Today’s Post by Joe Farace
It troubles me to think that I am suited for this work—spectacle and fetish—a pale odalisque.—from E.J. Bellocq’s “Letters from Storyville,” March 1911
John Ernest Joseph Bellocq (1873–1949) aka E.J. Bellocq was an American professional photographer who worked in New Orleans during the early 20th century.
Bellocq is most remembered for his haunting portraits of prostitutes that he produced in Storyville, New Orleans’ legalized red light district. During his lifetime, these images were only known to a small number of his acquaintances. The Storyville negatives were only discovered after his death in 1949. After several years, they were purchased by photographer, Lee Friedlander.
In 1970, John Szarkowski curator at the Museum of Modern Art mounted a show of Friedlander’s posthumous prints on gold tone printing out paper that were made from Bellocq’s 8 x10inch glass negatives. Bellocq’s photographs have inspired novels, poems and movies including the 1978 film Pretty Baby, where he was portrayed by Keith Carradine.
My INfluence
How I made this shot: I would be the last person to compare any of my work with a famous photographer’s, let alone E.J. Bellocq but I am and was influenced by his (and other photographer’s) work, including the portrait featured today of Courtney, a young model. It was not my intention to produce a slavish copy of Bellocq’s work but just an homage to his oeuvre.
This portrait of Courtney was made in my 11×15-foot home studio. To light the portrait, I placed a 320 Ws Smith Victor FLC300 monolight fitted with a 24×24-inch soft box at camera left. Fill was provided by another FLC300 monolight at camera right with a 45-inch umbrella mounted and placed near the back corner of my camera room. A Smith Victor 110i monolight with 24×24-inch softbox at camera left was used as a hair light, although to be honest the effect appears minimal.
The background was an inexpensive 10 x 24-foot muslin backdrop that was shaped using Home Depot and Lowes clips and hung on a JTL background stand. Later the background was damaged beyond repair when my basement flooded, .
The camera used was a Canon EOS 5D Mark I with an EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM lens (at 50mm) with an exposure of 1/60 sec at f/14 and ISO 125. Since this pose, costume and backdrop reminded me of the work of E.J. Bellocq, I converted the image to monochrome using Silver Efex and added edge effects using Color Efex.
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My book Joe Farace’s Glamour Photography is full of tips, tools and techniques for glamour and boudoir photography and includes information on all of the cameras and lenses that i used as well as the complete exposure data for each image. New copies are available from Amazon for $34.95 with used copies starting around ten bucks, as I write this. The Kindle version is $19.99 for those preferring a digital format.