Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton

Today’s episode features a former student of Michael’s, Val Dagrain who is finding his way in the film and tv industry after leaving Trenton, New Jersey, and after years in the music business as a rapper. Val is working in New Orleans as a PA, a data manager, a camera assistant, and now coming full circle from his days with Michael, starting as an on-set photographer, the job he has been working towards.  https://www.instagram.com/valdagrain/ Check out the YouTube Channel for bonus content: https://www.youtube.com/@realphotoshow/videos This episode is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club, a monthly subscription service for photobook enthusiasts. Working with the most respected names in contemporary photography, Charcoal selects and delivers essential photobooks to a worldwide community of collectors. Each month, members receive a signed, first-edition monograph and an exclusive print to add to their collections. Begin Building your dream photobook library today at Charcoalbookclub.com  Val Dagrain is a 2nd Camera Assistant / Data Manager on film sets in the Gulf Coastal regions. mostly in New Orleans, but also Houston, Austin & Jackson, MS. He is from Trenton, NJ and attended Mercer County Community College for a year before leaving to pursue a career in music. Val pivoted to being a film/tv as a crew member and has begun to work as an on-set photographer. Support Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/real-photo-show

Photographer, RIT Professor, and owner of Booksmart Studio, Eric Kunsman talks about his ongoing multi-faceted and social activist project, Felicific Calculus, Technology as a Social Marker of Race, Class, & Economics in Rochester, NY. Eric discusses how the work started and was influenced by his experiences growing up in declining steel town and later, as an adult, his family faced a dire financial crisis. Eric and Michael also talk about their connection at Mercer County Community College. https://www.erickunsman.com Bonus Content: https://youtu.be/9dZ_vpIY1gg More Vidoes about Eric’s work: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWeP6Y6BGspCNvTEOh4AN4w This episode is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club Charcoal Book Club is the monthly subscription service for photobook enthusiasts. Working with the most respected names in contemporary photography, Charcoal selects and delivers essential photobooks to a worldwide community of collectors. Each month, members receive a signed, first-edition monograph and an exclusive print to add to their collections.   Begin Building your dream photobook library today at Charcoalbookclub.com  Eric T. Kunsman (b. 1975) was born and raised in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. While in high school, he was heavily influenced by the death of the steel industry and its place in American history. The exposure to the work of Walker Evans during this time hooked Eric onto photography. Eric had the privilege to study under Lou Draper, who became Eric’s most formative mentor. He credits Lou with influencing his approach as an educator, photographer, and contributing human being. Eric holds his MFA in Book Arts/Printmaking from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia and holds an MS in Electronic Publishing/Graphic Arts Media, BS in Biomedical Photography, BFA in Fine Art photography, all from the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, New York. Currently, he is a photographer and book artist based out of Rochester, New York. Eric works at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) as an Assistant Professor in the Visual Communications Studies Department at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf and is an adjunct professor for the School of Photographic Arts & Sciences. Support Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/real-photo-show

Photographer and curator, Anne Immelé and Michael have a fascinating coversation about curating shows that take into account both sight and sound. We also talk about Anne’s new book, Les Jardins De Riesthal or Riesthal Gardens, a series of poetic portraits of family and landscape within a community garden that Anne tended to with her family for a period of 15 years. http://www.anneimmele.fr https://charcoalbookclub.com/collections/recent-books/products/les-jardins-de-riesthal Bonus Content: https://youtu.be/hppeViU9kaM This episode is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club https://charcoalbookclub.com Charcoal Book Club is the monthly subscription service for photobook enthusiasts. Working with the most respected names in contemporary photography, Charcoal selects and delivers essential photobooks to a worldwide community of collectors. Each month, members receive a signed, first-edition monograph and an exclusive print to add to their collections. Anne Immelé, Ph.D, has worked as an exhibition curator, building on theoretical, committed research, since her Master’s degree in Visual Arts at the Université Laval in Quebec, Canada (1997). She analyses the spatial installation of photography and the medium of the exhibition itself. Her curatorial research stems from a Doctorate of Arts thesis, entitled "Constellations Photographiques" submitted in 2007 at the University of Strasbourg and published by Médiapop Éditions in 2015. Anne Immelé lives and works in Mulhouse. Her photographs question our relationship to the territory in its multiple dimensions: geographical, human, social but also memorial and poetic. She is the author of several books, including WIR with the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy published by Filigrane, ou Oublie Oublie, published by Médiapop in 2021. Her photographic work is regularly exhibited. Professor at HEAR, Haute Ecole des Arts du Rhin, she co-founded in 2013 the BPM – Biennale de la photographie de Mulhouse, of which she is the artistic director and curator of certain exhibitions. Support Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/real-photo-show

In this episode of Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton, Michael and photographer, Vanessa Winship, have a wonderful conversation about two bodies of work she made in the United States, She Dances on Jackson, published by MACK, and her most recent book, SNOW, published by Deadbeat Club. Vanessa talks about how both of these books began, the former as a proposal and the latter as an assignment. Vanessa also describes her experience of traveling around the United States and witnessing both beauty and turmoil. https://www.vanessawinship.com https://deadbeatclubpress.com/products/vanessa-winship-snow Real Photo Show is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club, an amazing way to add to your photo book collection. https://charcoalbookclub.com Since 2005 Vanessa Winship is a member of Agence VU. After leaving Britain in 1998 she worked in long term projects in the Balkans and countries surrounding the Black Sea along with her husband, photographer George Georgiou. She is the author and subject of six photographic monographs, Schwarzes Meer (Mareverlag GmbH 2007), Sweet Nothings (Foto8/Images En Manœuvres 2008), she dances on Jackson (MACK/HCB 2013), Vanessa Winship (Fundación MAPFRE 2014), And Time Folds (MACK/Barbican 2018) Sète#19 (Le Bec en L’air / Images Singulières 2019) and a box set, Seeing the Light of Day (B-Sides Box Sets 2020) She is the recipient of a number of awards, including two World Press Photo prizes, 1998 and 2008, Sony photographer of the year, 2008, and the Henri Cartier Bresson foundation prize, 2011. She has exhibited at numerous festivals and institutions, nationally and internationally including the Barbican Art gallery in 2018, Sete, 2019, Cumbria, 2021 Her first mid-career-survey show was held at Fundación MAPFRE, Madrid, Spain, 2014. With George Georgiou she teaches a number of photography workshops, and separately as guest speaker, reviewer, curator, editor and mentor. Support Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/real-photo-show

Jennifer Cabral is an artist and Library Collection Photographer. Jennifer took part in a group show at the JKC Gallery, curated by me and Ryann Casey, titled The Road Home. Jennifer shared work that included the project, Mine_IRA which explored the trauma of the destruction of homeland caused by industrial mining as well as the trauma from experiencing sexual abuse. This work has continued in a trilogy of projects that we discuss on the show. This is the first episode to include a new bonus segment called, Two Photos that Changed Me, in which the guest will talk about two photos they made that affected them greatly in different ways. This bonus content is linked below at the Real Photo Show YouTube channel. Mild trigger warning: While sexual abuse is mentioned in this episode, we do not go into any details of the abuse. Mentioned in the show: Júlia Pontés http://www.juliapontes.com/ Bonus Content https://youtu.be/8KlWKzflCKo This episode sponsored by Charcoal Book Club and Charcoal Editions. Charcoal favors open-ended editions and wants the essential beauty of the gelatin silver print to be accessible to collectors at all levels. Charcoal works with acclaimed printer Sergio Purtell to ensure customers of the highest possible quality photographic prints, while the purchase price reflects an equitable division of compensation between gallery, printer, and artist. Visit Charcoal Editions at: https://www.charcoaleditions.com and use code REALPHOTOSHOW at checkout for a 10% discount until the end of the year. Jennifer Cabral holds a BFA from two Brazilian institutions: School of Fine Arts Escola Guignard with a concentration in Photography, and a BFA in Social Communications from PUC-Minas with a concentration in Advertising. She relocated to the U.S. and attended classes at the continuing education Program at The School of Visual Arts in New York. Cabral is curently a Library Collection Photographer documenting cultural heritage collections and manuscripts. In may 2022, she received a Master of Information degree from Rutgers University School of Communication with a concentration in Archives and Preservation. Her studies focused on potentialities brought into collections when photography and archives intertwine. Support Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton by contributing to their tip jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/real-photo-show

Ara Oshagan joined Michael in the JKC Gallery to talk about his work and his book, displaced, published by Kehrer Verlag. Ara is a descendant of family that was displaced by the Armenian Genocide and he was born in Beirut, Lebanon where his family was displaced again by the Lebanese Civil War. We talk about how his conceptual and documentary work about displacement and diaspora are so closely tied to his lived experience. The link to the flip-book in the notes will be helpful for you to see some of the work we discuss in this episode. https://online.fliphtml5.com/mgvxt/nwsz/?1665678668308#p=1 https://araoshagan.com/work Real Photo Show is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club and their new project, Charcoal Editions. A curated, online gallery selling open edition silver gelatin prints at more reasonable prices. Listeners get 10% off their purchases through the end of 2022, just type in realphotoshow in the promo box at checkout at https://www.charcoaleditions.com. About Ara I am a photographer and installation artist interested in disrupted and marginalized communities and identity. I am shaped by a history of multi-­‐generational dislocation and diasporic identity. A descendant of families who were displaced from Western Armenia by the Armenian Genocide, I was born in Beirut, Lebanon. I grew up in the Armenian community with a French/Armenian/Arabic elementary education. Displaced once again by the Lebanese civil war, my family and Iarrived penniless to the US. I came of age in America. I do not belong to any single country nor language nor nationality. I live in-­‐between several languages and cultures, among multiple ways of thinking and ways of life.My identity is transnational and ambiguous: it is a process. My work as a visual and installation artist springs from these sources: I am interested in the exploration of the ambiguities of my identity and the crossing of physical, cultural and linguistic boundaries. I live and work among disrupted and marginalized communities—communities that have been uprooted, dislocated and relocated and scattered again. Much of my research and work is about the sensibility and structure associated with this way of life. My own familial and personal history is deeply connected to the communities I photograph and engage in my artistic practice.

Pradip Malde joined Michael Chovan-Dalton and Ryann Casey for a live show at the JKC Gallery to talk about his book, From Where Loss Comes, published by Charcoal Books. From Where Loss Comes is an unblinking look at how sacrifice and belonging are deeply rooted in the human experience. Sixty photographs and close to 9,000 words consider pain and suffering that is private, sacrificial, and yet rattles against values that are thought of as being inalienable — our fundamental human rights. It is a story of the root causes of female genital mutilation and cutting (FGM/C). Pradip, Ryann, and Michael talk about how you go about creating work that deals with such painful and personal stories and how you present that work in a respectful and caring manner. Real Photo Show is spoused by the Charcoal Book Club and their new project, Charcoal Editions. A curated, online gallery selling open edition silver gelatin prints at more reasonable prices. Listeners get 10% off their purchases through the end of 2022, just type in "realphotoshow" in the promo box at checkout at https://www.charcoaleditions.com. Pradip Malde is a photographer and professor at the University of the South, Sewanee, TN. Much of his work considers the experience of loss and how it serves as a catalyst for regeneration. He received a 2018 Guggenheim Fellowship, which resulted in his book, “From Where Loss Comes” (Charcoal, 2022) and is represented in the collections of the Museum of the Art Institute, Chicago; Princeton University Museum; Victoria & Albert Museum, London, Yale University Museum and the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh, among others.

MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowship awardee Wendy Ewald virtually visits with Michael Chovan-Dalton to talk about Wendy’s books, The Devil is Leaving His Cave, recently published by MACK and the expanded reissue of Portraits and Dreams, also published by MACK. We talk about Wendy’s interest in collaboration and how you have to let go of some of your expectations. Slideshow: https://youtu.be/h3roT2U5aWc?t=1175 https://wendyewald.com https://www.mackbooks.us/products/the-devil-is-leaving-his-cave-br-wendy-ewald?_pos=2&_sid=1e30512e0&_ss=r https://www.mackbooks.us/products/portraits-and-dreams-wendy-ewald?_pos=3&_sid=1e30512e0&_ss=r Photo Show Live is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club https://www.charcoalbookclub.com About Wendy Ewald: For over forty years I have collaborated on photography projects with children, families, women, workers and teachers. I’ve worked in the United States, Labrador, Colombia, India, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Holland, Mexico and Tanzania. My projects start as documentary investigations and move on to probe questions of identity and cultural differences. In my work with children and women I encourage them to use cameras to look at their own lives, their families and their communities, and to make images of their fantasies and dreams. While making my own photographs in the communities, I ask my collaborators to alter my images by drawing or writing on them, challenging the concept of who actually makes the image – who is the photographer, who is the subject, who is the observer and who is the observed. My work questions the conventional definition of individual authorship and casts into doubt an artist’s intentions, power and identity. I have also created many projects with students from elementary school through college. The projects are designed as interventions as well as artistic projects. Among them are American Alphabets, a series of photo installations made with Arabic, Spanish and English speakers; On Reading, a video installation with learning disabled students, and Who Am I in This Picture, a public art installation with faculty, staff and students at Amherst College. With each situation, I use different processes and materials to shift my point of view and engage with my subjects. My work may be understood as a kind of conceptual art focused on expanding the role of esthetic discourse in pedagogy and creating a new concept of imagery that challenges the viewer to see beneath the surface of relationships.

https://youtu.be/ee3QoKxI7Nw -------- This episode with Collette Fournier can only be released as a video because Collette presented her life's work with a slideshow presentation so head on over to the Photo Show Live YouTube channel to watch Collette talk about her life in photography. Collette V. Fournier has an MFA in Visual Arts from Vermont College and a BSfrom RIT in Communications and Photographic Illustration. Born in Harlem,she grew up in Brooklyn and Queens, NY. She is the retired staff photographer from Rockland Community College and adjuncts in the Photography Department. Fournier worked as a staff photographer for The Rockland Journal-News, The Bergen Record, about...time magazine, and freelanced for The New York Post. Earlier in her career she worked in the television industry.   Fournier curated several exhibitions including a multi-sited exhibition “There is a World Through Our Eyes: Perceptions and Visions of the African American Photographer” exhibited at RCC, ACOR, Arts Alliance of Haverstraw (AAH!), Rockland Center for the Arts (ROCA) and Blue Hill in 1993 in Rockland County. Fournier has had fifteen one-woman exhibitions and participated in over forty group shows. She vigorously exhibits her photography and was the recipient of the prestigious Rockland Arts Council County Executive Award.   Fournier is an active member of Kamoinge Inc., an African American photography collective since 2001, “Timeless” was published to celebrate the Collective’s 50th year (kamoinge.com). As a Soros fellow (OSI), she documented Post Hurricane Katrina. Her award-winning documentation of “A Ripple of Thunder: Black Motorcyclists in America” was recently exhibited in Photoville Fences 9th Edition. She has written a book on her 40-year journey through photography.   Fournier’s photography work is collected in Photography Collections Preservation Project (PCCP), Social Documentary Network, Brooklyn Museum of Art, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Smithsonian Institute, WDC, Finkelstein Memorial Library, Women International Archive, CA. and in private collections.

Episode Notes Just a quick update about shows coming in September at the JKC Gallery.