© Dina Litovsky.

“The bachelorette party is a popular rite of passage for a bride. Through this ritual, the bride-to-be is initiated into a role of a wife by her friends in a fascinating twist on traditional gender roles. The women celebrate by engaging in ‘masculine’ behavior, signifying that a woman has as much sexual freedom to lose as her partner. A ritual attempting to reinforce relationships among women is performed in a conventionally atypical female way- through a night of sexual games and drinking. With this project I am exploring the bachelorette party as a curious ritual of friendship and status, intimacy and consumerism.” – Dina Litovsky

“Bachelorette” received a Silver Medal, 2nd place, in the PX3 2012 awards and 3rd place in the Fotoweek DC 2012 Awards. Litovsky’s project is currently featured in FotoMagazin, Portfolio edition September 2012, curated by Manfred Zollner. Also featured in that issue are portfolios by Damion Berger, Jamey Stillings, Jill Greenberg and others.

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© Harold Feninstein

After a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2011 which raised over $40,000, Jason Landry at Panopticon Gallery teamed up with Nazraeli Press to publish Harold Feinstein | A Retrospective, Feinstein’s first-ever monograph of his classic black-and-white photographs.  As Landry states, “Harold (who is now 81) would say to me, I’ve been waiting for a book of this work since I was 15 years old.  When he said it, I knew he meant it, and I had to figure out a way to deliver it.”

Feinstein was born in Coney Island in 1931, and would often say that he fell out of his mother’s womb onto the beach on Coney Island with a Nathan’s Hot Dog in his hand and the sounds of kids screaming on The Cyclone in his ears.

He began his career in photography in 1946 at the age of 15 and within four years, Edward Steichen had purchased his work for the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Feinstein joined the Photo League at 17 and became a prominent figure in the vanguard of New York City’s street photography scene, exhibiting his work at Helen Gee’s Limelight Gallery.

Over the years, Feinstein taught classes and workshops, telling his students, “When your mouth drops open…click the shutter.”

—Courtesy Panopticon Gallery
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All Photos © Lauren Silberman. Above: Kalan & Este at the Koala Bear House

“Over the past four years I have been spending a great deal of time in New Orleans, where I have begun to photograph details of the city as well as its people. Lush with plant life that is not native to the city, and rich with many non-native people that thrive there, New Orleans is, as geographer Peirce Lewis called it the ‘inevitable city on an impossible site.’  The wildlife that flourishes mirrors the human wildlife that flourishes. The photos are a collection of these metaphors – weeds push through the cement, vines crawl through fences, and friends’ and acquaintances’ characters shine through the dust and sweat that makes up the city.

“I see the city as magical hub of growth, hope, and resilience as reflected through its landscape and its people. Whether my subjects are native to the area or come from other places, they each contribute to the life and culture of New Orleans making it a vibrant place in which to live and create. I am constantly inspired by their strength and eccentricities, and each image is a gesture of admiration and an opportunity for me to celebrate their beauty.”

— Lauren Silberman

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All photos © RomanLeo

RomanLeo is a portrait and fashion photography team consisting of Randy Crisp and Ruzanna Yesayan. They took the Grand Prize in last years PDN The LOOK Fashion photography contest with these images from the series “Domestique” created for Vestal Magazine. July 4th is the extended deadline for the 2012 The LOOK contest.

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Gordon Parks, “Emerging Man, Harlem, 1952.” Gelatin silver print. © The Gordon Parks Foundation. Collection of the International Center of Photography.

As the first black staff photographer at Life magazine, Gordon Parks photographed both the gorgeous and the gritty, and the two opposing subject matters would define his career as a photographer. While Parks once said he used his camera as a weapon against the things he hated, like racism and poverty, he also admitted that it can be used to capture beauty, such as fashion and society portraits.

In honor of the centennial of the ground-breaking photographer’s birth, the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York City, in co-operation with The Gordon Parks Foundation, is hosting a unique outdoor exhibition that can be viewed along the museum’s exterior. “Gordon Parks: 100 Years” includes an oversize mural of “Emerging Man” (above) and over 50 photographs by Parks, which will be displayed via three video screens as part of a window installation at the ICP building at 1133 Avenue of the Americas through January 6, 2013. Visit icp.org for more information.

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