Debbie Carlos: Micro
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Untitled (from “Micro”)
© Debbie Carlos
Debbie Carlos caught my attention with her series Micro. As Debbie puts it, there’s a sort of “anti-nostalgia” present in the work. To me, the images capture everything that’s beautiful and fleeting about photographic details.
I can’t help but think of of Joerg’s recent comment that,
A badly printed photo is a problem. A badly printed big photo is a big problem, especially since it allows you to see a lot of detail if you get close.
In the case of Debbie’s work I’d disagree entirely. I’d love to see these images large, in all their grainy glory.
November 13th, 2007 at 8:08 am
You’re completely missing my point.
November 13th, 2007 at 8:52 am
I’m not getting the connection between craft and “anti-nostalgia”. In fact, I don’t know what she‚Äôs talking about.
The Internet cares about prints now? That is silly.
November 13th, 2007 at 11:29 am
Joerg, I understand then that you may be talking about Crewdsons, Guskys and so on - and I agree that if the intent is for clarity, then pushing the print past it’s prime (especially for the sake of what’s popular in the market / photo world) is a “big problem,” as you put it. I wouldn’t disagree with you on those grounds…
However, I’m making the point that there are works that don’t aim for the ideal that you imply and these works are best displayed by exploiting the medium of photography - allowing for grain, blur, dust, etc., rather than covering it up.
I haven’t seen Debbie’s work in person - I have no idea how she intends to print/show these works - but I thought to myself last night how much I’d love to see them huge, pushed past their prime, turned “ugly.” The scale would really activate these small photographic (non)details.
Dan, I think this could be the “anti-nostalgia” that she refers to - I’m not sure. But, as I wrote, I still find beauty in these and they then become nostalgic for me (though, not for any one thing but for a feeling). So, I’m not sure how effective the term anti-nostalgia is on her part. I’d love to hear what she has to say.
November 13th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
Don’t be such a baby Joerg, the only person missing the point is you. First you bite Shane’s Jane Tam post without giving him credit and now this cranky comment?
November 29th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
Hi Shane, Thank you for posting these and I’m really glad you like them. I don’t think these images have anything to do with craft and I don’t think any of my work really is. In fact I have often disregarded or at least purposefully subverted it a lot in the past but not so much in more recent works. Much of it, like you have said, just has to do with a certain feeling.
In regards to the term “anti-nostalgia”, I suppose what I was thinking that nostalgia is often (though thinking about it now, its not always the case) connected to warm feelings or a past that you feel connected with, something that perhaps defines your sense of self. Anti-nostalgia then becomes a disconnection with you and the past. These photos are not my memories, they are not recreations of any specific memory, rather a strange ambiguous idea of memory or a recreation of how we experience memory. There is maybe something happening, maybe there is an important event going on in the photo but you can’t know it because there is not enough information. I don’t know if that explains it all but I hope it shed a little light on what I meant.
I did show these earlier this year at a show in LA and they were printed 25×25″, mounted naked to the wall. I could definitely see these being printed larger though!