The Winnebago Workshop Website
As the Winnebago Workshop prepares for our upcoming cross-country trip to New York, we’re excited to announce the launch of our new website: www.winnebagoworkshop.com
The Winnebago Workshop Kickstarter!
The Winnebago Workshop is an art school on wheels. With your help, it can keep traveling. More students can be given free access to life-changing experiences. More teachers on the road. More art. Find out more about the Winnebago Workshop and how you can support the development of young artists HERE.
We have great rewards for backers including a new book by Alec Soth that will only be available on Kickstarter.
Which picture do you like more?
Two weeks ago I posted these two pictures on Instagram without any other explanation than the hashtag #InstagramLikeTest. What was going on? Mick Brown, a writer for the Telegraph Magazine, was in the Twin Cites to profile me in advance of my show at Media Space in London. During our time together, he suggested we both make a picture of the same subject with our smartphones. Mick believed my picture would contain some sort of ‘magic’ that would be missing from his. I’ve worked with Mick in the past and admire him enormously, but I thought his hypothesis was harebrained.
The Winnebago Workshop
Big changes are underway here at Little Brown Mushroom. We are taking a hiatus from publishing to focus on our new experimental educational endeavor: The Winnebago Workshop – a mobile classroom that puts artists with teens to create multimedia stories.
This August we’re going to have our first week-long workshop. Each day we will meet at the St. Paul studios of Alec Soth and Little Brown Mushroom. After a morning brainstorming session, we’ll board our RV and explore. Through photographs, video, drawing and writing, participants will collect visual stories. Throughout the course of the week, we’ll have public projections of the stories on the side of the RV.
Apply HERE
Mr. Hardy and me
In a recent article about Songbook in The Daily Beast, the influence of my high school teacher was discussed:
It was also growing up in Minnesota when he [Soth] first began learning about photography from his teacher, Bill Hardy, who he still keeps in touch with to this day and works with on educational projects. “He’s a remarkable guy, and he would really encourage us to get out of the classroom and take walks and explore. I remember his first lesson was without a camera. He would just have us walk with cardboard mats with windows cut-out and we’d look through them,” he recalls. “It was a good lesson, but I didn’t take to it originally.”
Dreaming of Summer Nights
The beginning of March is fine time to start day dreaming about the simple pleasures that await us around the seasonal corner. In that spirit, the Carnegie Museum of Art recently published a short essay of mine on the cover picture of Summer Nights by Robert Adams. Read it HERE.
This also caused me to revisit a video homage I made to Summer Nights a couple of years ago for the Aperture Foundation. Watch it HERE.
Songbook by Alec Soth
I’m thrilled to announce the release of my new book and exhibition Songbook debuting at Sean Kelly Gallery in NYC (Jan. 29th, 2015), Fraenkel Gallery in San Francisco (Feb. 5th, 2015), Weinstein Gallery in Minneapolis (Feb. 20th, 2015) and Loock Galerie in Berlin (April 30th).
Songbook is published by MACK (LBM is not selling copies). I’ll be doing my first book signing at Sean Kelly Gallery on Saturday, January 31st at 3pm. – Alec Soth
Help support Colombian photography
A little over a year ago I asked the question, What Is Happening in Contemporary Colombian Photography. Through the fantastic work of Tom Griggs and his blog fototazo, I’ve since learned a lot. One of the great things Tom does with his blog is help support non-prof microgrants for Colombian photographers. Yesterday he posted a request on the behalf of nine former microgrant recipients to travel from Colombian to the University of Iowa to participate in an intensive workshop in the summer of 2015.
I believe so much in the work Tom is doing to encourage up and coming Latin American photographers and hope you’ll consider supporting this project too. More info on the microgrant HERE
Make a tax-deductible contribution HERE
My favorite photobook of 2014
I’m a fan, and defender, of year-end lists. While these lists are subjective and at the mercy of fashion and favor-currying, they generally succeed in bringing deserved attention to quality work. They are also a lot of fun to write. Having put together lists of favorite photobooks in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 – I’ve found the process has helped me clarify my thinking about the medium.
