what’s happening now, as it is a prediction of what’s to come...(Read the full interview under Feature Articles at the top of the blog).

Exhibitions: Melbourne

Robert Ashton – Into the Hollow Mountains
A Portrait of Fitzroy 1974

I saw this exhibition last week. There is something nostalgic about this series of photographs that make them more than just a record of the time. Perhaps it is the familiarity of this suburb; Fitzroy is an iconic inner Melbourne enclave and its rich history maps the migration of Melbourne – here blue-collar workers, indigenous Australians, migrants and artists converged. Yet there was still a sense of community within such diversity. People said hello on the streets or nodded their head in greeting. There was time to stop for a chat at the Milk Bar. Neighbours knew each other by name and if they didn't "mate" or "luv" sufficed. Pubs like the Builders Arms and Champion Hotel were local watering holes and there were always stories to be told.

There is one photograph that epitomises, for me, what Fitzroy was like back then; the Greek women sitting outside a house on kitchen chairs surveying the street (above). This image took me back to the days when I rented a house in the area. Even though it was the mid-80s, every afternoon I would see my elderly migrant neighbours out on the footpath with their chairs and radios. It always gave me a sense of being part of a village, rather than living as an addendum to a big city. They were the neighbourhood watch; nothing got past them. And they were always happy to give the "girlie" a toothless grin and offer me a seat or a pickled onion!

The ability to induce personal reactions, to make us think of times gone by, to wander the streets of inner Melbourne before there were mobile phones, gridlocked traffic, and gentrified homes, this is the power of Ashton’s images. “Into the Hollow Mountains” is a really wonderful exhibition, one that will resonate with all, regardless of whether you have personal knowledge of Fitzroy or not. For it is in the spirit of humanity that this story is told.

All images (C) Robert Ashton

Until 27 September
Colour Factory
409-429 Gore St 

Fitzroy

Tom Evangelidis – Façade

In contrast to Ashton's black and white images are Sydney photographer Tom Evangelidis' dramatic exhibition of large format photographs that features iconic architecture from some of the world’s most visually stunning cities including Prague. Hanoi, St Petersburg, Sofia, Istanbul and Havana.

Havana

St. Petersburg

Moscow

Shot over a ten-year period, Evangelidis says his large format photographs “are not romantic, stylised commercial representations of architecture but rather community streetscapes complete with the aberrations and flaws travel photography would typically avoid”.

There is also a beautiful high-end photography book of the same name available.

Until 27 September
Edmund Pearce Gallery
Level 2, Nicholas Building
37 Swanston Street
Melbourne

Exhibitions in Brief:

Melbourne: