Vorticism: avant-garde art at the Tate Britain, London

by Sean McLachlan on

In the years before the outbreak of World War One, European artists developed a variety of different styles to reflect the pace of change and industrialization in what used to be a traditional continent.

Cubism and Futurism were two of the biggest movements. One of the briefest and most vibrant was Vorticism. The Vorticists started around 1913 and focused on the hard lines and quick pace of the machine age.

Now the Tate Britain in London is hosting a major exhibition on the movement called The Vorticists: Manifesto for a Modern World. It brings together more than 100 Vorticist works from all the major players.

One of the leaders of the movement was Wyndham Lewis, although some Vorticists say the only reason he was popularly seen as the leader was because he gave more interviews to the press. He was certainly important, though. Lewis was the founder of the Vorticist journal Blast, the first issue of which had a hot pink cover and featured writings by T.S. Eliot and Ford Madox Ford. A whole section of the exhibition is dedicated to this journal and its groundbreaking design and typography.

Some of the rarer works on display include those from the many women welcomed into Vorticist ranks, a daring move at the time. There are also the Vorticist photos of Alvin Langdon Coburn, often hailed as the first abstract photographs. These photos will blow your mind and hurt your eyes.

%Gallery-126430%While Vorticism was mainly a British movement, this exhibition also explores its influences on the New York modern art scene. In fact, it was an American poet, Ezra Pound, who gave the movement its name.

The output of this movement was remarkably small. Blast only had two issues, and there were only two Vorticist exhibitions. World War One killed some of the Vorticists and left others embittered against the modern world. Yet Vorticism had a major impact on modern art and its works are still discussed and copied today. The two issues of Blast are still in print almost a century after they first appeared. One advantage of its brevity is that an exhibition of this size can encompass a majority of the major works, giving the visitor a full understanding of the meteoric life of one of modern art’s most intriguing avant-garde movements.

The Vorticists: Manifesto for a Modern World opened yesterday and will run until September 4.

[Image of Workshop c. 1914-5, by Wyndham Lewis courtesy of the Wyndham Lewis Memorial Trust]

National Geographic offers Dreams of Burma

by Kraig Becker on

National Geographic Traveler and Fotopedia have teamed up to deliver yet another fantastic travel app for the iPhone and iPad. Entitled “Dreams of Burma,” the new app manages to captures the spirit and culture of the Southeast Asian country in a host of images, maps, and other features that make it the next best thing to actually being there yourself.

As you would expect when Nat Geo and Fotopedia get together, photography will play a central role in what ever they produce. That is definitely the case with this app, which comes packed with more than a thousand stunning images from Burma. Those images offer everything from intriguing glimpses inside ornate local temples to breathtaking views of some of the stunning landscapes found throughout the country, however it was the photos of the people, going about their daily lives, that left the biggest impression on me.

Your favorite images can be used to create slideshows or set as your desktop background on your device. Built-in connections to email, Facebook, and Twitter also allow you to easily share the best photos with friends and family as well. The app also features a “Trip Builder,” which lets you create your own Burma getaways, both real and virtual. There is also a forward written by Traveler Editor-in-Chief Keith Bellows, as well as interactive maps and a comprehensive search feature as well.

This new app is available now and is completely free. It does require an Internet connection to pull in much of the content however, so be aware of that before you use it on the go. Other than that, I can’t think of a single reason why anyone who considers themselves a traveler, and owns one of Apple’s i-devices, wouldn’t have this app installed. Get it now by clicking here.

Photos from the amazing “Ghost Ship” fleet

by Jeremy Kressmann on

Photographer Scott Haefner fantasized for years about visiting the ‘Ghost Ships‘ of California’s Suisun Bay, a fleet of mothballed merchant ships waiting to be scrapped. But it wasn’t until recently that he and a few close friends built up the nerve to visit these abandoned wonders in person, evading round-the-clock security and ocean currents in the process. The photos he brought back of these magnificent decaying ships are just as amazing as the story of how he was able to take them to begin with.

The story of these amazing Ghost Ships starts with a government program called the Naval Defense Reserve Fleet. These mothballed merchant vessels were set aside by the government to be activated in case of emergency. At its peak in 1950, over 2,000 vessels were scattered around the coasts of the United States, included several hundred in Suisun Bay, about 30 miles north of San Francisco. Today, they sit abandoned, leaking toxic paint and heavy metals into the surrounding waters.

Working with several friends, Scott spent over two years secretly visiting the ships to meticulously photograph their interiors. Using a small inflatable raft, the crew would silently motor out the ships under cover of dark, running a test scouting mission before eventually spending whole weekends wandering and photographing the ships’ eerie rusting interiors. Even though the explorers were under constant threat of discovery (and likely arrest), they never got caught (other than one close call). You can read Scott’s full account of the experience and see more photos over at his website.

Want to explore more amazing abandoned places? Check out these Gadling galleries of 25 haunting shipwrecks and the 10 creepiest abandoned cities. The full ghost ship gallery is below.

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Images of Paris in La Belle Époque

by Sean McLachlan on

Paris has always captured the imagination with its architectural beauty and interesting inhabitants. La Belle Époque from the late 19th century to the start of World War One is considered a high point of Parisian life, and this life was captured by an eccentric photographer named Eugène Atget.

Atget started taking photographs of Paris in the 1890s. Working in the early hours of the morning with large-format negatives in order to catch as much detail as possible, he photographed many fine old buildings that have since disappeared. He photographed people too, preferring street vendors, shopkeepers, prostitutes, and the homeless. Instead of the rich and famous, he focused on people you’d commonly see on the street in those days, like this little girl singing along to an organ grinder, courtesy the Gilman Paper Company Collection.

Atget continued to work after the war until his death in 1927, documenting a Paris that even then was beginning to disappear. He was a bit of an anachronism, using the same equipment and same techniques he had thirty years before. A photo of him from the 1920s shows him as a shabby, hunched old man. He must have been an object of fun among the Bohemian set, for his looks, mannerisms (in old age he only ate bread, milk, and sugar) and outdated photographic style. The art world never really appreciated him until after his death, but now he’s renowned as one of the most important artists of the era.

Atget’s work is now the subject of a free exhibition at Madrid’s Fundación Mapfre, one of the best private galleries in the city. Eugène Atget, Paris 1898-1924 runs until August 27.

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Photo of the day – Approaching Rio

by Meg Nesterov on


Many of us love the window seat when traveling. Even in cramped coach class, you can feel like you have your own little nook with a place to prop up your tiny airline pillow (in case you don’t fly with a SkyRest like Mike Barish) and a great view of the sky and landscape below. But few of us ever get the best window seat, up in the cockpit, where the view is framed by hundreds of tiny lights and controls. Fortunately own resident pilot Kent Wien shared this nighttime arrival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. See more of his beautiful sky photos here.

See any stellar views on your travels? Add your pictures to the Gadling Flickr pool and you may see one as a future Photo of the Day.