Gorgeous Slide Show of Kyrgyzstan

on the New York Times website by photographer Carolyn Drake. Her website backs up these beautiful images with a lot more strong work especially from central Asia (a part of the world I very much want to return to someday.) I think this photographer has a really unique and special point of view - please check out her work...

(c) 2008 Carolyn Drake for The New York Times

Masato Seto

I became aware of these fantastic portraits by Masato Seto through Malia at Jackson Fine Art. They are currently promoting this work and I thought they were definitely worth promoting here on my blog. The women on display are sitting in cigarette booths in Taipei and its outskirts. The space, light, and feminine gaze are all very intriguing.

Cameron and Tyrone

I found these lovely boys doing a street workout up in Harlem on a beautiful block called Hamilton Terrace. I am loving their blingy belts. Don't be surprised if you see me sporting one soon...

40th Birthday. I made it!

May 2, 2008     Douglas, Michigan

Christopher Doyle

We have recently been renting films shot by master cinematographer Christopher Doyle. Any film shot by him is a visual delight. He served as director of photography for many of the films of Wong Kar Wai and Gus Van Sant. One particular over the top film I just saw is called Dumplings directed by Fruit Chan - it is both stunning and totally creepy. Check em out...


Still from: Paranoid Park



Still from: In the Mood for Love

A boy after my own heart...

Justin's newest tattoo.

New Tattoo Boys

Justin



Aires


If you haven't seen the series... check it out.

Hitch Hikers

My partner Seth found this wonderful little book Hitch Hikers a couple months ago by American photographer Doug Biggert at a book store in Paris. It is a fantastic collection of portraits of hitch hikers that Mr. Biggert picked up while driving in northern California and across the United States in his old Volkswagen bug. The introduction states that he begin the project in 1973, inspired after meeting Henri Cartier Bresson in a Saint Patrick's Day parade, he has made over 450 photographs to date and has a story for almost all of them. Some of the images read with a strong suggestion of the potency and potentiality of young male sexuality and many of them intrigue us to want to know more about his passengers. A great find but it seems to be very difficult to find here in the states and on the net but is available here through Amazon.fr

Hotel Room Portraits

I have finally gotten around to updating the Hotel Room Portraits series on my website. I also migrated it from renaldi/2 to renaldi/projects as I feel this project is very special. After the amount of traveling we have done there were a lot of additions - below are some of my favorite and here is a link to the entire series to date. A warning for those who might be uncomfortable with nudity - though most of these images are "G" rated, there are one or two I would rate as "NC17's"...



Helsinki, Finland 2007



Riverton, Wyoming 2007



Linz, Austria 2008



Taipei, Taiwan 2008



Olsztyn, Poland 2007

A short film

the day to day life of albert hastings

This book by KayLynn Deveney is another recent acquisition to our photo book collection. It is a really lovely portrait of an elderly Welsh man and extremely touching. I highly recommend it.

Photo Prodigies

In the past year I have had the opportunity to meet two young photographers who are what I would call prodigies. Firstly, there is Shane Lavalette, newly 21. I had the pleasure to meet Shane at an opening last summer and we got to know one another last summer while he was interning here in NY. The other young prodigy is someone I met through Flickr named Pete Halupka, age 19. Pete and I hung out while he was in town for the Armory show and we photographed each other while he was at my place. In both cases these young men are extremely knowledgeable with regards to both the history of photography and what is going on in the current photography scene. The hunger for photographic knowledge and experience that they both possess is really something incredible. I myself was an undergraduate photography major at NYU in 1986 but it seems like knowledge and information has increased tenfold much mirroring the advance and spread of the internet. Anyway, hats off to these two young photographic talents and all those like them. Keeping the photographic passion alive and soaring.


Jörg Colberg, Shane Lavalette, and myself September 2007
photo courtesy of Jörg Colberg's flickr page



Pete Halupka March 2008

Friends

Building on my family series that I began last summer I also set out to make portraits of my friends. Here are some of the images I like so far...



Allison   Manhattan 2007



Andy   Provincetown, 2007



Jen    Brooklyn 2006



Koray    Provincetown 2007



Kiki    Provincetown 2007

My Suburban Childhood

These old Renaldi family photographs of me are so grounded in American twentieth century snapshot vernacular. I loved that enormous stuffed Smokey the Bear. Many months later my brother George and his friends destroyed him by pulling off his limbs for fun. I cried and cried and cried...

End of the World?

This article in the NY Times about a particle accelerator in Switzerland is pretty scary. It looks like something from Star Wars that destroys planets! I wonder what the worlds premier astrophysicist photo blogger has to say about it?

Valerio Mezzanotti for The New York Times

Upcoming Events

I will be lecturing at the Camera Club of New York on Tuesday, April 22nd, 7pm. It will be held at the School of Visual Arts,
Amphitheater at 209 E.23rd St. between 2nd and 3rd Ave. I will be showing some more recent work as well as some of the work I did for the Microsoft shoot.


I will also be lecturing at the New York Public Library. The talk is part of the Aperture Events series. It will be held July 14th at the mid-manhattan branch at 455 Fifth Ave. I will be showing work from my first monograph Figure and Ground as well as some newer work.


Lastly, I am teaching a week long workshop at ICP this summer. If anyone is interested in taking my class here is the information and course description...

THE LARGE-FORMAT PORTRAIT•
08MVC15 | Richard Renaldi
July 21–25 | Mon–Fri | 10:00 am–5:00 pm | $600 + $30 fee
During this class, students will become familiar with using
both the 8x10 and the 4x5 view cameras. There will be a
demonstration with the instructor’s own 8x10 camera, as
well as an assignment using the school’s 4x5 cameras.
We will review and discuss the work of large-format
photographers. Students will create a small, strong portfolio
of portraits during the week with a final review on the
last day of class. Emphasis will be on photographing
strangers and unfamiliar subjects. We will also discuss the
instructor’s own work and cover as much technical information
as possible throughout this fun, one-week course.
PREREQUISITE: Photo III or portfolio review

Robin Bowman

Umbrage Editions recently released a book called It's Complicated: The American Teenager. In it are beautiful moving portraits of teenagers by photographer Robin Bowman. I just received the book this week and it is a very strong and inspiring body of work.

Trees

Big Beach, Maui



Honolulu, HI.



Calakmul, Mexico



Flood Plain, Jeffersonville, Indiana



Big Island, Hawaii


There is always the urge to photograph something beautiful in nature. I resisted landscape photography for a very long time from an anxiety about whether it might be boring. As it turns out I have been really satisfied with what I have created in regards to landscape. This leads me to this recent series which I am still a little apprehensive about showing but I cherish trees - so here it goes... They at least should be more interesting than Lee Friedlander's tedious twig pictures. I hope to get them all up on my website soon.

Planet Earth

I just finished watching the fourteen part BBC series Planet Earth. It was the most spectacular natural history series I have ever seen. The cinematography was breathtaking and the content was literally mind blowing. Our planet is such a beautiful extraordinary place and it is essential we all take care to keep it that way. You can rent the DVD's here or buy them here.

8 x10 from Taipei

Wu



Max



Newlywed