AIPAD Show Marks the Passing of the Years

Julie Blackmon, American Gothic, 2008

Every year I tell myself, next year I am going to the AIPAD Show. Then I tell myself the same thing the next year. I guess New York City is just too far from Wisconsin to traverse the distance. Maybe it's just conceptual distance.

The AIPAD show—arguably the most important show of work as opposed to gear, in the U.S. certainly—is the important legacy of AIPAD's founding President emeritus Kathleen Ewing, who also played a big part in my own development as a savant and connoisseur: when I was naught but a ragged, penniless photo student, she patiently allowed me to peruse the stock of artist's portfolios at her gallery (with some of which I remember not only the images, but the order they were in in the boxes), which I repaid by helping out from time to time stuffing envelopes or doing other menial chores.

The Association of International Photography Art Dealers Show started today and runs through Sunday at the Park Avenue Armory at 67th Street, 643 Park Avenue, New York City. Tickets are $40 for run-of-show and $25 ($10 for students) daily.

Any set of AIPAD show highlights will necessarily fall woefully short of comprehensiveness, but any set of AIPAD highlights is better than none. Here's one.

Next year, I am going to the AIPAD Show.

Mike
(Thanks to Gabi Fitz)

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Featured Comment by Jeff: "Passing of the years, surely. I remember attending AIPAD when it was still held in D.C. during the early '90s. Had a chance to buy a pristine vintage print of Walker Evans' Main Street for $7000. Took a walk around the fair to decide, and when I returned 15 minutes later, it had a red dot on it (indicating sold). Easy six figures today. Yes, time has passed. The N.Y. shows have gotten better, in displays if not in prices (although works span various price points). The Armory Show (paintings, but also photographs) was always worth attending, too, but now they stagger AIPAD and the art show over two weeks. Usually, too, the Met, MOMA and many galleries in the area have some great exhibits. Best to plan a few days to avoid picture overload."

Mike replies: Tell me about it. I was probably at that same show, by the way. I think I went to all the ones in D.C. I remember the one where there were Koudelka prints (by Voja Mitrovic I'll bet! —although he went unnamed, to me at least, at the time) for sale for the first time...for $1,200 each. No, no slipped digit there. I, of course, thought "that's an awful lot of money for a photograph." Note to past self: no, no it wasn't, you idiot.

Featured Comment by Kerstin: "I can't believe that so far only one of the comments on this post have mentioned the Blackmon picture at the top. It puts me in mind of Charles Addams and I love it—especially the bird and the fellow holding the kid upside down. I went to Blackmon's website to check out her other stuff. I like the series on life (this is part of it), and the black-and-white work, not so much. I think this shot is the best of the lot. Thanks for the link."

Mike replies: A most painterly photographer—Julie Blackmon's work reminds me of more painters than I can put my finger on, from Bruegel the Elder to Magritte—and several photographers, a few of them still life photographers. And you're now the second person who's told me she doesn't care for the black-and-white work! I liked it. It's more...like photography.

Featured Comment by Ken Tanaka: "Ah, Julie Blackmon!  That's a wonderful image that I've not seen.

"Julie's story is interesting and may help many people appreciate her work. She sidelined a career as a commercial photographer to become a 'Mom' and keeper of the home and hearth. But after a few years, and a couple of kids, she became bored with her new, somewhat exurban/rural life. Her old Hasselblad called to her from a closet.

"So one day she began capturing scenes from her daily life, mostly of her children and husband around the house. She began to light the scenes and would then often 'bribe' her kids into playing in the frame while she snapped.

"She entered some of her initial work into a prominent competition and suddenly she was a hit with the art world. As you can see from her site, she's refined her work to a very identifiable style that's all her own. Her prints are generally large-ish but not overwhelmingly large, sized for the scene not the sale.

"I had the good fortune to meet Ms. Blackmon a few years ago when she was just taking off. She was about as far from being an art world character as you can get. She was rather shy and a person of short, concise answers at a showing of her work. Not at all unfriendly, just very very Midwestern (U.S.).

"Dennis, in the Comments, is understandably mistaken and has not looked closely at the piece shown. It is not 'conceptual'; it is domestic! Julie's imagery captures literally fantastic scenes from plain ol' domestic life. She might these days be staging the scenes but originally they were set like wild life photo traps.

"There are photographers whose relentless promotion and celebrity absolutely mystify me. But Julie Blackmon is not one of those. Her imagery is delightfully imaginative and technically superb. She's exactly the type of photographer I take great pleasure in seeing promoted and shown."

Comments

[Bill Rogers]

Go to NYC for a week. Gorge yourself. Your midwestern soul deserves it.

[Clayton Lofgren]

Can I go with you?

[Radiopaque]

My wife says that NYC is too far conceptually ( 196 mi) for me to drive to this weekend. I'll still try to convince her as I'd like to attend this show. If not, I'll go next year. If your looking to share expenses I'll share a room and buy you dinner...

[Doug C]

Mike,
Kathleen Ewing is a somewhat common name. Did she have a gallery in Washington DC or is this another Kathleen Ewing?
Doug C

[Mike Johnston]

Doug C,
One and the same....

Mike

[glennbrown]

I found a lovely Evans platinum print at this show for a very low price, Go........

[Dennis]

I've never heard of it. I won't be able to go this year, but if I remember will watch for it next year. The conceptual piece at the top didn't do anything for me, so I was surprised when I looked at the first few photos in the linked piece at how much I really like some of them. The first couple beach scenes are great; I like the cyan tones, the composition that break the rules ... I noticed that the horizon in the second isn't quite level (normally one of my peeves - and something I can see right away in a picture, but can't manage to sense in the viewfinder !) but actually *like* it that way ! And I also like the near-square pictures. (John's recent article on print sizes mentioned that artwork tends to be squarer).

[Steve Smith]

Every year I tell myself, next year I am going to the AIPAD Show. Then I tell myself the same thing the next year.

In 2003 myself and a couple of friends went to Samois in France for the Django Reinhardt guitar festival. We had been saying "... oh well, we can go next year" for the previous twenty years!

[Joe]

I enjoy AIPAD. I go every year. I see prints I never get to see anywhere else. I discover new artists I then follow. This year I lingered over huge Alec Soth prints at Weinstein Gallery, and studied a late print of Ansel Adams' "Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico." Lots of Michael Wolf, a couple Loretta Lux (whatever happened to her?), big Robert Bergmans at Yossi Milo, Bruce Wrighton (new to me!) at Laurence Miller. I wouldn't miss the show.

But I have to tell you, I've never spent more than two hours at the show, tops. The vast majority of the work doesn't interest me at all, and even the artists I seek out are represented by only a few pieces — that's the nature of showing work in a little booth. I'm also not one to spend a lot of time with any one piece — at any gallery or museum. Some people are — maybe you.

So come to NYC next year to catch the show, but if you're like me, you'll want to fill up your time here with lots of other activities. Which shouldn't be a problem.

[james]

This is the first year I am telling myself, next year I will go to this show. I wonder how long it will take before I actually do go??

[Peter Hovmand]

nice picture, but also a bit sad :)

[Stan B.]

If memory serves, I believe The Diane Arbus monograph sold for $12 and E100st for $15 back in the early '70s. I defintely remember not getting the latter and thinking... man, gotta draw the line somewhere!

[Chris Hensel]

Mike,

Fred Herzog had some prints up this year, I believe with The Laurence Miller Gallery. A couple thousand each. Great show all around. Would be interesting to learn how the galleries price these prints. "Vintage" seems to be the key, but some prints list the year the photo was made AND the year the print was made and some do not. Arbus' Identical Twins was listed at over 800,000.00.

[MJFerron]

It's a show I'll probably never get to see but I appreciate the heads up on Julie's work. Very enjoyable. Problem is $2600 to $8500 for a print? Folks are really paying this?

[Mike O'Donoghue]

Surreal. Looks like plenty "shopping" going on here. Is this still photography or "art"? This can't all be taken "around the house". All so two dimensional. Not sure I like it at all. Interesting, though.

[Dennis]

Thanks, Ken, for explaining Julie Blackmon's work. Your comment was enough to shift me from dismissing "Gothic" as "weird/conceptual" to going to her website to look around. And while it still sits a little outside my comfort zone (some photos more than others), with your comment in the back of my mind, I found her photographs more intriguing that I'd expected. I'm sure her photos are nice to look at printed large, but seeing many of them together was essential for me to start to appreciate them. It turns out, "Gothic" and a few others ("Boars Head") aside, some of my own personal favorite photos that I've taken are candids of scenes that she's idealizing. Again, thanks !

[dsr]

Just back from a weekend in NYC to see the AIPAD show. It's been two or three years since I've attended. Things change....

There was a good representation of classic/vintage work. There always is. Prices for this seem pretty stable.

The work of many modern photographers was noticeably absent. Only one gallery had Keith Carter. I saw only a single Sally Mann print at the entire show. I didn't see even one Michael Kenna anywhere. If I were to judge simply by the number of prints on the wall, the hottest photographer around right now is Maggie Taylor. Her work was EVERYWHERE!

There was LOTS of contemporary photography being shown. The trends, I think, are predictable. There were lots of big, bigger, and REALLY BIG prints being shown, with prices to match. Both color and B&W. Alec Soth led the way with some really huge prints from his recent "Broken Manual" show. The big prints, not surprisingly, are being sold in really small editions (like 3 or 5). But edition sizes have shrunk for all work. Typical editions are into single digits now.... with many prints being sold in editions of 5, 7 or 9.

And by the way.... digital prints are fully respectable now. "Archival digital prints" and "digital pigment prints" hung shamelessly next to the silver gelatin and platinum prints and commanded equivalent prices.

There were more manipulated prints being shown. Lots of Japanese photography. And there were several interesting but self-consciously "different" electronic/photographic installations.

And there were BOOKS! Three booksellers had space among the galleries this year, and nearly every gallery had standard/limited edition/and deluxe books for sale from the artists they represent as well. There were some artist books, but more commonly, beautifully printed books with prints included (I bought one). It is clear that books themselves are being produced and sold now as art objects.... I, for one, LOVE this trend.