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Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Photography from Isolation to Communication: David Campany (April 15, 16, 17)

Around the world, we are all under very tight parameters. Our movements and interactions are limited. What can be done with photography under such restrictions? Creative work always needs parameters. They help us to reconsider and reinvent. Isolation can also be a time for reflection, reviewing work we have made, and shaping it into something meaningful.

Photography from Isolation to Communication is a series of online 60-minute lectures that demonstrate and discuss in detail what can be done with photography in our present restrictions. 

All lectures are scheduled to take place from 1 to 2 PM EST. Tickets are $35 for general audience and $30 for ICP members and give access to each speaker's series of three lectures.


Photography from Isolation to Communication with David Campany

This class will meet for three one-hour sessions: April 15, 1 PM; April 16, 1 PM; April 17, 1 PM 

Session 1. Collaboration in Isolation (April 15)

Collaboration in isolation is possible. In fact, it has been happening for a long time. In 1863 Oliver Wendell Holmes imagined two photographers on different continents exchanging images and coming to know each other. Today’s social media would not surprise him. 

Most photographs are made by individuals, but most outcomes of photography – books, magazine articles, exhibitions, and websites are the result of collaboration. Few of us have expertise in all the necessary departments. These isolated times are actually great opportunity to think about collaboration at a distance. From social media projects to long distance exchanges of ideas, in this lecture David Campany looks closely at what photographers do alone, and how they can work with others at a distance. 

Session 2. Photobook Editing (April 16)

Making photographs is the easy part. Then comes the editing, the shaping of a body of work. It needs calm thought, clarity of purpose and, yes, isolation. Our present restrictions may well give you a little of the downtime needed to edit your work successfully. As an editor, Campany has the trust of many great photographers, and each book project he works on is different. Sometime it’s collaborative, sometimes he works alone. In this lecture, Campany unpacks the different methods he has used in editing books for publication.

Session 3. The Photographer-Writer (April 17)

Put simply, a photographer who writes can achieve more than a photographer who does not. In our visual culture words are never very far from photographs. They can enrich, expand, explain and extend our communication, and our appreciation. Since the beginnings of the medium, there have been remarkable photographer-writers: WHF Talbot, Frances Benjamin Johnston, Walker Evans, Berenice Abbott, Martha Rosler, Jeff Wall, LaToya Ruby Frazier—the list is long and illustrious.

In this lecture, David Campany takes you through the detail of image-text interaction. He will draw on key examples that have informed his own diverse work as a respected writer on photography, and explain the key aspects of his own writing process.


Please note: All sales are final and no refunds will be given.