Friday Fan Letter #4: Walt Simonson

So if your read my bio page, you know as a young man I wanted to draw comics ... next up Thor artist Walt Simonson.

Walt:

I don't remember when I started reading comics, but my parents recognized I was reading, and encouraged me.  One of the first books I started reading was "The Mighty Thor", it was the 1980's, you were working magic on that book.  I'm a bit of a completest, so I scoured the local comic book stores for back issues I read them out of order as I could afford them.  It's hard to read a story out of order, I didn't get it, and I was like ten or twelve.  When you left Thor I followed you to X-Factor, but I might have already been collecting that series.  At some point I picked up the Star Slammer graphic novel after lusting after it for months, it's still one of my favorite books.   

You and the Marvel artists of time, made me want to draw comics.  Which started me down the road to being an artist which lead me to photography.  I figured out pretty late in high school I wasn't going to make it as a penciler.  I did apply to art school, but chickened out and sneaked into college at the last minute.

Anywho thanks, for making great art and inspiring me to be an artist.

Sincerely 

David CUtts

Friday fan letter #3: Guy Bourdin

Preamble ... since this is my photo blog I'm writing these fan letters to some of my photographic influences (yes Robert Smithson was a big influence on my early photographs), and since I'm a chicken, I've been sticking to dead ones.  It might be weird to write a mostly unintelligent letter to David LaChapelle (and honestly I like his work, but not a big influence on mine) and actually have him read it.  I bet he has a google alert set up for his name.

I'm not sure when or how I stumbled on Guy Bourdin's work, but it was in the last couple of years.  Any who here goes number three.

Mr. Bourdin:

I wanted to write you a little note, letting you know that recently no other photographer has inspired my work as much as your fashion photographs.  I've masqueraded as a photographer for 15 years then three years ago started making a living with a camera, and when ever I get in a funk lately I check you out on Google for a little inspiration.  I love that your work is about the girls, and the garments, not about big productions.  Yeah it's a little kinky, and I'm a dude so I dig that, but it's a fun kink, like Helmut Newton an appreciation for what was in from of the lens, not a objectified object.  Yeah a feminist might kick me in the balls for that, oh well.

 Another thing that draws me to your work is probably a product of the time you worked.  I like photographs that are photographs, what I mean by that is when I look at contemporary fashion images they aren't photographs any more.  With all the retouching and photoshoping I think fashion photography has become fashion photo based illustration.  I'm over perfect plastic looking skin, porcelain white eyes, not a hair out of place, perfect symmetry, and liquified bodies.

Thanks for making great photographs for a long time so I have a bunch to look at, I hope you enjoyed it.

Sincerely 

David Cutts

Friday Fan Letter #2 Richard Avedon

Hey Dick:

I know you are dead, so you'll never read this, but I wanted to let you know I'm a big fan.  Like most former photography students I studied a little art/photo history while we looked at your early fashion work, and some of your "art" what I enjoy most are your portraits.  As we expect they are technically

perfect, and in the digital age, I appreciate the craft.  It's the connection the subjects make with me, the viewer, that I am in awe of.  Make me a beautiful portrait thanks, make me a beautiful portrait that connects me with the subject ... LOVE it.  Go further take a risk and photograph not so beautiful people  and make me care, that's bold and I'm at a point where I don't care about "beautiful" or "important" people we see them idolized to often in the media.  I'd like to think you felt the same way, because when I look at your In the American West I see you giving your subjects the same care you would a    

big budget fashion shoot, or celebrity portrait.

Anyway thanks for making pictures for sixty years so we have a lot to look at.

Sincerely 

David Cutts

Letter to Robert Smithson

Fan Letter:

This crazy dude went out to the Great Salt Lake, pilled up a bunch of rocks in a spiral, but the lake was really low that year so no one has really gets to see it.

Okay Robert Smithson kind of has been an art hero of mine for 20 years or more.  I'm not an art history major, never played on on TV and have trouble stringing together more than a few sentences, but here goes.

Robert:

I've been out to the site of your Spiral Jetty maybe a seven or eight times.  The first three or four were quite disappointing, the tips of a few salty rocks ... who cares.  I care, Rozel Bay is a pretty spot, oh fuck that the most of the lake is amazing.  We camped and photographer around the lake a lot while at school.  It's an intoxicating place, I love it.  I love the light, the heat, the cold, the salt, the wind, also hate most of those things.  Mostly I hate what people have done to the landscape around the Lake.  Not that I'm an environmentalist, I have my sympathies however.  Most of what people have done around the lake is just sad, yeah it can make for interesting sophomoric photographs (I know I made them), but it seems to me what people have done in and around the lake have mostly been failures.  That's sad, the lake sucks up everything we pour into it, and doesn't seem to give a lot back.  Oh well.  I don't know if it was a trip out to the jetty that made me realize what you were doing or some thing I read.  I love that the lake swallow the jetty most years.  The work changes as the lake changes, and it won't be there for ever.  I guess the point is nothing will be here for ever, something to get used to, and that is awesome.

So thanks.

Dave