© Matthew Turley

Tourists visit the upper platforms at the Aiguille du Midi (12,604′), with the Mont Blanc massif in the background.

Mig-21, Mongolia. © Eric Lusito

Traveling through Russia and the former satelite states of the Soviet Union—from East Germany to Mongolia, from Poland to the far reaches of Kazakhstan—Eric Lusito sought to photograph the abandoned Soviet miltary bases that were left behind as the remnants of a fallen Empire. From its creation in 1961, the Berlin Wall became emblematic of the divide between the West and the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War—when it came down in 1989, it signalled the collapse of Soviet hegemony over the Eastern Bloc. After the Wall, just published by Dewi Lewis, is Eric Lusito’s photographic record of the land and architecture—haunted by the symbols and history of a once powerful Empire.

All photographs © Gary Cialdella. Two Houses, Steiber Street Whiting, IN 1999.

Once a major crossroads for American industry, the Calumet Region sits on the south shore of Lake Michigan, just east of Chicago, straddling the border between Illinois and northern Indiana. Like so many American post-industrial regions, the Calumet is a mixture of rail yards, refineries, abandoned or underused plants, once-prosperous Main Streets, modest homes, changing neighborhoods and signs of urban renewal.

Photographer Gary Cialdella grew up on the Eastern edge of the Calumet in Blue Island, Illinois. When he left for college, he had no thoughts of returning, but as an adult he moved to nearby Michigan. More than 20 years ago, he reacquainted himself with the area and began photographing it. He recently released his book of black-and-white landscapes, The Calumet Region: An American Place (University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago/Brauer Museum of Art, Valparaiso University). The work is also on display at the Brauer Museum of Art through March 21, 2010.

For more on Gary Cialdella’s project The Calumet Region, see our article, “Ain’t That America” (Exposures, January 2010). (more…)

© All Photographs by Massimo Cristaldi. Simulacra – 8

Simulacra was recently featured in the Italian magazine Gente Di Fotografia, in an article written by Alan Rapp. He says, “Massimo Cristaldi’s Simulacra depicts small-scale Southern Italian religious edifices in nocturnal composure. Photographed from an impersonal middle distance, these ensconced and freestanding roadside shrines stand humble, sentinel. The religious icons within them are largely unseen, their very existence called into question by the effects of the long-exposure Cristaldi employs even their own interior glow precludes their visibility. In this average street-side context, the physical and supersensible signifiers are conflated. Physical cars may recede into the sort of light-streaked oblivion generated by a slow shutter at night; the stationary but seemingly remote shrines themselves over-expose to create an indeterminate burst of light.” To continue reading Alan Rapp’s article click here.

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