Book Store Interview We Love Our Employees Book concept by Alejandro Cartagena Interview by Forrest Soper This week Forrest Soper sits down with Alejandro Cartagena to discuss his new publication, We Love Our Employees. At the beginning of the 20th century, one of Mexico's biggest beer companies was worried about the newly offered constitutional rights of workers to unionize. The company was worried about strikes and other labor troubles. In order to spot trouble makers, for years they secretly planted spies at workers' parties to listen to their conversations. This book contains the pictures of many of those parties.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

We Love Our Employees
Book concept by Alejandro Cartagena

Gato Negro Ediciones, Mexico City, 2019. 112 pp., 6¾x9¼".

The following interview took place at 5:00 PM EDT on April 29th, 2020 during a video call between Alejandro Cartagena and Forrest Soper. It has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Forrest Soper: Today I’m speaking with Alejandro Cartagena whose recent photobook, We Love Our Employees, was published by Gato Negro Ediciones in 2019. The book gathers a series of photographs taken by Alberto Flores Varela depicting the employees of the Cervecería Cuauhtémoc at company-sponsored work parties. Fearing worker strikes, the brewery hired informants, known as “Los Zopilotes”, to attend these events and report any suspicious individuals or conversations back to the company.

The first thing I wanted to ask was about the photographer himself. How did you first learn about Alberto Flores Varela’s work, specifically the images published in this book?

Alejandro Cartagena: We have to go back to how I got started in photography. I was a digitizer for five years in a state archive. Alberto Flores Varela’s whole archive is stored there. He had one of the most prolific portrait studios in Monterrey at the beginning of the 20th century. There’s a book where they talk about how maybe a third of the city passed through that studio, so its a massive commercial studio archive.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

In the first few years, I scanned one or two images of Alberto’s. Most of his work is portraiture. Two or three years into working at the archive, I had the original 5” x 7” negatives in my hands. I started scanning them, and I was fascinated. They were so well photographed. They were, of course, made with a large-format camera; he used two flashes to illuminate, as most were taken either at night or indoors; and the depth of field was pretty good. As a photographer, I was fascinated with the images — the compositions, the rhythm, the faces, and their expressions. I was like: “This is gold! This is photographic gold!”

That was my first introduction to Alberto Flores Varela and his work. He was a favorite of the companies here in Monterrey, and was assigned a lot of portrait work for Cuahtémoc y Famosa, the company [portrayed in this book.] He also worked for Vidriera, a company that makes the bottles for Coca-Cola and various beers; and a steel foundry called Fundidora, which was one of the biggest industries here in Monterrey at the beginning of the 20th century. He has images from all these companies, but [the party images] were the most consistent and repetitive of all the images I got to scan during my five years at the archive.

FS: And when you say “consistent and repetitive” is that in terms of aesthetics?

AC: Yeah, aesthetics and theme. It was the number of images that stuck with me. I saw these images for the first time in 2006 or 2007 and I couldn’t let go of them. Ten years later I was going through a situation with my family and didn’t want to travel that much. So, I went back to the archive and said: “Hey, can I look at all the images I had scanned?” The first group that stood out were the worker parties.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

FS: You talked briefly about Cuahtémoc y Famosa, an institution created by this brewery. The brewery was founded in 1890 and exists today as a subsidiary of Heineken. It’s my understanding that this brewery was very influential in the development of the city of Monterrey — the city you now live and work in. Can you talk about the history of the brewery in relation to the city?

AC: Monterrey has always been… maybe a myth? Maybe reality? But it’s an industrial city. The main industry has always been steel. One type of steel was invented here around the turning point of the 19th to the 20th century. Beer and Tobacco were other big industries and now we have the automotive industry. The plant that creates all of the Kia cars for the rest of Latin America is based out of Monterrey. We’re close to the US, just an hour and a half south of the border. The city has a very strategic location for commerce, as they’re able to supply things to the rest of Mexico and the US.

That created a situation for companies to grow, and grow fast. Cuahtémoc y Famosa was one of the mother companies that created models which other companies in Monterrey mimicked. One thing that Cuahtémoc y Famosa understood from the beginning — and this is something I’ve learned with the researcher Ximena Peredo, who wrote the intro for the book — was the idea of industrial paternalism. They were trying to find a way to get workers to be loyal. And loyalty comes through love.

So, how does [a company] show love to their workers? Let’s give them parties, let’s give them a house, let’s give them healthcare, let’s give them places for their kids to go to school.

They created a city within the company, that provided everything for their employees. They created a sense of loyalty from their employees, who were willing to do whatever it took for the company to profit and survive.

They made it through the Mexican Revolution, the great depression, the First and Second World Wars. They survived these situations with employees who remained loyal to their parent company. That model was duplicated, and that’s what it feels like in Monterey.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

In Mexico, we call [these employees] “Godinez.” I’ll send you a link so you kind of get an idea. The Godinez are a kind of worker who are willing to give up their lives, go to work 9 to 5, and not complain about their company. For me, as well as Ximena, it all comes from Cuahtémoc y Famosa’s strategies on how to control employees through industrial paternalism.

One thing that scared Cuahtémoc y Famosa, were new laws in the Mexican constitution which allowed people to unionize. In response, they invented what is now a common practice — “White Unions.” White unions are unions from within the company, created with a board run by the company. You are unionized — because it’s your legal right — but you can’t really complain about anything. You can’t strike. You can tell them “oh you know… this is happening, or that is happening”, but there is no fighting between the union and the company — they are one. They exist only to fill the gap of legality.

FS: When I was reading about these white unions or “Sindicato Blancos,” I read that in Mexico, they were primarily regional within the city of Monterrey and didn’t really expand throughout the rest of the country. Was that just because Monterrey was such a large industrial center?

AC: The Cuahtémoc y Famosa model permeated throughout the city. In Monterrey, people are faithful to their company. It’s very strange. I’m not an expert on this topic, but when you talk to people who live here they praise their companies… it’s weird. It’s a strange breed of people. There’s a lot of work, so people want to come to Monterrey for work. The stereotype is that people from Monterrey are hard workers — that’s the theme of the city. Is this true? Is it not? I don’t know. But it is the stereotype. There is a huge industry here and it’s always thriving — even in the midst of this pandemic, Monterrey is still holding up.

FS: Although I did hear that the brewery stopped operations because of the pandemic. Is that true?

AC: Yeah! They stopped operations. There is no beer in Monterrey. I drink a lot of beer and my ex-wife drinks a lot of beer… But a week and a half ago, there was no more beer. So, now we’ve been hitting the Mezcal hard.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

FS: *Laughs* Back to the book… The company founded its white union in 1931, and most of the images in the book were taken in the 1940s. From the essay, I learned that they were originally published in a magazine called Trabajo y Ahorro or Work and Savings. Were you ever able to see the original publication? What can you tell me about that?

AC: I haven’t seen the publication. It was Ximena who found that. She, and the researcher she was working with, have the copies of the magazine. But these were internal magazines. It was propaganda for their paternalistic strategy. It was the beginning of their “Employee of the Month” strategy. People who were doing a good job were published in stories about how they got their house, new babies, etc. It was like: “Hey, Look! We care for our people. Here they are. Here’s an example of how we’re taking care of you.” It was pure industrial propaganda for the company.

FS: That’s one of the things that drew me into this work. The company sponsored, paid for, and promoted these images. But now the same photographs appear disconcerting. Rather than portraying a utopian ideal, the images seem dystopian. The people are tense and have a sense of unease. No one is smiling. The fact that the meaning we get from photographs can change throughout time is something I felt this book demonstrated better than most publications.

AC: That is what is fascinating about this work! This book is going to be part of a six-book series called Love and Politics. Because of the coronavirus (etc.), we’re spacing them out a little bit more [than we had originally planned], but we’ll hopefully have one more by the end of this year. It starts with the idea of the archive:

Who deems what needs to be archived and not? Why were these images thought important to be archived? What do they really mean? What do they really show?

These images are being archived because they belong to a photographer who is an emblem of the city. But once you read into them, it’s not as nice as history puts it. There is this underlying meaning of what the images really mean — or meant. That’s the fascination I have with archives. They’re like a double-edged sword — they can hit you by being amazingly beautiful, but then, they can tell you horrible stories underneath that beauty. Archives have that power.

There’s one image that started my whole fascination with archives. It led to me accept the idea that I could be an author, not only through image-making, but through editing, sequencing, and re-thinking images. It’s an image taken by Guillermo Kahlo, Frida Kahlo’s father. He was an amazing photographer from the 20th century. He was one of the photographers favored by the dictator Porfirio Díaz before the revolution. Porfirio Díaz commissioned him and Eugenio Espino Barros, another photographer from Monterrey to travel all over Mexico and photograph Mexico’s progress. They created this beautiful book 100 Years of Independence from Spain.

Excursionistas de la Reunión Panamericana en el Puente de Metlac, Guillermo Kahlo. 

One of the images from the book (Excursionistas de la Reunión Panamericana en el Puente de Metlac) is of a group of people. It’s almost like an Ansel Adams photo of a canyon. In the middle of this canyon, there is a railroad on a bridge. It’s maybe 80 meters high? It looks like a marvel of engineering from the beginning of the 20th century. In the middle of the picture, there’s a train parked on the tracks and every single passenger of the train is standing out on the train tracks. These people are risking their lives because the dictator, Porfirio Díaz, wanted a photograph.

That image sparked the whole idea of how archives can be re-read. This image is supposedly showing how Mexico is progressing into the 20th century, but, in reality, it’s an image of power — of despotic power over people. People are risking their lives because one person thought it was a good idea. Photographs ask us not to be naïve, but photography has gotten beneath our skin. We don’t ask questions, even when they are shouting: “Ask me! Ask me what am I about!”

That’s my new flavor for authorship — looking at images and finding ideas that are there but, that we haven’t paid attention to in the past.

FS: In publishing works of vernacular photographs though the six-part series that you mentioned, I was wondering if you could talk about what it was like working with Gato Negro Ediciones? I know you did another book with them called Enrique which also featured vernacular photographs. I don’t want you to reveal too much information about the series before it’s ready... But what can people look forward to?

AC: Gato Negro is one of the most fun publishers out there. Fun in the sense that they want something that hits hard, is political, and has a new social understanding of the world we live in. They’re very critical, but in a way that feels light. You want to see the work. You want to read what they’re publishing.

I had been talking with León Muñoz Santini, the owner and editor in chief, about publishing together for around three years. We first did Enrique: A Presidential Guide to Selfies, which is about our ex-president Enrique Peña Nieto. We Love Our Employees had been in the works and we were like: “OK, maybe it’s time for the six books -- maybe not.” And then he was like: “OK, let’s do it!”

We Love Our Employees is now nearly sold out. We’re going to do a second edition with all new images.

The rest of the series is all about what is [deserving of being] archived. What has value, questioning that value, and making a critical assessment of why those images exist and what they really mean. I’ll tell you the titles. Music for the Masses, Our Leader, Our Parks, and Rituals of Love. These books all relate to politicians — how to be a politician, what politicians do, and questioning what images of politicians are doing in a photography archive. The other book is called The Supervisors.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

FS: I was hoping we could talk about the design. The book came enclosed in this bright pink dust jacket, or wrapping. It shows a picture by Alberto Flores Varela from which you’ve cut out all the individuals. I know you’ve been using that motif, cutting figures out of photographs, recently in your work. Could you talk a little bit about that, and also the design choice with the bright pink.

AC: The cover (or dust jacket, or wrapping) is a work of mine. I’ve been buying archives. After working in the archives, I wanted my own images. I started buying old photographs from dumpsters and flea markets in Mexico City. One of these images was made by Alberto and was from these parties. I cut it out for a series of images called Groups. The book wasn’t even published when I started that work, but I later remembered the image and decided to photocopy it on a bright pink paper that mimics the same pink within the book.

The bright pink is Risography. The Riso-printer does these funky colors. León is a master of combing colors and design, so he was the one that proposed it. I was like: “Yes! Of course!” That’s the fun of working with people whose publications you really like.

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

FS: I’ve been reading and re-reading this book often, now that we are in lockdown, and It’s become particularly poignant now that workers across the globe are experiencing new tensions with their employers and governments. I wanted to ask, how have you been spending your time during quarantine?

AC: You mentioned how these images have suddenly become so poignant. This is part of our world — this is an anticipation of what is happening right now. It’s art talking about how we need to think, or re-think, our world.

I just read a piece in the New York Times about liability issues. How companies are screaming: “Are we going to have liabilities? Are our employees going to be suing us If they get sick at work?” The lobbyists are trying to create a loophole where people can’t sue if they get sick. And the unions are saying: “No you can’t do that because that’s going to open up a whole can of worms, and make for really bad work environments.” Employers, employees, the government, unions are all clashing together. That’s all in this book.

It’s questioning “how we can make everybody win?”… But especially “how can we make the companies win?” In the end, they’re the mothership. They need to come out on top. It’s very interesting how the book kind of talks about that while referencing our current situation.

Anyways…

Quarantine has been very strange for me. As a photographer and an artist, I spend a lot of time in my studio and at home, so it’s very similar to my normal life. I think what has affected me the most is the lack of a sense of urgency.

I might have a solo exhibition coming up in August... But I don’t know yet. I’m working on a book with The Velvet Cell that was supposed to be published a month ago and then, be presented at Arles, which is now canceled. So, those sensations of “If I do it, or I don’t, it doesn’t matter.” That is, I think, the most difficult thing as an artist. I don’t have a boss, so I’m my own boss and my own demon.

But when I find my flow, I get into it. I’ve been in my flow for the past four days and I work until 1, 2, or 3 in the morning. I’m almost done with the book for Velvet Cell. I finished the third part of the trilogy with Skinnerboox, the Santa Barbara books, that will hopefully come out this year. I’m also working on the other five books for this series of Love and Politics. So, I have a lot of work that has me sitting in a chair — working on books, looking at my archive, and looking at my photographs.

Next year, if things pick up, there are already three or four books aligned for work that I did six, seven, or eight years ago that has matured. I’m seeing them with new eyes. I’m like: “That has to be a book.” So, that’s what I’ve been doing, but at the same time, that’s what I’ve been doing for the past two years. Trying to be the most that I can in the studio, looking at work, re-thinking it, and finding a way to make a book or an exhibition. It’s exciting and it’s not at the same time. Who knows?

We Love Our Employees. By Alejandro Cartagena.

FS: I think we’re almost out of time, but before we go, I wanted to ask: Is there anything else you wanted to let the readers know about? Do you have any parting words of wisdom?

AC: Stay at home if you can. Be Safe. I don’t know, that’s a really difficult question. That’s the most difficult question of all.

Stay excited. Find things that excite you. I just subscribed to this subscription site by Jeffrey Ladd. He has access to an archive of art books from an amazing collection, and he’s posting these rare art and photography books on his website. I have found the most amazing things there lately. I’m reading that.

I try to not force things. Sometimes I’m here in my studio, and I’m staring at InDesign and I just can’t do anything with a book. So I watched a video of how to story-tell, how to screen write, and now I’ve become fascinated with screenwriting.

Instead of feeling frustrated with not being able to do something, I just do something easy and enjoy it. Quarantine has been really hard for a lot of people. It’s not an easy situation. Try to enjoy it and try to be calm.

Order We Love Our Employees here

Alejandro Cartagena is an editor and a self-publisher. His books examine social, urban, and environmental issues in the Americas. Alejandro lives and works in Monterrey, Mexico.
www.alejandrocartagena.com

Forrest Soper is an artist and photographer currently based out of Rochester, New York. A graduate student at the George Eastman Museum and The University of Rochester, Forrest has worked as the editor of photo-eye Blog and as a photochemical lab technician at Bostick & Sullivan.
www.forrestsoper.com

Book Of The Week Errors of Possession Photographs by Garrett Grove Reviewed by Forrest Soper "In many ways, I believe that Errors of Possession will only become more relevant as time passes. In a book about the belief and pursuit of dreams, I see my country reflected, and like my relationship with my country, I have a complicated relationship with this book. It brings me hope and awe; uncertainty and fear; tension and calmness; confusion and ultimately understanding." —Forrest Soper

Errors of Possession. By Garrett Grove.

Errors of Possession
Photographs by Garrett Grove

Trespasser, USA, 2019. In English.
104 pp., 29 b&w and 28 color plates, 8¼x10¼".

Garrett Grove’s first publication, Errors of Possession, is an exploration into the rural landscape of the Pacific Northwest. Shot between 2015 and 2017, the book uses the events surrounding the 2016 presidential election as a backdrop for its poetic narrative.

Despite revolving around this polarizing event, Errors of Possession is far from being politically charged. There are no photographs of politicians or political advertisements. Not a single candidate is mentioned or referenced. Instead, the book acts as an incredibly intimate portrait of a society during a time of change.

The tone of the book is set with an image of a utility pole printed on the book jacket. The wood has worn away and many components are left hanging precariously to the electrical wires. Underneath the jacket, the image of an enigmatic and desolate landscape is printed on a metallic foiled cover. Throughout the book, similarly mysterious and perplexing images fill the pages. A man closes his eyes, surrounded by a sea of potatoes. A parrot perches on an inverted globe. A cowboy hat seems to be levitating above the trees as snow falls.

Errors of Possession. By Garrett Grove.

By seamlessly blending black-and-white and color images, Grove’s images create a haunting portrait of a changing landscape and its inhabitants. Rather than creating a straightforward or journalistic document, Grove chose to inform his photographic narrative with poetic ambiguity. Aside from a remarkable page of prose written by Travis Klunick, the book is devoid of text. The images are suspended in time as we are given a chance to reflect on this pivotal moment in American history. Layered in complexity and emotion, Errors or Possession is simultaneously illuminating and mysterious.

Errors of Possession. By Garrett Grove.

Errors of Possession is one of the most honest portraits of contemporary America that I have ever encountered. Rooted in the hardships of blue-collar life, the book is a commentary on faith, change, and perseverance. In facing tribulations, our country has suffered, yet many still believe in—and are searching for—the American Dream.

After working tirelessly while seeing little fruits of our labor, many have become desperate. We chase any opportunity for a better life. We yearn for relief and we are desperate to find calm. America is dignified and hardworking, yet growing weary and tired. We look for change. We turn to the uncertain future, hoping it will bring brighter days. A decision is made. We watch with bated breath as we witness the consequences. We carry on. Time moves forward.

Errors of Possession. By Garrett Grove.

In many ways, I believe that Errors of Possession will only become more relevant as time passes. In a book about the belief and pursuit of dreams, I see my country reflected, and like my relationship with my country, I have a complicated relationship with this book. It brings me hope and awe; uncertainty and fear; tension and calmness; confusion and ultimately understanding. It is a book about change in the landscape, in our lives, and in our society.

Errors of Possession is a book that I have been returning to constantly for weeks, yet I still feel it has more to offer.

Order your copy

Read More Book Reviews

Errors of Possession. By Garrett Grove.

 

Forrest Soper is an artist and photographer currently based out of Rochester, New York. A graduate student at the George Eastman Museum and The University of Rochester, Forrest has worked as the editor of photo-eye Blog and as a photochemical lab technician at Bostick & Sullivan. forrestsoper.com

Book Store Interview Empty New York Photographs and Text by Duane Michals Interview by Forrest Soper Beautifully realised and now achingly nostalgic, the photographs in Empty New York show us the city frozen in time, just as Eugène Atget, one of Michals’ heroes, commemorated Paris in the early years of the twentieth century. As much social history as photographic reportage, Duane Michals’ pictorial poem reminds us with every frame how he has earned his place among the greats of American photography.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

Empty New York
Photographs and Text by Duane Michals

Enitharmon Press, London, UK, 2018.
In English. 224 pp., 12x13x1¼".

The following interview took place at 12:00 PM EST on June 25th, 2019 during a phone conversation between Duane Michals and Forrest Soper. It has been edited for clarity and brevity.


Forrest Soper: I’m speaking today with Duane Michals whose most recent book Empty New York, was published in 2018. It contains over two hundred duotone images of New York City made in the 1960s. As the title suggests, most of these images lack human presence creating an empty portrait of the city that is seldom seen.

The first question that I wanted to ask you is: This body of work was one of the earliest photographic series you made. You were in your early thirties, and you had only really been working with photography for around six years. Do you recall what first inspired you to take photographs of the city in this way?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
Duane Michals: I fell in love with Atget. Don’t forget, that was a long time ago and Atget wasn’t well known at all. And every now and then I would run into one of his pictures of empty Paris, and I was just thrilled! And then I saw this wonderful documentary by a photographer named Becker called Atget (Harold Becker, Eugène Atget, 1964) It was stunning, mesmerizing, and almost like walking through a dream of Paris in 1901 or something… whatever the date. So, I decided to do an exercise on New York in the same way. I began to get up early Sunday mornings and just walk around the streets. If you photographed a bodega with one person in it, you looked at the person…and I was just looking at the environment.

I knew that wasn’t what I would be doing in my life, but it was an exercise. I did it for, I don’t know for how long… and I published a few of them. But eventually, it led me to do stories because these different places looked like stage sets, and then I thought well, if they’re stage sets, then I could ‘people them’ and make my own drama. The question was: 'how do I do that?' And the second question: 'what is my drama?'

FS: And when you first saw Atget’s work, what was it specifically about his images that captivated and inspired you?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
DM: It was the emptiness. It was like the city had been abandoned. It was usually dramatic because, in New York, we are used to traffic and cars honking and people running against the light and cellphones. And suddenly there was a beautiful, beautiful corner and it forced me to look at the corner itself. And of course, time is on the side of photography, and these photographs which were done in the 60’s it’s already a long time… '64 I believe, look how long ago that is already and they have a dated quality.

It’s like looking at old Times Square — which by today’s standards looks like downtown Peoria, Illinois — and looking at Penn Station which was stunningly beautiful. It’s a record of Penn Station. These places, they have their own existence. The city exists without us. We could all die, and the city would still be here... unless we blow it up. And it’s just quite magical. It’s theater. Of course, our lives are theater. Right now, this conversation is a little bit of theater — way, way, way off Broadway I might add — but never the less, theater and that’s what it’s about. It’s about theatricality, history, drama, and the empty street.

And every now and then you might see somebody, and there’s something kind of … they all look like ghosts. And these photographs look like ghosts too. It doesn’t exist in the same way… the way we won’t. I’m 87 and I’m not going to be around… [in] my family everybody goes at 85, 86, 87, so I’m at the cusp of ‘not being.’ I call it ‘not being,’ I think death is such a nasty word. So, I will not be. Anyway, that’s it. I’m dead.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: It’s interesting. Before I started reading this book I never would have associated your work with Atget’s. But after doing some research, the parallels between your life and his are remarkably similar.

You both served time in the army before turning your attention towards art. Atget briefly studied acting at the national conservatory of music before he was expelled, and likewise, you studied graphic design at Parsons before leaving without securing a degree. And you both worked briefly in your respective fields of study before turning towards photography. And finally, the two of you drew most of your artistic inspiration, not from other photographers, but from painters.

With that in mind, when you are looking at this work, were there any painters that influenced this body of work in addition to Atget’s photographs?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
DM: Its interesting you said that because I’ve taken nothing from photography. I love photography, but my sources [of inspiration] are writers and painters — artists. I love the whimsy of Lewis Carrol. I love all of that childish fairytales. I also love… Magritte was a huge influence on me. And also, Balthus and de Chirico. I tend towards the surrealists. They don’t reproduce reality. I’m not a Stephen Shore kind of photographer. I don’t walk around photographing suburbs — which is a legitimate thing to do, and he does it well — but that’s not what I’m interested in. My work is theater. I did little dramas, I tell little stories.

You’re right in the terms that, Atget... I don’t identify with Atget, but I could tell where he came from.

FS: You mentioned this briefly before, but the majority of images in this book haven’t been published before. What made you want to re-visit these images and publish a book, some 55 years after you made them?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
DM: Because it’s been 55 years since I made them! I’m on the cusp of going away, so I wanted to get them out there. It was a wonderful body of work. If you get involved in those pictures, they are very emotional for me. They are very haunting. I find them melancholy. There’s a certain... a heavy sense of time.

The decisive moment is a wonderful thing — photography deals with time beautifully. When I see those pictures Brady took of dead Civil War soldiers at Appomattox Court House in the trenches with their bloated stomachs… You can read about the Civil War, but when you see those photographs it makes it very real. Time has always had a heavy presence in photography. The genius of photography is that [by the time] I say ‘It’s now’ it is not 'now', but it is still 'now' in that film. That picture of when I graduated from high school is still there, that moment that’s not there is… [the image is] a reminisce of that moment. It’s quite poetic and very touching in a deep way.

FS: I was wondering. When you revisited this work during the course of making this book, did you view the images in a new light? Did you see them differently from when you first made them?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

DM: Yes, because when I first made them I was part of them. I was in them. I was of them. Now that time has intervened, I look at them again, but I am not the same person I was when I took them in the same way that they are not the same place they were when I was walking down the street looking in the window. They are two different experiences. And there’s a beautiful melancholy about it. A sweet melancholy. It’s not a sad melancholy. It’s a sweet melancholy of what once was. I like that — ‘once was.’ Those photographs are a remanence of then.

I’m particularly touched by the Penn station ones, which I mentioned before. Because there are a couple of people in there, and if you look at the clock at like 6:42.* And you knew that was 6:42 in the morning, not 6:42 in the evening. In the evening it would have been filled with computers — computers? commuters! Words that start with ‘Com.’ (Don’t even go there.) Anyway… I should have warned you that I’m very verbal.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: No, that’s great!

DM: 42 regular. Yeah.

FS: I wanted to talk to you a bit about the process of making this book and making books in general. You’ve published dozens of books over the course of your career. Books have served as a large source of inspiration for your work, be it books of Atget, of Whitman, of Cavafy.

When you’re making a book — or when you’re reading a book — what makes a book successful? What is the mark of a good book?

DM: Well, first of all, I love books.

I don’t spend money on clothes. I steal most of my clothes, I never spend money on clothes — that’s supposed to be a joke.

FS: *laughs*

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
DM: If I’m going to steal them, I might as well go to a good store instead of the second-hand shit I wear… but it’s not important to me.

But, I truly love books. I prefer my work to be seen in books. I like the intimacy of books. When you pick up a book, every single sentence in that book is a thought. The writer sat down and thought that sentence and then he wrote it. If you could hear a book it would sound like a symphony. And if you’d go to a library or a bookstore, if you could hear the books it would be a cacophony of all kinds of sounds! It’s really quite beautiful.

Books are my best friend. I prefer my work to be seen in books. You know exhibits are nice and all that, but ultimately you have this book that will last way, way, way beyond the exhibit. And you could revisit the book at any time. You could go to the bathroom and sit on the toilet and read a book — yeah, I said that!

I truly love books. You read something, say by Walt Whitman or Cavafy and it was written over a hundred years ago. It’s beautiful. The idea that those words endured through wars — present wars, Hitler, and hopefully through Trump (unless they burn them. Of course, Nazis and all fascists have to burn books. They have to burn ideas.)

So, I do prefer my work to be seen in books because of the intimacy of books and the privacy.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: You mention the intimacy of books. I know that you don’t print your photographs large. They’re rather small prints compared to your contemporaries. Is the reason behind that, that sense of intimacy you want to convey?

DM: Yes. I love diaries. I like anything that’s personal.

I hate those large photographs. I once said that an 8x10’ Gursky picture of a parking lot in Tokyo is just a huge parking lot. But an 8x10” Robert Frank can break your heart. So, it has nothing to do with the size of the photograph. Large photographs are only designed to get attention, to take up wall space. The most banal photograph can look good if it's big, by just the sheer size.

  
So, I tend to like small people. 5’8” and under. I love Toulouse-Lautrec and Mickey Rooney — they’re my favorites. And I like journals and diaries, so yes, I do prefer small prints.

I’m not that big myself actually.

FS: How tall are you?

DM: 5’7”. I used to be 5’8”, but now I’m 5’7”. The incredible shrinking Duane! My dad was pre-shrunk. He never got smaller. Anyway, how tall are you?

FS: I’m roughly 6’1”.

DM: Well that’s huge! Oh Rough? How rough are you?

FS: *laughs* I don’t think I’m that rough.

DM: Well you just said roughly! Rough! *makes dog noises*

FS: This book, you published it through Enitharmon Editions. Was this your first time working with them?

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
DM: Let me think. I did something with them in the past, that’s how I know them but I don’t remember what it was. Oh! I did The House I Once Called Home with them.

FS: Oh! It’s interesting because that’s a body of work that I saw being directly inspired by this work, I see a lot of visual similarities.

DM: Uh-huh. Where are you from?

FS: Originally, I’m from Boulder, Colorado.

DM: I went to DU!

FS: How was that?

DM: Well it was far away — oh you didn’t say where was it. *laughs*

What happened was, I was 17. I’m from Pittsburgh and I was supposed to go to Carnegie Tech in those days. And I was trying to get a scholarship and you had to list three schools. So I listed my first two choices, and then I looked at the list of schools and they had the University of Denver and I thought ‘well that’s a long shot I’m never going to get it. Denver mountains — that must be nice.’ And amazingly I got a scholarship!

I was seventeen going on five. I was very naive and very young and very homesick. So, I have a soft spot in my heart for Colorado. Although I suspect Denver is getting much too big.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: Just as New York is.

DM: Yeah. Again see, I like small cities. Anyway, I wish you weren’t 6’1” that kind of ruined the whole illusion… but I’ll get over it.

FS: I’m sorry. What would my ideal height be?

DM: 5’7” I like people my size — bite-sized.

So, then what happened? I threw you off your trolley. We were talking about Enitharmon Press.

FS: Right! How long did it take to make Empty New York? How long were you working with them on this project?

DM: I don’t know. It took a long time because I’ve only published only four or five of those pictures so there were tons of them. Over 200 to go through, make choices, and remember things about them. It was very nice because it really brought back that particular time and who I was then, and where they led me.

When you do a work, the work itself is wonderful but then the second question: 'Where does it take you? What does it open in your mind?' Work should never be an end in itself. It should always open new doors for you. It has two meanings. The original meaning and the eventual meaning.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: With that in mind, I know this work is now seen as a precursor to your series, your sequences, your portraits, and your textual drawings. But going back to when you were making these photographs, what was your next step? What did you start photographing immediately after Empty New York?

DM: Oh well that led me to doing Sequences.

I always tell the story about a photograph of a barber shop. For some reason, I’m bald so I tend to photograph lots of barber shops, I guess nostalgia. But on the wall in this one barber shop was a white jacket, you know the kind that a barber puts on? And I thought: ‘Oh look! He comes in, he puts on his barber costume, and then he does his barber act!’ That was very liberating to me. Although the concept was cumulative, that was the moment when I thought: ‘Gee! Why don’t I ‘people’ this room and make my own drama?’ That was very liberating. And the next question was: ‘What’s that going to be?’ I like that idea of: ‘yeah Mr. Wise guy? So what is it? Put up or shut up.’ So that was liberating.

Then in Brooklyn, I set up a little street scene. (The bridge is over there.) I considered it a failure. But then I realized later all I had to do was animate it. Just make the people cross the street, go around the corner and disappear. It was like bringing it to life. That was a very exciting period for me because it liberated me from the tyranny of the decisive moment. I could do whatever I wanted to do. Then the question was: ‘what did I want to do?’ and then the next step to liberate me from a certain kind of photography — or to re-invent photography for myself —was to write text under it. And that was very liberating.

And now I’m making movies which is also the destination I suppose — what I’ve been doing all these years at this late date brought me to making films.

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: That actually was going to be one of my last questions: ‘What you are working on now?’ So, you’re making cinematic work?

DM: Yeah, what happened was, I call them mini-movies. They’re films of maybe 5, 6, 7 minutes. I don’t have any ambitions for Hollywood. But of course, if somebody offered me ten million, I’d say 'I’ll do a porno for ten million. I’d even star in it.' Anyways, I got so distracted by the porno idea that I have to get off the phone for a minute.

FS: *laughs*

DM: Now what was I thinking about? Films!

I had a great long-time friend that I spent my life with named Fred and he died two years ago of Alzheimer’s. We were together for 57 years and the last seven years he left me every day little by little as he vanished into Alzheimer’s. During that period, I was completely saturated — marinated in taking care of him. My assistant told me that we could make a film with a little camera.

So, for... I don’t know how many years now, maybe four or five years? We’ve been making these films. I suppose by now we have thirty of them. But we’re making two right now. One is called ‘Fart Art.’ It’s a movie where I sell farts of famous artists on the corner. And then we did one where I interviewed myself which is funny. And then we’re doing another one called ‘The Bird Whisperer.’ It’s about a man who does these magical and theatrical things with birds. It’s been very liberating. To me, the ultimate liberation in the work is to make these little films. It involves writing the story, and I act in a lot of them.

You should come see the movies!

Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  
FS: I would love to!

DM: You’ll be surprised! It’ll knock your socks off! (as a starter.)

FS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to add to the readers out there? Any parting words of wisdom?

DM: Do it.

Life is very, very short. A lot of people are bullshitters. They talk, and talk, and talk. I talk a lot, but I ‘do it.’ I’m very verbal, it’s natural, it’s what I do. But people talk and never do anything. Or they make projects that are so grandiose that it couldn’t happen.

‘Oh! I have this great idea. At five in the morning, I want to flood Times Square and have five hundred white horses running through the water – splashing.’

Please. That’s never going to happen. 300 I could see, but 500 is ridiculous. But do it! Do it! Do it! Life is too short.

Now, I don’t mind getting old because I did it well. But the two things [to remember]:

Number one: Have no regrets. If I think of something I’ll do it. Although I talk a lot, I’m not a bullshitter.

Number two: Don’t be poor. Being poor in this culture when you get old is very mean to you. It’s very mean. This culture is very mean. And if you have children, there’s no guarantee that they’re going to look out for you… And don’t be rich either, but, just don’t be poor.

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Empty New York. By Duane Michals.

  

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Duane Michals is an American photographer who creates narratives within a series of images. Born on February 18, 1932 in McKeesport, PA, Michals received his BA from the University of Denver in 1953 before starting to work as a photo journalist. Over the course of his career, he has taken portraits of influential artists such as Andy Warhol, René Magritte, and Marcel Duchamp, often marking his prints with poetic writings and observations about his subject. He currently lives and works in New York, NY. The artist's works are included in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, among others.

Forrest Soper is an artist and photographer currently based out of Rochester, New York. A graduate student at the George Eastman Museum and The University of Rochester, Forrest has worked as the editor of photo-eye Blog and as a photochemical lab technician at Bostick & Sullivan. forrestsoper.com

*The clock in the photograph mentioned reads 6:55 rather than 6:42.

Book Of The Week Borderless Photographs by Wang Yishu Reviewed by Forrest Soper Printed in an edition of 800 copies, Borderless is a book that truly needs to be experienced personally to fully comprehend its impact. Wang seamlessly interweaves photographs from China, Japan, Mongolia, Thailand, Canada, and The United States to create a body of work with a captivating and engaging flow.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

Borderless
Selected as Book of the Week by Forrest Soper.

Borderless.
Photographs by Wang Yishu.
Jiazazhi Press, Ningbo, China, 2018. 104 pp., 61 color illustrations, 8½x10¾x¾".

"Borderless by Wang Yishu is one of the more spectacular Chinese photobooks I have seen published in the last five years. Originally trained as a photojournalist, Wang abandoned his traditional journalistic practices to focus on the fine art aspects of photography. Rejecting straightforward photographic essays, Wang began to view each photograph as its own aesthetic entity. These individual elements could then be used with others to create a communicative experience that superseded the impact of his traditional work. In doing so, Wang has become a masterful editor as he leaves the viewer to find their own meaning between the otherwise disparate images.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

Printed in an edition of 800 copies, Borderless is a book that truly needs to be experienced personally to fully comprehend its impact. Wang seamlessly interweaves photographs from China, Japan, Mongolia, Thailand, Canada, and The United States to create a body of work with a captivating and engaging flow. Sometimes images are paired by form, as the arching back of a jumping kangaroo is paired with the curved shape of tangled foliage. Other times, Wang focuses on color when the head of a goose preparing to jump into a body of water is mimicked by a woman in a polka-dotted dress looking out from a bridge. Motifs, such as surveillance and dissociation make their subtle appearances, as Wang Yishu invites the reader to find their own meaning in this work devoid of text. It becomes clear that Wang has been critically looking at the changing world around him, and he invites the reader to do the same.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

In three years of working with photo-eye, I have had many people asked me how to make a successful photobook. Should the cover have an image on the front? Which publisher is best? How many images should my book have? What paper should I use? I’ve never seemed to have a satisfactory answer to any of these questions. People appeared to be looking for a formula to success, a recipe that they could follow. After much thought, I’ve come to believe that there are just four simple elements that come together to form a successful photobook: the content of the imagery, the quality of the photographs, the sequence of the book, and the design of the publication. All four of these components require good editing in order to be successful. Much like a traditional novel, which is composed of a mere twenty-six letters and a handful of special characters, a photobooks success is often determined by how the individual components interact with one another on the page. To make a successful photobook it is essential that you learn how to edit if you wish to create the greatest impact in the mind of the viewer.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

At the end of the day, the fact that Borderless has such a skillful edit leads me to recommend this book. The images themselves are beautiful, but the interrelationships between them transform the work into something truly remarkable and personal.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

Zhang Jungang writes in the afterword '[Wang] doesn’t emphasize on any intention or topic when it comes to exhibitions or publications, but rather takes photographs as material to construct a space that is dedicated to observation and perception. Hence, the viewers are encouraged to find their own way out.' I believe that Wang’s philosophy is truly emblematic of the art of photography. By using the camera, one can freeze time in order to make sense of an ever-changing world, and through editing, the photographer can impart that understanding into the mind of the viewer. Some will see beauty, some will find deeper meaning in life, but all will be better for having engaged with the work.

Borderless By Wang Yishu. Jiazazhi Press, 2018.

Borderless is a prime example of photography in its purest form. I can't recommend this publication enough." — Forrest Soper

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Forrest Soper is an artist and photographer based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Forrest is the editor of photo-eye Blog, a former photochemical lab technician at Bostick & Sullivan, and a graduate of the Santa Fe University of Art and Design.

Book Of The Week AIRGAP Photographs by Drew Brown Reviewed by Forrest Soper Focusing on the Yale men’s ice hockey team, AIRGAP uses heavy flash and tight composition to create a body of work that is as much a work of science fiction as it is sports photography. Shot dramatically in black-and-white, this work seems more at home in a Ridley Scott film than it does in Sports Illustrated.

AIRGAP By Drew Brown. TBW Books, 2018.

AIRGAP
Selected as Book of the Week by Forrest Soper.

AIRGAP. 
Photographs by Drew Brown.
TBW Books, Oakland, USA, 2018. Unpaged, 9¼x12½".

"The vast majority of sports photography that I’ve seen can be placed into one of two categories: documentary or fashion. Whether the photographer is attempting to capture the action and energy of an event or is making portraiture to serve as marketing for a team, most sports photography seems to be primarily focused on making a factual document rather than working with artistic intent. Commercially driven, sports photographers always seemed to be technically brilliant, but their work never evoked a strong sense of artistic vision or intrigue in my eyes. Even when sports photography does have a more artistic influence — such as Annie Leibovitz’s Olympic Portraits or Stephen Shore’s baseball photographs — sports photography always seems to be rooted in reality. An exception can be made for Drew Brown’s first monograph AIRGAP.

AIRGAP By Drew Brown. TBW Books, 2018.

Focusing on the Yale men’s ice hockey team, AIRGAP uses heavy flash and tight composition to create a body of work that is as much a work of science fiction as it is sports photography. Shot dramatically in black-and-white, this work seems more at home in a Ridley Scott film than it does in Sports Illustrated. Ice, blood, and sweat alike merge in darkened arenas flooded with LED lights. Young men are put in enigmatic cryotherapy chambers and have breathing apparatuses attached to them as they exercise. Portraits are filled with distant stares and enough protective gear that one can’t help but draw parallels between soldiers. Nets, lights, and arena structures combine to create a futuristic dreamscape. Drew Brown has created a surreal world full of mystery and intrigue.

AIRGAP By Drew Brown. TBW Books, 2018.

I was first exposed to the world of hockey during my undergraduate studies. Many of my friends, including my college roommate, were avid fans of the sport, and as a result, I ended up drunkenly watching many games. These games would often end only to have us continue with watching a horror or science fiction film as the night and celebrations continued. In this sense, AIRGAP brings back many fond memories, as these two worlds collide. While my nostalgia was what first drew me to this work, I’ve remained constantly intrigued due to the brilliant originality of the environmental portraits and haunting geometric abstractions that fill the pages.

AIRGAP By Drew Brown. TBW Books, 2018.

With thirty-eight images, AIRGAP is a publication that functions almost like an over-sized zine. The images are familiar, yet entirely foreign. Fantasy meets reality, as Brown crafts a world that is both strangely familiar, and yet foreign beyond recognition. I have never seen a body of work that is so heavily focused on sports yet is so experimental and original. AIRGAP is not only the perfect book for a hockey or science fiction fan, but it also is a great example of how photography can be used to view familiar scenes in a new light in order to impart deeper meaning and understanding.

AIRGAP By Drew Brown. TBW Books, 2018.

AIRGAP is Drew Brown’s first monograph, and if he continues on his current trajectory, he is sure to have a fruitful career as he challenges and pushes the boundaries of photography. Brown reminds us that we are living in a future that is both beautiful and unsettling, as he creates images that refuse to leave the mind." — Forrest Soper

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Forrest Soper is an artist and photographer based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Forrest is the editor of photo-eye Blog, a former photochemical lab technician at Bostick & Sullivan, and a graduate of the Santa Fe University of Art and Design.