Visit to the ICP Museum

Our trip to the ICP Museum gave way to an exploration. When looking at the work of Elliott Erwitt’s Pittsburgh 1950 or Henri Cartier-Bresson: The Decisive Moment, for even a second, one realizes that the is a magical object–capable of transcending boundaries of time and space. Our tour guide, Kevin, asked thought-provoking questions that encouraged students to dive deeper into the context of the images (social, historical, personal etc.), and go beyond the immediately visible. We used this context to understand not only when the photo was taken, but also whether or not the photographer was successful in connecting with his subjects to create an accurate portrayal. With our class’ focus this year being The Portrait, it is important that we see an array of different approaches to portraiture such as MULTIPLY, IDENTIFY, HER. Students left that exhibition excited and eager to jump back into their own projects. We talked about all that we had just experienced for the next hour and thirty minutes while heading home.

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Guest Artist Lynn Cazabon

This week we had the pleasure of welcoming Guest Artist Lynn Cazabon into our preteen classroom for an amazing workshop combining botany and photography! Through an introduction to the wild and abundant plants thriving in the local environment of THE POINT, we explored the neighborhood to collect a variety of different species and to discuss the role these plants play in the local ecosystem.

The plants were then used to create images through a variety of darkroom-based techniques including photogram, cliché verre, and selective development. We learned a great deal about plants growing between the cracks in the concrete of our neighborhood (some are edible, some have medicinal properties!), while also managing to make some beautiful prints (not to mention a big mess)!

  

Lynn Cazabon is a Professor of Art at University of Maryland Baltimore County where she teaches a wide range of photography classes. Her work has been exhibited internationally and was recently included in the exhibition and book Emanations: the Art of the Cameraless Photograph by photographic historian Geoffrey Batchen. She is currently a South Bronx Resiliency Lab Artist-in-Residence at THE POINT.

Preteens Visit the BDC

The ICP at THE POINT preteens recently visited the Bronx Documentary Center (BDC), where they had the opportunity to view and discuss the exhibition Flint is a place by Zackary Canepari. Students learned about Canepari’s eight year project on Flint Michigan, focusing specifically on the story of a female boxer there. They also learned about the installation design of the exhibition.

 

The class also had the chance to meet Jesus Emmanuel, a member of the Bronx Photo League, on his way back from a day of shooting in the neighborhood with his large format camera. They got to go into the backyard with him and experience the 4×5 camera. He demonstrated, giving students the chance to maneuver the camera and the light meter and exposed a couple of images.

 

Activity shots, credit: Sophie Vasquez & Sara Munoz Ledo Rodriguez, ICP at THE POINT Teaching Assistants

Guest Artist Visit with Laurel Golio

Laurel Golio, a Brooklyn-based visual anthropologist and photographer, spoke with our preteens this winter. She is a working commercial photographer and the co-founder of WE ARE THE YOUTH, a photojournalism project that shares stories of LGBTQ+ youth in the United States.

Laurel led a class discussion on representation and story telling, asking the students who they believed could tell someone’s story best. After a productive discussion about how to approach stories with representation in mind, the students had a chance to share their work with Laurel and get feedback on their projects.

ICP at THE POINT Pre-Teen Final Presentations

For the Winter 2018 semester our pre-teen class focused on constructing a narrative and how to control and think about the story they want to tell. Through photographing people, places, and things that students see in their homes, neighborhoods, and schools, they begin to tell a story of who they are through their images.

Many of the students focused on their classmates and the use of photography to mark time. For our final presentation the students displayed their projects for their family and friends.

Congratulations to our Pre-Teens on an amazing 10 weeks, you had amazing work and we can’t wait to see you all soon!

ICP at THE POINT Teen Photo I Final

Last night was the final; class of our Teen Photo I class at THE POINT. The students this term focused on self portraiture and the final show was amazing! We are so proud of the work our students came up with and how great their final product was.

The students got to take their own approach to self portraiture and they got to decide what made a self portrait to them.

In the beginning the students were not thrilled with the idea of taking pictures of themselves but as their final projects show they became comfortable with it and embraced the topic. But Sofie took a new point of view to the self portrait and photographed herself through her mother, Sofie says “I see a lot of myself in mother…Traits of her personality has also seeped into me…I knew I wanted my self-portrait project to be dedicated to recreating photos of my mom when she was around my age.”

We are inspired by the different paths the students took to create their final projects and are so happy with how well it came out!

One of our Seniors Nico is deciding on colleges and what he will be doing after high school so he decided to base his self portraits off of that. We think he described it pretty well, “My photographs have a soft blurry effect, which represents my path. My path isn’t clear yet. Just like a camera, when the image, or in my case; my future, is blurry, adjust the focus. It’s time to DECIDE. COMMIT. SUCCEED.”

 

Congratulations to everyone! Your personal projects came out wonderful and we were so happy to work with you.

ICP at THE POINT Guest Artist Visit

This winter, our Teen Photography II class welcomed photographer Cynthia Vargas as a guest artist. Cynthia shared her experience as a young photographer starting out shadowing her grandfather throughout New York City, photographing everything he came upon as a way to save memories of a time that he feared would soon be forgotten. This inspired her to pick up a camera and begin her own photographic journey which involved documenting New York City’s break-dance scene, parties and events, and everyday life in Washington Heights. She spoke of the importance of community and it being not only a place where we live, but also a place we create. Cynthia also spoke of the importance of documenting these spaces and the people in them, along with their stories.

We viewed multiple bodies of Cynthia’s personal work all based on the theme of “community and self exploration”. After Cynthia presented her own work, she then took time to view the students’ work and give invaluable feedback on their personal projects.