new photos, Samantha Contis/Dorothea Lange photo book

jtk · Feb 24, 2020

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/13/arts/dorothea-lange-moma-review.html

https://samanthacontis.com/About https://samanthacontis.com/News

https://cphmag.com/day-sleeper/

Most Lange images unseen-unpublished previously.

Not clear how Contis worked, but she had access and apparently helped exhibit this Lange work in context of her own work. My budget doesn't allow me to buy the book (I like used books) or stay in NY for MOMA.

https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/...=4d99df1b5337eeb1904feed29a6dfb2e&action=view

awty · Feb 24, 2020

So what has Contis have to do with Lange?

CMoore · Feb 24, 2020

awty said:
So what has Contis have to do with Lange?

Did you see the links.?
Looks like she is Reviewing/Renewing/Curating/Revisiting the photos of Dorothea Lange.

her most recent book, Day Sleeper, a reimagining of the work of Dorothea Lange, was published by MACK in 2020.

A new book entitled Day Sleeper now lifts Lange’s work out of the stasis it has found itself in for too long. For the book, Sam Contis used the archive housed at the Oakland Museum of California (plus images from the Library of Congress and the National Archives). In her afterword, Contis writes that “[t]he more I spent looking through her contact sheets, the more I started to feel an unexpected kinship. […] I formed the idea of making a book that would show her in a new light and also reflect a shared sensibility.”

There are two words here that I find absolutely crucial, namely kinship and sensibility. Through her deft choices, Contis has allowed the rest of us to partake in her own discoveries, essentially giving Dorothea Lange a contemporary life, a contemporary incarnation.

awty · Feb 24, 2020

CMoore said:
Did you see the links.?
Looks like she is Reviewing/Renewing/Curating/Revisiting the photos of Dorothea Lange.

her most recent book, Day Sleeper, a reimagining of the work of Dorothea Lange, was published by MACK in 2020.

A new book entitled Day Sleeper now lifts Lange’s work out of the stasis it has found itself in for too long. For the book, Sam Contis used the archive housed at the Oakland Museum of California (plus images from the Library of Congress and the National Archives). In her afterword, Contis writes that “[t]he more I spent looking through her contact sheets, the more I started to feel an unexpected kinship. […] I formed the idea of making a book that would show her in a new light and also reflect a shared sensibility.”

There are two words here that I find absolutely crucial, namely kinship and sensibility. Through her deft choices, Contis has allowed the rest of us to partake in her own discoveries, essentially giving Dorothea Lange a contemporary life, a contemporary incarnation.

Ok, so she's flogging a book of some pictures she managed to dig up of Lange that no one has published yet. Don't know why its so hard to say that.
Im sure Lange would of already published anything she wanted in her lifetime.

James Bleifus · Feb 24, 2020

Thanks for posting this @jtk, I hope that I can see this exhibition. I was planning on visiting NYC in June. Maybe I can make it in May. There's so much scholarship about Lange yet to be done.

Cheers, James

CMoore · Feb 25, 2020

James Bleifus said:
Thanks for posting this @jtk, I hope that I can see this exhibition. I was planning on visiting NYC in June. Maybe I can make it in May. There's so much scholarship about Lange yet to be done.

Cheers, James

Indeed

jtk · Feb 25, 2020

awty said:
Ok, so she's flogging a book of some pictures she managed to dig up of Lange that no one has published yet. Don't know why its so hard to say that.
Im sure Lange would of already published anything she wanted in her lifetime.

Why do you need to spin this negatively : "managed to " ?

Not having to seen the book or exhibit, Contis appears to be showing some Dorothea work with which you/we may be unfamiliar and she is showing or pairing some of her own work in that context. I briefly met Dorothea and an important friend spent some warm time with her...and I knew her son: there's much more to her than "dust bowl" and great depression. Perhaps some others have suspected she was more than a familiar Social Studies illustrator?

CMoore · Feb 25, 2020

jtk said:
Why do you need to spin this negatively : "managed to " ?

Not having to seen the book or exhibit, Contis appears to be showing some Dorothea work with which you/we may be unfamiliar and she is showing or pairing some of her own work in that context. I briefly met Dorothea and an important friend spent some warm time with her...and I knew her son: there's much more to her than "dust bowl" and great depression. Perhaps some others have suspected she was more than a familiar Social Studies illustrator?

I do not understand the bad marks either.
Conti's efforts seem to be Positive/Admirable.?
D. Langes time spent at the (usa) Japanese Prison Camps is important. The book or articles of one person often leads to a much bigger awareness.

awty · Feb 26, 2020

I asked the question of who she was and I got some jargon which I dumbed down. I googled Samantha Contis to see her photography and couldnt see anything the slightest bit Dorothy Lange like.
Not very bright but am happy to be educated, best done with pictures please show me, words dont have much of an effect on me........not unless you can sing them to a tune.
Theres nothing wrong with a bit of cynicism, Lange would of had to do a great deal of work gaining the trust of people who she photoed in the depression, they would of been highly cynical of everyone especial those from the government.

James Bleifus · Feb 26, 2020

awty said:
Theres nothing wrong with a bit of cynicism, Lange would of had to do a great deal of work gaining the trust of people who she photoed in the depression, they would of been highly cynical of everyone especial those from the government.

No. Lange says that saying that she and her companion (sometimes Rondal Partridge who was often her driver, and sometimes her husband, Paul Taylor) were from the government caused the migrants to open up. They wanted their story known.

awty · Feb 26, 2020

James Bleifus said:
No. Lange says that saying that she and her companion (sometimes Rondal Partridge who was often her driver, and sometimes her husband, Paul Taylor) were from the government caused the migrants to open up. They wanted their story known.

Ok, didn't realise poor people during the depression were so keen on the government in the USA. Would of thought there would of been a bit of coercion By Lange. See you educated me. Still waiting for someone to connect Sams photography to Dorothy.
Here in Australia there was 30% unemployment in 1932 and a lot of division in the government, the Communists and Fascist were very active. Think there is more romanticism about the great depression in the USA than here, here we tend to be more romantic about the Great War, probably because we didnt have any photographers in the caliber of Dorothy Lange in the 1930's.

Heres my mum on the farm with a couple of her brothers (she had seven siblings) in there Sunday best in around 1931, they dont look too bad off to me.

jtk · Feb 26, 2020

Cynicism is an ulcer, it feeds on others.

In the thirties poor people could count on Franklin Roosevelt, their music, and a better future.

CMoore · Feb 26, 2020

awty said:
.......I googled Samantha Contis to see her photography and couldnt see anything the slightest bit Dorothy Lange like.
.

Should there be.?

You sound angry.
Did Samantha turn you down at a party.?

awty · Feb 26, 2020

CMoore said:
Should there be.?

You sound angry.
Did Samantha turn you down at a party.?

Yes, other wise it looks like she is cashing in on someone else's fame.
No, just a little frustrated that you ask a simple question then get accused of being cranky and diseased.

jtk · Feb 26, 2020

awty said:
Yes, other wise it looks like she is cashing in on someone else's fame.
No, just a little frustrated that you ask a simple question then get accused of being cranky and diseased.

A learning opportunity.

awty · Feb 26, 2020

jtk said:
Cynicism is an ulcer, it feeds on others.

In the thirties poor people could count on Franklin Roosevelt, their music, and a better future.

The only reason a politician reacts is if it gives him some more votes, other wise the peasants can eat cake.

new photos, Samantha Contis/Dorothea Lange photo book

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