BODIES OF WORK ~ PICTURE GALLERIES
BODIES OF WORK ~ BOOK LINKS
In Situ ~ la, la, how the life goes on • Life without the APA • Doors • Kitchen Sink • Rain • 2014 • Year in Review • Place To Sit • ART ~ conveys / transports / reflects • Decay & Disgust • Single Women • Picture Windows • Tangles ~ fields of visual energy (10 picture preview) • The Light + BW mini-gallery • Kitchen Life (gallery) • The Forks ~ there's no place like home (gallery)
Tuesday, May 19, 2015 at 01:14PM 
potting stuff / wood camera app ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
potting stuff / viewmatic app ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
To keep from going stale you must forget your professional outlook and rediscover the virginal eye of the amateur. ~ Brassai
Monday, May 18, 2015 at 10:02AM 
However, inasmuch was we had timed the trip in order to have dinner at a truly excellent restaurant in nearby (to the canoe place) North Creek (pop. 616), the trip was not a waste of time - as if driving through the Adirondacks on a beautiful day is ever a waste of time. In any event, there was a "bonus" aspect to the trip - the "discovery" of two unique projects. One, community-based, the other, the work of an individual. The community-based project, The North Creek Mosaic Mural Project, is a large (figuratively and literally) endeavor which is being undertaken by 100s of volunteers who take part in the assembly of the ceramic tiles under the supervision of local artist, Kate Hartley. Assembly started in 2012 and continues with the start of the third panel. There is a fourth panel along the wall, which I assume will be muralized over time. This project is a "discovery" only in the sense that the wife and I had not paid much attention to it (as it incrementally evolved to its present state) over the years during our frequent-ish visits to North Creek. I think that was due to the facts that; 1.) we had always viewed it from across the street which led us (or at least, me) to, 2.) think of it as a painted mural. If it had "only" been a painted mural, it would have been interesting enough but, as a mosaic mural - made of thousands of pieces of ceramic - of fairly gigantic proportions, it's genuinely awe inspiring. FYI, the mural depicts many of the recreational opportunities to be found in and around North Creek. The village is located on the Hudson River and is noted for its whitewater rafting. It is also the home of Gore Mountain Ski Resort (one of America's first). In addition, the village is the terminus of the Saratoga and North Creek Railroad which is a modern reincarnation of the original Ski Train which ran (1934-1940) from Grand Central Station in NYC to North Creek. The station is also notable for the fact that Teddy Roosevelt, after a legendary night run - on wagons and stagecoach - from the base of Mt. Marcy, learned of the death of President McKinley and of his own succession to the presidency of the United States. The individual-based "project" is not really a project per se. As least it was not conceived as such. It began with a local artist, Jake Hitchcock, whose medium (to my knowledge) is rocks. Apparently, he likes to indulge in making mounds of stones, aka: cairn (from the Scottish/Gaelic word carn), commonly erected as a memorial or marker. Or, in this case, as what might be labeled installation art. It seems that over time, Hitchcock's work of making traditional mounds of rocks, albeit "artistic" mounds of rock, evolved into making dogs constructed of rocks. Eventually, locals caught on to his cairnine (the wife's word) making proclivity and the requests for his talent grew. Consequently, there are quite a number of highly visible examples of his work dotting the landscape in and around his tiny home hamlet of Minerva, NY (immediately adjacent to North Creek). The cairnines can seen in yards (like the one in the squared square picture which seems to "making water" in the garden), at the road-end of driveways, and even randomly scattered along the roadside (like the one on the rotting tree stump). The carnine on the dam once had a tail. Now that it's gone missing, it resembles, to my eye and sensibilities, a duck or species of waterfowl. Which leads me directly to the hen/rooster anomaly. Was this non-carnine assemblage created by Jake Hitchcock or is the work of a rouge cairnist?On Saturday past, the wife and I went on a drive to the east-central Adirondacks to retrieve one of our canoes which had undergone a small repair. Or so we had been led to believe. As it turned out, the repair had not yet been done so in about a weeks time a return trip is called for.
Tuesday, May 12, 2015 at 04:39PM 
I do think it’s time we reconsider the idea that everything has to be created around a project - twenty images wrapped up in a neat bow with an artist statement on top. Projects are great, but what about all the single images we shoot that have no home and get over looked because they are not in that portfolio gift box? In the entry, Smithson introduced the work of Andrew Sanderson, "a photographer who creates single images." That is, "work that was not defined by a single subject, instead a range of subjects that have caught his interest." In selecting the work to be viewed in the entry, Smithson - who primarily presents the work of project-based picture makers - admitted that, "What was fascinating to me as an editor was that it was difficult to select the work – I still felt it needed consistency and a thread of connection if only through light and process." Smithson's entry was of interest to me inasmuch as I consider myself to be a picture maker who creates pictures, not defined by a single referent / idea, but rather of a range of referents which catch my interest. While I do have a couple bodies of work which were begun from scratch as referent / theme based projects, the overwhelming bulk of my work is based upon the adage, f8 and be there. Just a cursory glance at the top of my blog home page will indicate that I have quite a number of referent / theme based bodies of work. However, the fact is that most of those bodies of work were created / identified long after the the pictures in them were made, not for a premeditated project, but as the result of something - quite literally, any thing - that pricked my eye and sensibilities. That written, it wasn't until most recently that I put together 2 collections of work, 2014 ~ The Year in Review and The Light, - which were NOT based upon a shared referent. In the case of The light the thread of connection was the light. However, the referents were all over the map. In the case of 2014 ~ Year in Review, once again the referents were diverse but the thread of connection was the consistent manner (process) in which I see. In both cases and IMO, the collections work as all of a piece despite the fact that the pictures are all essentially single pictures or made as such. In any event, Smithson summed the issue up pretty well - "So today, we are simply looking at images, quietly considered, beautifully executed ... and for some photographers, that’s enough."In a recent entry on LENSCRATCH - ANDREW SANDERSON: THE SINGLE IMAGE - Aline Smithson fleshed out a previous statement:
Monday, May 11, 2015 at 04:52PM 
Sunday, May 10, 2015 at 08:46AM ;)
;)
Sunday AM, heading home.
Friday, May 1, 2015 at 11:05AM 
A fair number of picture makers did take it seriously and enough of a picture making "movement" was established that an enterprising app maker came up with the Viewmatic app. An app designed to produce pictures with "the experience of looking through the viewfinder of a classic film camera". However, like most, dare I write "all", apps which end in "-matic", the user is presented with a canned set of options. Some are good (enough), some not so much. So, never one to leave almost well enough alone, I scavenged the viewfinder frame and then proceeded to make my own master viewfinder file into which I can drop any picture I desire. The master file has a number of layers - grain, vignette (light and dark), grid, crop guide, etc. - which can be modified and combined to produce a much more custom finished look than I can get from the app. The only effect I have yet to make is a layer which can add the dust and scratches which were part and parcel of an eyed TLR viewfinder screen.Came across a iPhone app which harkened back to a time in the analog era when I started to play around with making pictures of scenes as viewed on the viewfinder screen of a beat up vintage TLR. I messed around with it for a while but never got serious enough to really pursue it.
Thursday, April 30, 2015 at 11:04AM 
As I continue to play with various camera and developer effects apps for the iPhone, it has occurred to me that, sooner rather than later, there will be a considerable number of iPhone derived pictures culled from which a book will emerge.
That book, in keeping with my picture making life long belief that Polaroid prints are little joys and should be seen as such, will be a small format book. And as I make display prints, those too will be kept small. All because, to my eye and sensibilities, the small thing seems to create a visual impression which I can only describe as "precious".
And speaking of small, it has come to my attention that Polaroid (the real Polaroid) offers a digital instant print printer, the Polaroid ZIP Instant Mobile Printer. The printer fits in the palm of your hand and it spits out, directly from a mobile phone or table, little 2×3" prints with a smudge-proof protective polymer overcoat (and a sticky back for extra fun!!!).
And, just like the original Polaroid film, the paper, ZINK (zero ink), has the heat activated color dye crystals embedded in the paper. No inks to replace is a most definite plus. The paper is available in 10 sheet packs at the modest cost of $.50 a sheet.
Needless to write, my wanter is in overdrive and I just might have one of these printers by this time tomorrow.
Wednesday, April 29, 2015 at 09:58AM 
While some claim that a place doesn’t exist until it has a poet, I think the same can be said of photography—a place doesn’t exist until someone has created the defining photographs of it. Upon first reading, my reaction was simply that the statement is a fine example of artist / art speak bullcrap and hubris. After a bit of reflection, I believe it to be discussion worthy inasmuch as .... .... I would certainly agree with the idea that the understanding, appreciation or knowledge regarding a place / person / thing can be enhanced, at times greatly so, by the work of a poet or a picture maker (photography, painting, illustration). Hell, I would even throw in the work of authors, film makers, and song writers as well. In the best of work, the result(s) can be an iconic representation(s) - a thing regarded as a representative symbol of some place / person / thing. However, whatever the source of inspiration for a given work, it most definitely existed prior to the work derived from its existence. In the case of a place, Alaska for instance, I am certain that the people populating that place, had no trouble whatsoever knowing, without the help of a poet or picture maker, that Alaska existed. And, seriously, even before there were people, the place we now know as Alaska existed, in point of fact. That written, I am reasonably certain that the word "exist" as used in Witmer's statement is employed with a dash of metaphoric / symbolic meaning. If not that, then employed, not in the literal meaning of "actual being", but in the sense of not "existing" in the mind beyond the basic hard cold facts of a place / person / thing. Some poets and picture makers are capable of injecting honest and true emotion and feeling, as adjuncts to fact, into the perception of a place / person / thing. In a sense, making it more completely "real" than a merely visual / word depiction of something. Imbuing a place / person / thing with a richer perception of a place / person / thing's identity and place in the scheme of things. And, IMO, that's what separates the men/women from the boys/girls in the world of art. As for making the (pronounce it, with emphasis, like "thee") defining pictures of a place / person / thing, get over it. No single picture or group of pictures can completely define anything. The best picture(s) can add significantly to perception of something but experiencing a place / person / thing, aka: personal experience - despite its inherent self-limiting prejudices, is the still best way to fly in the cause of trying to fully understand a place / person / thing. Although ....Yesterday on LENSCRATCH in the entry, DENNIS WITMER: THE STATES PROJECT: ALASKA, Dennis Witner stated