gonzo photography

From: cyberico - view profile

Date: Sun, Apr 2 2006 3:35 pm

Email: "cyberico" <cyber...@gmail.com>

Groups: alt.photography

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recently i discovered a sort of new world: the gonzo photography.

i start reading some books of hunter thompson that invented the

gonzo journalism and the gonzo word as well in the 70s. (see on

google)

i found that gonzo photographers are zoldan king www.zoldanking.com

terry richardson www.terryrichardson.com but im interested in

knowing more about this side of photography. do you know

photographers that are gonzo photographers? please let me know

I'd never heard of the term 'gonzo' applied to photography - just journalism and

pornography - but, hey, why not?

 

I'd never heard of Zoldan King either, and can't see much of interest on his website, but I

like Terry Richardson's work, especially when it's art directed (e.g. Sisley ads).

 

If 'gonzo' photography is about the physical involvement of the photographer (and sex and

drugs and bodily functions) then check out Nan Goldin, Larry Clark and Corinne Day.

 

If they're not sufficiently artless for you, have a look at Vice magazine.

I've met a few frat boys with digital cameras that might qualify as 'gonzo' if TR's website is any indication of the (?)genre... I think ZK's 'trash' billing pretty much sums it up, though I suppose some will find a place in their hearts for pedestrian snapshots of the rude and unseemly bits of life that most people walk right by...

ZK's stuff seems self-absorbed and lacking in context. I wouldn't apply the term gonzo to it.

 

However self-absorbed Hunter Thompson's prose and life may have seemed, it never lacked context. He filtered everything through his skewed lens but in the end the stories were always about other people and situations, not himself.