Our friend Mixup has sent in this note about the late photobooth artist Jaroslav Supek.

Multimedia artist and writer Jaroslav Supek died after a short illness on 9th July 2009. He was born in 1952 and lived in Odžaci in the Vojvodina region of north Serbia and he took part in many group and solo exhibitions nationally and internationally over four decades. 

He shared the Slovak background of Andy Warhol (Warhol’s parents were from Miková in north-eastern Slovakia) and maybe this had a small part to play in his passion for photobooth machines, something which interested Warhol too. 

I had the good fortune to meet him twice during 2004 when I was working on art projects with Saša Marković and we were staging the 6th International Photobooth Convention in Belgrade. He came along to Belgrade to join in the activities and a few days later we travelled to visit him at his home. We spent an afternoon sharing a drink or two and looking through his many works and catalogues and because of his connection with Slovakia he also owned genuine photobooth strips of Andy Warhol. Maybe not the greatest photobooth artist but certainly the most well known so holding them in my hand was a moment to savor.

Of most importance were pieces relating to the 1997 show “First International Exhibition of Photo-Booth Photography” held at the Srecna gallery, Belgrade, for which he was curator, featuring photobooth work from South, Central and North America and all over Europe. I had a small piece showing and although I had been formulating the idea of a regular convention (still two years away) it spurred me on to achieve this goal.

I feel it can be honestly said that Jaroslav was one of ours.

Supek in the booth at the 2004 International Photobooth Convention in Belgrade

Over the past five years we’ve collected a lot of photobooth-related stuff, much more than we can get to on a regular basis, and the To-Do List tends to pile up. Over the last week or so, we’ve had a chance to get a whole passel of material online, from TV shows and movies to commercials, print ads, music videos, and photobooth locations. In no particular order, here they are. Enjoy!

A commercial for Fruit Gushers in which kids’ massive fruit-shaped heads make their photobooth tip over.

An episode of “How It’s Made” that shows how a digital photobooth is assembled.

The 1989 Lewis Gilbert film Shirley Valentine, with a railway photobooth sequence.

Low Water’s video for “Sister, Leave Me”. Dave sent me the video and a nice note back in 2008; my apologies for not getting to this for far too long.

The 2008 opening titles of “Neighbors,” now with more pseudo-photoboothiness.

The film Onion Underwater, for which we have only a few images from the trailer.

A few glimpses of a photostrip in an episode of Fringe.

An ad for Will Young’s album Let It Go, as sold by Tesco.

Science World’s Photobooth of Doom.

Wickbold Light Bread from Brazil.

The 2001 animated short fim Autofoto.

And finally, two photobooths in the Helsinki Railway Station, thanks to Marco:

The booths (Helsinki Railway Station II and Helsinki Railway Station III) are located in the west entrance of the station. 

One of these may be the first booth I found in Helsinki in 2005, moved to a new location within the station.

We’ll be back with more goodies in the coming months. 

Please keep your contributions coming, as we continue to build our database of all things photobooth.

I didn’t know who Chris Benz was before coming across this piece in the New York Times, which describes some recent changes in the young fashion designer’s life. He recently moved to a new studio space, and left his photochemical photobooth behind:

You recently moved into a new studio space, but you didn’t bring along your famous photo booth.

It was getting to be a bit of an albatross. It broke down. There was only one company in the tristate area that sold them and serviced them, and it closed. So it was just sitting there, all 2,000 pounds of it. We ended up begging this guy in Pennsylvania to take it. At first he didn’t want to, because he said it was worth so much money. We were like, “Just take it!”

New York Magazine characterizes the move this way: “Already he’s moved on from his old studio, ditching a beloved, near-inoperable photo booth in the process…”

You can see some photobooth photos here and a photo of the booth and some photostrips in a New York Times post he guest-blogged in 2008.

I just returned from a brief visit to Europe where photobooths still abound in all the usual places (post offices, train and subway stations, arcades.) However, I am sad to report that 99% of the booths I encountered were digital. London was the one exception, and two of the photobooths there were the highlight of my trip.

The past year has seen the re-emergence of chemical photobooths in The Big Smoke thanks to the industrious efforts of two independent outfits: Photomovette and Photoautomat. As luck would have it, I hit the city at the perfect time to see activity from both companies. October 31st marked the closing of Photoautomat’s show at Cargo; the following evening Photomovette was hosting an opening party for their booth. I spent the morning of the 31st hanging out at Cargo, chatting with Alex and taking in the show.

Following a quick lunch of steak & ale pie and mashy peas (in case you were wondering), I met up with Carole and Siobhan, the women of Photomovette. I proved not very helpful in resolving a few of their remaining booth idiosyncrasies, but they were gracious hosts nonetheless. They were busy putting the final touches on their booth and organizing the venue for their party the following evening.

After parting company, I headed for the Tube to make my way back to my West London lodging. The subway ride was notable for two reasons: 1) I happened to sit beneath an ad adorned with a fake photostrip and 2) it occurred to me I had inadvertently slated my travel for Halloween. If you’ve never experienced it, trust me when I tell you it is slightly disorienting to experience a new place on Halloween. It certainly left me wondering if London Tube traffic was always as colorful, or if it had something to do with the holiday. See for yourself:

For those of you who missed either of the above-mentioned festivities, fret not, more opportunity awaits you. Alex’s booth remains at Cargo, and is outside in the beer garden. Feel free to stop by anytime. As for Carole and Siobhan, they are hosting another photobooth party on the 13th of December.

A few weeks ago, Tim and I were, by chance, both in New York City at the same time and were lucky enough to enjoy a look around the Museum of Modern Art’s exhibition of new photography acquisitions with Leslie Ureña and Lee Ann Daffner of the museum’s photography department.

As we walked through the galleries, we headed directly for the reason we were there: a case containing forty-four Photomatic photographs of a woman, taken over a relatively brief span of time.



The photographs are remarkably unvaried: no one else, save a tiny sliver of a child’s arm and head in one photo, ever shares the frame with the woman. The frames are both metal and paper, with a few varieties of each type represented, and the photos are, for the most part, in good shape.



I’m curious to see if any of the photos feature interesting markings on the back, but that will have to wait until the exhibition is taken down. The photos are great to see up close, and the rest of the show, including a terrific batch of photos by Richard Avedon, is open through March, 2010, and is well worth seeing.

We’re grateful to Leslie, Lee Ann, and Sarah Meister, as well, for setting up our little meeting. We’re always encouraged when we see photobooth photos in a museum setting, and to see their significance and their narrative power taken seriously in the grand scheme of the history of photography.

The European photobooth scene really heating up after some lean years there in the early 2000s… In addition to the projects we’ve mentioned recently in Berlin, the gang from Photoautomat in London are hosting a show of photobooth photos in the month of October:

Photoautomat and the Arch1 gallery space at Cargo are pleased to invite you to the opening of the new exhibition:

EVERYDAY PHOTOGRAPHY

The exhibition is a collection of portraits taken in an old analogue photo booth situated in Cargo’s beer garden.

The opening night is on 5th October- we will be offering a free drink to everyone that arrives at 7pm (subject to availability)

“We at Photoautomat believe that life is what happens outside of our portable electronic devices. Our analogue photo booths breathe life back into everyday photography and we hope they’ll inspire your imagination as much as they do ours.”

For more information, visit their website.

Thanks to Rafael for these photos from the “J’adore aglisia” project we mentioned last week. Looks like fun…

Photobooth artist and long-time friend of Photobooth.net Daniel Minnick is part of a show opening soon in San Francisco called Sweet Believer Exit. The show, which is at 2nd Floor Projects, will have an opening reception this Saturday night September 26, and runs through November 1.

For more information, visit the 2nd floor projects blog. Please let us know if you get a chance to check out the show.

We have news of two photobooth projects happening in Berlin currently. We’ll have more info once they’re completed, but for now, here’s the scoop:

First, Photoautomat.de is taking part in the Berliner Kunstsalon with a project titled “J’adore aglisia”:

J’adore aglisia combines an ecclesiastic confessional and a photo booth in a new, unexpected and modern way. It refers to the well-known advertising slogan “J’adore Dior”; at the same time, it is also a play of words with the French word église (church). The name aglisia is an acronym for the Latin termini of the seven capital sins; therefore, it is an honest commitment to a new religious orientation which states: I covet sin! For a small fee, you can be redeemed from your sins.

For more information (in German), check out their PDF on the project, and visit the Berliner Kunstsalon site for more information on the event as a whole.

Secondly, Patrick Coyle, a London-based artist, will be in Berlin using one of the city’s photochemical photobooths to conduct an interactive project with strangers in the booth.

Patrick Coyle’s intuitive approach to his interactive performances directly contradicts the laboured objects he produces during the event. Often producing obsessively precise visual poetry, the result veers from whimsical ramblings to surreal contemplations. For KOMME, Coyle invites individuals to pose with him in photo-booths around Berlin. His notes written on the developed photos concerning the sitter and his relationship to them will be revealed at the private view. Participants hear Coyle’s comments upon their time together only if they attend the private view at the end of the week.

There’s more information about the project here. The photos will be on display at the gallery at the following address between September 24 and 26, so that the public can see the progress of the project:

ÏMA Design Village

Burstein Ostrowski GBR

12–14 Ritterstrasse

Berlin 10969

We’ll have more information on both of these projects once they’ve concluded, so stay tuned.

Catching up on some old news from late 2008, we heard about an art piece entitled “Photo Booth,” by American artist Lorna Simpson, which was sold to the Tate Modern at the Frieze Art Fair in London for $70,000. In an article in the Telegraph, Jessica Morgan describes the piece.

As curator of contemporary art at Tate, I am on a committee that buys new work every year at Frieze. We have a budget of £125,000 (the money comes from a philanthropic organisation called Outset). This year we bought six pieces. I was particularly pleased to get Photo Booth by the American artist Lorna Simpson, whose work we have been trying to buy for several years. She works predominantly in photography and video.

For this piece she gathered 50 photo-booth portraits of anonymous African-Americans that she discovered in thrift stores in Harlem in New York, where she lives. She matched these with 50 watercolour-and-ink drawings that are subtle and very beautiful, and play off the formality of the photographs. The whole piece cost $70,000, which is a large part of our budget but by no means an unreasonable price given that Simpson is an established artist who has been working since the early Nineties.

You can learn more about the work and see the work on the Salon 94 Freemans website.

Photo Booth © 2008 Lorna Simpson