Photograph by Sarah Pickering

On the occasion of the release of Sarah Pickering’s monograph Explosions, Fires and Public Order, Pickering will talk this evening with writer, lecturer, curator and author of Art Photography Now, Susan Bright. The conversation will take place at Aperture Bookstore and Gallery and will be followed by a reception and book signing.

Pickering has said of her work that it “Explores the idea of imagined threat and response, and looks at fear and planning for the unexpected, merging fact and fiction, fantasy and reality.” In the conversation Bright and Pickering will discuss these themes and the images included in Explosions, Fires and Public Order depicting the mysterious worlds of The Metropolitan Police Public Order Training Center (a simulated urban environment near London where officers rehearse response to imagined scenarios), controlled explosions used by the British Military during drills, as well as constructed home interiors set ablaze for training purposes at UK Fire Training College.

Susan Bright and Sarah Pickering In Conversation
Wednesday, March 31, 6:30 PM

FREE

Aperture Gallery & Bookstore
547 West 27th Street, 4th floor
New York, New York
(212) 505 – 5555

Click here to view Explosions, Fires and Public Order

Click here to view limited edition print of Pickering’s photo Artillery

The deadline to apply to the next 6 month session of  Aperture’s Work Scholar program is this Thursday, April 1st. The session begins in July and we are happy to announce the opportunity of two new positions added to the growing program:

EDITORIAL (LIBRARY)
Commitment: 3 days/week
Work Scholars accepted per season: 1

The library intern will assist in organizing and maintaining Aperture’s multiple in-house libraries. Responsibilities include: integrating books into Aperture’s libraries, adding books to the database; working with supervisor to assess the overall organizational system applied to the library; adding all books previously published by Aperture to the database and doing the research necessary to achieve this goal; working with off-site warehouse staff to stock any books missing from our library; synthesizing several overlapping libraries into a cohesive whole.

Requirements: Preference will be given to candidates with a background in library management or study. Required: interest in the photographic and publishing fields, high level of attention to detail, proficiency with basic database tools (e.g. Delicious Library), strong organizational skills, willingness to do light physical labor.

EDITORIAL (COPYEDITING/PROOFREADING)
Commitment: Full-time
Work Scholars accepted per season: 1

The copyediting/proofreading intern will work with supervisors to copyedit, proofread, and fact check all requested materials, mostly pertaining to ephemera, marketing materials, and website, liaising with almost every department in the process. The intern will also help check round-to-round corrections and bluelines.

Requirements: A working grasp of the publishing field, excellent grammar and communication skills, as well as prior text-related experience will enhance a candidate’s application. Some training will be available. Because of the nature of this position, applicants should be native English speakers.

Click here for more information about other internship opportunities at Aperture and how to apply

Click here to view pictures of current Aperture Work Scholar’s at work!

Check out new Aperture projects by Sanna Kannisto and Trevor Paglen coming soon, made possible by the Aperture Fund for Emerging Artists. In this clip, watch Trevor Paglen talk about his exploration of covert activities by the U.S. Government in his first monograph, Invisible, to be released in Fall 2010, and Aperture’s publisher Lesley A. Martin speaking about our long standing commitment to discovering and publishing the work of new and visionary photographers.

Often shot from a long distance, Paglen explains how the fuzziness of his images questions how we perceive and interpret images in our society using techniques from both the photography and the astronomy fields. Following the tradition of 19th century landscape photographers like Muybridge, he speaks about his series of spy satellites taken over pictorial western landscapes connecting the dots between both, as tools of discovery for unknown territories and geographical expansion. Paglen finally touches on the political performance as part of his photographic practice.

Now more than ever, we need your support to bring the outstanding work of these artists the global attention it deserves. Please contribute $10 or more today by clicking on the link below:

Click here to make a $10 donation to this fund now

Click here for more information on the Aperture Fund for Emerging Artists

The Women’s Committee of the Philadelphia Museum of Art is now accepting submissions for its first photography portfolio competition. Seven winners will receive cash prizes and their work will be included in a limited edition portfolio. Melissa Harris, Editor-in-Chief of Aperture magazine, photographer Tina Barney, and PMA curator Peter Barberie are among the jurors. Submit online through May 15th.

Please join Aperture for some of our exciting upcoming events:

Copyright Barbara Probst

On Tuesday, March 23rd Aperture and the Photography Program in the School of Art, Media and Technology at Parsons The New School for Design will present an artist talk with Photographer Barbara Probst.

Probst is an internationally celebrated artist who lives and works in both Munich and New York and has exhibited at galleries and museums both in America and Europe. Her work examines the multiple simultaneous narratives of a single moment of exposure, triggering the shutter release of several cameras pointed at different perspectives on one scene with the use of a radio-controlled release system.

Artist Lecture with Barbara Probst
Tuesday, March 23, 6:30 pm

Aperture Gallery & Bookstore
547 West 27th Street, 4th floor
New York, New York

Additionally this coming Thursday at the SVA theater a screening  of Alfredo Jaar’s film “The Ashes of Pasolini” will be followed by a conversation, presented by the MFA Art Criticism and Writing Department at SVA in partnership with Aperture, between Alfredo Jaar and filmmaker, poet and critic David Levi Strauss.

Alfredo Jaar is an architect, artist and filmmaker who lives and works in New York City. He has created more than fifty “public interventions” around the world, and more than forty monographs have been published about his work. David Levi Strauss is the chair of the MFA Art Criticism and Writing Department at SVA.

The Ashes of Pasolini Screening and Conversation with Alfredo Jaar and David Levi Strauss
Thursday, MArch 25th, 7:00 pm

School of the Visual Arts
333 West 23rd Street
New York, New York

Next week Sarah Pickering and Susan Bright will be in conversation at Aperture on the occassion of Pickerings first monograph Explosions, Fires and Public Order (Aperture, April 2010).

Cover of Lay Flat 02 / Image Credit: Ann Woo / Courtesy of Lay Flat

Lay Flat 02: Meta is the newest publication from the Lay Flat independent imprint run by photographer Shane Lavalette.

Bringing together emerging and established artists, Lay Flat specializes in dynamic and varied books and publications that are just as much art objects, in their own right, as the work featured in their pages.

The recent second book by Lay Flat entitled Meta gathers essays, texts and images from artists and thinkers whose work contemplates the medium of photography itself. The book includes works by over twenty artists  who actively challenge and experiment with the conventions of photography as well as essays by contributors such as pioneer of experimental photography James Welling who was featured in Aperture issue 190, Aperture books publisher Lesley A. Martin, and Alex Klein who edited Aperture Published Words Without Pictures.

A release party and book signing for Lay Flat 02: Meta will take place at ICP this Friday, March 26th, with a number of the contributing editors and artists in attendance and available to sign books.

Lay Flat 02: Meta Release Party and Book Signing
Friday, March 26th, 2010
6:00pm – 7:30pm

ICP Museum Store
International Center of Photography
1133 Avenue of the Americas at 43rd Street
New York, NY 10036

Click here for more details and to purchase Lay Flat 02: Meta

Click here to view Words Without Pictures

Click here to view James Welling’s artist’s lecture at Aperture Foundation

The American Society of Magazine Editors has announced Aperture magazine as a finalist for the 2010 National Magazine Awards. Aperture, along with Architect, Military History, The Paris Review, and San Francisco Magazine, has been nominated in the general excellence category, for publications with a circulation under 100,000. The magazine has been nominated six years in a row for this award, which honors how well each publication fulfills its editorial mission. Winners will be announced on April 22nd. To see full list of nominees, click here.

Here is another great opportunity for emerging photographers to have their work exhibited: the Edward Hopper House Art Center is holding an open call for their 2010 juried photography exhibit with juror and Aperture books publisher Lesley A. Martin.

The exhibit will take place in three gallery rooms of renowned painter Edward Hopper’s birthplace and childhood home, now a multi-arts center.

The submissions deadline for this exhibit is Monday, March 22, 2010 and all artists will be notified by April 13, 2010.

For more information call 1-845-358-0774
or email info@hopperhouse.org

The April 1st deadline to apply to Aperture Foundation’s Work Scholar program is approaching.

For over twenty years Aperture’s intern program has provided recent college graduates the opportunity to gain experience in Aperture Foundation’s various departments including editing, design, production, exhibitions, circulation, sales, marketing, development and the creation of web content. Interns learn valuable skills in photo-book publishing and media as well as make connections within the arts community.

There are weekly opportunities to engage in Aperture’s events-programming including gallery openings, lectures and dialogues between renowned photographers, curators, critics and scholars hosted in Aperture’s gallery and bookstore.  Aperture’s loft space is located in Chelsea in the heart of New York City’s art district. The typically six-month long program includes special tours of galleries and museums and other intern outings.


Plus there are office cats!

Click here for more information about Aperture Foundation’s Work Scholar program.

Click here to view a past Work Scholar outing to the Museum of the City of New York with museum curator Sean Corcoran

Click here to view a past Work Scholar outing to Jack Shainman gallery with artist Hank Willis Thomas

Copyright Pieter Hugo

Portraits by Pieter Hugo were featured in Aperture Issue # 186, and now you can see his new series, Nollywood, at Yossi Milo Gallery. The photographs recreate scenes and characters from the Nigerian film industry, one of the three largest in the world.

Closing reception with artist:
Thursday, April 8, 2010
6:00-8:00 pm

Exhibition on view:
February 25-April 10, 2010

Yossi Milo Gallery:
525 W. 25th St.
New York, NY