10/18-Visiting Artist 3-Brian Ulrich

Brian Ulrich
website
representation

Brian Ulrich is an artist photographer (b. 1971 in Northport, NY) living in Chicago, IL. He came as a visiting photographer to VCU's Photo and Film Department.

COPIA
Plenty, a plentiful supply: now chiefly in L. phrase copia verborum abundance of words,
a copious vocabulary. Cf. COPY n. 1c.

I. a. Plenty, abundance, a copious quantity.
b. Fullness, plentitude. Obs.
c. esp. of language: Copiousness, abundance, fullness, richness.
copy of words : = L. copia verborum. Obs. (from artist statement)

Untitled, Thrift, Chicago (2006)

Brian Ulrich observes our consumer based culture. His lecture was very easy to sit through because he is so down to earth and real. He didn't try to force a vague or trite concept down our throats. He presents issues that are in front of our faces daily. I thought he was really funny too.

The series Copia, "explores not only the everyday activities of shopping, but the economic, cultural, social, and political implications of commercialism and the roles we play in self-destruction, over-consumption, and as targets of marketing and advertising." I found the image of fake Nike shoes particularly interesting. They sat in heaps in the basement of a thrift store and were brought up periodically to make the consumer think they found a great buy. I am pretty sure that everyone in the audience said "whoa" or gasped at the same time. To think that even thrift stores participate in capitalism.

Ulrich refers to Thrift as the "secondary life cycle of consumer goods". When people appear in portraits they are the middle/lower class. Before this series he did Retail, focusing on the middle-upper class shopping experience between malls and super centers. They are both chapters of the Copia project.

Ulrich's process is admirable. He carries around a medium format, and sometimes a large format camera. He was talking about how scary it was to ask for permission in getting a portrait or even documenting a space. He found that most people are friendlier than they seem. It doesnt hurt to ask...most of the time. So some people, like Jessica in the portrait, stood still for his exposures. His pictures are so rich though because he takes the time to do it with film. He makes sure he gets the shot and if for some reason there is camera shake or the film is ruined, he will travel back to that place and try to take it again. I make the mistake of getting discouraged when something doesn't work but I think many artists could benefit from this type of attitude. If it doesn't work, do it again. Do it until you get what you wanted. Its easy to get put behind when something doesn't go the way you want.


Some more of Ulrich's images. These are from his Dark Stores, Ghost Boxes and Dead Malls series which I also really enjoyed. He started this in 2008 and it branched from his other series'. They are beautiful large format pictures of old buildings and spaces once used for consumerism.