chris-moreno

[chris-moreno]

Karen Jyrzyk

Karen Jyrzyk is a self-taught photographer based out of Boston. Jyrzyk started her photography career when her parents gifted her a digital camera after graduating from the University of New Hampshire in 2003. Originally, Jyrzyk photographed bands in both live and promotional settings. In 2009, Jyrzyk’s focus shifted and she moved on to shoot portraits of people. The unexpected death of her father in 2011 contributed largely to her work from that point onward.

Jyrzyk’s work really is fantastic in every sense of the word. Each photograph is a careful composition, surreal and dreamlike in quality. Despite the various objects in a composition, each photograph is unified by the use of monochromatic hues. Some of these photographs feel as if they are stills from a strange dream or an odd fairytale. I really feel like I could stare at each image forever in an attempt to imagine the story behind each one. I really enjoy the aesthetic quality of these photos and feel very inspired to create a version of my own. I feel like it would be challenging to make seemingly random and chaotic objects into a cohesive work of art.

http://lenscratch.com/2018/10/the-states-project-new-hampshire-karen-jyrzyk/

[chris-moreno]

Adriene Hughes

Adriene Hughes is an artist and fine art photographer based out of San Diego, California. Hughes most current body of work is focused on landscapes and the effects of global warming. This series of photographs began in 2017 with infrared images taken during a forest fire in the state of Washington.

The resulting infrared photographs taken by Hughes are so surreal. One would assume the photos have been edited to look so colorful. In this series of photographs, Adriene Hughes imagines what communication between plants would look like if visible to the human eye. Hughes takes prints of her photographs and uses thread to embroider colorful clusters that link one plant to another. I love this addition to the photos because the clusters bring a really nice textural quality to the work. I don’t think I noticed the thread until I had a closer look at each photo and noticed the sense of rhythm the clusters brought to each piece. The use of thread really emphasizes the connection between each of the plants and furthers Hughes’ concept. These photos are also so aesthetically pleasing. I really love the colors brought out through the use of infrared.

http://lenscratch.com/2021/03/the-artist-intervenes-adriene-hughes/

[chris-moreno]

Nathalie Seaver

Nathalie Seaver grew up in Manhattan and Paris, but is currently based out of Los Angeles. Seaver’s work is a combination of photography, collage, textiles, and mixed media.

The photographs featured here are part of her series called Deconstructing Beauty. I found these photos interesting because of the added collage quality. I think that without the dots scattered throughout each photo, these images would only be still life photographs of plants. The confetti-like dots take pieces of each photograph and scatter them, allowing for each still life to have a sense of rhythm and movement. The dots often bring color to a place that would otherwise be devoid of it and also lead the viewer’s eye through the piece. The dots in these photos follow organic patterns, which keep from being too distracting. Sometimes the dots feel like petals floating through the wind and past the frame of the photo, which really places emphasis on the concept of deconstruction.

http://lenscratch.com/2019/11/nathalie-seaver-deconstructing-beauty/

[chris-moreno]

Kristina Knipe

Kristina Knipe is an artist and educator who holds a BFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and an MFA from Tulane University. Knipe is a believer of artmaking as a healing practice. Knipe’s photography work explores the identity of her subjects through objects, symbols, and spaces. In 2020, Kristina Knipe received the Clarence John Laughlin Award.

Knipe’s photography really caught my attention. Each of her photographs tells a different story about each individual. While most portraits are formal and focus solely on the sitter, Knipe’s photographs take each portrait in the opposite direction. Each image is rich with texture and miscellaneous objects that offer just a frame of a bigger story. The objects vary from one portrait to the next, but all of Knipe’s photographs are somewhat reminiscent of memento mori and vanitas paintings. I love the use of texture in each one of her photos and I love the juxtaposition of flowers and plants with man made objects. I also enjoy that, while some objects are repeated within some of the photographs, each image is unique and also representative of each subject.

http://lenscratch.com/2021/01/focus-on-portraiture-kristina-knipe/

[chris-moreno]

Charles Rozier

Charles Rozier, born 1951, took interest in photography at a young age. In college, Rozier discovered the work of both Henri Cartier-Bresson and Diane Arbus. Rozier cites these photographers as influences for his own work. Rozier photographed his family for over three decades, while having very little contact with the world of photography.

Rozier’s body of work mostly focuses on the lives of those around him. His photographs are unposed portraits of his loved ones. Rozier captures images of fleeting situations which often feel as though they have been staged. The fact that these images are unposed is what surprised me the most. Many of these images carry so much drama in them and I think that’s what makes them really special. Rozier captures his subjects in a candid manner and in their everyday environments. Oftentimes, it gives an imperfect edge to the family around him. It’s really great to see this style of photography that feels reminiscent of the odd photos in the family photo album instead of the fabricated, airbrushed reality that society tends to push on us.

http://lenscratch.com/2010/01/charles-rozier/

http://lenscratch.com/2013/07/charles-rozier-2/

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[chris-moreno]

Erick Jonathan Guzman

Erick Jonathan Guzman is a California born visual artist now based out of Brooklyn. Guzman graduated from Brown University in 2016 with a BA in Visual Arts with Honors and a BA in Health and Human Biology. Guzman is pursuing an MFA in Photography at Rhode Island School of Design. Guzman is a first generation, Chicano, Queer, and Genderqueer person, so their work is focused on those topics.

Guzman’s photography works are done mainly in black and white. The photographs I have selected for this post are so interesting because they’re very different from the way masculine bodies are usually depicted in our society. These photographs are striking yet delicate. It’s a really nice change of pace from visuals of the idealized, hyper muscular bodies we are so often pelted with. Guzman’s photography really challenges that and the machismo that is so prevalent in Latinx culture.

http://lenscratch.com/2020/09/erick-jonathan-guzman-to-obadiah/

[chris-moreno]

Bunny Luna

Bunny Luna (they/them) is a multidisciplinary artist based out of North Carolina. They work primarily with the medium of photography. Luna’s work often portrays the connection between humans and nature mostly through the use of film double exposures. Luna’s nude self-portraits and film double exposures have been shown nationally in galleries, as well as published internationally.

Most of Bunny Luna’s photos are double exposures, which I think is very interesting to see the juxtaposition of the human form and a nature scene. They mention in an interview that the first double exposure they took was completely by accident. That fact is a nice reminder that most artists don’t have their style completely figured out from the start. Luna’s double exposure photos carry a surreal, sort of dreamlike feeling. Rather than achieving double exposure photos through digital editing, Luna sticks to the analogue method. I was surprised to learn that they create these film double exposures even though they won’t necessarily know what the end result is until they actually expose the film. Luna mentions that they do not and will not control the end result of their double exposures. As someone who likes to have control over their own projects, that’s a very intriguing perspective to have and it definitely inspires me to explore that further in my own time. Luna’s method is more mindful of what image gets captured, as the space on a roll of film is limited. I think it would be nice to step away from the methods we are used to in the digital age and depart from the tendency to take a million different shots only to pick the best.

http://lenscratch.com/2020/11/bunny-luna-we-need-each-other/

https://bunnyluna.com/double-exposures/

[chris-moreno]

Final Theme Project Proposal

My younger brother is a professional martial artist and TaeKwonDo instructor. He takes his profession very seriously and is very passionate about teaching his students. The last year of the pandemic caused the closure of his TaeKwonDo school, yet he continued to practice at home despite limited time and space. Just recently, his school has reopened with limited capacity and required facial coverings.

Now that classes have resumed, I plan to photograph my younger brother not only as a martial artist, as in the previous project, but as an instructor, too. This time I would like to showcase more of the instruction side of my brother’s life, as well as some of the things he does that are not necessarily related to the martial arts. Photographing my brother in his element, but also in his free time will allow me to better understand him as a person and also allow me to know him a bit better overall.

I plan to take the most photos of my brother as he instructs the students in his class. Many of the photos will be taken as the scenes happen, but I may direct some of the shots if possible. My main goal is to get a clear depiction of what it’s like to be present in a class taught by my brother. I would ultimately like for the audience to maybe walk away with some more knowledge of TaeKwonDo, while they also have a better sense of who my brother is. Who knows, maybe this project will inspire someone to learn more about the martial arts.

[chris-moreno]

[chris-moreno]

Theme Project Proposal

Things changed drastically when the pandemic began and they still haven’t quite gone back to normal a year later. The last year has been consistently stressful and scary, but having to stay at home has inevitably caused my family unit to become closer. Since the pandemic began, I feel like I’ve learned a lot about my family and the way each person expresses themselves, too.

For this project, I plan to photograph the members of my family and document some of their routines and the activities they get up to around the house. Both of my parents worked in agriculture and performed manual labor for a majority of their lives, so a lot of their efforts are focused on taking care of the plants in their yard. However, they each have very different skills that they exercise as hobbies. My dad has a habit of taking on several home improvement projects around our house, whereas my mom takes on projects like making little crochet hats. On the opposite side of things, my siblings and I have skills that are very different from those that my parents have. My sister and I are both in different stages of the graphic design major, so most of our skills revolve around the studio arts and digital arts. My brother is the wild card of my immediate family, as he is a professional martial artist and TaeKwonDo instructor. I thought it would be interesting to use this project as a way to tell a story about each family member through a series of images.

Ideally, I would like to capture my family in scenes as they happen, but will stage some scenes if necessary. I like the idea of telling a story about observations of my family that I probably would have missed if I hadn’t moved back home at the start of the pandemic. I think there’s a large gap of time where there were no pictures taken at all in our household, despite having access to the technology. I think it would be interesting to capture photos of each family member in their element and have it be reminiscent of the old family photos that we often revisit. Overall, I think I would like the audience to feel like they have a good sense of who each person in my family is. Perhaps the audience will make some connections or find similarities between my family and their own!

[chris-moreno]

[chris-moreno]

This is a bit of what my weekend looked like. This far into the pandemic, it feels like everyone is really struggling to find ways to stay entertained. My family seems to be struggling with that a bit too, even though we’re all homebodies to some extent.

In the 1st photo, my dad is shown lifting weights. He’s newly retired and trying different methods to stay fit and healthy despite the ongoing pandemic. He’s set up a sort of makeshift workout station in the middle of our living room since it’s probably safer to do than his usual go-to of running.

The 2nd photo features my younger brother struggling to use his phone with freshly painted black nails. He’s going through a bit of an emo phase at the moment and is constantly looking for new music to listen to.

In the 3rd photo, my mom relaxes and watches youtube videos on her phone and sends texts to her sisters. This photo makes me weirdly proud of her, as there was a time not too long ago where she insisted that she would find it too difficult to learn to use a smart phone.

The 4th image is once again a photo of my younger brother. He’s an essential worker, so he’s gone most of the day. When he gets home after work, he plays some video games to decompress. This view shows him from my point of view as I push his door open and annoy him for as long as I can get away with.

The 5th photo features my sister’s favorite little ritual. Coffee is her favorite thing to drink and she needs to have at least one cup a day. This might or might not have been her second cup!

Pictures 6-8 show a little bit of my mom’s process in our kitchen. She’s ridiculously good at multitasking and so, so quick at everything she does. She is also notorious for not using cutting boards or any surfaces, as she prefers to slice veggies while holding them.

The 9th photo in this set is a brief moment late at night in the dark of our living room. My sister brought out the new Uno Flip game she recently purchased. My siblings and I debated whether we should play one round or give into temptation and inevitably spend hours aggressively competing against each other.

The 10th and final photo in this set tells you that my siblings and I are terrible at making good decisions because I’m sure this was several rounds into the game and also late enough that we had to turn on a couple of lights to be able to see.

#art30 #weekend project #photography

[chris-moreno]

Hi everyone, my name is Christina Moreno! I am originally from Delano, so I have an AA-T degree in Studio Arts from Bakersfield College. I am currently a student in my final semester at Fresno State, where I'll be earning my Bachelor of Fine Arts in Graphic Design. I enjoy listening to music, writing, and snacking on cucumbers with Tapatio and lime. Although I am a graphic designer, I do love working with my hands. I think my favorite hands on media to work with is printmaking. I love gaining as much knowledge as possible in order to be a stronger designer and overall artist. I hope this class will help me add photography to my ever growing skill set!