It was very fancy, there were large prints blown up lining the walls of the reception room, and champagne was being given out. Here is the photo she used to advertise the event, which was printed out huge on the wall:
Before the event I'd familiarized myself with Alexandra Evang's work, and had to laugh, because it's just not my thing, but I finally found one photo that I liked. It would be even better if the person was not feeding the horse, but I appreciate that her feet are safe up in the tree, and I like the ones where the face is hidden by hair. That the horse is blinking makes it seem slightly more natural than the others.
Alexandra is only 23, Michi called herself a grandma in comparison, but they travelled to Marbach together for a seminar, so they're acquainted. Both are students of Gabrielle Boiselle, Germany's top horse photographer. Check out what Gabrielle has in her calendar for May:
Wow. What appears to be a completely natural moment in time.
I'd put that on the cover too.
I don't like photos that look like they are staged. I don't mind staging and reflectors but it's best if you can't tell, so an abundance of flowers is not my thing. Even Vavra makes me shake my head when he puts horses in fields of poppies.
However I love the one of Mara running through our field where Michi captured the thistle blooming in the foreground completely incidentally. I never knew our weeds could look so good: ) Michi always complained of Mara that she never presented herself for the camera, she just raced full speed back and forth.
Anyway, back to today. We were given permission to take pictures of her pictures, which everyone was doing. Also one of her associates was filming the event and I kept turning away from the camera.
Michi said, "I know, I know, you look at these pictures and all you see are potential injuries." I said, "I'm dying to ask her how many injuries occurred in her 3 years of work, but that sounds rude." (Specifically I wanted to know how many bare feet were crushed by hooves - or how many hooves made contact with model's faces.) Alexandra admitted that she photoshopped out the neck ring and lead rope on that one when she told its story.
Well at least she has safety stirrups. This is perhaps the only one that clearly shows the entire horse, and its eye as well. This may be her only photo that seems to feature the horse.
I cannot judge the artist because I'm sure it's the client who wants to get half naked and ride/lay on the ground with her animal, although it seems to prudish me they want to advertise underclothes and hair color. (And speaking of staging, when we were teenagers my sister put on her goth clothes and we took Baasha to a cemetery where a friend captured some lovely black and white ethereal photos of them. I love cemeteries, and he looked pretty good in one.)
Today I was disappointed that the girl in the tree photo was nowhere to be found in the event - not in the calendar, not in the two books of her photos. Hm, the only one I like, the photographer herself does not.
Michi showed me that in almost no photo is the horse's eye visible, maybe you noticed (from the calendar image). Indeed on the walls today, the horses were mostly in silhouette with "gegenlicht" - the sun behind the subject, making a halo around the person and horse. Michi told me Alexandra is mostly a (human) model photographer, and uses horses and pets as props. Nothing wrong with that. I liked some of her photos with no animals, just friends laughing together naturally.
Michi reiterated to me her main principle as a photographer: Capture the personality of the individual horse, and show its best side to the camera, she calls it the horse's sahneseite - its "cream side". Quite right - she made Mara look 1. tense in her own field and 2. possessing the muscles of a body builder:
And she made Baasha like an angel:
I'm so glad I know Michi.
She's anxious to meet my next horse so she can lie completely flat in our pasture and get photos of him or her. She said, "How can you be so patient, waiting so long?"
Am I patient? I didn't notice.
7 comments:
Ha-Ha! Does being a horse person make us cynics or realists? Or both? I'm the same way, analyzing situations with horses. When I see them in a movie, I watch their ears, look at their tack, watch how the person is riding them, look at the ground they are on. When I see photos of bare chested guys tossing hay, I smirk because I know that no cowboy or ranch worker in his right mind would do that because they'd itch to death afterwards. And yes, bare feet around horses, a big no-no!
"I'm dying to ask her how many injuries occurred in her 3 years of work, but that sounds rude." (Specifically I wanted to know how many bare feet were crushed by hooves - or how many hooves made contact with model's faces." This made me laugh. Perhaps because we are older and wiser?
I'm really not into the whole princess in the long dress riding her long-maned white stallion.I'm too much of a realist about horses.
Such lovely photos of your horses.
KB, did you see all the examples I linked? I'm curious if the links work, or if they're just for facebook people.
In my only horse catalog they sell a calendar called "stall boys" and it's topless men with horses. (Click to zoom in on their belly buttons: http://www.kraemer-pferdesport.de/Grooms-Kalender-2016.htm?websale8=kraemer-pferdesport&pi=182022&ci=247613) I had to show my husband so we could laugh together. Who would buy that? Aside from as a joke (an expensive one!)? or on a movie set? Maybe you could mail me, cuz you have much in common with my current issues, eli underscore barnett at hotmail.
Being a horse person should make us both realists and cynics. Or? Cuz there's so much crap thrust at us, we have to disentangle ourselves from hype. And horses die from the most seemingly harmless things, it's enough to make us paranoid and crazy for answers. *sigh* How nice it would be to live a life free from "horse crazy"...
I agree on the staged ones, and of course prefer them without models, products, etc. That one of Mara is still lovely, and I'd love to see the Basha in cemetery ones!
But I admit I have Vavra's "unicorns I have known" photography book. About once a year I get it off the shelf, and instead of analyzing as a horsewoman, I remember and review it as I did when I was little and got the book as a gift. The wonders of unicorns, the beauty of a running horse. Staged or not, those images are pure beauty (and of course I wonder how to turn my horse into a unicorn!)
I am frequently astonished at what people will do (or buy) (or believe) when it comes to horses. How many non-horse-people have seen the picture of Fiddle throwing one of her wobblies (ears pinned, back feet flying) and commented how bee-yooo-ti-full the pony is.
Head/desk.
The links worked for me because I'm on FB. I guess stress is a price we pay for horses in our lives, although due to my health I no longer have them. Both my husband and I miss having them around.
My fingers are crossed for you.
Aww does that mean you don't like my staged photos of me and Chrome? I'm not half naked or barefoot in them but they are staged and there are some of me sitting by his legs lol. I like some of these from a photographer's point of view, but yeah some are dangerous. Although the rearing one doesn't look like she's as close to the horse as it appears... I could be wrong though. :-)
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