Danny Lyon at the Albuquerque Museum

 The Albuquerque Museum has brought a lot of great exhibits to the city in the years we have lived here.  Journey West: Danny Lyon is the best yet. Lyon has had a home in New Mexico since 1970 and many of the pictures are from that period of his career, but the show is really a retrospective including images from throughout his long life as a photographer and film maker.  The museum's publicity picture for the exhibit is a good example of his content-rich, empathetic and action-packed style.

For the featured exhibits the museum always offers some free 5x8-inch reproductions for people to take, so I brought home five from the Lyon show including his best known, Crossing the Ohio River, Louisville, Kentucky (1960). 

Seeing that rider looking back over his shoulder always brings to mind García Lorca's Canción de Jinete (Rider's Song).

  Córdoba.
  Lejana y sola.

  Jaca negra, luna grande,
  y aceitunas en mi alforja.
  Aunque sepa los caminos
  yo nunca llegaré a Córdoba.

  Por el llano, por el viento,
  jaca negra, luna roja.
  La muerte me está mirando
  desde las torres de Córdoba.

  ¡Ay qué camino tan largo!
  ¡Ay mi jaca valerosa!
  ¡Ay que la muerte me espera,
  antes de llegar a Córdoba.

  Córdoba.
  Lejana y sola.

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  Córdoba.
  Far away and alone.

  Black pony, big moon,
  and olives in my saddle-bag.
  Although I know the roads
  I'll never reach Córdoba.

  Through the plain, through the wind.
  black pony, red moon.
  Death is looking at me
  from the towers of Córdoba.

  Ay! How long the road!
  Ay! My valiant pony!
  Ay! That death should wait me
  before I reach Córdoba.

  Córdoba.
  Far away and alone.

  (trans: Stephen Spender and J.L. Gili)

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Danny Lyon's blog is Bleak Beauty.

An interview of Lyon by Susan Meiselas covers much of his career.

The Magnum interview.

Many examples of Lyon's work can be found at the International Center of Photography.

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The curators did a nice job of summarizing the exhibit at a presentation on opening day.  That is Danny and his wife, Nancy, in the front row.

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UPDATE:

I have visited the exhibit three times now.  I think it is a very good exhibit, but to fully appreciate Danny Lyon's work one really needs to see the pictures in the context of his complete photo essays as expressed in his books.  The pictures individually are good, but his work is pointed toward getting across often complex messages about society which need some concentrated attention and thoughtful consideration of details, themes and time frames.

Danny Lyon over the years has focused his attention and his art on marginalized groups.  He shows in detail how the members of such groups are dehumanized by the greater society.  His essays and books are calls to action.  For instance, in his book, Conversations with the Dead,  he shows that the correctional system of the U.S. is a continuation of the traditions of slavery and a system that reinforces and perpetuates the behaviors that it is supposedly designed to combat.

What makes a good photograph?

Our local film photography group is preparing to mount an exhibit at one of Albuquerque's branch libraries.  Participation in the event is quite a departure for me as I haven't made more than a few prints in the past fifteen years.  It turns out to be a useful exercise because it prompted me to look at my work and develop some ideas about how I wanted it to be represented publicly.

My criteria for selecting images for the exhibit are not fundamentally different from those I use to choose what I put on my blog.  A basic tenant of my photo philosophy has always been to show that virtually any camera - no matter how simple - is capable of making fine photos.  I like that first shot of the winter trees partly because it was made with my little Ansco Panda box camera.  In other instances I have been pleased when an image reflects the quality which derives from excellence of lens and camera design as in the case of the balloon captured by the Mamiya C330.  Beyond the instrumentation, of course, there are issues of composition, tonal range, emotional content, timing and many other aesthetic considerations.

I will probably select a couple images from that first group of six for the exhibit.  The second group of five images below was shared with group members to encourage them to include some pictures of people among their submissions.  That met with some success as two people promptly submitted a half dozen shots each, only of people.

Moving beyond the immediate goals of the New Mexico Film Photographers show to the broader question of what makes a good photograph, the answer is fundamentally simple.  The quality and value of photographic images can and should be evaluated as are any other art works in any other medium.  So, if confronted by the question of what makes a photograph good, the easy answer is probably to respond with a question:  What makes a good painting, drawing, sculpture, etc?  That is not to say that photography does not have unique qualities compared to other visual art forms, or that there is not room for individual taste or stylistic preferences.

Exhibit

One of my photos was selected to be in an exhibit at the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History.

 The photo is a pinhole image of an F-105 on display at the museum.  I'm pretty sure it was the only pinhole image on film in the show, and I was pleased that it turned out looking pretty good at 11x14.  The exhibit will be up until the end of the year.

Exhibit at the National Hispanic Cultural Center

Click graphic for the complete announcement.

E•CO - Environmental Graphic Exhibition from Europe and Latin America

exhibition

E • CO presents photographic projects, made by twenty Latin American and Europeans photographic collectives, whose works have been commissioned by the Ministry of Culture of Spain, under the Spanish Presidency of the European Union and within the celebrations of bicentenary of many Latin countries’ independence.

Dates

Del 01/03/2012 al 31/05/2012

Inauguración

01/03/2012

(18:00 h)

Visiting Hours

Lunes a viernes, 9 am - 5 pm. Sábados de 8 a 12

Location

Instituto Cervantes - Pete V. Domenici Education Center (NHCC)
1701 4th St SW
87102 Albuquerque Nuevo México
(ESTADOS UNIDOS)