MOSSLESS

Elspeth Diederix is 39 years old and looking forward to 40....

Sat, 31 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Elspeth Diederix is 39 years old and looking forward to 40.

MOSSLESS: I really liked your Supernatural series. Are you a believer in the supernatural and/or superstitions yourself?
ELSPETH DIEDERIX: I am not superstitious, but I do believe in a ‘supernatural’ kind of energy. Vague, but I do feel that there is something more than what you see. In my early work I would try to visualize this unseen energy in the photographs like ‘Portrait of my father 1996’, ‘Kubus mist 1998’ or ‘Family portrait 1998’.

ML: In your series Doride Ultramarina, you’ve experimented with taking images of objects under water. Where did the idea for this come from and how did you go about photographing these objects?
ED: When I started diving I was completely fascinated by this whole new world underwater. A world in which you become more aware of color. Colors slowly disappear the deeper you go, first the reds are gone and when you use a flashlight suddenly the most dreary brown looking objects become bright red!

Underwater the color blue is a physical experience. When you jump off a boat in the blue water which is not near a reef you could turn 360 degrees and not see anything but the color blue. You are swimming in a color.

I have always been photographing everyday objects which are somehow almost invisible to you because they surround you all the time. I want to photograph them and show them to you in a different light. It was a natural move to take objects underwater. Water transforms. Transparent objects like plastic bottles and cups become almost invisible except for that tiny thin line that reflects the light and makes it look like a drawing (‘Transparent still life 2002’).

Photographing objects underwater can be quite challenging. They are all made while diving, mostly in the Red Sea. You have to figure out if the object is buoyant or sinks and accordingly you tie it to a weight or let it hang from a flotation device. If you just let the objects go, they float to the surface or sink or are taken away by the current. It is a bit of a puzzle. Every photograph is a little installation.

ML: Some of your earliest photography dates back to 1996. Where you interested in photography before then?
ED: I started with painting at the art academy and then in later years I made small objects and installations which I would photograph. Then I discovered that with photography I get to do everything; paint, make sculptures of any material, use every location that seems interesting. I was not tied down to a studio and paintbrushes. All I needed was a camera and I could go around the world and make works wherever I was. I felt that there was so much freedom in photography. But starting out with painting has influenced the way I photograph. I sketch first, I photograph, then I redo it maybe because I need a better location or a different color. Like a painting my photographs are made up layer by layer.

ML: What is it like in Holland this time of year?
ED: Lovely. I have a studio with a big garden and it is lush and green and full of flowers. Some days are rainy but have a tropical warmth. Today it is fresh and sunny. As soon as the sun shines everyone is out soaking up each little sun ray. The streets are all decorated with flags for the world cup. It is festive.

Gabe Kelley is 19 years old and watched a five year old stab a...

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Gabe Kelley is 19 years old and watched a five year old stab a fly with a pencil today.

MOSSLESS: When and why did you first take a serious interest in photography?
GABE KELLEY: I first took a serious interest in photography in ninth grade because I signed up for a photojournalism class. I hated the class, as much as anyone could hate something. It was very limiting as we could only take pictures in the classroom, my mind was a bit bigger than the classroom and I couldn’t stand it. I loved the idea of photography after that class though because I realized that people could tell me what to do in photography and I could give them the big ole soaring middle finger and photograph what I want, the idea of being able to break through what people wanted me to do and explore my own limits really pushed my work further. I still hate that class though, but at the same time I love it for giving me that.

ML: You refer to your work as being “an attempt to allow people into my life, for that small brief second”. Why do you think people would find your life interesting?
GK: I think my reasoning behind saying that is actually the opposite of the question, I don’t think anyone finds my life interesting. Most of the subjects I photograph are very boring, showing my surroundings, but I feel as though I can sometimes shine a light on the boring and get a nice shot in the end, that explains how I glorify things in my mind.

ML: A lot of your photographs appear to be very spontaneous and yet others come across as being very thought out. Are you the type of person who carries their camera around with them at all times?
GK: I’ve got a Supreme leopard print camera bag on my belt pretty much all the time. I leave the thing unzipped so I can whip the camera out at anytime. If you see me on the street, please, steal my camera, I need to be taught a lesson of closing that thing, and saving film. If only I showed some of the spontaneous shots that I wish I could take back.

ML: You’re also a keen graphic designer. Where does your interest in this stem from?
GK: I actually am going to school at MICA for graphic design, but this year my love for photography shot back up, so that major is subject to change. To be honest I can’t think of why I started in graphic design, I think I had to take a computer art class to fulfill my degree for graduation, and I found myself liking it, and looking at it night and day, so I figured I’d try and give back a little bit to the world that I was enjoying so much.

Michael Koch is 37 years old and is raising the curtains for his...

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Michael Koch is 37 years old and is raising the curtains for his next exhibition in Autumn.

MOSSLESS: The images on your website are decidedly small - especially compared to their real size, printed. What made you decide to present them online this way?
MICHAEL KOCH: Surfing the world wide web is a spiralling thing to do - I just want the website to be kind of a preview to my work. I think the best way to experience art is to go to exhibitions and look at the originals. There are so many details in my work which can not be shown on the screen - like the surface and reflection of the diasecs and the shown materiality, skin, hair or clothes - or even the installation and combination of pictures, furnishing and other things in the room - you have to “get into the mood”. In my work I like to irritate. I am not looking for harmony. This is not possible to be shown on a screen without transforming it into a different artform. Maybe I will find an alternative someday…

ML: In many of your series you set portraits and photographs of nature side by side. Why is this?
MK: I love being in nature where I find a lot of harmony and inspiration. Maybe that is typical german and hopelessly romantic - but experiencing nature in my photographs is also a different theme - the landscape transforms to a stage or a backdrop and becomes something artificial. The combination with the portraits or still lifes is like an associative entanglement just to create certain emotions.

ML: You series I Never Promised You A Rose Garden is especially beautiful. How did you evoke such colours?
MK: I work with an analogue medium-format camera and printing and filtering colour in the laboratory is a a huge part of my working process. At university I learned to filter neutrally but I am more interested in colour faults to support the artificial. When I take pictures I use flash lights or artificial light in combination with natural light in order to get theatrical effects. And of course I choose the colours during the process of staging the details like setting, clothes or make-up.

ML: What’s playing on your iTunes right now?
MK: Kate Bush - Never Forever.

Matthew Gamber is 32 and has digitized nearly 20,000 pages....

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Matthew Gamber is 32 and has digitized nearly 20,000 pages.

MOSSLESS: Did you ever have discussions with that colorblind student you were teaching color theory? It sounds like a really interesting scenario.
MATTHEW GAMBER: This particular student was concerned he would not succeed in the class. As he worked more in the darkroom, he began to identify individual colors as specific types of gray. By the end of the term, he could correct his color prints in terms of value and contrast. Most of us see color as a unified property, whereas he saw color as series of broken elements. He didn’t need to do the class exercises to understand color theory–he was living it.

ML: Please clarify this for me - in This Is (Still) The Golden Age you’re making photograms of what’s on the telly?
MB: The image is a direct transfer of the light radiating from a television’s cathode ray tube. By pressing the paper directly against the glass, you can collect the traces of light that remain when a television is turned off. What remains is an artifact formed by an illusion.

ML: Your series of chalkboards contemplates the idea of blank slates. Since chalkboards are rarely truly clean (as especially can be seen in your photos), what does this mean in terms of our lives?
MG: These slate chalkboards are products of our industrial heritage. These large objects are near the end of their utility, and the photographs are a record of their accumulated use. Paradoxically, a chalkboard can never embody the idea of a “blank slate,” as it inherently symbolizes the intention of the language that is to be written on it. In this sense, an empty chalkboard is forever imaginary. A useful chalkboard has no history; a used chalkboard is history.

ML: What’s the most interesting interview you’ve had on Big RED & Shiny?
MG: The most interesting interview for me was with Ken Feingold, an artist that creates sculptural installations using animatronic, ventriloquist-styled dummies. Some of his sculptures are based on his own likeness, and it was an uncanny experience to sit with him in person. His work is excellent, but this impression made the interview absolutely memorable.

Bob O’Connor is 32 and prefers clouds to sun.MOSSLESS:...

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Bob O’Connor is 32 and prefers clouds to sun.

MOSSLESS: Those are some hella nice houses you’ve photographed. Did you always know you were going to be shooting interiors at some point?
BOB O’CONNOR: I never really planned on it, but looking back on things, it was somewhat inevitable. I went to school for architecture and that’s definitely shaped the way I see things. I’d like to be shooting more institutional/industrial interiors (the sort of authorless architecture that people spend a lot of time working/shopping/living in, but don’t really think much about), but I’ve got bills to pay and that sort of stuff isn’t that commercially viable, so fancy houses it is.

ML: Speaking of Hella, how was Iceland?
BO: Iceland was incredible. I can’t say enough good things about it. The landscape varies from rocks/grass/glaciers/waterfalls/hot springs without too much traveling. You can see them all in an hour’s drive. The light is always changing and it’s light out 24 hours a day in the summer. There are horses and sheep wandering everywhere. Everyone should go there at least once. It’s magical.

ML: How different is shooting interiors to shooting landscapes? Are there similarities?
BO: I’m always trying to convey some sense of space/scale in my photographs. So in that sense I treat them similarly, but interiors (residential ones especially) are often as much about the stuff they’ve used to decorate the home and the styling than they are the actual space. I think my color palette carries over between the two genres.

ML: How do you deal with clients? How much preparation do you go through before meeting them?
BO: I try to do as much research as I can. I’m interested in things like who they’ve hired in the past, past budgets, are they jerks to work for, etc. Once a project is assigned I tend to ask a lot of questions. Nobody likes surprises (me or the client) so I want to make sure everybody is on the same page regarding expectations from the start. As the economy has gotten worse clients are less willing to take risks. You pretty much already need to have shot the same thing they need before they’ll hire you. It’s unfortunate. There were some interesting collaborations in the past with a photographer from one genre photographing something outside of that genre - like using a people photographer to photograph architecture, just to have a completely different point of view on things. That doesn’t happen so much anymore. Now there’s a lot of safe/boring work out there that all looks the same. Hopefully clients will start taking chances in favor of more interesting work when/if the economy ever recovers.

Stephen Tamiesie is 28 years old and is at your front...

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Stephen Tamiesie is 28 years old and is at your front door.

MOSSLESS: How do you come up with ideas/concepts for new projects? Is it something you start off with in your mind or does it fall in to place after you’ve taken the photo’s themselves?
STEPHEN TAMIESIE: Generally I’ve already been thinking about a potential project and its objective before I begin to produce it. But I think like many other photographers, there are aesthetic elements in my work that connect individual images to one another even if that was not the initial intention of the images or if they happen to fall outside a body of work. However, when looking at a series of work to create, I try to have a clear direction in mind at the beginning before getting started. Ideas for projects come from all over. Sometimes it’s being in a certain location that will spark a concept or even just conversations with friends about society’s oddities. NPR and PBS probably contribute subconsciously to my photography as well.

ML: Do think that your documentation of the decline and abandonment of the Salton Sea area would better serve as a message to those who have the power to rejuvenate the land, rather then an artistic project based on it’s aesthetics?
ST: Perhaps, though the series’ intention wasn’t meant to be political. Even before I began producing images for The Salton Sea many of the negative aspects of the region had begun to be restored by the state such as wildlife and water quality. The area is still very much a wasteland though and may never be completely restored. When making this series I was more inspired from an anthropological standpoint rather than environmental. Don’t get me wrong, I want to see the wildlife and ecological damage in the area fixed as much as anyone else. But The Salton Sea is more a character study of the area’s inhabitants - past and present - based on their unique evidence in the landscape, rather than a call to action for reform. I encourage those who are interested in the Salton Sea’s rehabilitation to visit http://www.saltonsea.ca.gov/ for up to date information.

ML: I’m particularly fond of your Signs of American Life series. Has you ever considered re creating the concept in a different country to portray life from another continent?
ST: Definitely. If I had the opportunity to create a similar series in another region depicting the relationship of the land and inhabitants I would do so. I think whatever country or culture I chose would need a similar quality of character like Signs of American Life portrays the American West. Nadav Kander’s Yangtze, The Long River comes to my mind when I think of an example of this character.

ML: Do you have any other hobbies besides Photography?
ST: Tennis, sippin’ whiskey and I’ve recently started roasting coffee in my garage.

Alessandro Zuek Simonetti is 32 and was born in a small city...

Sun, 18 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Alessandro Zuek Simonetti is 32 and was born in a small city close to Venice, Bassano del Grappa.

MOSSLESS: Who did you grow up admiring?
ALESSANDO ZUEK SIMONETTI: When I started to shoot in the early 90’s I didn’t have access to many sources other than Italian punk-hc and graffiti zines. Internet was moving its first steps while underground niche cultures were taking their small part of young kids’ attention. At the time I didn’t even have a PC, so the first artist I was looking at were those that were recent witnesses to the decade of the 80’s. Photographers such us Glen E. Friedman with what I considered the Bible of the undergrond culture, “Fuck You All”. Shabazz, Ricky Powell, Chalfant and Martha Cooper, all of them capured what inspired me, hip hop and punk music scene, the pioneers of the graffiti culture and the old skaters.I never studied photography so I was definitely into the DIY kind of concept.

ML: The person in your series Ibiza Till The Morning seems to have a lot of fans. What are they like?
AZS: Ibiza in August is a nightmare… I found, as other millions Italians, a cheap last minute flight with my friends and I brought all my stuff to shoot, just in case. In the old part of Ibiza I met Baby Marcelo aka La Troia Assassina (the Killer Bitch), an Italian man that likes to tranform himself every other week in a different character. That night the theme was Roman Empire. Transvestite, gay muscled stunning models, old ladies and beautiful girls were following La Troia for hours before her show in one of the most popular disco club of the island. I texted her at 8am cause I was so tired and I left the club.

ML: In your about me section you’re standing next to a gigantic print of one of your photos - where was it exhibited?
AZS: That was a group show at Dispari e Dispari art space in Reggio Emilia, Italy, a while ago, a huge industrial space dedicated to art, a rare thing in italy. The photo is a plotter print on paper, I installed that wall by myself and it was hard as hell! The subject is a portrait of a 12 year old kid from LA with a powerful shotgun. That day he shot for the first time.

ML: What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen happen on the streets of New York?
AZS: Huge drama, Italian fights in the East Village with my girlfriend… she’s great.

Sarah Wilmer is 29 years and 443,520 minutes old.MOSSLESS: Some...

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Sarah Wilmer is 29 years and 443,520 minutes old.

MOSSLESS: Some of your more notable photography is probably from the shoots you’ve done with various bands and musicians. Do you generally only shoot for bands that you enjoy yourself or have you shot with bands you never even heard of?
SARAH WILMER: I began by photographing my friends bands and other musicians I met and was interested in. That work resulted in many different kinds of people approaching me for images and I like that very much. If I am unfamiliar with their work, I will listen to the music and read about them before conceptualizing and making the photographs.

ML: Do you have any plans to start compiling a another book much like your Spiderchest collection?
SW: I have yet to see a shirt I like as much.

ML: What is the story behind your “My Brother Max” series? In one shot there’s a very daunting image of a man pulling a girl by her legs down a hill and then in another there is a harmless image of a baby kangaroo. It’s all very confusing!
SW: As is my brother Max.

ML: What does photography mean to you?
SW: Adventure, excitement, work, pleasure, and surprise.

Bryan Lear is 28 years old and his belongings should be finding...

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Bryan Lear is 28 years old and his belongings should be finding their way out of cardboard boxes soon.

MOSSLESS: How has your approach to photography changed since you first started out?
BRYAN LEAR: I think that my approach has been fairly consistent through the years, although I hope the results have improved with time. When I started out my photographs were more heavy-handed. Over the years I’ve tried to refine my ideas and develop a stronger sense of subtlety and absurdity. I also spend more time researching the subjects and ideas I’m interested in exploring than when I was starting out.

ML: One of my favorite photographs of yours is of a huge fire with a number of people all gathered around it. Can you tell us what’s actually going on there?
BL: I was in Wisconsin on my honeymoon. My wife and I were at a fish boil. It’s a traditional meal/event in the Door County area. Basically you put whitefish, onions and potatoes in a large cast iron cauldron and boil it. The oils rise to the top during the cooking process, and to get them out they throw a bunch of kerosene into the fire to make it boil over which causes the massive fire in the photo.

There were only a few people there, when all of a sudden a tour bus pulls up and it’s full of senior citizens. They pack the place right before it’s time for the big finale. It all came together by accident. I don’t think the photo would be as strong without them.

ML: Where does your inspiration come from?
BL: My everyday surroundings are my main source of inspiration. Common objects and spaces can reveal a great deal about us and our relationship to the natural world. I find them endlessly fascinating.

ML: What is it about photography that has always appealed to you?
BL: It’s ability to depict the ‘real’ in a way that alters your perception of it.

July 14th

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 07:01:15 -0400

…the day interviews are being posted again. mark our words, it’s gonna catch fiiire!

MOSSLESS has reached an important milestone! As it turns out,...

Thu, 27 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

MOSSLESS has reached an important milestone! As it turns out, we’ve been doing interviews for a year now. We’ve done 181 to date, and that’s quite something.

To celebrate, we’re going to take a month off while we’re working on the magazine (mind you, we’ll still be posting on mossfull). In the meantime, we’ve compiled a selection of some of our favourite interviews! So fill up your cup of Earl Grey and enjoy these puppies, because they’re great. This is our ‘best of’!

JAMIE KRIPKE
CELINE CLANET
ALANA CELII
JENNILEE MARIGOMEN
ANNE LASS
SOPHIE CURTIS
KATHERINE SQUIER
BRIAN GABERMAN
TOD SEELIE
CARLOS NUNEZ
WAYNE LEVIN
GRANT WILLING
ROELAND VERHALLEN
BOBBY DOHERTY
THOMAS PRIOR

and last but not least, our video interview with SEAN VEGEZZI

Noel Rodo-Vankeulen is 27, living and working in Brampton,...

Tue, 25 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Noel Rodo-Vankeulen is 27, living and working in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, a city he loves.

MOSSLESS: How did you get involved with Shane Lavalette’s Lay Flat 02? What did you write about?
NOEL RODO-VANKEULEN: I’ve been in touch with Shane off and on for a couple of years through email as we both author blogs concerning photography. I really loved the idea of Lay Flat and hearing of the second issue’s focus I contacted him with the idea of writing something.
My essay, which is really more of an opinion piece, connects late 60’s/early 70’s counter-culture with our ideas of contemporary abstraction, particularly concerning its concepts and aesthetics within visual problem solving. I use Albert Hofmann’s discovery of LSD as a springboard for a widespread familiarity with the ‘abstract’ as a mode of contemporary art making – essentially its awkward use as a stand in for spirituality, phenomena, the intangible, etc.

ML: How has photography changed in the last ten years?
NRV: I feel as if it has returned to a neutral position similar to the Kodak Brownie era - democratic, disposable and common. In this respect, and, in terms of its position as Art, it’s very different from the development of painting or sculpture. When you really stand back and look at the media of photography and how it is has developed and expanded (film, digital, chemical prints, ink-jet, etc), it has always been dictated by the masses and not the specialists. So in a sense, photography as a way to experience the world and to project experience in any form, is still very similar.
I think it’s a safe bet that future generations utilizing photography as a language, through whatever media (analogue, digital, etc), will still view their photographic past with our same longing. The biggest difference I see is how we observe the photography we make.

ML: What’s your series Flower City about?
NRV: In Flower City I’m focusing on the area where I live (Brampton, Ontario), a relative nowhere city transformed by a failed greenhouse industry, as a stand in for photographic experience. I’m really interested in how the medium functions as both art and photography, specifically how these two distinct aspects of a greater whole can alter and mediate what we see.
For the whole series I’ve worked with a large format camera and shot everything on black and white film, making the body of work a cryptic play not only on the ambiguous nature of photography itself, but showing the medium’s specific nature of looking. There is something archaic in using a 4x5 camera and how it can render basic and minimal compositions of people, places and objects as almost alien or distanced. In this respect I’ve specifically chosen to photograph subjects that range the gamut from quasi-exotic to the completely mundane. I’m interested in how these two extremes can have the same presence and become almost mythologized or iconic.

ML: Coffee or tea?
NRV: American beer.

Andrew D Musson is 22 and is afraid his sentence won’t be...

Sun, 23 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Andrew D Musson is 22 and is afraid his sentence won’t be as witty as the others.

MOSSLESS: How has working for Ryan McGinley and Thomas Prior & Luis Sanchis been? Good experiences?
ANDREW MUSSON: They’re both very cool people and there’s so much to say about them. My internship at Ryan’s studio has mostly been studio work overall but fun nevertheless. My time there is coming to an end soon, but I plan on keeping in touch.
I got to know Tom along with Luis Sanchis by getting really lucky and meeting them about 2nd Assistant work in NY. Luis is a master at what he does and Tom himself is an amazing photographer. Seeing he and Luis Sanchis work together is quite inspiring. They’ve been together for so long; when I assist for them I feel like I’m interrupting some sacred ritual, haha. But I learn a lot from the two and I’m really looking forward to working with them more in the future.

ML: What’s the longest day you’ve had with either photographers?
AM: Sadly the longest day I’ve spent with Ryan is when reviewed my portfolio (or lack thereof) last week. We talked for an hour or more about photography and strange films. I’ll be joining them on the shoots this summer though, really looking forward to that.
For Tom and Luis it was the second day of the first shoot I worked on with them, we shoot between the Lower East Side in the morning and Williamsburg at night; a hotel suite and an abandoned catholic school respectively. By the end of the 13 hour day all of us were tired, but Luis shot some great work. When I was walking home after it finally hit me that I was actually working with fucking Luis Sanchis and Thomas Prior. Haha. I’ll always be excited to help them out.

ML: How does your photography background help your filmmaking?
AM: I think it’s more the other way around actually. When I was in school for film I was the Director of Photography for the shorts we did there and it taught me a lot about really looking at the subject you’re shooting and how important the background/foreground relationship is. Since school ending I’ve become a much more active photographer and pretty much stopped all attempts and ideas on filmmaking. In the future I’m hoping to be immersed into both worlds equally. As well as getting back into drawing and music: the two things that lead me to filmmaking and photography in the first place.

ML: If you could have any building in the world as your dream studio, which would it be?
AM: Just give me a loft in Williamsburg with some Southern exposure I suppose or maybe an Airstream trailer in Colorado. To be honest though I’m not the studio type. I’m attracted more to documentary situations and visiting strange places I’m unfamiliar with. I think that’s what my future holds.

Aaron Fowler is 20 and is not wearing pants.MOSSLESS: Are the...

Fri, 21 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Aaron Fowler is 20 and is not wearing pants.

MOSSLESS: Are the pictures in I’m Not George Washington a collection or were they all taken around a certain time?
AARON FOWLER: They were all taken around the same time. It’s a very loose body of work that may or may not be complete.

ML: What’s the story behind this image?
AF: This is my friend Robert and I. He’s my roommate in Chicago. I used to be really into playing the knife game but the standard way of playing it made me feel weird because I only cared about how it was affecting me. Asking him to do it was difficult because I was worried he would be worried he would hurt me. He really got me thinking about what trust means. He’s a keeper!

ML: Your mother took the Teeball picture. Have you indeed not had a future in the sport?
AF: One of my grandparents actually took this, I found it in a bin of photographs I took from their house. I’ve never actually liked sports, I’m too uncoordinated and the atmosphere of athletics is really intimidating. I’m kind of in love with the idea of baseball, but I couldn’t tell you national vs American league teams or anything. I just want to play a lazy game of catch.

ML: What’s one thing you miss most about childhood?
AF: I miss getting cool stickers at the doctor’s office and being barefoot all the time.

Ace Kieffer is 22 and is currently on the bus back from NYC to...

Wed, 19 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Ace Kieffer is 22 and is currently on the bus back from NYC to Baltimore.

ML: Right now your work is up at Hey Guys in Brooklyn. How did that come about?
AK: First off, Erin Jane Nelson is the best. She put the show together and did such a rad job. I woke up with an email one day, about a month ago, from Erin saying she was asked to curate a group show and she wanted us to be a part of it. I was super stoked and agreed to it right away. The other guys that are in the show are not only good friends of mine but also amazing artists that I truly respect.

ML: You showed some pictures on a stack that people could look through instead of hanging some up. Why is that?
AK: I had talked with Erin about this during the planning of the show. I’m not very good when it comes to narrowing things down and like choosing one or two photos out of hundreds or whatever. So I initially sent Erin a folder with a bunch of images and we both agreed on having the one photo of my dad’s thumbs printed big and then have the stack. We thought it would be a good way to show my work since usually I use photography simply as a means to document the world around me and the stack served as a more interactive and intimate view into that. I got a lot of good feedback on it at the opening.

ML: Those pictures were all on a wooden shelf that I heard you made. Why did it smell so good?
AK: Yes I did make the shelf. It was a scrap piece of oak that I had laser etched. The smell, I suppose, is just a result of the burnt wood.

ML: What’s one thing you wish people asked you more?
AK: I wish girls would ask me out. That answer was my moms idea but I agree with her.

Niall O’Brien is 30 years old and thinks Judge Judy is...

Sun, 16 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Niall O’Brien is 30 years old and thinks Judge Judy is always right. “God I love that woman’s decision”.

MOSSLESS: Your photography comes across as being heavily influenced by youth culture and punk rock music. Why are these things such a big influence on your work?
NIALL O’BRIEN: To be honest my knowledge of punk rock was limited when I started this project. I never really got into it when growing up. My interest was, and is, in youth culture in general. I’m keen to create insight into a world mostly un-penetrated by adults. Obviously the punk aspect is picked up on most of all as it looks great but that is the least interesting part for me. I’m into the reality of their actions, showing believable, unaware moments of a group of wild kids. It took a while to really get in with them, about 2 years, and 4 years on I’ve kind of become part of them, trust is important to them and I’m pretty honest in my approach.

ML: Is your photography a reflection on your own child hood?
NO: I think so. When I grew up it was pretty crazy times not dissimilar to the punks. The only difference was that I was immersed in it, actively taking part. I was living it not taking pictures. Superheroes was my chance to relive and capture it. I want to show people an almost voyeuristic view on a specific group of youths.

ML: What is the meaning behind the title of your Superheroes series?
NO: Superheroes came from a film I made with director Matt Lambert (Dielamb). I wanted to film a group of friends hanging out in a room and record all day long and cut the video and audio and make an art piece. We found the punks and thought our lucky day had come. We then decided to poise a question to them, “If you could have any super power what would it be”. Simple, but we thought we could get some good answers. This then became a vox pop film about flying and escapism and we then called it “Superheroes” and the name just stuck. Since then I had an exhibition called “Good Rats” and now that name seems to be sticking more. That came from a Dropkick Murphys song with Shane McGowan. Also I thought it was fitting as they seem to be perceived as rats but I know how good they really are. It made sense.

ML: Do you have any plans to make any more short films?
NO: I started working with film over 3 years ago. The process is kind of like been back in college as I’m pretty clueless technically. One minuite you’re on your own snapping away, editing, making most of the decisions, next minute you’re surrounded by a team of people who all have something important to add to the work. It fascinates me and I’m really into meeting people with other skills that make a project come together. It is important we are all on the same page too and that takes time. I’ve been working with the same people for a while now and I’m confident in the way we work together. At the moment I’m working on a screenplay that myself and Martin Forsith are writing. It is fiction but a lot of influence from the stories and adventures I’ve experienced with the punk kids.

Mark Peckmezian is 24 and just graduated from Ryerson a couple...

Fri, 14 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Mark Peckmezian is 24 and just graduated from Ryerson a couple weeks ago.

MOSSLESS: Do you have any darkroom rituals?
MARK PECKMEZIAN: I do. I consider printing, especially for my snapshot stuff, a huge part of the process; sometimes an image is not just enhanced by its treatment, but virtually made by it. Ultimately, I try to treat every image according to its own needs. In a banal sense, this means that I make specific choices in paper, developer, toner, etc. for each image. More interestingly, I use particular printing treatments to sort of properly “frame” the meaning of the image. For instance, printing the image with a large white “tab” on the bottom is one treatment with a specific effect associated with it: write a number or date in that space and the image instantly reads as “document” or “note.” There are many more: printing the image small within a large sheet (connotes preciousness or, depending on the image content, deadpan), ripping the paper edge (connotes a casualness or informality, especially useful for undermining any potential cheesiness), printing a test-strip version of an image (test strips being the darkroom equivalent of a sketch, it makes the print seem like mere “process work” as opposed to “product work,” which induces a critically less-strict viewing), printing many small variations of an image (shifts attention to the process and to the graphic qualities of the image). I think these treatments are all the more powerful because they, I think, seem incidental or accidental, and thus bypass the viewer’s critical radar to a degree. I think this is one of the reasons I love working in analog so much: Digital is a world of total control and thus of total responsibility. I find that stifling.

ML: Do you have a manifesto or common ideology to everything you shoot?
MP: Yes and no. My only real, self-consciously held ideology is to not have an ideology, but I recognize that, if you add up my beliefs and value, I inevitably have what amounts to an ideology. I don’t know how to describe that, really. I can say that I strongly value affective-ness in art (I have little patience for art that is highly remote and accessed only intellectually). I really value creativity and, although I come up short most of the time, that’s a common-denominator aspiration behind much of what I do — if you’re not doing anything that is in some way new, why do it at all?
But the really important ideology is, yeah, to not really have one. I think ideologies mislead much more often than they guide, and I think you could diagnose a lot of bad art as having this (dogmatism) as their root problem. It’s important to keep your eye on what actually matters, which is the actual-fact experience of viewing your work, the net consequence of your art — practice always trumps theory, in a nutshell.

ML: Matt Tammaro (who we’ve interviewed) is your roommate. What’s it like to live with another photographer?
MP: Technically speaking we are ex-roommates — he moved out a few days ago — but the question still stands, as I lived with him for a year and live now with another photographer, a filmmaker, and a fashion designer (we share a studio loft in downtown Toronto). There are obvious perks to this (instant feedback, free assisting, shared equipment, etc) but I think the real value is just having your whole world be art-tinged, where there is no separation between work, play, and home life.

ML: What’s the difference between photographs and pictures?
MP: Ha, good question. I divided the work on my website into these two categories for practical reasons, mostly. I have a ton of work and thought a lot of it was suitable for inclusion on my site, but I couldn’t figure out a way to properly categorize it. I was reminded of Vice magazine dividing up music into “Beats” and “Guitars” (I don’t know if they still do this) — highly-colloquial descriptions can be strangely accurate, I think, or at least highly useful. In my mind, “Photographs” are the “serious” images, the product of planned shoots and with higher production values; “Pictures” are basically “snapshots,” incidental, candid photos, or photos that I otherwise just don’t have much invested in — sketches, jokes, things I’m unsure of. I consider the “Pictures” more junky, and always have, but time has tended to reverse these designated values: I sort of like and value more strongly the more “stupid” or junky “Pictures,” and I think, on the whole, people respond more to them than to the “Photographs.”

John Zimmerman is 23 years old and lives in Baltimore.MOSSLESS:...

Wed, 12 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

John Zimmerman is 23 years old and lives in Baltimore.

MOSSLESS: Why is photography important to you?
JOHN ZIMMERMAN: It is empowering to be able to archive a passing moment. A photograph captures slight visual nuances in a way no other medium can.

ML: Can you remember the first photo you ever took and what it was of?
JZ: My first roll of film was on my fathers old Nikon F2, most of the photos were overexposed because I had no idea how to operate a camera, I was most likely photographing landscapes around my house.

ML: Do you have any plans for the summer photography wise?
JZ: I teach kids and walk dogs for income; once I get some time off I plan to travel to Iceland.

ML: Some of the locations in your photographs look like they’ve been taken on distant and mystical lands. Where do you find such places?
JZ: I try to travel as much as possible, even if it is a day trip. When you become too familiar with your surrounds you tend to lose interest in the subtleties that can make a good photograph. When I travel I focus all my energy on interpreting my surroundings and usually find what I am looking for.

Bryan Schutmaat is 26 years old and writing these responses in...

Sun, 09 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Bryan Schutmaat is 26 years old and writing these responses in a room full of 10th graders.

MOSSLESS: What would you say your photography documents?
BRYAN SCHUTMAAT: This is kind of a difficult question. It’s like asking a musician what his/her band sounds like, which is always tough to describe. And whether or not my work or art photography in general really “documents” anything is open for debate. I suppose I document the American landscape and culture and how it’s seen from the roadside, but there’s more to it than that. I document my own vision.

ML: There seems to be a few religious references in some of your photos. Would you say that you’re religious person yourself?
BS: No, I have no religious convictions whatsoever, but I’m nevertheless interested in how the cultural landscape is shaped by beliefs and how this manifests physically. Land, architecture, and everyday things can reveal a society’s faith, pride, work ethic, attitudes, and so on. In America, this is all greatly affected by Christianity, which covers the countryside like a giant blanket, and through photography I examine its influence.

ML: How did you find your subjects for your Half Damp Eyes series? Were they good friends or people you just met your travels?
BS: They’re all friends of mine, but as the project expands I anticipate shooting more acquaintances and even strangers. The idea began as a personal project about getting older and I wanted to use subjects who’ve had an impact on me to characterize a specific time in life. However, I’ve come across many people I don’t know too well but with whom I still relate, so I think by photographing them I can convey the emotions associated with my initial intents.

ML: Your photography has been shown at many exhibitions across the world. How does having your work shown in a gallery make you feel?
BS: Pretty good, but it also challenges me to do bigger and better things. I know I have a lot to learn and long way to go, so small successes get me excited and push me further.

Gary Fogelson is 27 years old and is drinking water.MOSSLESS:...

Fri, 07 May 2010 12:00:00 -0400

Gary Fogelson is 27 years old and is drinking water.

MOSSLESS: When did you first take a serious interest in photography
GARY FOGELSON: I bought a digital camera in 2002 and started taking a lot of photos while riding or walking around the city. I was fairly new to New York and sort of used the camera as a way to collect all of the new things I was seeing. In 2005 I bought a 35mm point and shoot camera and kept taking photos, but because of the limitations of film they became more considered. I’ve stuck with film since then, with the exception of the day to day stuff I observe and record with my phone.

ML: Your latest collection of photos is all about old printers that have been dumped out on the street. Did you ever take one home to see if it still worked?
GF: I have a pretty good relationship with my current printer, and haven’t had the desire to try out one from the street. Since I began taking photos of the printers, I have noticed a lot of other things in the trash that I could use. I found a great wire rack to store zines in, and the other night I found an old stove top coffee maker that someone was tossing out along with some mugs and plates. When I got it home I realized it was filthy. I tried washing it, but it didn’t clean up at all. I felt weird throwing it back out on the street so I salvaged the bottom section as a flower pot.

ML: I also noticed there’s a few sound clips floating around on your website. What are the purpose of these?
GF: A little over a year ago my friend Nicolas Atkins started this amazing video diary called TvTv (tvtvchannel.com), and it inspired me to start recording stuff. I don’t have a video camera in my phone, and he was doing such a good job with the video anyways, that I thought audio would be an interesting thing to try out. I look at those recordings the same way I look at the photos I take. They are just different kinds of moments that require a different method of recording.

ML: You’ve probably taken hundreds of photos, each more different than the next. In your opinion what qualities of a photograph merit a perfect shot?
GF: I don’t think much about quality or perfection when I’m taking a photo of something. I just try to collect images that I’d want to look at again, and right now photography seems to be the best way of doing it.