Every year Arles buzzes with photo people of all stripes. Its festival runs throughout the summer but the week of 7-13 July sees a concentration of openings, parties and people in town. During a quick walk through the streets last night I was able to catch some striking work by the Montpellier-based artist who goes by the letters TTY, otherwise known as Thierry Art. He works in what looks like porcelain but may only be highly polished epoxy-resin, and photography. He won the Taipei International Digital Content Award in 2012. My personal view is that he needs to get a name with resonance. The work speaks for itself. It’s on show at Le magazin de jouets.
The Little Models: Tout ce qui naît tend à mourir, TTY photography.
Eternal Heads 3/4, TTY photography.
Then round the corner at Voices Off, 3 rue du Séminaire, William Ropp was exhibiting a range of his eery portraits. His book of haunting images Memoires rȇvées d’Afriques has just been launched. Ropp himself was there on the shop floor and there was a steady stream of visitors. Ropp seems to specialise in capturing enlarged or slightly astigmatic eyes, which reminded me of the early portraits of Lucian Freud. Anyway, I liked them. He goes for deep shadows and long exposures. Ropp is French and based in Nancy
from his Mali series, William Ropp
William Ropp
Then it was off down to Actes Sud bookshop to check out the times for today’s showing of the John Maloof and Charlie Siskel documentary on the new York street photographer, Vivian Maier.
Self-portrait, 1954, Vivian Maier
Maier was a great discovery for me last year and I was happy to snag the last copy of the PowerHouse Books monograph on her, Vivian Maier: Street Photographer. The kind bookshop assistant retrieved it from the window. More on Arles, its new Van Gogh museum/archive and on Vivian Maier tomorrow.
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