Laura D'Alessandro: How Could She?! With all This Poking and Pawing, How Can a Girl Stay Good?!

Laura D’Alessandro: Faded/Fated Fairytales

December 6, 2011 – January 7, 2012
Opening: Saturday, Dec 10, 5-8pm
Artists Talk: Wednesday, Dec 7, 6pm

Du Mois Gallery
4921 Freret
New Orleans, LA 70115
504-818-6032
Hours: Thurs-Sat 12-6 & by appt

Faded/Fated Fairytales is Laura D’Alessandro’s further exploration of the fairytale motif as embodied in her own self-reflective and intimately photographed dioramas.

She will present an artists talk at the gallery on Wednesday, Dec. 7, starting at 6:00pm.

Statement:
“Vision is, to me, a complicated phenomenon composed of multiple layers, altered under varied states. I incorporate layering in my images to evoke the layers of my internal and external experiences. The artist’s life, recorded through my journals and portraits, is essential to my work and includes much of what I incorporate to create my photographic constructions. I use these fragments, elements of collage, and found objects to create a miniature stage set, a movie still from a fictitious moment in time. By controlling lighting and perspective when I ultimately re-photograph my constructions, I can create a mood and direct the viewer’s gaze.

I have been exploring women’s issues with a partly lyrical, partly satirical approach. I have investigated the many influences, both positive and negative, which act to shape women’s beliefs, choices and appearance. My photographic constructions also reflect elements from my life and journals that are personal, and yet I hope that the viewer can also bring in some of his or her own experience.”

Delhi, LA by Natasha Sanchez

Natasha Sanchez: Nattie Concepts World Tour

December 7, 2011
Performance at 8pm

The Backroom at Buffa’s
1001 Esplanade Avenue
New Orleans, LA 70116
504-949-0038

This is a one-night performance of witty ditties and sharp photography that chronicles the Nattie Concepts World Tour through exotic locations including Algiers, Transylvania, and Delhi – all in Louisiana. Songs, stories, and photographs are blended together in this short performance piece to create musical snapshots of a truly universal world.

December 5- 11, 2010

This week long workshop with Andy Levin uses New Orleans as a venue for teaching photographers to develop visual ideas and creating a unique visual identity. The emphasis is on concept, and photographing within a narrow perspective, with daily editing sessions gradually developing a theme or story line. Photographers are encouraged to create a body of work suitable for presentation at the end of the week long class. The workshop is for photographers who are interesting in going beyond the single image, and have reasonable technical skills, and a portfolio is required.

Note: This 7 day workshop will involve daily editing sessions and close consultation in your choice of stories. Digital camera and laptop required. Students are responsible for travel, hotel, and meal expenses.

Tuition: $725
Workshop limited to 5 students.

Out of town students are encouraged to arrive day advance for a pre-workshop orientation and portfolio evaluation.

This workshop is administered by 100 Eyes Photography Workshops.  Register here.

Ellen by Jonathan Traviesa

Jonathan Traviesa Lecture

December 7, 2010
7:30pm

New Orleans Photo Alliance
1111 St. Mary Street
New Orleans, LA 70130

Jonathan Traviesa won the inaugural 2009 Michael P. Smith Fund for Documentary Photography (MPS Fund) grant for his series of environmental portraits, “New Portraits in New Orleans”. Traviesa is using the $5,000 grant to propel his portrait series in a new direction – to document the newest residents of New Orleans – ones that have helped rebuild and restructure the city in positive ways. Traviesa will speak about this new focus and show photographs made during the grant year. Traviesa writes:

“This project has reinvigorated my life and place in New Orleans. To find and document the various peoples and communities that are literally rebuilding the city, reshaping urban space, changing broken policy, and expanding the cultural fabric is overwhelming – in the best way. To talk with the folks who are actively making the new future recently begun in New Orleans is to witness the city change and grow before my eyes. And yet, New Orleans will always maintain its core identity. My photographs represent that through the stylistic platform of my larger project.”

The MPS Fund’s first juror, Jeff L. Rosenheim, Curator, Department of Photographs at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, selected Traviesa’s project. In his words: “Traviesa’s photographs delight the eye and thrill the heart. In addition, they reflect something often lost in contemporary art practice: patience and real communication between artist and sitter. In essence, Traviesa allows himself to be a medium through which he and the residents of New Orleans can express their desires, worries, thoughts, and dreams.”

BIO:
Jonathan Traviesa is a photographer and artist living in New Orleans since the late 1990s. He has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in New Orleans, Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York. In 2005, the Times Picayune named his Katrina photo-sign installation best art show the year. He has been teaching Photoshop at NOAFA since 2005 and is a founding member of The Front, an artist-run gallery founded in 2008.

Traviesa released his first book, “Portraits” with a concurrent exhibition at The Front during October and November of 2009. As part of PhotoNOLA, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art exhibited a selection of his portraits from the book. Traviesa was awarded the New Orleans Photo Alliance’s inaugural Michael P. Smith Grant in December 2009. His work is collected privately around the United States and publicly by the Ogden Museum and the New Orleans Museum of Art.

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The New Orleans Photo Alliance will begin accepting proposals this fall for the next grant cycle of the Michael P. Smith Fund. All required materials must be received between November 15, 2010 and January 20, 2011. For submission information and guidelines, please visit the Michael P. Smith Fund’s website here.

Into the Flatlands: Kathleen Robbins

December 7, 2010 – January 1, 2011
Opening: Saturday, Dec 11, 5-8pm
Artist Talk: Tuesday Dec 7, 6-7pm

Du Mois Gallery
4921 Freret Street
New Orleans, LA 70115
504-818-6032
Hours: Thur – Sat 11am-7pm

Statement: Into the Flatland explores familial obligation and our conflicted relationship with “home.” The photographs in this series were made during regular trips home to visit family over a period of five years. These are the people I love most in a place that I am deeply connected to. I chose to leave the Mississippi Delta for many of the same reasons anyone ever chooses to leave a rural area. This is land that my family has inhabited for generations, and I am pulled to this place in a way that I am not able to fully articulate. It is not my nostalgia alone that creates this longing; it is that of my mother and my mother’s mother.

On Tuesday Dec 7th, Kathleen Robbins will present an artist talk, “Into the Flatlands: Process and Imagery”. Light refreshments will be served at 5:30; talk with discussion to follow.

A Beginner’s Workshop on Photobook Publishing
with Melanie McWhorter

December 6 & 7, 2010

This two-day workshop covers the evolution of a photography book from its inception as an idea to a finished product.
Intended for photographers with little or no experience in publishing, A Beginner’s Workshop on Photobook Publishing is an interactive, dynamic workshop that enables participants to fine tune their ideas and become familiar with design, layout and essential publishing processes. When completed, participants will be able to make decisions about publishing their work and envision all of the steps involved in producing their project from start to finish.

Placed between two weekends of PhotoNOLA, the timing of this workshop is ideal for photographers interested in attending the many events and exhibitions that take place during New Orleans’ annual festival of photography.

Topics covered include researching and developing the concept for a book and the important decisions that must be made at each step along the way. For instance, how does one determine a target audience? What publisher is right for you and how do you approach them? Is it better to work with an established publisher, or is it better to self-publish in the bold new world of the digital book?

Melanie covers the basic components of financing, as well as the essentials of distribution ranging from such easily overlooked matters as storage, to the finer points of what is required to get the book on to the dealers’ shelves. This workshop is the perfect publishing overview for photographers of all levels.

Workshop participants have the option of attending PhotoNOLA Education Day: Focus on Publishing on Friday, December 3, at the International House Hotel. The event includes a presentation by Mary Virginia Swanson and a publishing industry panel discussion. There is no charge for participants of A Beginner’s Workshop on Photobook Publishing who wish to join this event.

Tuition: $395

This workshop is administered by New Orleans Photography Workshops.