Barbara M. Ventura – Next Step Alumni Group Exhibit

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John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group

For over 10 years I’ve been mentoring a select group of individuals. Their progress has been thrilling to watch. It’s been a true privilege to be a part of their growth. July 7 their first Group Exhibit will be unveiled at the Maine Media Workshops. (link)
Barbara has been a member for 4 years. Here’s one important thing she learned and her work.
Alumni Insights
The most important thing I learned from my participation in John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group, other than the privilege we have to be able to partake of John’s artistic career as well as his insight and directive in our creative expression, is that we can become a part of a living organism rather than a Group organization.
Participation in the apparent difficulties that we ourselves go through as well as the success stories and journeys of others can become a personal experience to each one of us. We can see the fact that we belong to a group as a whole (one) rather than individually. We can get involved seeing the Group as a living organism rather than an organization with the assurance that what takes place when we meet, is far beyond those undeniable reasons to attend a workshop.
Artist’s Statement
My work is an anthology of what could be called “eternal moments”; images captured as an expression of my identification with Life in the form of Nature as an integral part of my Essence and Being.  I could also define it as occasions when I am at One with nature and the conscious distinctions between the self and the observed fade away. I believe one must move beyond the dualistic concept of “an artist and his work” in order to create and experience art in its essential timeless expression.
This expression is the resultant flow from an interminable encounter with Life.  Through this interaction, my life as a seeker has given way to the profound inner confirmation that art and artist are One. Therefore it has become an indescribable joy to experience the world as an observer while being inspired to transcribe spiritual truth into visual imagery.
See more of Barbara’s work here.
See the Next Step Exhibit at the Maine Media Workshops July 7 – 30.
Find Barbara’s Next Step Blurb book here.
Find out more about my workshops here.
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Karen Daspit – Next Step Alumni Group Exhibit

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John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group
For over 10 years I’ve been mentoring a select group of individuals. Their progress has been thrilling to watch. It’s been a true privilege to be a part of their growth. July 7 their first Group Exhibit will be unveiled at the Maine Media Workshops. (link)
Karen Daspit has been a member for over 5 years. Here’s one important thing she learned and her work.
Alumni Insights
The most important thing I learned from my participation in John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group is that a group can create a synergy that produces artistic progression and excellence.  Next Step has done that for me, personally.  Somehow, watching other artists work improve and establishing a close connection with them via the internet creates a platform for improvement.  Our group leader, John Paul Caponigro has set the standards high for critique, and quality of work submitted to the group. This has helped fuel the improvement I have experienced. It is almost a magical experience!
Artist’s Statement
The tropical environment I find in Hawaii inspires my images. The fauna here never ceases to amaze and provoke my creative spirit.  I enjoy working with an earthen palate and taking what I see around me and re-composing it to my liking.
I have always been blessed with a creative ability that allows me to “see” a finished image in my mind’s eye.This ability, combined with my experience in the computer industry has served me well in this metamorphic journey.
My work has matured over the last 12 years.  While conquering some of the technicalities of a camera, my work was basic and somewhat geometric and design oriented.  It has progressed through various themes of flowers and leaves, to what is now a much more intricate and creative product.
I enjoy this task so much. I have met amazing people who have encouraged and mentored me. Living in Hawaii is a blessing to my work.
I strive to charm the observer, as I have been charmed.
See more of Karen Daspit’s work here.
See the Next Step Exhibit at the Maine Media Workshops July 7 – 30.
Stay tuned for individual and group Next Step Blurb books.
Find out more about my workshops here.
Read More

Shayne Lynn – Next Step Alumni Group Exhibit

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John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group
For over 10 years I’ve been mentoring a select group of individuals. Their progress has been thrilling to watch. It’s been a true privilege to be a part of their growth. July 7 their first Group Exhibit will be unveiled at the Maine Media Workshops. (link)
Shayne Lynn has been a member for over 5 years. Here’s one important thing he learned and his work.
Alumni Insights
I signed up for my first John Paul Caponigro photography workshop looking to become a more technically efficient Photoshop user.  The workshop impressed me by going beyond Photoshop and illuminating how to see differently, to be witness to your own work and also use this new knowledge to be more creative – both before and after taking the picture.
I have been part of the Next Step Group for four years. Having an active dialogue with this community of diverse visual artists facilitated by John Paul has broadened my own interpretation of photography and the express power that lies within it. The group helps one clarify meaning and purpose in their own work, and has given me support to pursue my own projects.
Artist’s Statement
These images visualize internal spaces in nature, mirrored in myself – the depth of which I seek to explore and comprehend. They represent the small, simple, meditations of nature and moments I became comfortably lost in. By becoming still (sometimes disturbingly so), I released the pressure to “be creative”, and was able to witness my breath, to sense an image and compose it. The camera frame holds together the pieces of the world for me, defining the horizon, creating a center from which to focus on. I sought to capture a sense of energy moving in containment – a channel of “becoming in an unplanned way – flow”.
See more of Shayne’s work here.
See the Next Step Exhibit at the Maine Media Workshops July 7 – 30.
Stay tuned for individual and group Next Step Blurb books.
Find out more about my workshops here.
Read More

Jim Graham – Next Step Alumni Group Exhibit

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John Paul Caponigro’s Next Step Alumni Group
For over 10 years I’ve been mentoring a select group of individuals. Their progress has been thrilling to watch. It’s been a true privilege to be a part of their growth. July 7 their first Group Exhibit will be unveiled at the Maine Media Workshops. (link)
Jim Graham has been a member for over 6 years. Here’s one important thing he learned and his work.
Alumni Insight

I first came to John Paul 8 years ago.  And from that workshop and my subsequent inclusion in the Next Step Group  I have been able to develop a voice that speaks through my work.  John might say that I always had one and that he only helped untie the strings that has bound it.  But, I’d argue differently.
My inclusion in this group helped in my ability to articulate a visual language.  An Artistic language.  For I do believe that when we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change, to hear and to see; at such a moment, there is no point in pretending that nothing has happened or in saying that we are not ready. The challenge will not wait.
And it was not only John Paul who taught, but each member of that group as teacher.  Each offering their own individual gift to the other. Each part having their own unique attributes that bound us all together.  Not just a whole community but a visual chorus.
I’ve also been fortunate that others have valued my input about their work and that curiosity has given me the courage to begin to teach on my own.

Artist’s Statement
The work I choose to show in a gallery is typically made while traveling. I usually just photograph whatever interests me. Documenting where I am or what my surrounding environs are.  The resulting imagery inevitably ends up integrating my experience with the natural world. I seem to have an inner agenda, which is always seeking a harmony between the two, as well as a need to reconcile the inner, psychological world with the outer world of my everyday experiences. Each of my images has it’s own story.  I may not have known the story when I released the shutter.  But, the journey home and the time taken to suss out the images I have created, each stories unfolds.  They are perhaps an afterthought – a way to make sense of a fleeting moment or a memory.
In the naming of my images I try to give a bit of meaning to the moment I’ve tired to render.  I try to find a way to finish the image as a final piece and to bind the group as a whole. Each image has it’s own place and it’s own narrative.  While I have my own story for each, I hope that the viewer find his own stories within them.
See more of Jim Graham’s work here.
See the Next Step Exhibit at the Maine Media Workshops July 7 – 30.
Stay tuned for individual and group Next Step Blurb books.
Find out more about my workshops here.
Read More

Exhibit – Two Generations at MMW

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Father and son exhibit together in a special exhibit – Two Generations (Paul Caponigro and John Paul Caponigro) at the Maine Media Workshops. The exhibit runs from July 26 to August 22. Saturday, July 26 from 4-6 pm is the opening and at 7 pm I’ll present a lecture. The following day we’ll run a special workshop (all proceeds benefit scholarships for aspiring photographers at MMW); with a visit to and demonstration in our personal studios – first in my father’s studio (analog) and then in my studio (digital).
Two Generations was first exhibited in 1995 at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockport, Maine. Following that, it’s traveled to many museums and galleries including the George Eastman House in Rochester, NY. It’s been several years since its last showing. Now, it’s been updated with new work and it’s coming to Maine Media Workshop’s Union Hall in Rockport, Maine. The prints are drawn from my personal collection. There are over 50 prints (silver gelatin and pigmented ink) representing classic highlights from our careers as master printers.
Our work is at once very similar and very different.
Our processes are entirely different. My father remains one of the premiere masters of 20th century technology while I’ve become one of the leading pioneers in 21st century technology. I work primarily in color, my father works primarily in black and white – though we both work with the other palette on a more limited basis.
On a more soulful note, our work is very similar. We both share intense interests in nature and spirituality. Our primary impulses are essentially mystical and poetic. Our themes and our stances towards nature and art are closely allied.
This show is actually somewhat nostalgic for me. At the age of 19, I had my very first group exhibit at The Workshops with my father, George Tice, and Eliot Porter.
Want to hear what happens when father and son share scotch?
Read our father son conversation here (first published in View Camera magazine in 1995).
Check my Calendar for other upcoming events.
Sign up for Insights to receive alerts on special opportunities like this and others coming soon.

Kernan Creativity Workshop – Day 2

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Sean (Kernan) used a great metaphor today. “For me, discovering photography was like finding a white horse in the woods. You get on and it runs away with you. I spent a long time learning to control it. Now I spend a lot of time trying to get it to run away again.”
I knew the week would be different. I knew I would be kinetically and theatrically challenged. I know Sean. I didn’t know how I would find a personal connection to the exercises. I did today. I’ve always been fascinated by birds flying in flocks and fish swimming in schools in unison. We participated in a bit of that ourselves today. This connected with my interest in sensed but unseen patterns.
Today involved more motion. Sean patterned a lot of today’s activities on an acting method called Viewpoints (Anne Bogart and Tina Landau). We moved to varied music. We gestured in response to architecture. We walked patterns in unison. We made shapes with each others bodies. We followed and reacted to each other’s rhythms and gestures. None of us are trained actors/dancers, most are complete novices, and yet the results today were surprisingly expressive.
The picture for this blog entry is an improvisational exercise in motion Sean Harris and I did together. It was surprising. It felt good. Onlookers enjoyed it.
I use other art forms (forms I intentionally remain an amateur at) improvisationally (being spontaneous and suspending judgement), looking for reminders of what it takes to enter, sustain, and direct flow states. Doing this helps my professional work. You can develop an instinct for flow. You can prepare for it. You can learn to enter it faster and go deeper with it. But you can’t will it to happen in any traditional sense of the word.
Letting go was a big theme today. When we tried too hard it didn’t happen. When we cast aside ego and intellect another part of ourselves kicked in – and things worked. It seemed to me that true mastery comes when this happens. Technique is learned and facilitates expression and reception but is aimless until it’s put in the service of something. Curiously, that something always seems to involve surprise for the creator. Discovery. Break through. So what does it take to get into that state with photography? How do you know when you’re there? How do you sustain it? How do you direct it?
I’ve got a few clues but no definitive answers. Sure I want more and I’ll keep searching for them. But I’ve come to understand that the questions themselves are more useful than the answers. They keep you on your toes. They keep you awake. Trust the process. Out of engaging the process unexpected answers come.
Who’s Sean Kernan? Find out here.
Read my in depth conversation with Sean here.
Read Sean interviewing me here.
Check out Sean’s blog entries on the class here.
Check out Sean’s creativity workshops here.
Check out my creativity workshop here.

Kernan Creativity Workshop – Day 1

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(Kernan, Heisler, Maisel)
Last week, I taught my workshop Illuminating Creativity. Now I’m taking a workshop on creativity!
This week, my friend Sean Kernan is teaching a special workshop for instructors only at the Maine Media Workshops this week. Sean has a very different approach to teaching creativity than I do. He too loves to collaborate. In the past, he’s brought in people like Alan Arkin and the dance company Pilobolus.
Who will be taking the workshop with me this week? My wife Ardie. Oh and some guy named Jay Maisel. And another great photographer named Greg Heisler. And another great photographer named Elizabeth Opalenik. And another great photographer named Allison Shaw. And many more! I have no idea what will happen. I just know it will be a great week. Stay tuned! Every day, I’ll try to share at least one highlight here.
Today started with meditation. Nice move. It increases awareness. It focusses attention. It reduces judgement. It encourages receptivity. I often think we don’t focus on or speak about enough the states we’re in when we produce work, particularly the states we’re in when we produce our best work and how to get there. Meditation is one key among many. Play is another.
On the first day we played a number of theater games. Walk an imaginary line. Throw an imaginary ball. Play an imaginary game of tug of war. It worked when the participant focussed. It worked better when another participant cooperated with them. The event was changed by the group observing and focussing at the same time. Group dynamics (and how each of us responds to them) are fascinating. Collaboration can be extremely stimulating.
We walked and watched ourselves looking while focussing specifically at things and monitoring peripheral vision simultaneously. Taking notes in class made me even more aware of the elements in play while doing this. A significant new object or space demands attention. Moving objects demand attention. Motion produced by moving your body is less demanding. Focus of attention moves when a stronger pattern is observed. All patterns are contextual (patterns within patterns).
We watched Charlie Rose’s interview with sculptor Richard Serra. Serra speaks very visually about his primary passion – space. Its clear sight is one of the primary senses he experiences space with. At one point in the film he walks through his sculptures and the camera follows while he describes the experience of space produced by his sculpture. His physical gestures as he navigates his labyrinths make a statement like “This is the inside of the outside. This is the outside of the inside.” understandable. His sculptures give us a heightened experience of space. His work offers experiences of archetypes of space.
Moving in space seems to be the theme of the day.
What’s this have to do with making images? Nothing. Everything. None of us expect to make finished work this week. All of us expect to have a better understanding of what it takes to make better work at the end of the week. Sometimes not focussing on a final product, but focussing on the process instead reveals more and in the end, if that understanding is applied later, more work and higher quality work may ultimately be produced.
Who’s Sean Kernan? Find out here.
Read my in depth conversation with Sean here.
Read Sean interviewing me here.
Check out Sean’s blog entries on the class here.
Check out Sean’s creativity workshops here.
Check out my creativity workshop here.