27/01/2010
Work Published. Source Magazine: The Photographic Review.
Neighbourhood appears over ten pages in the Winter edition.
“A commitment to place is a common theme for the three photographers in this issue. John MacLean has chosen to operate only within a five minute walking radius of his house in south London. A process that has forced him to re-explore a place dulled by familiarity. Pacing out the same terrain repeatedly he picks up on the minutiae and incremental changes in his neighbourhood.” The Editors, Source Magazine.
01/11/2009
Work Published: IANN magazine of contemporary photography
1.11.2009.
“Nameless Cities” IANN contemporary photography magazine.
Featuring the work of: Chikashi Suzuki, Yoon-Jean Lee, Paul Graham, Olivio Barbieri, Richard Galpin, Lorenzo Durantini, John MacLean, Niels Stomps and Jan Lemitz.
Special Issue No.4, November 2009 http://www.iannmagazine.com/
Modernity is not a dazzling spectacle or a superficial reality; modernity represents both. – Baudelaire
As we experience the rapid expansion of urbanization, we can say that modernity is an era of cities. If a person was to claim that life in the ‘city’ rather than a ‘nature’ –based lifestyle was preferable and more familiar, we would probably agree without a moment’s hesitation. Moreover, the number of people who assimilate into the city increases daily, causing a wide unification of social constructs. In particular, the major cities of nations experiencing fast growth in the wave of globalization, such as Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai and Honk Kong, are in the driving force of development. They are also recognized as emblems and indicators of the economic strength of a nation. At the same time, we are constantly reminded of issues surrounding urbanization and that cities experience diseases brought on by consumerism and greed, or problems related to discrimination and division. Although order and organization create a basic outline for the formation of a city based on social understanding, countless complications can also reside in the deep structures and divisions of modernity.
Just as Baudelaire stated that modernity is contradictory and unstable, the image of a city is also comprised of a dual construct that is variable and dynamic, forming an intersection of ‘order and ‘chaos’. This special issue brings together different cities that have been formed by rapid industrial development. Nine artists presented in volume 4 reveal a parallel gaze on the city, rendering subjects in a way that is neither beautiful nor vulgar. Instead, each image transforms what was once familiar into an unaccustomed cityscape.
Editor in chief – Jeong Eun Kim
31/10/2009
Exhibition: “Itchy Scratchy”
31.10.2009
John’s photograph “Starr King” (from the series ‘City’) is featured in the exhibition “Itchy Scratchy” at the Permanent Gallery, Brighton.
Itchy Scratchy was initiated and curated by photographer/writer Jason Evans http://www.jasonevans.info/. The concept was inspired by a thought put forward by Charlotte Cotton (below):
“I think of it as the picture/s that you print up, just to a small working size, to get a look at. The ones that interest and trouble you because there is something that you don’t fully understand about them, as if you unconsciously did something. These pictures seem to signpost a new direction in a photographer’s practice, they are transitional pieces, and precursors to a new phase or project. I think all the best photographers have the guts to move beyond the pictures they already know they can make, and spend time with the itchy scratchy pictures to work out what comes next.”
Permanent Gallery, 20 Bedford Place, Brighton BN1 2PT, +44 1273 710389
info@permanentgallery.com
http://www.permanentgallery.com
http://www.permanentbookshop.com
23/09/2009
Book Published: “Neighbourhood”
23.9.2009.
Publication of John’s fourth book: “Neighbourhood”. Printed in Belgium by Cassochrome.
“Throughout the history of photography, practitioners have frequently looked to fresh, unfamiliar locations to generate new work. Inspired by the methodology Robert Rauschenberg employed to make his Combines, I decided to try an opposing strategy. Why not, I reasoned, photograph the place that was most familiar and least far-flung? So, I began to produce a large body of photographs ‘taken’ within a strict, five-minute walk of my house.” John MacLean 2009
23/04/2009
Book Published, “City: Book One”
23.4.2009.
Publication of “City: Book One”. Limited edition: 800 copies.
“The intention of this body of work is not to document specific cities or individuals – it is an endeavour to construct ‘my own city’ through photographs. The camera allows my internal world to overlap with the external – it fuses the two together – to create a third place. Forms and chance encounters are recorded, and these become a catalogue of my ideas and values.” John MacLean 2009.
24/04/2008
Exhibition: “Brasilia”
Exhibition: The Architectural Association, London, UK. March 2007.
“Photographer John MacLean captures Brasilia’s tensions in a memorable series of images. The results do not bear the imprimatur of conventional architectural photography. Instead, his calm, inquiring gaze gets under the skin of an already extreme urban landscape.” Architectural Review, March 2007.
“This is not the heroic Brasilia. This is a series of intimate portraits taken by photographer John MacLean of the great new town in the jungle, which captures the city at it’s often-neglected human scale. Almost perversely intimate in tone, MacLean’s work is clearly influenced by documentary photography, capturing and presenting the small stories which form a city. Instead of exploring the standard urban imagery, MacLean has instead created an intriguing testament to the city’s discrete streetscape.”
BluePrint 3.07. Critic’s Choice.
Architect’s Journal. “This Brasilia portrait is oblique and elliptical, but memorable too” 8.3.07
23/04/2008
“48 Recent Photographs” Published
23.4.2008.
First collaboration between designer Wayne Daly and John MacLean since John’s Exhibition at The Architectural Association.
“48 Recent Photographs” represents a cross-section through John’s largest body of work to date: “City”.
“A figure, seen from above, draws a line in the sand. Workers dutifully engage in their Sisyphean tasks. A commuter advances towards the viewer, the time on his watch legible; he is doubled in a softly, distorted reflection. An Edenic pastiche provides a wry framing for a couple engaged in a duel of digital communication. The screened image of a mother and child struggles for recognition from the minimum of information supplied. Here, transient traces of natural light are awarded the same status as the city’s absurd monuments. In this microcosm of calmness and spatial ambiguity, nothing is perfect, nothing lasts and nothing is finished.” John MacLean 2008.