my best shot – ryan mcginley

great photographers talking about their favorite shots, this is another great article from the culture pages of the guardian. today, ryan mcginley. more to come.

“working on this series, 15 of us traveled to a new location every day, camping at night. after three weeks we got to this barn in marionville, missouri. I had wanted to shoot with hay for a while, as I have fond memories of Halloween hayrides as a child. I like the saturated colour of hay in photographs: the way it can be gathered easily, yet fill the air wildly.

the bales created a simple graphic background, and we had a gigantic inflatable air mattress, like the ones used by movie stuntmen. safety is always our biggest concern, so we start with low jumps and gradually get higher. public nudity is illegal in most places, so we have lookouts with walkie-talkies to let us know if there is a problem.

the model, amanda, emailed me through my website. I rarely cast anyone this way, but I’m glad I did because she is one of the best people I’ve ever worked with. some people fall like a ton of bricks but she fell like a feather, gracefully and slow. in this picture she is doing a flip and my assistants are throwing handfuls of hay simultaneously, with a fan blowing. It reminds me of The Wizard of Oz – but my own version, where Dorothy gets her clothes ripped off in the twister.

Falling is a movement that endlessly fascinates me. I guess this action traces back to activities from my youth: skateboarding or diving from stages or into pools. I want to capture the feeling of weightlessness I would get jumping from a speaker and landing in a crowd, or flipping backwards off a diving board.

I love Amanda’s face in this photo: she looks like she’s in a trance within the chaos of the hay. I shot for about four hours, rotating models. I never know who is going to end up in the final shot, or if there will even be a successful image. I guess that’s the fun part for me: finding the moment where everything lines up. Not knowing what’s going to come back is like a present: it’s the poetry of chaos.”

by pp+tg

CATEGORIES: photography, surf-skate

Moro, lasso, al mio duolo

translated to mean “wearily, i die of agony”, this is the title of one of gesualdo’s madrigals, featured above in werner herzog’s “death for five voices” …herzog has said out of all of his films, this one is incredibly close to his heart.  one can see why, carlo gesualdo was a fascinating figure.  a man whose credits include nobleman, composer, chromatic engineer, lutenist—and of course, murderer.  carlo killed his wife (and also first cousin) donna maria d’avalos and her lover when he caught them “in flagrante delicto.” notwithstanding any of his passions or shortcomings, gesualdo was if nothing else, a magnificent composer of delightfully haunting tunes. by sv

CATEGORIES: music, must be considered films

Archipelago Cinema: Ole Scheeren’s Floating Movie Theater In Thailand

“the thought of watching films here seemed surprising“ said ole scheeren. “a screen, nestled somewhere between the rocks. and the audience… floating… hovering above the sea, somewhere in the middle of this incredible space of the lagoon, focused on the moving images across the water: a sense of temporality, randomness, almost like driftwood. or maybe something more architectural: modular pieces, loosely assembled, like a group of little islands that congregate to form an auditorium…” do not feed the fish by ak

CATEGORIES: architecture, lovely, other places

ras beatle!

backstage at the roxy, 1975.  photo by kim gottlieb-walker.  two gentle souls engage in a once in a lifetime meeting.  “ras beatle!” was marley’s response when told that harrison was in attendance at the show and wanted to meet him. by sv

CATEGORIES: backstage, fashion blokes: men of style

big speaker without the big bad bass: Dunlavy Audio Labs SCIV loudspeakers

dunlavy SC-IV, anechoic response on HF axis at 3m with grille on, with nearfield midrange response below 400Hz, nearfield woofer response below 700Hz, and complex sum of nearfield midrange and woofer outputs in the ratio of the drive-unit diameters.

 colin jordan of the boiler room mastering studios on his dunlavy SCVI-A’s (the “A” stands for the newer generation of SCIV’s with modified bass drivers producing slightly deeper bass than the SCIV’s)

dunlavy audio labs: the DAL factory in colorado springs before it closed down

hand made to last a lifetime

its been over a year that i have been looking for a pair of speakers that can fill my large room at low volumes without dealing with exaggerated bass or loss of midrange. i seriously considered magnepan 3.6 or 3.7’s (a brand i owned years ago) but ended up here. i finally had a pair of dunlavy SCVI’s delivered over the weekend and i’m super excited to set them up. they are to be customized for me in white (pics to follow) to blend the 6 foot tall monoliths into my space a bit. dunlavy loudspeakers are a rather special bunch (measurements/specs), hand produced for a short period of time in the 90’s in colorado springs USA by john dunlavy (formerly head designer of the duntech out of australia) before DAL disappeared, as most idealist companies do… john dunlavy also passed away in 2007 making his speakers, and life’s work immortal. the SCVI’s were honored as stereophile’s 1994 loudspeaker of the year and then product of the year. stereophile editor robert deutsch who reviewed the speakers in april 1994 ended up not returning the speakers as they do with the usual reviews and instead ended up buying a pair himself. back in 1994 (more than 18 years ago) they cost what many considered a reasonable $4,995-$5,495/pair or $6,995-$7,495/pair for SCIVAs plus shipping (a considerable amount given they are over 500lbs, 250lbs each) plus tax. today they are still sought after by those looking for an un-exagerated, flat bass, and neutral mids that is due to its dense un-ported modular cabinetry that houses each driver separately. i had listened to them before purchasing them and while they fill the room beautifully at low volumes they still have the incredible ability to be fast unlike the magnepans. i will write more later. by dd

CATEGORIES: audio-electronics, read