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December 23, 2009
FotoFreo 2010 is month long celebration of photography showcasing the work of internationally renown and emerging photographers from March to April. Like the Ballarat Biennale it consists of core and fringe programmes as well as discussion.
The core programme includes work by photographers previously mentioned on junkfor code: Carrie Levy, and the two Australians Pat Brassington and Narelle Autio.
The American documentary photographer, Eugene Richards, is part of the core programme. The work featured is the colour work of the abandoned and forgotten houses of western America in areas such as the plains of Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico and the Dakotas.
Eugene Richards, An abandoned house just outside Corinth on Highway 42 in northwest North Dakota, from The Blue Room
This series consists of pictures of abandoned buildings and the communities that once supported them. They couldn't make a living any more on a small farm.
These regional ghost towns speak of an irreversible decline.Judging from Richard's work They are places that have been emptied out as the family farm gave way to the capitalist enterprise.
Eugene Richards, empty house+ train, North Dakota, from The Blue Room
North Dakota stands for abandoned houses, empty stores, churches without congregations, community buildings gone dark and closed schools.All that signifies a future of narrowing possibilities.
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Couple Fotofreo with the Perth Centre of Photography and Perth, for all its historic isolation, has a very active photographic scene. Much more so than Adelaide, which has no photographic centre or biennale.