Alessandra Sanguinetti: Playspace Commission: June Velie, Black River Falls, Wisconsin

To celebrate the publication of The Photographer’s Playbook: 307 Assignments and Ideas, Aperture commissioned twenty-two photographers to create new works in response to assignments from the book. Curated by Christopher McCall of Pier 24 Photography, the project sparked a fascinating dialogue between some of the world’s leading photographers and educators working today. What follows is an insight into the possibilities of looking at photography through someone else’s eyes.

“When I was a kid in Buenos Aires, my mother had Wisconsin Death Trip on our bookshelf. I don’t know why or how it got there, but that book ushered me into photography with its first sentence: “The people you are about to see were once actually alive.” For this assignment, I visited Black River Falls, Wisconsin—the actual place of many photographs that had gained legendary qualities in my mind. I played with the pictures that had been engraved in my imagination since I was nine, approaching each sitting as if it was the one and only last portrait of each person.”—Alessandra Sanguinetti

The artist responded to Paul Reas’ assignment, The Discipline of Music, on page 282 of The Photographer's Playbook: “Whilst teaching photography in the documentary course, I will often refer to the discipline of music. Those early visual exercises our first-year students pursue, as they strive to attain visual vocabulary, I equate to the study of musical scales...My assignment would be to take an established photograph you connect with and find a situation or location that is reminiscent of the original. Once you have done this, “riff” on the ideas or expression of the original. See if you can’t inject something new.”

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