Stacey Dugan reviewed LaPorte, Indiana over at UR Chicago magazine! Here is Dugan covering some of the book's more curatorial aspects:
Some of his selections would be well-described as outtakes - a baby crying, a little girl itching her eye or a teenage girl looking scared stiff - but those imperfections make the subjects overwhelmingly human, even if they aren't the portraits that would make their way to the family mantel. Bitner's juxtapositions, too, are playful but astute.
More reviews from the UK! The British fine arts magazine Modern Painters offers its thoughts on LaPorte, Indiana in their new issue:
Roland Barthes famously noted that in the 1953 film Julius Caesar, coiffure guaranteed historical authenticity: The cod-classical fringe flagged the male actors' Roman-ness. In Jason Bitner's selection of found studio portraits from the 1950s and 1960s, the equivalent ensign is a little tuft of hair that sticks straight up from a brutal haircut.
Hannah Lack, from the global culture magazine Dazed and Confused, wrote a glowing review of LaPorte, Indiana - here's a selection:
The photographs capture post-WWII middle America when suburbia was ballooning, before Vietnam and the 60s hit the nation's consciousness ... we can only guess at the mysterious stories that hide behind these milk-fed faces.
In the June '06 issue of Lake Magazine, Deborah Hufford wrote a fantastic review of LaPorte, Indiana! Hufford comments on the pictures' place in Mid-Century America:
Emblematic of the times, the earlier photos' subjects sport beehive hairdos, crewcuts, cat-eye glasses, and a preponderance of pearls. later, skirts creep up and the sideburns creep down, the country slouching toward the '60s.
The images are modest, almost workmanlike. But they are tinged with a gentle self-consciousness, even hopefulness, and bespeak the quietude and dignity of their Midwest subjects.
Check out the full review here.
Andrew Huff, editor and co-founder of the wonderful Chicago-based web publication Gapers Block, weighs in on LaPorte, Indiana. Here, Huff describes one of his favorite photo-couplings:
I find myself returning over and over again to a spread showing two men in suits, each with a flat-top haircut, thick black-rimmed glasses on a slightly nobby nose, and a mild smile; the biggest difference between the pair is that one happens to be black, the other white, but their similarities almost lead you to believe they're related.
Read Huff's full review here.
Here's a selection from Susan McCallum-Smith's review in Baltimore's The Urbanite Magazine:
Jason Bitner, the cocreator of FOUND Magazine and an expert in "show and tell" cultural artifacts, carefully sifted through these mementoes of the universal human journey - the christenings, communions, birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, and retirements - to produce a portrait of the small town "everyman." Collectively, the book feels like a tactile Winesburg, Ohio, yet each print reverberates with undeniable individuality. These people could be our relatives, triggering emotions in us both affectionate and protective
Find the whole review here.
On April 23rd, Jason Bitner stopped by Chicago's 720 WGN radio station to talk to host Nick Digilio about LaPorte, Indiana.
Check it out!
Bitner (left) and Digilio show the camera some famous Chicago love.
Kristen Gehring, in the Chicago Journal, wrote a events reminder of the Intuit book party on April 27th. We know that this is a couple weeks late, but we still wanted to share:
Tonight, Thursday, April 27, at 6 p.m., we’re going to Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art, 756 Milwaukee Ave. (312/243-9088), to hear Found Magazine creator Jason Bitner talk about his new book, LaPorte, Indiana, which "presents a selection from 18,000 studio portraits [he] stumbled upon in the backroom of a diner in northwestern Indiana." We’re from northwest Indiana. It is not outside the realm of possibility that a portrait of us in our Sunday best, with our parents and our two stupid little brothers, may be among the 18,000 photos discovered by Mr. Bitner. This would not be good for our image. We plan to take a blowtorch along tonight, so we can discreetly excise the offending portrait should it show up in the presentation. If Mr. Bitner is upset, we shall quietly tuck the blowtorch into our handbag and goddess demurely.
Luckily, the blowtorches weren't needed.
From the April issue of Indianapolis Monthly a thematic look at LaPorte, Indiana! A look at LaPortean women thrown together by the common feature of less-than-perfect vision. Check out this beautiful grouping of Gals With Glasses!
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