Project Basho: Photographer's Place in Philadelephia and Beyond - Photography Classes and Workshops including Platinum/Palladium Printing and Wet-Plate Collodion, Rental Black and White and Color Darkrooms, Rental Photography Studio, Fine Art Photography Gallery, Lectures by Photographers, Informal Critiques and Discussions Project 5: Inviting

Lecture Series and Other Programs
 

Foster a culture around photography

One of the key concepts of Project Basho is to nurture a vibrant and active culture around photography in Philadelphia and its surrounding area. In addition to offering darkroom spaces, classes and workshops, and a gallery space, we recognize the importance of providing programs to promote conversation and dialogue about the medium and its possibilities. With this in mind, Project Basho will be developing a series of lectures and other programs in our new lecture room starting this fall.

We plan to invite photographers and other notable people who are involved in the field of photography to offer a range of lectures and panel discussions to the local community. These occasions are intended to provide deeper insights into photographers’ work, their ideas behind the work, the impact and implications of the work in a larger context, and ultimately their identity as a photographer as well as an individual in the ever-changing contemporary world.

Also in our lecture room, we will be showing photography-related movies on a bi-monthly basis. These titles include both documentary and fiction where photography plays an important role. We are actively building a list of movies to show, and we are open to any recommendations from participants. These screenings are free of charge, and anyone is welcome to these occasions. If you have a suggestions or would like to recommend movie titles for the screening, please feel free to contact us.

Lecture Series Schedule: Spring ’08
April 11th

On Collotype by James Hajicek

In conjunction with "Time: Exhibition of Contemporary Collotype Prints," Project Basho is inviting James Hajicek for a lecture on collotype process and its history.

James Hajicek is a professor in the School of Art at Arizona State University. His area of interest is late 19th century photographic printing processes and has engaged in an extensive research of the collotype and woodburytype printing processes. His own creative work has been exhibited internationally and is part of the public collections including the International Museum of Photography at the George Eastman House, Rochester, New York, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, France.

The lecture is sponsored by Berindo and Frieds of Project Basho.

April 18th

Diana Bloomfield

As a photographer, educator and curator, Diana has been engaging in photographic activities for 25 years. She specializes in pinhole photography and 19th century printing methods. Her arresting images have won her numerous awards such as Project Grants from United Arts of Raleigh, NC and have been exhibited and published nationally and internationally, such as Qinghai International Photography Festival in China and in "Pinhole Photography: Rediscovering a Historic Technique," by Eric Renner. She lives and works in Ralegh, NC, where she teaches at NC State University and Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University.

Night for Emerging Photographers

In order to compliment our lecture series by notable photographers and other professionals in the field, we are launching "Night for Emerging Photographers" in May 2008. "Night for Emerging Photographers" is a program where new and emerging photographers are given an opportunity to present their project and body of work as well as ideas to the general public in order to gain feedback and responses.

Every other month, we will choose two photographers for presentation. Each photographer will have 15 minutes to show their work and elaborate their ideas behind them. Presentation can be literal to interpretive and observational to question-raising. This process is all informal and intended to provide candid and invaluable feedback to photographers' work.

If you are interested in participating the "Night for Emerging Photographers" as a speaker, please complete the online application. Applications are reviewed an on-going basis, and are open to those who have a body of work. Selected artists will be contacted with further information. Please feel free to contact us if you have questions or suggestions regarding the program.
May 22nd

Ed Dougert: Black Land

A continuing documentary project illustrating the legacy of the anthracite industry on the coal region of NE Pennsylvania including economic, societal, and environmental issues. Completed in black and white prints which create an entry point into a topic or point important to this part of our state's and nation's history. Many sites photographed are now inaccessible or destroyed. Photographic representation and interpretation must flow from knowledge and I have studied this region's history and coal mining's background thoroughly. A presentation of my work will be an illustration of how to approach a documentation project and how a photographer maneuvers for expression while trying to illustrate a story.

Visit photographer's website

Brian Shumway: Happy Valley

This series chronicles the hidden lives of the children of Happy Valley. Happy Valley is a euphemism that refers to an area nestled within the heart of the Wasatch Mountains of Utah, geographically disconnected from the outside world. It is an unabashedly religious place, where, despite the frivolity of itŐs name, everything is not always chipper. There are countless children here; Mormons are taught to 'multiply and replenish the earth' by their leaders, which they dutifully obey. Having spent part of my own youth in Happy Valley and being an uncle to over fifty children, I wonder as to the nature of such a place and its people — in this case, its littlest people.

Visit photographer's website

Movie Night
April 20th

"Blowup" (1966)

Description:
A successful mod photographer in London whose world is bounded by fashion, pop music, marijuana, and easy sex, feels his life is boring and despairing. But in the course of a single day he accidentally captures on film the commission of a murder. The fact that he has photographed a murder does not occur to him until he studies and then blows up his negatives, uncovering details, blowing up smaller and smaller elements, and finally putting the puzzle together.
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