Len Prince: Changing Identities - Photographs of Jessie Mann

This evening was the Wrap Party for the exhibition Changing Identities: The Len Prince Photographs of Jessie Mann. The event, hosted by the Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg Friends of Photography, featured the photographer in a very casual one-on-one discussion of his art, his model and muse, Jessie Mann (the daughter of photographer Sally Mann), and an enlightening Q & A with Len about his techniques and working relationship with Jessie. It was all terribly interesting and a wonderful opportunity to spend time with the artist. The print shown above, my favorite in the show, features Jessie in a pose that strongly resembles the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo in front of her mirror. It's an exceptional image and a very powerful example of Len's body of work with Jessie Mann.

Here is the Museum of Fine Arts' description of the exhibition: "Len Prince is celebrated for glamorous portraits of Hollywood stars and sleek advertisements for Cartier and Estée Lauder. In 2001 he met a self-possessed young woman, Jessie Mann, who had practically grown up in front of the camera. Sally Mann’s nude photographs of her children, including Jessie, created great controversy, igniting debate over child exploitation, censorship, and the nature of art.

"By the end of Prince’s first session photographing the adult Jessie, she had become his muse. What followed was a five-year collaboration exploring archetype, transformation, and identity. These have become some of Prince’s most accomplished and respected photographs.

"Prince and Mann make compelling images that reference paintings, famous photographs, historical figures, and mythology. They have been inspired by Ingres’ sumptuous Grand Odalisque, May Ray’s solarized image of Lee Miller, and Robert Mapplethorpe’s self- portrait in leather chaps, among other images. While these photographs can be disturbing and stark, they are often beautiful and fascinating. Theatrical and seductive, these unforgettable images explore the relationship between viewer, subject, and artist by examining personae and their meaning, as well as the very nature of the self." - Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, FL

It Was An Open House: Rebecca Sexton Larson - Studio Artist Extraordinaire

My photos are of copyrighted work (c) 2009 Rebecca Sexton Larson

Nothing is more fun than to be invited to the home of friends for a party. Especially as we get closer to the holidays the get-togethers are even more fun and filled with anticipation of the people you'll see and meet, friends new and old, and the great conversations that will ensue. Tonight delivered on every level. A terrific couple and super friends issued an Open House invitation.

Our drive to their house was filled with neighborhood displays of lights and fanciful Christmas characters of every size and construction. No real snow but everything else imaginable. From wooden cut-out sleighs and reindeer to huge inflatable snowmen, the journey there and back was almost half the fun. Tonight was a party but promised so much more. Matt Larson and Rebecca Sexton Larson are two incredibly talented and accomplished individuals. AND, they are married! Happily.

They opened their studio and home to exhibit and offer their work for sale. They featured dozens of small works that would make great gifts so a couple came home with us that we could not pass up. Matt and Becky are two extremely gracious hosts. Their art fills every room and is on the floors, walls and on every surface. It was arranged in frames under their dazzling white Christmas tree and overflowed to Becky's enchanted studio in their back yard. The evening could not have been more perfect as the weather was amazing and guests enjoyed the illuminated deck and yard.

The photo above is an example of just one of the many alternative photographic processes Becky has employed during her career. She has used straight photography and pinhole cameras and in this instance she made a series of extraordinary tintypes, in a variety of sizes and then encased each in a gorgeous, hand-made lidded box. Becky even sews images together in some of her artwork.

My photos are of copyrighted work (c) 2009 Rebecca Sexton Larson

Here is a short excerpt from Becky's career bio: "Rebecca Sexton Larson is a Tampa based studio artist working with alternative photographic processes. In 1998, Rebecca was awarded her first Florida Individual Artist Fellowship from the State of Florida and in 2002; she was awarded her second Florida Fellowship. And this year she received her third Florida Fellowship. Other major awards include an award from University of the Arts in Philadelphia to lecture and exhibit, an Artist Enhancement Grant from the State of Florida, and in 2005 she was commissioned to be the City of Tampa’s Photographer Laureate. Sexton Larson's photographs are in numerous major collections throughout the country, including: Polaroid, Progressive Corporate Art, Graham Nash (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young), Polk Museum of Art, Shumaker, Loop & Kendrick Law Firm, Trenam Kemker Law Firm and the Tampa Museum of Art (to name a few). Currently Sexton Larson’s work is featured in the book, Pinhole Photography: Rediscovering a Historic Technique by Eric Renner."

Visit Becky and her work online at BoxPhotos HERE. To see Matt Larson's photography from tonight's party go to Tampa Florida Photo HERE and visit his work online at ToyCameraPlay

Becky and Matt are talented and genuinely awesome artists AND people. We looked forward to tonight's open house and it delivered in every way possible.

Big Blue Toes dance to the courthouse steps: Ofra Friedman's FREEDOM

This giant foot belongs to Freedom, a steel wire mesh sculpture of a dancer by the artist Ofra Friedman. The dancer is suspended in a ballet pose and positioned on the front lawn of the oldest building in Tampa that was built for government use. It's a really good place for this piece of art. The building where she stands is still an imposing structure as you can tell from the giant columns. Although it has remained closed and empty since the new Sam M. Gibbons Federal Courthouse opened in 1997, it is well maintained on the outside and still looks like the Federal Courthouse that it was. It was built on an entire city block and once served as our main U.S. Post Office, then the Public Health Service and finally was converted into the U.S Courthouse in 1984. It actually provides a delightful backdrop for this dancer whose toes and fingers point the way up and down Florida Avenue. She is a exciting and eclectic addition to the old building and our downtown.

How long will it last: The chalk just keeps on keeping on.

The front page of the Wednesday, November 5, 2008 issue of TBT*Tampa Bay Times, the daily that has gained a wide readership on both sides of the bay, is reproduced on the sidewalk at Hyde Park Village. The chalk art reproduction is still visible after several weeks of foot prints, weather and lots of dog paws that have crisscrossed its surface a thousand times. The artwork was created during the inaugural Chalk Walk, a public festival of drawings created in late March by about 25 individuals, families and groups. The Tampa Bay Business Committee for the Arts played host and several other companies joined together to sponsor the events for the hundreds of artists and Chalk Walkers. Some of the finished works were huge and others not so big but they all showed great imagination, design and color. Tampa's future was their theme and it was interpreted in a wide number of ways by adults and children. Tampa's skyline, mass transit systems and beautiful people were favorite elements of many of the designs. Sidewalks in front of village restaurants, shops and around the fountain of Hyde Park Village were used liberally as canvases. As the days have gone by most of the works have disappeared, but this one remains. Public chalk art by it very nature smears, smudges and literally blows away. (Think of the Florentine artists working on the touristy streets by the Ponte Vecchio.) What we need are more chalk artists, more frequently.