Alejandro Cartagena

Alejandro Cartagena is a Hispanic photographer that works and lives in Monterrey, Mexico. His work is about the social issues in Mexico. He does landscapes and portraits. He has had his work shown all over the US from Chicago all the way to New Mexico, even out of the country.
 Mexico is a struggling country especially for the cities near the border. Some of these areas are very unsafe because of the drug cartel and the poor community. He is focusing his work on the environmental and social issues that are going on in Mexico, what the people wish they could have. His words are so wise and he is very committed to showing the world what is happening in Mexico.
He has one project based around the 'dream of owning a home in 21st century Mexico"
This series is called Landscape as Bureaucracy. I chose this series because it reminds me of my project. Owning a home is a dream that most people have. I also really enjoy this project because he does documentary work to capture something that is so precious to people especially to a place like Mexico. He is not trying to show only the good or the bad, but instead he just shows the natural aspect of this idea of having a home. I am also really interested in Alejandro because my family is from a very poor unsafe area in Mexico, I know the struggle that people deal with. I know that owning a home in Mexico is a big accomplishment especially in certain areas.
He also has a sub series to this that shows his family and how they are growing in the community and creating a home for their family.
All of Alejandro's work is very beautiful because he is so committed to working in this place he does a great job capturing special moments and his words speak very well for him in all his series.





'building dreams for $230 thousand pesos'

'inside my brother´s future housing complex, october 2010'

'man waiting for his paperwork to be checked at a real estate firm sales office'


 http://alejandrocartagena.com/

Trevor Paglen

http://www.paglen.com/?l=work&s=othernightsky


Trevor Paglen is a New York based artist/geographer that received his MFA form SAIC and a Phd from U.C Berkeley in geography.  his work tends to be related to space and our interactions/relationship with it. I like his work one for his choice in topics but more so in how much research he puts into his work that.  In his body of work "The Other Night Sky" he tracked and photographed the trails left by satellites, debris, and other objects in space.

Ben Marcin

http://www.benmarcinphotos.com

     Ben Marcin was born in Ausberg, Germany. As a child he moved to Baltimore MD, where he still lives. He is a self taught photographer, buying his first camera at the age of 27.  Since then, he has been shown in numerous national galleries.

     Marcin often trains his lens on the places where people live and interact with on a daily basis. Marcin's work caught my eye, because of his ability to see the mundane and make it provocative. This is perfectly illustrated in the body of work "Towers."
     With "Towers," Ben Marcin photographs apartment towers and sky scrapers. He then removes all information from the photo, except for one wall of the structure. This technique allows you to see the cookie cutter patterns of each building. Even more intriguing are the subtle variances that begin to jump out as you explore the image. Each block of each building begins to develop its own personality, hinting to the people within.

Allyson Klutenkamper

     Was born in Missouri but was raised in Minnesota. She now lives and works in Ohio. Klutenkamper work normally is of women in domestic spaces that are have no connection to the subject. She uses these scenes to make a fractured narrative that represents different emotions, while also utilizing the concept of beauty as an experience rather then a condition.
     This piece is from Klutenkemper's  work called Domicile. There is a sense of sacrifice in the work. That the limited view of the narrative, creates the feel that it is a personal sacrifice that is being made. I feel that the work is about loss or the falling apart of a situation. Being that the majority of Klutenkemper's work focuses on  isolation, anxiety and despair in domestic situations, i feel that the work is about the sacrifice of a women in which something has gone badly in the home.
     I chose this work because i found it visually interesting but also  because i liked that the artist was wanted to invoke not only an understanding of the situation but also invoke a emotional exchange with the viewer.

Chris Jordan

He is a artist from Seattle who does photos on mass consumption and 

garbage. He was a lawyer who enjoyed photography. He decided to give up his

law career and move to Seattle because of its reputation of being an exciting city. He started taking

photos of garbage. He makes a statement of American Consumerism and waste in 

his photo's .His photography shows what is going on every day around us that we

over look or choose not to see. The top photo is from his "Running the Number's" series and 

the bottom on is from his "In Katrina's Wake" series.  The first one i choose because it is 

a large numbers of photos of nuclear mushroom clouds put together to form a view of the Titanic and 

is titled "unsinkable, 2013" . It represents the 67,000 metric tons of radiation in pools around nuclear 

power plants. My second choice is shows the great loss after a natural disaster. Both photo's 

 make a statement and yet show beauty in them. 

I choose him because the statement he makes with the photos, that there is too much waste in 

society today and that it is destroying our planet little at a time. His work appeals to me 

in that I believe that something needs done and the only way it will 

is if someone draws attention to the destruction we are creating on this planet. 

http://photographyforagreenerplanet.wordpress.com/tag/chris-jordan/

Even in the light of destruction there is hope. Whether it is man made with trash and garbage

or whether it is from a natural disaster there is always a way to rebuild if we

start now to fix or reverse the damage that was done by humans or nature. 

His photos draw attention to the waste that we as humans have grown accustom to, as we pass it 

everyday yet do not look upon it as if the world will heal itself with out our help. 

hey just put up my website, wondered if I could get some feedback?

http://www.jacobwieringa.com/

link