Blog 17

I found a new photographer named Michael Bosanko who works with light in his art. He says "Light Art (or Light Graffiti) for me had its humble beginnings back in summer 2004 in Greece when by chance, photographing a moonlit landscape went unexpectedly wrong. Unclipping the camera from its tripod, I quickly discovered that by putting the camera into long exposure I could move the camera in my hands and use the moon itself to write out a word. Buzzing with excitement, the next natural stage was to keep the camera on a tripod, and use torchlight to ‘draw’. Ever since then, I have been on a solitary journey of discovery, pushing the limits of my photographic knowledge, my imagination, and always overstepping the boundaries of what is feasibly possible." 
I find this interesting not only because I am interested in light photography, but also because I am pretty sure the first time I figured out how to use long exposure was while I was trying to take a picture of the moon over the ocean at the beach. Here are some of his shots:

I like that he doesn't act like he started out as a professional "light-painting" photographer but points out that he found this skill by mistake. I would like to take pictures that manipulate or use light as part of the composition, whether it's light shining through a flower petal or a strip of light stretching across a street as a car speeds by. This doesn't relate to appropriation or technology, but it is something I enjoy so I'm trying to figure out where to fit it in. I'll probably use some of the pieces that I get from this concept for my breadth or quality. 

http://www.michaelbosanko.com/photo17499835.html

Blog 16

(for yesterday)
This week, I found a photographer named Steve McCurry. I really like his work because he is a renowned street photographer, and natural photography of surroundings is something that greatly interests me. He takes risks and goes to strange and far away places to take pictures, which is interesting, though out of my comfort zone definitely. He has gone to India (a place I would particularly love to travel to), Italy, Cuba, Russia, and many more countries. Here are some of his pictures...

 ( http://stevemccurry.com/bio )

( http://www.complex.com/style/2012/06/the-50-greatest-street-photographers-right-now/steve-mccurry )

I enjoy that his pictures are straightforward and realistic, but still interesting to study. He shows many different cultures in his photography, and that is something I would like to do in the future. 

Blog 15

This week I'm looking at an artist named James Turrell. He uses light as his medium and says: "'My work is more about your seeing than it is about my seeing, although it is a product of my seeing. I’m also interested in the sense of presence of space; that is space where you feel a presence, almost an entity — that physical feeling and power that space can give.'"

Basically, Turrell has been interested in light since he was a child, and likes to experiment with the idea of space while letting his audience decipher the meaning of his pieces. 

A weird side note is that apparently Drake had a very meaningful experience with Turrell's work and decided to rip him off by featuring it in his music video for "Hotline Bling". Turrell said he was "flattered" although he hadn't given Drake any permission to do this. At least the artist found humor in the whole situation

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Blog 14

Even though I'm in the middle of painting (update pic below), I keep looking at photography. It just interests me more I guess. Anyway, I found this artist who experiments with light in photography (AKA light painting) and I love playing with shutter speed and light. His name is Bruno Mesrine, he's French, and here are a couple of examples of his photography. I tried to look into some of his biographies but they were entirely in French an and a little hard to read. From what I can tell, he takes a lot of pictures in France of different monuments and buildings and either spells words with light or edits different pictures on top of each other, which is partly what I am hoping to do soon. I also have some pictures that I might use as a breadth piece that are similar to this style. (One of them is the background on my blog)

http://lightpaintingphotography.com/light-painting-artist/