“Here we are now, entertain us”

Since I started LPV and began following photography on the web, I’ve been keenly interested in the way that photographers publish and present their work.  Often you’ll see a blog post pop that says, “Photographer X has some new work on their site” you should check out.  I never really thought about it much until the other day when I saw that same type of message pop up several times around Daniel Shea’s new work ‘Plume.’

It’s a work in progress, so I can understand perhaps the reluctancy to promote too extensively.  But as a start to a project, it’s really impressive.  As I thought about it, this seems to be the type of work, from the type of photographer that should be debuted exclusively on a prominent blog or website. I would find this to be far more interesting than the typical post that presents a selection from a “photographer that the blogger loves and thinks everyone should know about.”

I’ve heard many photographers say that the web really isn’t great for presenting work and that it’s better suited for facilitating conversation.  There is certainly some truth to that and to be blunt, I’m starting to consider many photography blogs to be more PR than publishing.  Like, I’ve mentioned in a previous post, there are certainly some publishers and bloggers that are presenting and publishing photography in interesting ways, but for the most part everyone (including this blog) are following pretty much the same template.

I’m curious to see how things evolve. I think photographers who have a new body work that they’ve been holding back from presenting on the web should think about pitching it as an exclusive to blogs they follow and admire.  These type of features would benefit both the photographer and the blogger. And I think it’d create a more entertaining blogosphere.  If part of the purpose of using the web is to market and promote work, then why not add some buzz? Get people excited. Build anticipation.  Teaser trailers, exclusives rolled out over a week, spanning different publications.  You get the picture. Of course, you’re dealing with a rather jaded audience that more than likely has revulsion to hype, but I don’t think it has to be gratuitous.  After all, it is the web, why not experiment?

On that note, if you’re a photographer with a new body of work that you think would be a good fit for La Pura Vida, please shoot us an email.  We’re always on the look out.

editors@lapuravidagallery.com

In this post I will outline what type of formats and features you can expect as well as my reasoning for them.  I believe in transparency and establishing a dialogue with those interested in what we’re doing. If something doesn’t work, I’d like to hear about it. I always enjoy hearing feedback and many of the insights people have offered in the past have led to changes in my approach, so if you have feedback, criticism or observations, please feel free to leave a comment of shoot me an email.

On the Road to a Mission Statement

In the previous post I stated that I thought the objective of a blog should transcend merely “exposing and promoting” photography that appeals to an editors or curators taste.  So, on that note I will attempt to sketch out a clearer editorial objective for la pura vida.

The mission of la pura vida is as follows:

1. Collaborate with photographers and editors to create and publish unique individual and group essays.
2. Work closely with editors from a select set of Flickr groups to create features based on the group style or theme.
3. Publish OpEd pieces on the the intersection of photography and digital media; the photographic process and philosophy.
4. Publish, promote and distribute our print magazines ‘Photographs on the Brain’ and ‘Street Reverb.’
5. Promote and feature independent books, zines and shows that share our sensibility.
6. Aggregate and share interesting, relevant content produced by the photography community through our Twitter and Tumblr feeds.

I’m certain other types of formats and features will develop over time as well. The internet moves quickly, with new ideas and trends emerging sometimes within a day. So, it’s always a good idea to remain fluid, but I think these objectives will form the cornerstone of what we’re trying to achieve.  I’d like to add some thoughts on a few of these objectives as well.

Monthly Shows

When we started LPV in September of 2007, our objective was to take some of the good work we were finding on Flickr and present it in a more meaningful way than the group pools.  What evolved were the monthly shows that were inspired by quotes, phrases, ideas, etc.  We were never really interested in doing the literal type of themes that are all too common. I understand why people go this route. The concepts are typically easy to grasp, and easy for an audience to quickly connect with.  But we wanted to go another route. Perhaps it’s not entirely unique, but I do think our themes tend to be more lyrical and ambiguous.  One of the unique elements of LPV is that our submission process for the most part is completely transparent.  Our contributors can literally watch the edit evolve before their eyes in the LPV pool. This gives them an idea about what the editor is looking for, and often times a visual dialogue will develop between the editor and the contributors.  I know for some, this probably isn’t appealing, but having watched it first hand it feels like a unique form of collaboration.  The monthly shows are conceived with an idea or phrase, and then grow and evolve from there through the collaboration between the editor and contributors, before finally maturing on the day of publication. I believe these monthly shows offer something unique and interesting to our audience.

Photoessays & Features

I’ve been impressed with what Burn Magazine and a few other website have done with featured photoessays.  I’ve always been interested in working with photographers, and interpreting their work.  I’ve grown a bit fatigued with the standard format of selecting 5-7 photographs from a photographers portfolio, putting their name in the subject line and then calling that a feature.  I enjoy these type of posts to some degree, but creatively I want to move in a new direction.  So I’ve been working with a handful of photographers to develop unique photoessays and features for LPV.  As with all creative collaborations, it can be tricky, but ultimately I think these longer essays are more rewarding to consume.  Some of the features will be almost entirely edited by myself, others will be more collaborative.  My goal here is to give photographers a platform to present their work in new ways.  This might mean presenting photographs from a new project, creating an essay from an existing body of work, or experimenting with an idea for something completely new.  I want to give photographers a platform to test ideas, show new work and test new interpretations.  For me, even if these fail, it will be much more rewarding than presenting a handful of greatest hits from their portfolio.

The LPV Collection

In the near future, we’ll be launching The LPV Collection, Volume 1 with prints from five regular LPV contributors. Volume 1 will contain 20 photographs and will be rolled out at regular intervals. There will be more details to come in the upcoming weeks.  There are a number of great websites offering prints right now, and doing a good job experimenting with new ways to finance photography.  With The LPV Collection, I think we can offer something unique to the LPV community.

Conclusion

Moving forward, the editorial objective of LPV will be to produce features in collaboration with photographers and contributors.  Creative collaborations are exciting, frustrating, difficult, enlightening, and when well executed, inspiring.  There are many exciting, and interesting blogs and online magazines out there right now. It’s a crowded space where your attention is pulled in multiple directions on a daily basis.  My goal is that when people come to LPV they know it’ll be worth the visit because they’ll be viewing unique content that’s thoughtfully presented and created through the collaboration between editor and photographer.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting LPV.

(Please note I’m fully aware this blog is guilty of some of the things I’m questioning)

I’ve been thinking about how to go about publishing photography on the web since the day I started la pura vida.  So I was very much interested in Brian Ulrich’s post about blogs and publishing photography. He makes several good points and hit upon some ideas I think have been swirling around for awhile now.  My objective with this post is to provide some thoughts and observations on the formats and formulas I’ve observed.  This ground was covered last year around this time by DLK Collection in their insightful post Comment, Curate and Promote: The Art Blog Triangle. Definitely check that out if you haven’t already.  I plan on focussing outward with this post, and will follow up with a post about my plans for this blog and la pura vida.

Expose, Promote, Curate, Share

“Our objective with this blog is to expose and promote photographers that we love and think you should know about.”

This is the default ABOUT template I attach to many curatorial type blogs. It could easily be applied to this blog as well.  For me, I think you need a clearer objective than to simply promote and expose photographers. Even if you ‘expose’ a photographer on a popular blog, that doesn’t often mean much more than a spike in traffic for them that day.  It can be tricky but I think you need to cultivate an editorial objective and think about why you feature the type of work you do on your blog or website, and then make that clear to your audience.

The challenge with curatorial blogs is presentation.  The standard format is to select a series of photographs, often with a short blurb, and always with a link back to the photographers work.  What is important for me here is that the blogger/editor/curator selects more than a single photograph.  Adding one photograph and a short blurb along the lines of ’some very nice portraits/landscapes/work from XYZ photographer’ with a link to a project or site is uninspiring, outdated and lazy. Show me what you see in the work. Show me a series.  If you’re going to add text, make it thoughtful and well written.

A blog that mixes writing with a series photographs well is Urbannautica.  Aline Smithson of lenscratch is another good example of making a selection with excellent writing.  Because photography writing is often uninspiring, I tend to gravitate to blogs that just show me a series of photographs, like ThisPhotoThat and LOZ.  There are countless other examples, and which blogs you choose to follow will depend of on your sensibility of course.

And that’s the key word, sensibility.  The blogs that are strongest in this area have a rather well defined sensibility, and make a thoughtful selection.  Something I think all bloggers should work on (including this one), are headlines. For the most part, everyone uses the photographers name and that’s it.  There are so many photographers out there that we may as well just put up garbled text.  We should use informative, descriptive headlines. For example, and this isn’t a home run by any means, but something like “Surreal LA Streets From Parisian Raoul Gatepin.”  I know some don’t want to editorialize and think the work should stand on it’s own, but with the glut out there, I think you really need to sell it to the audience.  Add some zing and spice, grab our attention.

Most photographers have a personal blog, and many feature work by photographers they find interesting on it. This a practice that I have some reservations about.  I’m a firm believer in the separation of curating/editing and marketing one’s own work.  It’s a fine line, and many will argue that they are using their blog to reflect on work that informs and inspires their own photography.  This is a valid point. For me though, if you do this regularly, you should open up a blog dedicated to others work.  Save your personal blog for your work and thoughts. I find that more interesting anyway.  Why do I find this problematic?  Well, because you’re associating a certain visual style with your brand and I think it can be deceiving, not to mention you are using the work of others to drive traffic to your own website.  In the grand scheme of things this isn’t a big deal, but I do think it’s best to make a clear separation between curating and self-promotion.

The Photographer Interview

But an interview is not a questionnaire and all too many of these interviews are distilled down to a manufactured series of questions where it may even be obvious that the person asking the questions hasn’t even looked to see if those questions were answered somewhere else before. - Brian Ulrich

I find it hard to read interviews unless I’m already familiar with the photographer.  Most of the time I’m just getting the facts, and not insights.  An interview should be illuminating, insightful and give the audience something to think about.  Every time I read an Alec Soth interview I’m end up highlighting quotes and pulling out ideas to think over.  He’s clearly thinks deeply about photography and life, and knows how to articulate those thoughts.  Younger photographers and artists haven’t necessarily formulated a strong philosophical point of view, so often come across as aloof and not really caring that much.  Not all of course.

However, there is one point about the standard photographer interview that I think some of us are missing.  For a younger generation, these interviews are often more about networking, connecting and sharing than trying to give the audience something to talk about.  The way a ‘digital native’ approaches the web is often dramatically different than older generations. It’s less about publishing, and more about connecting and building relationships.  So, I’m hesitant to really be too judgmental on this formula because I think they might have different motivations.

Reviews, Commentary and Criticism

This is treacherous territory, and a place I don’t often visit.  If you’re going review books, write criticism, or comment on art, you need to be a damn good writer, and being a damn good writer, is damn difficult.  Not to mention you really need to know what you’re talking about.  More often than not, you end up sounding like a babbling, self-involved blowhard preaching from a podium.  Everyone’s a critic, everyone has an opinion, everyone has a blog.  But few are knowledgeable, insightful writers. The aforementioned DLK Collection writes exceptional reviews as does Jeffrey Ladd at 5B4.  I often enjoy Blake Andrews reflective, casual writing as well as Colin Pantal’s musings and acerbic sense of humor.  Mrs. Deane is wry, often insightful and blends commentary and curating perfectly.  The guys at insig.ht have carved out a nice space for reflective writing on the photographic process, which I prefer to reviews and commentary. And if you think you’re going to make a living as a photography critic, reviewer, or commentator on the web, well, good luck to you.  I think photography criticism relevant and has it’s place, but it’s never going to be widely embraced or consumed.

The Online Magazine, Photoessays and the Slow Web Movement

At the moment I’m very interested in these type of websites.  There are many that are doing it right: Fraction, Daylight, Ahorn, Deep Sleep, Burn, Too much chocolate, SEESAW, HUH., The Black Snapper and several others. With these type of sites you have editors working with photographers to create unique, thoughtful features that require your time and attention to consume.  These type of websites force us to break free from the single image paradigm that plagues the web and often creates meaningless consumption.

However, there are a few challenges. First, presenting multiple features at once on the web is difficult because of our short attention spans.  You’re lying if you don’t find it challenging to spend more than a few minutes browsing a website.  Second, since they don’t publish as frequently, they’re often not as visible.  Some run blogs as well, which is a good idea, but then it becomes a balancing act.  How frequently do you publish? What goes on the blog? What do you feature in the magazine? Also, the tendency to mimic print magazines often leads to disastrous presentation but I feel we’re evolving beyond that mentality.

I’ve heard the term “slow web or blogging” passed around by Jen Bekman, and Laura Brunow Miner, and I think it’s appropriate for this discussion.  These online magazines certainly abide by this philosophy and in the era of Twitter, status updates and microblogging, I’m not sure why someone needs to be blogging multiple times a day.  Certain people will take offense to this because they hate Twitter/Facebook/Tumblr, but I think they’re on the wrong side of progress in this instance.

Conversations, Community and Microblogging

Twitter is my hub for conversation and information.  I know it has it’s detractors, but I feel that microblogging and short conversations are important elements to the web experience.  For example, sharing photographers and articles over Twitter can cut back on the necessity of blogging. If you’re going to just show one photograph and a link, why do you need to blog it?  Again, this will be contentious, but I just think that Twitter and to Tumblr are perfect for aggregating, conversing and sharing.  Save the important features and items that can’t be communicated quickly, or paraphrased for the blog.

I find it mind boggling that a writer, curator or editor wouldn’t interact and converse with their readers in a public forum.  No comments, no Twitter, no participation, essentially preaching from a podium.  Yes, comments and chatter can be annoying and time consuming, but the benefits of interaction and engagement far out weigh the drawbacks.  There will be people that are set in their ways, but I think they’ll eventually be marginalized if they can’t adapt.

Conclusion

Within the photography community I often sense a displeasure with photography on the web. Image overload, viewing photographs on a screen and many other annoyances make people just want to give up. I certainly feel that way at times, but being an information junkie, I find it impossible to stay away.  However, I do think that bloggers and publishers should always be looking for ways to evolve, and make their content more relevant.  I think there’s a big divide between people that feel the web is best used for commentary, discussion, reviews and criticism as opposed to actually displaying and presenting photographs.  It’s a worthy debate, but I think the web gives us opportunities to present work in different ways than we can in the physical world.  The web is great for mashing up, interacting, collaborating, and experimenting.  I know I’ve opened myself up for criticism with some of what I’ve written, and there’s no question I’m guilty of many things I’ve mentioned.  In part two, I’ll lay out my plans for la pura vida and this blog.

p.s. – Yes, I know it’s your blog and you can do whatever the hell you want with it. Point taken.

Photography collectives are not a novel idea, but their potential in the age of the internet seems relatively untapped.  I’ve been fortunate enough to be a member of two of them, one that failed, and one that’s just getting off the ground. In both cases they developed through networking on the web, and include members from all over the globe.  I’ve been following a few others such as Dreamboats, Fjord and iN-PUBLIC.  And I’m sure there are dozens not on my radar. Not to mention what defines a collective which is open for debate.

In both my experiences what hasn’t always been clear was the objective of the collective.  Perhaps others have a clearly stated objective, and institutions like Magnum, VII and NOOR certainly have a clear objective.  I guess my inquiry is more about collectives focussed on fine art photography.  There’s certainly a blurring of the lines when you try to define genres, but there’s no question photojournalists and documentary photographers want their stories to be funded and reach a wide audience.

I was tasked with moderating the FUNDING portion of the Future of Photobooks discussion over at Livebooks and one of the comments pushed me in the direction of collectives.

I often say that the value might be in the aggregate, and not in the individual pieces. With the web, these groups and collectives can really span the entire globe, which is exciting. The dynamic at play in the work when gathered together in a book, can begin to carve out a recognizable group sensibility.

It’s kind of like the Wu Tang Clan. They bring the clan together, put out a group album, and then after that, promote the individuals, but it’s all really under the umbrella of the Wu Empire.

I’m not an expert on the Wu Tang Clan and haven’t read The Wu-Tang Manual (not yet anyway) but from my understanding their business plan was rather innovative and well executed, as their success attests to.

He devised what he refers to as his “five year plan”, in which the group would release a full length group album, and record a follow-up group album five years later, while releasing solo albums in between this time period to launch solo careers. – Wikipedia

When I read this I can see how it might relate to photography collectives and their potential path to success.  The collective could work on a couple of group books or magazines for a few years to build the brand identity (a phrase I’m sure makes photographers reach for the Rodinal), and then launch individual projects.  I think everyone who has spent a considerable amount of time following photography on the internet knows there’s a ton photographers out there doing interesting work.  How many times have you come across someone’s work, loved it, and then forgot their name a few months later, only to re-discover them again?  It happens frequently.  Keeping track of all the photographers out there is a daunting task.  I find it much easier to remember the names of collectives, Dreamboats, Fjord, iN-PUBLIC, strange.rs (self-promotion warning), Mindfist, Magnum, VII, NOOR etc.  If the collective model is embraced, the pressures of marketing and branding could be distributed amongst a group of creatives, most of whom likely have skills in other areas.

A huge challenge is always going to be financing and figuring out how to run the collective.  There are always going to be debates, arguments and conflicts within a tight knit group of creatives, but I think if that can be managed, these type of groups have a chance of making an impact.  If the photographs are interesting of course…

I’ve been following the conversation about “the future of photobooks” initiated by Flak Photo and RESOLVE and have found it interesting, but I wasn’t really sure that I had anything to contribute.  First of all, I don’t know enough about the publishing industry to really make any sort of informed comment about it. Second, I think the pros and cons of on-demand publishing services like Blurb have been sufficiently discussed.

Perhaps this is an indication of my current mindset, but what I kept thinking about was the market for photography books.  It’s the same thought that comes into my mind when I think about the new organizations selling “affordable photography” prints.  Whose going to buy these books and prints?  It’s the same question that newspapers, magazines and blogs have been asking for the last couple of years. Whose going to pay? And why?

Lay Flat and the recently launched PUBLICATION seem to prove that if you put out a high quality product, people will buy it.  Over the last couple of months I’ve been working on Issue #1 of “Photographs on the Brain,” which will feature photographs from the group edited pool that I set up on Flickr.  It’ll feature only photographs and will be distributed through Magcloud.  I haven’t seen a proof yet, so I can’t attest to the quality at this point, but from people I’ve talked to, it’s pretty good.  I like this model because it’ll be affordable and available to anyone who wants to purchase. Of course, the market is awash in zines these days, so it’ll be the same uphill struggle that other publishers are facing.  But with very little overhead, it seems like a low risk endeavor.

Because I’m optimistic about technology, I have no doubt that the quality of on-demand services will only improve and likely will meet the highest standards in our lifetime. I do believe this. Blurb is like Atari. Very cool for its time, but really only the tip of the iceberg in terms what’s to come.  I’m also optimistic that display technology will improve dramatically in the near future and make viewing photographs on the computer much more enjoyable.

If we assume the barriers to quality on-demand publishing will fall in our lifetime (and I know many people won’t agree), anyone will be able to produce high quality books. But that goes back to my initial question, whose going to buy these books?  Even the most devote book collector wouldn’t be able to purchase everything they’d like to have on their shelves. It’s straight economics. And if you produce your own book, how are you going to market it? RJ Shaughnessy has bee mentioned in this conversation for his initiative with “Your Golden Opportunity is Coming Very Soon.” He was generous enough to send me a copy, and it was awesome to receive it in the mail. It definitely got my attention more than an email pointing to a portfolio.  It’s a good strategy if you can afford it and target the right blogs.

Now, to the idea, and source of my headline.  What I’ve been thinking about recently is how we can share content in the physical world the way we share it online.  I think everyone agrees about the importance of creating a synergy between the digital and the physical.  One such endeavor that I think is interesting is Dr. Karanka’s Print Stravaganza, which is a roaming photography show.  Contributors mail in prints and shows are organized through the web in various cities.  This box of prints continues to grow and travel all across Europe.  And it’ll eventually make it’s way to other countries as well.  The shows are DIY and underground by nature, but it’s an interesting example of using the internet to bring photography into the real world. And how cool is that these prints will take on a life of their own by traveling around the globe?

That brings me to the Netflix of photobooks.  I admit the title is a bit hyperbolic, but I wonder if some type of joint venture could be organized amongst bloggers and photography organizations to share photography books?  I’m not talking about Steidl books here, more like the the Photography.Book.Now winners and other on-demand books. I would love to look at all these books but again, there’s no way I can buy each of them.  But there maybe a few that I would buy if I could see them first.  Just think if one of these books travelled to all the various bloggers so they could review them, and really promote the ones they thought stood out or were to their taste?  This would be a great way to expose true emerging talent to those out there trying to promote, discuss and market that type of work.  And just like, the Stravaganza, these books would take on a life of their own as they travel around the world.  You could also come up with some way of documenting whose had them and where they have been.  Could this type of model work for a larger photography audience? Maybe. Of course the problem you run into is that you couldn’t do this with collectible books, and shipping costs would be an issue, but I know it’s something I’d be interested in.  It would be awesome to have 3 or 4 new photography books arrive in the mail each month.  I believe there’s already a tremendous amount of experimentation being done by creative, passionate artists, but I just don’t think much of it is reaching enough of the eyeballs that might be interested in it.

The future of photography books should be about breaking down the barriers to experiencing this great art form.  Quality and experimentation are certainly important but if the books aren’t getting in front more eyeballs, then doesn’t the future look very much like the past?