Today we’d like to introduce you to Larry Brownstein.
Larry, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
I was trained as an engineer. It was my love of travel that first got me interested in photography – I joined a photographer-friend on a trip around Asia and learned from him during our six month adventure.
I began to get my landscape photos published in magazines and this was the motivation to keep myself going and improving and turning it into a business.
Since then I travel less and am more interested in subjects closer to home. I love photographing all aspects of Los Angeles from the architecture, to the fashion scene and various sub-cultures.
In the last year or two I have been collaborating with colorful local personalities to produce a fine art portraiture series that I have been releasing on Instagram at @brownsteinPhoto
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
I practice a lot of “street photography.” For me, the camera is a key that unlocks otherwise closed doors and allows me to look at the world more deeply. I endeavor, to the best of my ability, to attain a state of heightened awareness that sensitizes me to the visual elements of color, tone, pattern and composition. More importantly, though, it enables me to see an impending moment of candid, yet dramatic, street theater and to capture it unobtrusively, or, to simply notice an everyday treasure and, through my attention, elevate it from the commonplace to the sublime.
I also do a lot of fine art portraits – portraits that capture the essence of the interesting fashionistas, tattoo aficionados, cosplayers, underground performers, etc. that I collaborate with.
Do current events, local or global, affect your work and what you are focused on?
The role of the artist is more important than ever. The world is moving in a more and more commercial direction in which fewer and fewer voices get access to the media. In such a unipolar world the alternative perspectives of various artists are more and more important even as though perspectives tend to be more marginalized than in the past.
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
2018 ROUND HOLE SQUARE PEG, Long Hall Gallery, City of West Hollywood
2018 Street Photography, Los Angeles Center of Photography, Hollywood
2018 ROUND HOLE SQUARE PEG, Bert Green Fine Arts, The LA Art Show
2018 Bunk, Gallery 825, Hollywood
2017 The Creative Portrait, Los Angeles Center of Photography, Hollywood
2017 Art in Play, Beyond the Lines Gallery, Santa Monica
2017 Lost at Sea, Fold Gallery, downtown LA
2017 No Restraint, ARK Arts Gallery, Altadena
2017 VS., Gallery 825, Hollywood
2017 Out There, Gallery 825, Hollywood
Below is a partial list or recent exhibitions.
People can support my work by buying fine art prints of my work. The work can be seen at www.brownsteinimages.com. People can also hire me to do personal and family portraits by contacting me at larryb@larrybrownstein.com
2017 Present But Not Involved, Fathom Gallery, downtown LA
2017 On the Street, Fabrik Magazine gallery booth, Photo Independent LA
2017 What Does LA Mean to You?, Angel City Brewery, downtown LA
2017 User to User, Gallery 825, Hollywood
2017 Make America, Gallery 825, Hollywood
2017 Street Shooting, Los Angeles Center of Photography, Hollywood
2016 Los Angeles: Detailed, Annenberg Community Beach House, Santa Monica
2016 Imagined Realities, PhotoPlace Gallery, Vermont
2016 Oasis, Millard Sheets Art Center, Pomona
2016 Out There, Gallery 825, Hollywood
2015 Street Shooting, Los Angeles Center of Photography, Hollywood
2015 Poetry of Photography, Mike Kelley Gallery, Venice Beach
2015 Western National Parks, El Pueblo, downtown LA
2014 Figures | Context, PhotoPlace Gallery, Vermont
2014 Romance, The Factory, Pasadena
Contact Info:
- Website: Fine Art Photography: brownsteinimages.com Portrait Photography: brownsteinPortraits.com
- Phone: 310-815-1402
- Email: larryb@larrybrownstein.com
- Instagram: @brownsteinPhoto
2016 West Hollywood Halloween Carnaval, Los Angeles, California
Michaelangelo, model, Style Fashion Week, Pacific Design Center, West Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA
10/12/2017
2017 West Hollywood Halloween festival, Santa Monica Boulevard, West Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA
Downtown Los Angeles Street Happening, Los Angeles, California, USA
Dressed in Day of the Dead make-up can costume. Street Meet LA – a collaborative, creative street meet up.
Los Angeles, California, USA
Image Credit:
For the image of the clowns, credit: @richiethebarber and @princessorgana
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