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"Untitled from the Master Mickey Series" © Brion McCarthy |
Curious Camera - Begins
The idea for Curious Camera started for me back in 1992. One of my photographer friends, Brion McCarthy introduced me to images he made using his Mick-o-matic. They had a soft, dreamy quality to them. The camera he used was a big Mickey Mouse head and you clicked the shutter by pushing the right mouse ear down. The lens, which is plastic, is in Mickey’s nose. How cool is that? I have a passion for all kinds of toys,and a photograpy toy is the best of both worlds. Brion had a show of 14 of his “mouse” images in the lobby of my company, Photographic Works, here in Tucson. I had a new interest and was on a quest to someday have a Mick-o-matic of my own.
In 2007, I started ArtsEye which is a gallery that is artist and art buyer friendly. I started thinking about having an event that promoted this fun, rebel, bohemian type of photography, introduced to me by Brion. So my plan was to have workshops on pinhole and plastic/toy camera photography, a photographic competition with as few rules as possible, and to top it off - a gallery event.
So here we are 2009 at the birth of Curious Camera. The response has been amazing. The timing seems perfect for a fun project that costs so little to participate in. I want to welcome everyone to Curious Camera. This is just the beginning. I plan on making this an annual event.
By the way, I finally got my very own Mick-o-matic. If you come to ArtsEye for the Curious Camera event you’ll get to see it.
Mary Findysz
President
Photographic Works / ArtsEye
Insider Information
March 5th, 2009
I couldn’t remember what year Brion McCarthy had the show of his Mick-o-matic work, so I called him. He is working as a photographer in Baltimore, Maryland. He told me he just had scanned all the images and happened to have them in his car. (Really?) He couldn’t remember the year either, he went out to the car, while I was on the phone, and looked at the back of the prints. It was 1992. He sent me the following email.
Funny how you should call right after I had gone back and digitized all this
stuff. Honestly, I was not even sure why I was spending the time on it. I am
excited to take part in the contest. Let me know more as it comes together.
It was great talking with you, as always.
All the best.
Brion
I think that it is amazing that after all these years he had the prints in his car the morning I called. I just want to add that the competition/contest is not judged by me, so it is totally okay for any photographer that happens to know me to enter. The whole concept is - fun.
Mary