Friday, December 7, 2012

Blue Paris

Blue Paris, Marc Olivier

Texture, texture, and more texture.
I put enough layers of texture over this that it began to remind me of those metallic Kleenex boxes with abstract patterns on them from the 1970s.
Anyway, I'm doing all kinds of crazy stuff about texture in my other life as an academic right now which is distracting me from photography. I'll try to merge some of it into my blog soon.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Sotheby's catalogue app


Until tonight I had no idea that Sotheby's had an app (turns out they have several). Since I am not in the income bracket to bid on art auctions as a hobby (unless you want to count ebay), I had never sought out Sotheby's. Herbert Bayer's "Lonely Metropolitan" 1932 (the eye/hand collage pictured above) is expected to sell for somewhere between $300,000-$500,000. It's part of an amazing photography collection by Henry Buhl grouped around the theme of hands. It's a drool-worthy collection that includes photography by Walker Evans, Robert Doisneau, Man Ray, Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Robert Frank, Irving Penn, John Baldessari, Richard Avedon, Helmut Newton, William Eggleston etc. etc. It would be difficult to overstate how amazing this collection is. And how to I know? Because I just downloaded the free app and looked at the free catalogue in all its glory on my iPad. After registering, submitting a pedigree demonstrating noble lineage (kidding), you can access  and download free catalogues such as "A Show of Hands," which is like getting free photo/art books. Most of the photos allowing zooming, and there are even short videos about some key pieces. I'm an instant fan and am thrilled that Sotheby's is willing to share this work with lowly Plebs who will not be getting a $600,000-$800,000 Jeff Wall photo in their stocking this Christmas.


update: If you want to see some of the collection in book form, your best bet is to get Speaking With Hands —a catalogue from the 2004 Guggenheim show of Buhl's collection. I snatched up a "very good" used hardcover about two minutes ago for around $20.