Michael Schmelling is a photographer, director, and author of several photo books, as well as the principal photographer for The Wilco Book. For his next project, Chronicle Books will publish Schmelling's Atlanta on November 1st. Atlanta evokes the incredible diversity of the city’s hip-hop scene, capturing the lives of everyone from up-and-coming rappers to club kids to multi-Platinum artists. It also includes a series of insightful essays by The New Yorker’s Kelefa Sanneh. Exclusive interviews with key figures like André 3000, Big Boi, Gucci Mane, Ludacris, Shawty Lo, and The-Dream were conducted by Will Welch, an associate editor at GQ. An accompanying musical component will feature unreleased tracks from the scene's rising stars.
Between 2007 and 2009, Schmelling and his collaborators gained unprecedented access to the underground hip-hop scenes bubbling beneath the city’s surface and the lives of the young musicians and fans at its core. In a stunning series of black and white photos, he captures the heretofore-undocumented teen party scene – alcohol-free parties catering to the underage crowd, typically thrown by promoters in office parks after dark.
Here's a sneak peak of some images from Atlanta which will be shown here tonight as Lucie Foundation presents the first installment of the Pro'jekt LA Summer Series "Bounce, Rock, Skate." It will be an amazing night of photography and sounds with Giant Artists as the special guest curators.
Assembly New York will host an off-site designer sample sale featuring otherwise hard to find independent womens & mens designers. The sale will be set up like a temporary shop on Rivington in the lower east side and is open late, til 9 every night!
Where: Everybodys Going To Heaven 129 Rivington NYC 10002
The height of summer takes place tomorrow as we are super stoked for the opening of STOKED ON SUMMER group photography show... A free raffle with amazing prizes, goodie gift bags to the first 200 and a live performance by Magic Bullets!
Losing several members of their band to Girls (girls are always breaking hearts), Magic Bullets are back with a new lineup and vigor. THE BAND is coming in from SF and bringing their Smiths/Orange Juice type vocals and guitars to Space 15 Twenty this Saturday for Foam Magazine's "Stoked on Summer" gallery opening party. It's going to be a fun night!
Click here to order their new self-titled album on Mon Amie Records.
Is It Art or Fart? juxtaposes images of everyday life with works of contemporary art, effectively highlighting their uncanny resemblances. The project started as a blog run by two friends who've sighted and documented unintentional appropriations of contemporary artists like Jenny Holzer, Gabriel Orozco, and Marcel Duchamp.
Designed to resemble a Penguin Classic pocketbook, the print edition makes its west coast debut at LA's Family Bookstore with the support of ForYourArt. In celebration of the release, Family is also hosting launch party with a short slide show and commentary this Wednesday, July 14th beginning at 7:30pm.
The Franks is a new band from Echo Park. They're loud, they're young, they're fast and filled with infectious energy. And they know how to write songs. Check out their exclusive track, "Ray Gunn Radio" on IAMSOUND's The L.A. Collection Singles Series and download for free(!) their new ep, "Duh," from their website here. To celebrate the 15 Twenty Jewelry Studio Pop-Up Shop opening and the closing of the fantastic The L.A. Collection gallery show, The Franks will be performing with the support of ASKA this Saturday July 10th. The party is from 7-10pm and it's free and open to the public as always!
Why cheaters you ask? Though a traditional spelling bee will take place, participants can register online and raise money beforehand to increase their chances of victory -- the more money a team raises, the more cheats they have to use in the contest. Hosted in partnership with the creators of the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, the event will donate all proceeds to 826LA's free writing and tutoring programs for children.
Space is limited to 50 teams, so sign up now! If you're more of a spectator, you can still catch a piece of the action by signing up for the event wait list, though tickets won't be available to the non-team members until August 6. Out-of-towners can also support by donating to the teams that have great names, whether it's The Tori Spellings, The Best-Spelers, or MC Grammar.
It's all delightful fun and everything helps to support a local non-profit. Ch-ch-check it out.
"Atiba has been shooting the things he loves most in this world for years; skateboarding, basketball, music, just life in general. And everywhere he's gone he makes an instant impact much like a D. Wade or Ben Roethlisberger. When he was staff photog from Transworld Skateboarding the magazine hit new highs, when him and his pals started The Skateboard Mag it immediately dominated the market. To be honest, I had never even heard of ESPN, Adidas, Nike, Panasonic, Mountain Dew or Pepsi until he shot campaigns for them. It really is like everything he touches turns to gold. I bet if he touched his wife just so a baby would appear; he's just that good." (Bio by Chris Nieratko)
Tomorrow, July 1st, will be the hotly anticipated book launch of Atiba Jefferson, 15 Year'eS of Photo'eS by Atiba Jefferson, presented by éS and Space 15 Twenty.
Come celebrate the release of Atiba Jefferson's first book, a history of 15 years of photos for éS. There will be books, photos and music as well as a collaboration shoe!
The L.A. Collection Portrait series continues this week with Ingrid Allen and Elisa Saether painting musicians IO Echo and Imaad Wasif -
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And don't forget that this Sunday is the last of the Life Drawing Workshop! Here are a couple of photos from last Sunday's workshop. It's free, open to the public and materials are provided so there's no reason for you not to go!
