Real Photo Show with Michael Chovan-Dalton

Archipelago is a book about connection and isolation as described in the essays by Vicki Goldberg and Jean Dykstra. Chovan-Dalton and Del Amo discuss Del Amo's influence from the worlds of theater and dance, they also talk about teaching and the changes to their practices through the fall and rise of film photography.
Photo of Yolanda del Amo credit: Ignacio Evangelista

https://www.yolandadelamo.com
https://www.instagram.com/yolanda.delamo/

Yolanda del Amo is a Spanish-born, New York-based artist who works in photography. She questions how social constructs such as class, gender and family influence community, interpersonal psychology, and identity. Her work looks at individuals through a sociological and psychological lens, exploring how we live and connect with ourselves and others, and how we shape the world around us.

Solo exhibitions have been held at the Centro Cultural de la Torriente Brau in Havana, Hudson Franklin Gallery in New York City, and Light Work in Syracuse, New York, among others. Her work has been included in group exhibitions at venues such as Julie Saul Gallery in New York City, the Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover and the National Portrait Gallery in London.

She has been the recipient of multiple awards, such as a commendation at the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition organized by the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC and the second prize at the Salón Nacional de Artes Visuales in Buenos Aires. Institutions and Foundations that have supported her work through production grants include the Jerome Foundation, the John Anson Kittredge Fund and the Spanish Ministry of Culture.

Del Amo has been a resident artist at the Terra Foundation for American Art in Giverny, France, the Spanish Academy in Rome, Light Work in Syracuse, New York, the Lower Manhattan Culture Council in New York City (LMCC) and the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris.

She is currently Professor of Photography and Digital Media at Ramapo College of New Jersey.

This podcast is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club - Begin Building your dream photobook library today at:
https://charcoalbookclub.com

Filmmaker and photographer Ryan Hartley joins Michael Chovan-Dalton from the 2026 Chico Review to discuss project, Oaksplitter, a southern gothic exploration of the people and land from his upbringing.

https://ryhart.com
https://www.instagram.com/ry.hart/

Crawling out of northwest Tennessee, Ryan Hartley is an award-winning filmmaker, writer, and photographer.

In his youth, he roamed the outskirts of his small rural town, skateboarding, making home movies, and photographing both his friends and locals.

He has traveled around the world, working in reality TV, photographing bands, and capturing the communities and unseen people who remind him of his childhood.

Now based in Nashville, he works with artists, major record labels, and brands to help shape and capture their identity.

His latest project, Oaksplitter, is a southern gothic exploration of the people and land from his upbringing, and the in-between spaces where those worlds collide.

Publications:
Rolling Ston, Oxford American, The Bitter Southerner Publishing, Garden & Guns, Paste Magazine, Sunnyside Projects, Black Flower Publishing , Flood Magazine, Uncut Magazine

This podcast is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club - Begin Building your dream photobook library today at:
https://charcoalbookclub.com

Photographer Yue Sun joins Michael Chovan-Dalton from the 2026 Chico Review to discuss
His work from Inner Mongolia and the transition of his hometown from coal mining to tourism.

https://www.yuesunphoto.com
https://www.instagram.com/__4le_/

b. 1998, Wuhai, Inner Mongolia, China
Based in Shanghai, China
‍
Yue Sun is a self-taught Chinese photographer, currently working as a freelance-architect in Shanghai.

BA Architecture(ARB/RIBA Part I), Architecture Association School of Architecture

Group Exhibitions
2026 - Gui Qu Lai Xi, FujiFilm X-Space, Hangzhou, China
2025 - 6th Lanzhou International Image Biennale

This podcast is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club - Begin Building your dream photobook library today at:
https://charcoalbookclub.com

Photographer Klaus Ruckgaber joins Michael Chovan-Dalton from the 2026 Chico Review to discuss
Sehnsucht, the German word for a kind of longing, and how he uses that in his work.

https://fleischkleidung.com
https://www.instagram.com/fleischkleidung/

I was born March 7th 2002 in Mexico City.

I am attracted by the manifestation of feeling, the existential and the ungraspable.

I am an individual who believes that there are no absolutes, there is no absolute beauty or an absolute truth or meaning. My work is focused on that idea. Our flaws, we are our own unreliable narrator in our existence and we shouldn't hide this but instead to carry it with tenderness and acceptance. The way we see the world is unique, splendor can be found in the unconventional, the “dregs” of life can also be beautiful.

In decay flowers bloom, in the lesions there are lessons and without loss, love has no consequence.

This podcast is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club - Begin Building your dream photobook library today at:
https://charcoalbookclub.com

Sipke Visser is a photographer and speaks about how he collaborates through photography at the 2026 Chico Review

https://www.sipkevisser.nl
https://www.instagram.com/sipkevisser/
https://www.chicoreview.com

After being born I spent the first 19 years of my life in Leeuwarden, a small town in the North of the Netherlands. In 2005 I moved to London for love and to pursue a life in photography. While making a living as a retoucher I have consistently been working on making art with photography as the main medium. While by very proficient with photoshop I never alter any of my own work, apart from grading.

My projects usually involve people. I love involving them with a project asking them to participate somehow, usually by adding text or drawings to a portrait or image. In 2005, for Return to Sender, I sent 500 hand written letters with an image to random people all across the UK, asking for a response. For the HAIR project I asked people to have all their hair cut off and to then reflect on that. In the pandemic I photographed the neighbours in black and white to then revisit them 2 years later inside their houses, shooting them in colour now. For Take a Look at Yourself I photographed 150 people with a large plate camera over a period of 8 years. I then asked them to have a really long good look at the image, and reflect.

This podcast is sponsored by the Charcoal Book Club - Begin Building your dream photobook library today at:
https://charcoalbookclub.com