It’s Not Personal, It’s Business: The Mountain Project

I find it interesting what gallery owners think will work on the walls of their clients. After all, this is a highly commercial business. Once the buyer has realized that the large format print of the toothless mouth of some artists’ grandmother looks so 1994—especially when the image was made in 2005—this buyer may not come back. Then perhaps rather the corpse of the Taliban fighter? Or would you rather not have it in your living room, now that there are newer wars, with a different aesthetic, and Uptown dinner conversations have moved on to new topics? Photojournalism, albeit often a lot more relevant and substantial than the results of the self-exploratory approach, seems to remain an odd bet in the art gallery venue, even with the current spike of war and conflict as a “cultural phenomenon”. And of course photojournalism has made its entrance into the art galleries mainly because many traditional outlets for photojournalism are now practically extinct, and not because there was a genuine market for photojournalism in the art world in the first place.

Copyright 2007 Jens Haas

I have my own views on what makes sense to be hanged on a wall. And, although naive, self-absorbed art is not likely to go away, I like that some people have started to question its current dominance. I certainly don’t want to make a case here for some grandiose “high art”, which I think is dead for good. Rather for a stance along the lines of American low-life writer Charles Bukowski, that “[good] fiction is an improvement on life”. For example, the impact that can be created by an almost archaeological project in the streets of New York City works for me. I prefer it to a series of photos of what my distant aunt in some provincial village looks like in her absurd living-room (I’d also prefer a Rothko to a e.g. Picasso’s Guernica in my own surroundings). If this makes me superficial, superficial is exactly what I want to be! But Chelsea gallery owners beware: I’ve been showing around business people from Europe in your places quite a bit, people with a keen interest in the arts and substantial amounts of money to spend, and I’m continually amazed about how alert to any sort of self-referential art gallery drivel these kinds of buyers are. Maybe it is the curse (and the hope) of the art world that it has become very commercialized, and now has to deal with a very astute business clientele on *their* turf.

Copyright 2007 Jens Haas

The stern images from the new series from the Alps are very closely related to my Manhattan Project. Obviously it is another “surface” project with, I hope, some depth to it. The scale is vastly different: I’d say that, on average, I’m 500 to 1000 times closer to the subject in the Manhattan Project, compared to this latest series. But visually I find the results strikingly similar (I am of course someone who also is fascinated by the fact that the smallest particles seen through an electron microscope and the largest clusters of stars seen through the biggest telescope can look strikingly similar). Both series are made from images of subjects that combine many layers of time in one single surface. Both series make references to modern painters that I like (by “modern” I mean 20th century). And both series work well if hanged on a wall. Before I proceed with a project, I always show early samples to people I know well and who I trust enough that, if they shot a project down, I wouldn’t hang on to it. This one is being greeted with enthusiasm, and one viewer of the first large format prints from it summed it up for me: “I want to build a giant house where I can live with these prints around me”. That’s how I see these myself, and that’s of course the only thing that counts for me anyway: After all, this is not business, this is personal.

Copyright 2007 Jens Haas

Image galleries displaying the current status of The Mountain Project and The Manhattan Project are here, and two movies here. The inevitable Nietzschean e-card, amongst others, here.

Fruit Tarte In New York, By Mara L.

Remember: When you came to Manhattan before, as a tourist, you kind of enjoyed the odd meal at a diner, and you even went so far as to get some pommes frites, which they call french fries, when you were in a hurry. You thought that this was part of the local flavor, slightly adventurous, and it didn’t matter, since very soon you were going to sit in front of your nice plate of ravioli again. You actually did get meals at so-called delicatessens, which serve ready made dishes, prepared in a less than delicious way.

But now you are here and suddenly things are serious: Is this how you are going to live? Emphatically No. Without as much as a conscious decision, none of these touristy treats seems even conceivable. You are going to search for real food.

Copyright 2005 Jens Haas

I shall spare you the frustrations, and immediately jump to a first find. A tiny café, somewhat French. Not, of course, French enough to spare you the usual offer of muffins, but French enough in other ways. The Ansonia café on 74th street, around the corner of Broadway, home of many Europeans, and regular meeting place with Jens and a companion of his (whom I shall introduce to you at a later point). Here they serve a truly amazing clafoutis au cerises (this is a cherry tarte which I used to bake—still in the lands of real butter and milk, where baking was actually an option—according to Lenôtre’s recipe, learning from his book that it originated in the lovely planes of the Limousin). There are drawbacks to the location, such as a less than French-tasting café au lait. But that’s not their fault, you tell yourself, they can’t be expected to import French milk (which even *you* have not yet begun to do).

Coming up: Real Latte Macchiato

Speaking Of Peripherals II

I do appreciate any flash of genius in the vast, dark universe of image licensing, and last week there was one, in the form of the following quote from the Dan Heller blog (via Andy Goetze), on the second largest picture agency, Corbis (privately owned by Bill Gates): “[…] Corbis say their main asset is their vast number of images. This makes as much sense as selling snow to an Eskimo […] Folks, it’s snowing in PhotoLand, and those of you who sell snow need another way to put it to use.” The question raised in that entry, whether Corbis is currently profitable after almost two decades of continual losses, is indeed worth asking. It reminds me of an encounter with a Corbis employee several years ago who, after she had finally finished a mundane task in an incredibly erratic and inefficient way, justified her approach with this great line: “Don’t worry, Bill Gates’ wallet is big enough for that.” She said it with such casual confidence as if everybody in the company was using the line at least ten times a day…