Charles Lane Press | News and Events

Deutschland meets Outerland

richard — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 19:11:20 +0000

Presumably, the portrait on page one of “Outerland” is the photographer herself: a young woman with brunette hair wearing a turquoise science fiction costume of the 1950s. Presumably it is also the photographer who appears in the following pictures again and again in a kind of white space suit: a scientist wandering through eerily empty landscapes, meticulously collecting the data of nowhere. Occasionally, she evokes the pensive, decorative figures of a Caspar David Friedrich painting, only there is no romance here. For the landscapes in the large, new photography book by Allison Davies invite the viewer not to quiet contemplation, but to terror. The photographer has found topographies of wasteland in Iceland and New Mexico, Chile, and Colorado… probably. There is no text in this book. No word on the artist. No information on the parts of the world in which she was traveling. The word “Maybe” shimmers like a watermark on every page. You might think a space probe had radioed the pictures to Earth, they seem so extraterrestrial. Sometimes narrow tracks pass through brown sand and black ash, as if from the tires of a robot vehicle.
The story Allison Davies tells us in Outerland is derived from those end-time allegories that have supplied modern American art with dramatic material for novels, movies, and ballads sad and cruel. It may well be a story fueled by fear of weapons of mass destruction after the terrorist attacks of September 11. Or a meditation on an impending climate catastrophe. But Outerland goes deeper. It asks the question: On the first day after the end of mankind, what will remain?
The chief motive for the journey in Davies’ new cycle of photographs is to seek what is coming. And so, despite subliminal feelings of forlornness, curiosity and wonder that suffuse Outerland, there is work to be done. Like the conquering expeditionary photographs of the nineteenth century, we are in alien terrain, free of history, culture and memories. In characteristic style, Davies keeps to spare, sober documentation of vistas bereft of pleasing composition. They do not invite the viewer to feel good. Rather, they espouse a delicate approach to these new lands, and a warning to scan them cautiously. It is indeed a double-bladed invitation. Though there is great danger here in this threatening and inhospitable wasteland – offering scarcely a sign or an omen for the traveler – it may be more fragile than it first appears. What Allison Davies has given us with Outerland is nothing less than an instruction manual for the care and handling of the universe.
by Freddy Langer, The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, July 1, 2010
Translation by Seth Boyd

Editing Chinese Sentiment

richard — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 06:25:42 +0000

Outerland on Conscientious

richard — Wed, 26 May 2010 04:35:52 +0000

Women in Photography

richard — Wed, 12 May 2010 03:31:08 +0000

Allison Davies work is featured on the WIP website this month. Check it out here.

James Danziger on Outerland

richard — Tue, 04 May 2010 05:09:35 +0000

“Some projects take their time. Allison Davies’ ‘Outerland’ is a body of work begun in 1998 when Davies was an MFA photo grad at Yale and which she has continued to work on ever since. It sees the world through the eyes of a solo planetary explorer in what appears to be a lonely but still sublime post-apocalyptic future. Part narrative, part landscape, it’s ‘The Little Prince’ for the 21st century – a wordless visual inquiry into the mysteries of life.

“Photographed all over the world, from Iceland to Argentina, the genesis of the series came from Davies’ fascination with movie locations and sci-fi films like ‘Planet of the Apes’ and ‘Logan’s Run’.

“12 years in the gestating, Davies’ photographs have finally been published by Charles Lane Press in a book that’s as spare and luminous as its subject. With a first edition of only 700, ‘Outerland’ is not only likely to be an instant collector’s item, but as volcanic ash filters its way through the atmosphere – a prescient look at the fragility of the planet.”

-James Danziger, The Year in Pictures

Fall River Boys in Philadelphia Weekly

richard — Tue, 04 May 2010 05:05:08 +0000

Richard Renaldi captivates with black-and-white photos of people on the edges of society.

By Roberta Fallon

The first thing you notice about the subjects of “Fall River Boys” is how vulnerable they seem. The young men of Fall River, Mass., depicted in Richard Renaldi’s black-and-white photos at Sol Mednick Gallery as part of this week’s Equality Forum, might be neighborhood thugs. But Thomas, Trevor, Kevin, Craig and the rest—with their baggy pants, bandanas, piercings and cigarettes—bare their souls for Renaldi and pose with no semblance of attitude or pretense.

Renaldi is an extraordinary street photographer. In a field known for speedy encounters, he embraces the slow-cooked approach, using an old-fashioned mahogany viewfinder. He prefers pricey 8-by-10 negatives (black and white at $4-$5 each; color at $8.50-$9 each) and the long exposure they require—and the exquisite detail they produce. With the camera on a tripod and a black cloth over his head to keep the light out, Renaldi at work in 2010 is a flash from the past, a 19th-century anomaly. At a time when almost everybody has a camera phone, Renaldi’s old-fashioned setup capitalizes on the lure of the dimly imagined past.

PW spoke with the artist last week about his unusually in-depth portraits and methods. The New York University photography grad is imbued with brazenness from his mother, who apparently would routinely approach total strangers and “talk their ear off.”

Young people today might be more likely to flip you the finger than let you take their picture. So how does Renaldi get them to pose for him? And how does he bond with them so that they let their guard down and unmask themselves so completely? “It’s a question photographers ask me all the time … how do you do it? It’s a great mystery,” he says.

Renaldi introduces himself to his subjects as a photographer working on a project. He sometimes brings one of his published books to show them and promises to send a print. Hopefully, this is enough to prove his intentions.

But even if they could convince the subjects to participate, not every photographer could get these soulful shots. Something about Renaldi’s geeky friendliness and his all-too-human fear of being rejected makes an empathetic connection between the subject and artist.

“Of course, I’m a little anxious. It’s like asking someone on a date,” he says, adding that he’s also anxious about setting up the shot, something he fusses with under the blanket to get right.

Renaldi’s works are political. He’s not photographing the nouveau riche or old-moneyed Main Liners. He seeks out those at the edges of society. Previous work mined the bus stations and rural byways of America and gay meeting places in New York. The “Fall River Boys,” citizens of a once-prosperous, now post-industrial city, celebrate these dead-end kids, who are icons of the downwardly mobile. Some of the most poignant “Fall River” shots involve two friends leaning on each other. In shots like these, body language turns metaphorical and touch is exquisitely felt. Jonathan leaning on the small but solid William, for example, is both literal and metaphorical as friends who need each other. Trevor’s awkwardly placed arm over small Thomas’ shoulder, likewise, connotes the sheltering support one has for the other.

Fall River Boys in Philadelphia

richard — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 05:54:05 +0000

Fall River Boys
April 9-May 2, 2010
Sol Mednick Gallery
The University of the Arts
320 South Broad Street
Philadelphia, PA 19102
Gallery hours:
Mon – Fri: 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Sat: 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Sun: 12-4 p.m.
215-717-6300

Outerland Case Sample

richard — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 18:24:23 +0000

Charles Lane

richard — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 02:52:16 +0000

A lot of people ask us why we are called Charles Lane Press, and the reason is simple: Charles Lane is the unique little New York City alley that I have lived on for the past 13 years.

This alley, in the Far West Village of Manhattan, was photographed in 1938 by Berenice Abbot, and though the buildings on the Lane have all been spruced up and tricked out in the past decades, the paving stones are still there and are some of the oldest paving stones in Manhattan.

The stones of Charles Lane were first laid after the Revolutionary War and is one of the only streets in lower Manhattan that was never paved over. If you are an urban archaeologist, you probably know that most of the paving stones in lower Manhattan are of the Belgian Block variety, laid in the 1800s. Well, Charles Lane’s are long, thin rectangles from the 1700s!

So if you’re ever in the Far West Village, check out our charming little street.

Fall River Boys reviewed in Library Journal

richard — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:09:20 +0000

In his second monograph (after Figure and Ground), Renaldi documents the lives of young men in the old textile town of Fall River, MA, not far from the Atlantic Ocean, over the course of nine years. In spring 2000, Renaldi made the first of many trips to Fall River and began a series of portraits of young men coming of age, symbolically within the shadows of a lost industrial landscape. As character studies and environmental portraits, the 89 fine black-and-white photographs offer a slice of life of a fading New England factory town. There is a touch of irony in the collection, which captures the hopefulness of youth within the context of decline. Award-winning novelist Michael Cunningham contributes a thoughtful introduction. VERDICT This impressive collection will appeal not only to fine-art photographers but to all serious photographers, from amateurs to photojournalists. It will also attract anyone interested in American popular culture and social history. Highly recommended.
Raymond Bial, First Light Photography, Urbana, IL