An exhibition of works by Robert Longo at Louisiana Museum of Modern Art [Link]. Raft at Sea 2016-17 Longo traces photographs in charcoal. Large scale charcoal drawings. Of photographs. Blow-ups — upscaled photographs — traced projections. Iceberg for C.D.F (Caspar David Friedrich), 2015-16; The Western Wall, 2011 (Jerusalem) Stand back and you see the BIG…
photography
Speculative author
Hans Christian Andersen at Tivoli Amusement Park, Copenhagen [Link]. August 10 – here’s his desk at the H.C. Andersen Hus in Odense [Link]. The museum/center/garden/experience is remarkable tribute to the extraordinary range of his work. I had not appreciated his sophistication – fabulation, science fiction, psychology, collage, papercuts, letter writing …
Mik Critchlow
Extraordinary documentary photography from Mik Critchlow (1955-2023) — Ashington, Northumberland, once the biggest pit village in the world. Pitmen’s Requiem — see my work on the Durham Miners Gala – [Link] I came across his work on a visit to Woodhorn Museum [Link] — the last remains of the north-eastern coal industry — several hundred…
Applied Archaeology — Applied Humanities
Studio Michael Shanks Stanford University Newsletter 2024 Stanford Archaeology Center Archaeological mission and vision? Ivory tower as lighthouse? In a recent newsletter for Stanford Archaeology Center [Link] I talked of slow archaeology, of the benefits of long-running projects that afford time for unfolding reflection. Three interrelated projects remain ongoing. A kind of archaeological triptych. —…
ghost in the mirror
media archaeology More than twenty years ago I discovered the daguerreotype — one of the earliest of photographic media. Images are formed in a camera on polished light sensitive silver-plated copper—on mirrors. These are not just simply early photographs. They are unique one-off images, and positive-negative—you have to catch the mirrored surface at the right…
Archaeological shores: reflections on a metaphysics of cartography
Field notes. The pragmatics of an archaeological sensibility — what might one do in an archaeological visit to the beach? For as long as I can remember maps have made me anxious. Where does one draw the line of a coast, a road, a river? In archaeological excavation one is regularly required to document, record,…