Blog
Studio Visit Caochangdi and Songzhuang
10 Years ago, thanks to the China Culture Center in Beijing, I had the opportunity to join a series of visits to artist studios in Caochangdi and Songzhuang. The artwork and spaces pictured here include those of photographer Wang Qingsong, painters Huang Yin and Huo Qing, and sculptor Wang Yiqiong, who demonstrated his technique of exhaling his own cigarette smoke to create brown stains on white surfaces. These artist colonies emerged in the 1990s on farming land, away from the city center, and offered a supportive community and space for artistics freedom. While the 798 District has become more commercialized […]
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Nelson Algren and Simone de Beauvoir’s Road Trip through Franco’s Spain
Goytisolo, de Beauvoir and Algren posing atop the wall of the Alcazaba in Almería, Spain Only a handful of photographs exist of Simone de Beauvoir and Nelson Algren together from a love affair that persisted, mostly across the Atlantic ocean, for over a decade. Possibly the last photograph of them together is from a visit to Spain in May 1960. In the photograph, they stand with Catalan writer Juan Goytisolo to their right along the wall of the Alcazaba, an old Moorish palace, in Almería. A glimpse of the mountainous landscape beyond can be seen over Goytisolo’s shoulder. Beauvoir, in […]
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Spartacus in Spain
At a time when Hollywood studios and independent producers were looking to shoot overseas to save costs and highlight exotic locations, Spartacus was supposed to show that an epic film could be made without leaving California. But Director Stanley Kubrick insisted on shooting the battle scenes in Spain. Kubrick envisioned a vast, open landscape, with legions of trained soldiers marching in formation. Spain had the landscapes, it was relatively cheap, and previous Hollywood productions had paved the way for working there. However, none of the stars traveled to Spain. As I previously wrote about, this split production required creative editing […]
Read More‘Carabanchel’ ebook free download
The ebook version of my 2014 photobook ‘Carabanchel’ is now available to download free of charge. The book includes 56 pages of photos and text about the notorious Carabanchel prison in Madrid. More information about the book and download links are available here.
Read MoreOnce Upon a Time in Shanghai
‘Once Upon a Time in Shanghai’ (Daylight Books, 2019) available for order from Daylight Books and online retailers. Or ask your local bookstore to order it!
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A Day at the Shanghai Film Studio
Several years ago while visiting the Shanghai Film Studio, I photographed these actors on their lunch break. All dressed in identical black suits, they were part of a gangster film set in 1930s Shanghai. On this day, the studio was buzzing with activity. The gangster film was shooting a car chase and crowd scenes in front of a large green screen. Costume trucks and lunch tables were set up in front of a fake shipyard. Nearby, the production crew was setting in place props and signs along the streetscape for the next day’s shooting. Meanwhile, the studio also runs a […]
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125 Years of Federico García Lorca
Federico García Lorca was born in 1898, and earlier this year marked the 125th anniversary of his birth. When he was 30 years old, Spanish newspapers covered a sensational story from a remote corner of Andalucia. Twenty six year old bride Francisca Cañadas Morales was due to marry a local farmer. hours before the wedding she eloped with her cousin Francisco Montes Cañadas, with whom she had been in love since childhood. But before they could get away, the groom’s brother shot and killed Francisco. The episode became famous throughout the country as ‘el crimen de Níjar’ and served as […]
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Anthropology of the Moving Image
A new book looks at movie landscapes: Arnd Schneider, Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo has published widely on contemporary art and anthropology. His latest book, Expanded Visions: A New Anthropology of the Moving Image, brings together a set of essays on anthropology, ethnography and film. One of the essays, titled “An Anthropology of Abandon,” discusses experimental filmmaker and photographer Cyrill Lachauer’s “narrative landscapes” and travels through the American West. The essay opens with the desert, a tabula rasa on which the imagination can be projected. According to philosopher Jean Baudrillard, the desert is fascinating because of […]
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The Story of El Condor 1
I put together this short video about one of my favorite film sets in Almería, which appears in “Once Upon a Time in Almeria: The Legacy of Hollywood in Spain” (Daylight Books 2017). One of the most intriguing locations in Almería is the site of an elaborate fortress originally constructed in 1969 for the film El Condor. Adobe houses, horse stables, an elevated water tank, and a luxurious two story stone house surrounded a central plaza the size of a soccer field. The entire complex was circled by 30 foot walls with a network of watchtowers and stairways. The fort […]
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WW84 in Spain
In Wonder Woman 1984, Diana Prince appears to be in semi-retirement, working at the Smithsonian Institution as an expert in ancient civilizations while playing mall cop in her spare time. But she is soon faced with a new challenge when an ancient Dreamstone shows up, granting wishes while creating havoc. This is where the real action starts. Diana and reanimated dead boyfriend Steve Trevor fly to Cairo, chasing after Max Lord, who has fled with the Dreamstone to fulfill his quest for limitless power. The Egypt segment was entirely filmed in Spain, in Almería, on the southern coast, and the […]
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