As if being a master of the subtly breathtaking— an ace of the ethereal— weren’t enough, Vancouver-based photographer Jennilee Marigomen comes from that rare breed of people who possess an uncanny ability to identify other rad artists, and then connect them for awesome things.

For instance, she recently assembled a photo projection show called Stream, and then simulcast it bi-coastally at Space 15 Twenty in L.A. and Pent House Gallery in Baltimore. She art directs 01 Magazine, a blog/magazine hybrid with impeccable taste and innovative content. She even manages to elevate Tumblr to an art form. Whether looking at her curation or creation, one thing is clear: Jennilee Marigomen’s eyes have superhuman powers. They can see invisible dimensions of light and space. Here, she opens up about what they look for:

Although some of your photos have people in them, you seem to avoid straight-up portraits. What leads you to pick nature over people?
The images that resonate with me are the ones that embrace a certain kind of ambiguity and leave room for interpretation. There is always a bit of uncertainty and mystery in nature… It can’t be fully controlled and is always changing and adapting - which is what my Botanophobia series is about. I’m not really interested in subjects that are too direct or give a lot away.. I want people to revisit the image with a new perception each time. Kind of like a film with an open ending. Or maybe I prefer not to take portraits because I’m a little shy.

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Since its early days as minimalist HTML directory, awesome online photo gallery Tiny Vices has provided access to a goldmine of rad photographers’ portfolios without superfluous frills distracting from the viewing experience. Now they’ve got a brand new iPhone app that appears to continue that tradition of elegant simplicity, and it’s totally free!

This is exactly the type of content that makes me want an iPhone. Bah! If only Apple wasn’t so frighteningly totalitarian… and if only I wasn’t trapped in a T-Mobile contract. Should I finally swallow my scruples sell my soul to Steve Jobs?

French Photographer Bertrand Fleuret has a new book out from J&L, entitled Landmasses & Railways. Go check it out, you can download the whole thing for free as a PDF on Fleuret’s site.

Photographs by Boru O’Brien O’Connell. Memories of a faded time, and portraits of ordinary men so sentimental they feel taboo. From an interview with We Can’t Paint:

I like to photograph a somewhat ignored and even bland demographic; as a reflection of the medium’s history, as a reflection of the culture’s visual choices, and as a reflection of what I’m interested in. I like to imbue humor into photography, albeit sometimes in a very subtle manner, I think that is important. This is not to say that there isn’t an abundance of social and artistic criticism, or even humor, surrounding this same demographic I shoot, but for me masculinity lends itself to something less obvious than what I’ve seen; a silliness, a strangeness, but all this lies just under a layer of how serious or straight it wants to be taken.

I think there is a lot that is just assumed about male identity, especially given the stereotypical reticence of straight men. But this trait provides a wealth of material and questioning, unopened doors of weirdness. Maybe there’s still a fear of some kind regarding straight, platonic male relationships, but I see a lot to be gleaned from that pursuit, both in undermining its exterior, and maybe relating a bizarre anecdote.

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A troubling energy pervades Steven Brahms’s photographs. The world through his eyes is toxic yet exciting, coy and irreverent. It’s a desolate landscape dotted with slapdash abodes far off the grid, half-buried bodies in dread-filled trash heaps, naked hippies in nature, and men running with the intensity usually reserved for post-apocalyptic self-preservation. Image by image, Brahms slowly scratches away at the poisonous detritus of modern life to reveal the wonderment and humor buried beneath. He has done us the heavy of responding to a handful of prodding and open-ended questions:

Are the men in your photographs running towards something or away from something?
I ask them to run for their lives! So, I guess it depends on what each guy is thinking when he is running. The long haired asian guys running is a series I have been working on a lot lately. My project/question is: What makes a man run?

Scientists use constants and variables when investing questions. I decided that my constants would be: Asian guys with long hair, motivation (“Run for your life!!!”), and capture (the camera and lighting I use). Therefore the variables would be gesture and environment, resulting in an artifact of experience both personal and shared.

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If I was going to characterize my Oregon home with a particular song, I’d go with Tom Wait’s “All the World is Green.” It’s a song my hippie roommates sing by the fire when it’s raining too much to leave the house. It’s melancholy, like the blanket of clouds over Eugene that never really breaks from September through May. It longs for things to grow back that we have destroyed, like relationships and forests (“We can bring back the old days again, when all the world is green.”) The title describes one observation that many people have when they first visit Oregon, before they see between the trees and notice all of the scars on the land.

In February I took up a photography project to document the ongoing conflict between Earth First! activists and the logging industry. Here, activism still has a physical battlefield. The environmental anarchism that characterized Eugene in the 90’s has waned since the federal government made a number of arrests in the early 00’s (the “Green Scare”). Still, the forest defenders come back every year.

View the rest of my photo essay after the break. Listen to Tom Waits while you watch for a more complete sensory experience. It’s a love song, I know, but the color is just right.

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Marc Smith is a Disney animator by day and Lucha Libre photographer by night. After graduating from CalArts, Smith began his animation career as an inbetweener on The Lion King and Pocahantas. Inbetweeners are responsible for drawing the tens of thousands of action images— yes, you guessed it— in between the key frames. Not a bad way to foster an understanding of the human figure’s multifarious angles and expressions.

By Smith’s own account, he was content expressing himself through drawings and sketches until “one fateful day, after enjoying a particularly garlicky plate of hummus as his girlfriend dug though her purse for a piece of gum, she handed him her camera to hold. Just then, a 400-pound man carrying a 2-pound dog rounded the corner. With no sketchbook in hand, he used the camera, and a passion was born.”

The seed of that newfound passion has borne some spectacular fruit. Smith’s images explode across the screen. They are as immediate and arresting as they are thoughtful and measured— a precise balance that can be traced back to the photographer’s keen sense of timing and fundamental understanding of the body. Smith was kind enough to send us over photos and share some thoughts on photography, the appeal of Luchadores, and the very real pain of searching for missing teeth.

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Cartoonist Tim Hensley stopped by Giant Robot 2 yesterday to sign copies of his epic new graphic novel, Wally Gropius. It’s an irresistable satire about a Huey Lewis-obsessed teenage millionaire who falls under the threat of disinheritance if he refuses to marry “the saddest girl in the world,” launching an increasingly bizarre odyssey involving an icy seductress with a taste of money, men and national anthems.

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Delicate, yet cautiously inquisitive, Katie Shapiro’s photographs seem to breach the silent cocoons surrounding her subjects. Don’t miss her fascinating series Old World Charm, in which she documents the gradual gentrification of her Los Angeles apartment building.

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[ Note: Please give a warm welcome to Future Shipwreck’s newest contributor, the lovely Grace Pettygrove. I’ve known Grace since high school, and she has never failed to help me see what others miss in the world. I can’t wait to share her many talents with all of you! - Graham ]

Oftentimes photography feels like a form of thievery. The artist steals facial expressions and sunsets from their larger contexts, dropping in through the skylight and crawling away with life’s most visually provocative moments.

Then there are other photographers, like Alessandra Sanguinetti, who document change in a radical way: by staying in one place. In two essays, spanning a decade, Sanguinetti photographed a girlhood friendship in the Argentinean countryside. Guille and Belinda, as girls, explore “the Enigmatic Nature of Their Dreams.” The earlier images of their youth are intimate, fly-on-the-wall portraits of dress-up games and moments of utter inseparability—moments so particular to the friendship of little girls—interspersed with staged scenes that seem to remind the viewer of the ultimate mortality of young relationships.

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Photographs of unreal places by New York-based artist Craig Kalpakjian. Digitally rendered, these eerie, uncanny images of cold modernist architecture raise questions about alienation, psychological space and the lingering aura of of common places. Mystery lurks behind every corner in these forelorn bureaucratic landscapes, perhaps hinting at the rumbling signs of an impending apocalypse. Queries Kalpakjian, “Aren’t we always haunted by the future?”

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One of my favorite Texans, Ben Aqua, has a new music video for Austin-based band Over the Hill’s tune “Wickerman.” Check out some golden oldies from the Aqua archives after the jump, and revel in this mastermind photographer and video artist’s droolworthy canon of work.

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Løber Nøgen, a group of 6 photographers (including Future Shipwreck fave Flemming Ove Bech) whose name means “Running Naked” in Danish, have certainly chosen an apt descriptor for their collective work. Not that they let it limit their range of subject matter. They also bike naked, climb trees naked, and hoist each other up naked in a manner evocative of both childhood games of “light as a feather, stiff as a board” and, somehow, the Iwo Jima Memorial. Good times!

According to their mission statement, “The overall idea is to explore what the six founding members essentially have in common. Personal styles and boundaries are annulled and vanity is left behind in a childlike attempt to lose one self.” This deliberate self-effacement along with the photos’ doing-stuff-for-the-fuck-of-it-style content provide a lot of space for the viewer to read into it what they will. Any great admirer of the male nude, myself included (insert whatever would be the opposite of “no homo” here), will find lots to enjoy as will those who like to wax nostalgic about bygone days of youthful innocence. Whatever conclusion is ultimately reached, the viewer has to do some of the legwork too.

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Gorgeous photographs by Keily Anderson-Staley depicting the lives of people who have chosen to leave the world behind and live off the grid in the wilds of Maine. Discovered via Daniel Augschoell’s tremendous photographic digest, Ahorn Magazine.

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Molly Landreth takes pictures of queer people. Really awesome pictures, in fact. Her photo series, Embodiment, is one of the most compelling ongoing series of portraits around, and a fascinating survey of gender and sexuality’s infinite spectrum.

Now she’s teamed up with Shoot The Player’s Amelia Tovey to bring the stories of these amazing images to life in a series of short documentaries that will be released for free online. It’s like if Ira Glass from This American Life met William Eggleston in a gay bar and totally made out.

However, Molly and Amelia need your help to finish the project! They’ve launched a Kickstarter page to raise the necessary funds, so please consider donating a few dollars. This project has the power to change the way people see each other and themselves. Be a part of it! Donate $20 or more and you get one of several personal mix tapes made by rad people like Jens Lekman, Amanda Palmer and Tender Forever.

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