BBoy Monsters Spotted at Unlucky Breaks

Peep the BBoy Monster invading the middle of that cypher. Brought to you by the new panoramic feature on your iphone.

I was in NYC this past weekend for an event organized by Floor Obsessions crew called "Unlucky Breaks" at the Aurora Gallery. While most jams I go to the vibe consists mostly of bboys trying to out cock each other. Unlucky Breaks took a different approach to our tried and true formulas, and made all the combatants battle under different handicaps given via a spin from the "Wheel of Misfortune." This was easily the most fun I've ever had at a jam, each battle felt unique, as the handicaps really pushed the participant to step out of their comfort zone and take creative risks.

To top it all off, my friends over at Floor Obsession let me put up some of my BBoy Monsters for the jam. Funny enough, although I've been showing work more often recently this was the event I was most excited about. The BBoy Monsters is a body of work that I've been creating specifically with the breaking community in mind, I often describe it as “by a BBoy for BBoys”. So when I found out my buddies over at Floor Obsessions were holding the event in a gallery space, I jumped at the chance to put up my work. On the whole my pictures were very well received despite some hanging difficulties. I don't think I've ever felt so much love at a jam before (probably because I'm not exactly a great BBoy). Thanks to all the guys that came up to talk to me about my photos, it totally felt like a dream come true.

Below you'll see my recap of the jam. While I'm definitely breaking some photo-rules here with this gigantic edit, and image quality all over the place, there are some real gems in here. Special thanks to Eddie and Katya and the whole of Floor Obsessions for the opportunity to share my work with the community and to be part of such an awesome jam!!!

Waacking Monster

Julia is also a dancer who is proficient in many different styles. As we were shooting this "Waacking Monster" she kept reminding me "I can do a bboy monster too!!!" When I first started developing this project, Julia was one of the first people I asked to pose for me. Now almost a full year later, we finally got together over the weekend for a shoot.

This month I will be showing at Hallway Gallery on Center st. in Jamaica Plain in their holiday salon show. Also the bboy monsters will be invading Aurora gallery in New York this weekend for "Unlucky Breaks" a bboy jam with a twist! I figured this would be the perfect opportunity for my bboy monsters because it's always been my dream to show work at breaking event. Expect more pictures to be coming soon!

BBoy Monster: Gyrotronic2039

Apologies for the lack of updates in the past few weeks, things were a bit crazy preparing for shows/finding new ones. Luckily I have some good friends who keep me in check and twist my arm to keep making new work.

Gyro is a close friend and fellow crewmate. We are both founding members of Florox crew, although he's been rocking a couple of years longer than I have. In addition to being one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet, he is also fluent in many dance styles including breaking, locking, and house.

Upcoming Shows

I have a few upcoming shows this month, please stop by and take a look if you get the chance!!!

Tonight is the opening reception for my show at Jameson and Thompson, a frame shop I am currently working at in Jamaica Plain. I will be showing all the new stuff from my "World of One" series (basically the last five entries in this blog). So if you're a fan, or just a friend/acquaintance please stop by!! Reception is 6:00-8:00 come for some free wine/beer/snacks/awesome.

Jameson and Thompson
15 Greenview Ave.
Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
6:00-8:00

Additionally my "Reflection" photo will also be in a group show called "Regarding the 3rd Dimension" curated by Camilo Alvarez of Samsøn, Boston. It will be showing at the South Shore Art Center in Cohasset, MA. from Nov. 9 - Dec. 23, 2012.

Regarding the 3rd Dimension
SOUTH SHORE ART CENTER
119 Ripley Road, Cohasset, MA 02025

Last but not least, this month I will also be the featured artist at Colortek of Boston, a photo-lab near South Station in Boston (of course). This is a show that I'm really excited about, mostly because someone actually wrote about me and quoted some of the stuff I've written in this blog. It's like a greatest hits collection of the stuff I've put up over the years, only from an outsider's perspective and explained much better and more cohesively. Please check out the feature on their blog here:

Boston Photographer + BBoy / Johnny Tang

World of One: Hide and Seek

This is easily the most expensive photograph I have ever taken. Shot on 35mm Fujichrome color reversal film (which shoots positive, rather than negative images for those who are not in the know) at the Christian Science Center in Boston, with the assistance of my brother. I was originally hoping that the leaves on the trees would have more red in them by now, but I got spots of yellow here and there instead. This is I think, is a good way to describe what I feel like when I'm trying to remember something. It’s like it's all there, but I just can't see where it is.

World of One: Curious Boredom

After the success of "Yin Yang Whisper," I started to think deeper about the direction I want to take this body of work. When I started making these all I was really concerned about was trying to arrange the figures in an interesting way. As of late however, I have been playing with some ideas about how the two sides interact, and using that relationship to imply a narrative. The next images in this series will explore the paradoxical relationship between contrasting emotions. This one is titled "Curious Boredom" and was photographed earlier this week outside the Boston Public Library.

World of One: Yin Yang Whisper

Ladies and gentleman, allow me to present the next installment in the "World of One" series: The "Yin Yang Whisper." As I walk pass this building on my way to practice everyday, I always think to myself "wow that looks really cool maybe I should take a picture." Then I never do. Finally, I got my shit together and made it happen.

Whenever I'm trying to come up with a new idea for this body of work, I usually feel like I'm just rearranging black and white dots on a page. Being Asian, of course one of the first things that I usually think of is the yin yang symbol. However, I never follow through with that idea because I always think it will be cheesy. I'm pretty happy with the way this one turned out though. Whenever I look at it I think about how hard it is to listen to your own advice.

World of One: Narcissus

It felt like I was going to die if I didn't make this picture. The idea of it kept calling to me from the back of my mind. As with "Reflection" this was shot using film, and then scanned and manipulated in photoshop after. Photographed at the reflection pool at the Christan Science Center in Boston. Concept was inspired by the story of "Narcissus" from greek mythology.

World of One: Reflection

It feels like I've been waiting all summer to take this picture. Unlike the previous images in the world of one series, this was shot on 35mm kodak color film. Of course the film is scanned and manipulated digitally after. But actually shooting with film again, reminded me of how I'd completely forgotten the feeling of fear that came with it. The big difference is this, when you're shooting with film, you're bleeding money every time you press the button. I hear dollar signs in my head for each click of the shutter on my old Minolta.

But film has a completely different feel to it. The colors between each company and film type are different, there's more of an element of unpredictability to it. Each roll of film feels like more of a gamble, there is less room for error. I don't even know if I think this is a good picture or not, but I do know that I want to keep making more of these things until I get it right.

Girl in the Window

Probably one of the better pictures I've taken.

In photo-school they teach you little tricks to composing your pictures in order to make them look a little more interesting. One of these tricks that's always eluded me however, is taking a picture of someone standing in a window. When you do this, the window basically acts like a circle on the page telling the viewer where to look. If you do it right, it's really difficult to take a bad picture. In my case however, I always managed to press the shutter a split second too early, or too late. Thereby leaving pieces of my subject cut off by the edges of the frame, resulting in a terrible picture. Finally on a bright sunny afternoon this past week, I got the idea to set up this shot in formal setting. As all the elements finally came together, the process started to feel like second nature, like "damn, it'd be really hard to screw this up right now. I have no idea why it was so hard before, why do I feel stupid?"

BBoy Monster: Kim Minsung

BBoy Monster: Minsung, Radio City

BBoy Monsters have invaded New York!! I was in the big apple last week for our annual crew reunion, and met up with the legendary BBoy Kim Minsung for a shoot in time square. This guy is a former world record holder for 1990's and all around ridiculous powermover. Our crew has affectionately nicknamed him "God Moves," here are a few reasons why.

BBoy Monster: Korean Devil

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Photographer

Xing Yi - 5 Linking Form

Mysterious Attainment Broadsword

Long before I ever started break dancing. I, like a good asian boy, was really into Kung Fu. For most of grade school, I went to Kung fu class on Sundays in an after Chinese school program. While I have long since given up on my kung fu adventures, here's a guy who actually stuck with it. This is my buddy Henry Lee, newly graduated acupuncturist and master of the style of "Wudang Quan". These images were compiled from movements in the "Xing Yi 5 Phase Linking", and "Mysterious Attainment Broadsword" forms (Kung Fu names are so cool!!!!).

Note: to my militant Asians, I'm sorry this does nothing but perpetuate the stereotype that all chinese guys are Bruce Lee. My bad, next time!

World of Two: Multi-Jun

Multi-Jun

Apologies for the lack of recent updates. I have some new projects in the works, but am admittedly having some trouble getting it off the ground.

An old friend of mine asked me take a some engagement photos for him a while back. In addition to the traditional engagement style pics, he also asked me to do a surreal kind of shot. I took it as a chance to revisit a theme I did in August of last year with "World of Two". This one is much simpler than the previous, but I think there are definitely many technical improvements here.

More work to come soon...

Updates

Nowhere America, Atlanta - Boston

It's been a while, my apologies for the lack of updates. For the last few weeks I've had to put all art making activities on hold while I was making renovations to my portfolio site. The results of which, is a new and improved johnnytangphoto.com. I've made many structural changes, made the site a bit sleeker, and I've also added a webstore. I also added some new galleries, including "Bad Ghost Story" and "Tourist to Nowhere" which are compiled from some old work that I hardily ever show people. Be sure to check it out!!!

www.johnnytangphoto.com

The Long Drive

Camera Head

I was in San Francisco a few weeks back for the annual Tang family vacation. While I generally don't like playing the tourist, it was good to get out and shoot in a different environment. I found San Francisco to be quite enjoyable, definitely much enjoyable than LA. San Fran had a distinct yet subtle character.

Along the way my brother and I also got a chance to drive down to San Simeon to see Hearst Castle. Hearst Castle for those who do not know, is a castle built at the top a steep hill by William Randolph Hearst (America's first media mogul) at the early part of the 20th century. There he ran his media empire and filled his house with antiques from Europe. It's probably the closest thing we have in America, to an actual palace of some sort.





Alcatraz from Lombard St.






Inside Alcatraz.





Kept just out of reach.

Alcatraz Island

Redwoods in Miur Woods.

Big Sur

I photographed this mountain range on three separate occasions on this trip. I had no idea until we passed by this trailer for the third time on the way back. This is probably my favorite shot from the trip.

Hearst Castle

The indoor pool, looks like something straight out of prince of persia.

Lone Tree

Cutting through mountains...

Pacific

California Landscape

Light House

Head Hunting

Mug Shot

After 7 years of photographing mainly without the use of strobes, I've finally caved in and invested in some lights. I feel like I've opened pandora's box. But a couple of my homies have been hitting me up for head shots and actions shots recently. So I figured they would be worth the investment. Here's a shot from my shoot with my homie Jet Liem from earlier today. A few days ago I told this guy to come to the shoot with his hair "pre-styled". In typical bboy fashion Liem ran with the idea and went all in.

If anyone else is interested in getting some head shots done, hit me up with the subject line "Commission" at: johnnytangphoto@gmail.com

BBoy Monsters: The Brothers Lim

BBoy Monster: T-Bag, Table Diptych

Now that I think about it, I've known these two guys for a loooong time. When I started dancing in 2001, one of the first crews I met back then was a crew called "Baicha." There were these two younger brothers in Baicha (who I think they were in middle school or something at the time), who grew up to become the BBoy Monsters I present to you today. Although this shoot was postponed a number of times due to conflicting schedules, in the end it was totally worth the wait. Good art takes after all, takes a bit of patience. The shoot ended up being a lot of fun to do, both the dancers Tony T-Bags and B-Lim are skilled vets in the scene who have been tearing up cyphers all along the east coast for years. They came with great energy and ideas, as well as a sense of humor that made them a real pleasure to work with. All these images are based off of each dancers' unique styles, which I then tweaked by adding some of my own surrealist flavors.

BBoy Monster: T-Bag w/Gun

BBoy Monster: B-Lim

B-Lim Windup

BBoy Monster: Baicha Monster

Still

Towel on Door

Lamp

I like these pictures. I don't know why I like them, but I do. I can't say I was sober when took them, because I don't remember. But I was looking through my pictures, and I stumbled across these two and just stopped. Sometimes the beautiful is just there, you don't need a reason why.

Mash Up

Abercrombie Shot

Calm down ladies...

My homie Chris wants to be a model for karmaloop, and hit me up for some pics the other day. Although I never really doubted that I could do this glamor/fashion kinda stuff, the it's not exactly my thing so to speak. I feel like I've been having a hard enough time trying to sell my own ideas, let alone someone else's. But knowing Chris as a local bboy, I knew at the very least I would have a guinea pig I could try out some new techniques on. So at the end of our photo session I asked him if he wanted to do some bboy style shots just for shits and giggles. This was one of the last shots of the day. When I saw this picture I though to myself "Oh shit, that's not bad!...looks like an abercrombie ad and is borderline homoerotic, but not bad." Who says I can't shoot fashion???

BGirl Monster: A+

BGirl Monster: A+, Buddha Hands

I said I was going to get a bgirl for my next bboy monster shoot and I did just that. Not only did I get a bgirl, but I was able to get one of the illest bgirls in town!! I give you, the beautiful and amazingly talented BGirl A+!!!

These shoots are always a collaborative process, although I do make suggestions for what kind of poses will work better for this concept, each dancer will approach these parameters differently. A+ was a real pleasure to work with, she understood the concept behind the shoot very quickly and brought a metric ton of good ideas of her own. I also recently just finished a game called "Ashura's Wrath" which has an art style that blends Sci-Fi and asian mythology (in other words, there are characters in the game with multiples arms). With the aesthetics of the game still fresh in my mind, combined with A+'s sharp style and vast arsenal of poses, together we were able to produce some deadly visuals. That last line might have sounded a little corny, but really, these are the kind of pictures that you tell all your friends about shooting afterwards. Kind of like what I am doing now...

3 x 3

Kannon

BBoy Monster: Float

Classic

After more than a month since the unveiling of my last bboy monster. Today I'd like to introduce to you, my loyal readers...the legendary, world renowned, highly influential - BBoy Float!!! Float is the embodiment of a living legend, an O.G. who has been slaying beats, and roasting guys on the dance floor longer than most bboys have been walking. It was a true honor and absolute pleasure having the chance to collaborate with him on a shoot. This time I made extra effort to simplify my composition further, trying to achieve that proper balance of control and chaos.

I'm currently hoping to find a bgirl for the next shoot. Although I've had a few volunteers, I could always use more models. So if there's anyone who's interested in getting involved with this project please shoot me an email at: johnnytangphoto@gmail.com, with the title BBOY MONSTERS in the subject line. Till next time folks!

Floatski

In 3D!

Warm Ups

I went scouting earlier today, for a BBoy Monster shoot I've got coming up this weekend. Embarrassingly, I haven't been shooting much in the last two months because I've been hibernating from the winter. So I thought I'd take a few some warm up shots around the house before I headed out. If I could offer any advice, to any aspiring photographers who read this blog and would like to get better at photography, it'd be this.

Take pictures of your stuff.

It's important to actively look at your surroundings with curiosity and wonderment. That is where the magic comes from. If you can make your stuff look good, you'll find a way to make anything look good. Although these pictures might not be as visually shocking as my more surreal images are, this is where those ideas spawn from. Looks like April is shaping up to be pretty busy for me, this is just the beginning!!!

Joints and Jams

Wish

If you've been to a handful of bboy jams, you will have inevitably seen this happen in a battle. It's like an old running joke, a gimmick. The dancer stops in the middle of a routine, and poses for the photographer in the crowd. But for some reason, I never see the pictures that come from these encounters.

This is why.

This shit comes out terrible. Funny, yes. Good as a picture? No. I can't see anything in this picture. Although, I will say, it's actually pretty hard to focus on someone's head when it's flying towards your face. It just so happened, that they got me with this trick twice (and in the same battle!!) while I was shooting at a jam called "BBoy Games" out in Fall River, Mass a few weeks back.

Bebo

All jokes aside though, I did manage to walk away with some pics I'm very happy about. It felt good to be shooting bboy events again, I found it as challenging as ever, but definitely worth the effort. Here are some highlights from the jam.

Sugy

Tony T-Baggs

Xcel/Bombi vs. Heat/Bebo

Control Panel Crew vs Wish/Cuso

Bombi