Kelly Hofer, Calgary Flood pt 3:3

Kelly Hofer, noted Hutterite photographer, captured the floods inundating Calgary, Alberta, late last month.  With his permission, we are sharing his experience and a few of his images with you revealing the flood and its impact on the community.

Part 3:  The Ritual of Community
met reinje ne Nobaschoft

all images used by permission and (c) Kelly Hofer, 2013.

Kelly Hofer: Calgary Flood 2013 pt 2:3

Kelly Hofer, noted Hutterite photographer, captured the floods inundating Calgary, Alberta, late last month.  With his permission, we are sharing his experience and a few of his images with you revealing the flood and its impact on the community.

Part 2:  The Surveyors  
met äwadäl kome en be'kjikje

all images used by permission and (c) Kelly Hofer, 2013.

NYC - A Mennonite Landscape

Manhattan, New York, New York, 2013
 
Charlie Kraybill, born Mennonite, educated at Eastern Mennonite University, has made a home for himself while discovering a unique Mennonite landscape in the boroughs and urban canyons of New York City.

    Kraybill's friends on Facebook have long been treated to his particular vision and experience of North America's largest metropolis.  Kraybill has a way of cutting it down to size with a focus on what is otherwise often seen as the anonymous individual.  At the same time, his landscape tends to be defined by paths (streets, sidewalks, canyons, subway tracks) and set landmarks.

    To my mind, he moves beyond the hustle and bustle of 5th Avenue, Wall Street and Broadway to highlight the culture and quiet peace of those who call the city home.  Kraybill's NYC has more in common with the Paris of Renoir, Seurat and Erich Marie Remarque or the city of Edward Hopper and F. Scott Fitzgerald than the loud, boisterous lights, clubs and sirens so often brought out in contemporary television programming.  Kraybill's New York City is a place where a normal person might like to live, and where even a Mennonite might find a quiet, peace-filled lifestyle, and yet one that is always changing and never boring.

    One of his photographs seems to to indicate this sense explicitly by focusing in on the unmoving permanence of a potted, residential boxwood while the sights, sounds and brilliantly coloured yellow taxis whirr by in and out of frame, in and out of the context of the boxwood.

    In presenting a selection of his photographs on this blog, I have cautiously edited many of them to bring out colour, depth and contrast.  I often find this necessary for the digital blogs and images that are backlit on computer and cell phone screens.

    At the same time, one will note that Kraybill's native tone is much flatter, bringing out a style more reminiscent of the French Impressionists and Pointillists than the vibrant clarities of Visionaire, Vogue or even Gorski and Wall.  This ain't your Sex And the City or Devil Wears Prada photo-shoot.

    Enjoy and please contact Kraybill directly for use or questions relating to his work.

~ Bruderthaler

2nd & 6th at 16:25 pm

6th Avenue & West 4th at 21:42 pm

8th & 42nd at 02:26 am

8th Avenue below 15th Street at 22:00 pm

8th Avenue & 126th at 15:33 pm

14th Street at 19:30 pm

Movies from Lustre Mennonite

en fe'flucht hoot

Micah Rauch grew up in the Lustre Mennonite community in northeast Montana.  He states that this is his first animated film:

Enjoy!

'tag

Permanent Quilts

  My friend Dan Whittaker travels extensively in Asia.  An adventurous soul, Dan is also an architect.  His photography is amazing and educational.

  On his current trip, he created a Facebook photo album of tiles found in Bangkok.  The resemblance of the tilework to quilts jumped out at me right away.  With his permission, I'd like to share...

Artist Jacob Kane

   Jacob Kane is a graduate of the non-denominational, Mennonite-affiliated Lustre Christian High School in Lustre, Montana, Class of '91.  Born in Montana, Kane moved to San Francisco, California after serving in the United States Navy.  His work is now part of the on-going digital art endeavor, Omnetra (see link:  Jacob Kane Omnetra).

Jeff Wall, Jewish Russlander Photographer

Eena dee schienent Bilda aufnemmt

Jeff Wall by Hermann Wendler, 2007

   IIn tracing and detailing the extent of the Russian Mennonite diaspora, one spends a lot of time on the look-out for key names – such as Toews, Unrau, Wiens, etc.  Many names, however, exist well beyond the diaspora – Becker, Unger, Wall, etc. 

   Regarding the surname Wall, I have always been intrigued by the artist Jeff David Wall of Vancouver, British Columbia – is he of the Dutch Wall’s, the Norwegian Wahl’s, the Irish Wall’s (who are actually Dutch) or the Mennonite Wall’s – if he is Mennonite, is he of the Belgian Vanderwalle’s  or de Walles, or of the Frisien Walde / Waldens?  Nor is Wall’s photo of any assistance.  I, for example, look just like my father, grandfather, great-grandfather – all the way back to C.M. Wall, the earliest for whom an image exists.  Wall does not look unlike a Dutch-Flemish Wall, but they have also, possibly due to shared heritage, also looked suspiciously Irish.

   So leaving off the Jerry Springer – Montel Williams investigatory work , Arthur Lubow, of the New York Times, actually published the answer to the dilemma in his bio-piece on Jeff Wall , 25 February, 2007.  In a piece title “The Luminist,” Lubow reveals that Jeff Wall, that great Canadian photographic artist is actually – “Jewish”.  “Jewish?” one asks.  “Jewish” he says.

Collected Meanings: Japanese Pottery (repost)

en Leem Tap (?)

 

Collected Meanings:   

Japanese Pottery and Travel Stories

Dick Lehman

Goshen College Visual Arts Gallery

Goshen, Indiana

12 July, 2010

     My first reaction to this exhibit was one of curious pleasure mixed with acute apprehension.  Asian ceramics always tweak my interest.  My aunt Ruby FitzGerald (FitzRu) studied pottery under a Japanese Master (one of the first Western women to do so), and I have always freely lost myself in the Asian ceramics collections of the Art Institute Chicago and the Minneapolis Art Institute.  On the other hand -- of what real use is an Asian ceramics collection? 

    I need not have worried.  Dick Lehman is both an expert in the field of ceramics and an accomplished collector.  Collected Meanings explores decades of collecting and travel experiences in Japan as both a record of an on-going cultural exchange between the United States and Japan, and as an educational introduction to the variety of methods, textures, finishes, and shapes historically common to Japanese ceramics. 

    One might begin Lehman’s tour in one of two ways.  One might rush right into the cases of ceramics and begin exploring, or one might choose to engage the well placed magazine articles and travel memoirs posted along the wall.

Lustre - Volt Through the Lens of Tapaha

Lustre - Volt Community by Elliot Tapaha