antonin

Knowing that I would be leaving Look3 a little early this year and not seeing all of the presentations, I was looking forward to Antonin Kratochvil's Insight Talk on Thursday night. Although not really familiar with much of his work I had heard several good things about him from my former student Brian, who interned at VII (photo co-op in NYC) where Antonin is a member.  He specializes in 'conflict photography' and shoots mostly in black & white.  Although a very serious guy, doing serious work, my favorite quote of the night came when he was asked about his style.  "You seem to have a lot of things happening around the edges of the frame in your photos.  Do you have heightened peripheral vision?" After a long pause, Antonin answered, "no, I learned a long time ago that if I had subjects near the edges of the frame art directors were more likely to run my photos as double trucks in the magazine.  Also, I leave empty space in the center for the gutter."  So much for artistic vision.  At his signing, I photographed Antonin, making sure my students Jesse & Nicole would make the left page of the double spread and he would avoid the gutter.