urban ku # 133 ~ 'truth'

Wildness close to someone else's home • click to embiggenRichard Avedon wrote, "All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth."

On my long journey home from Pittsburgh, I was actually thinking along these lines about the picture presented here. I made it from the window of friend's loft (where I was staying) while I was in Pittsburgh. It certainly qualifies for Wildness gallery - it's just not wildness close to my home.

In any event, I was thinking about this picture because, in a way, it defiantly stands in direct contrast to the preferred visual image of Pittsburgh as decreed by the Pgh Chamber of Commerce. Those pictures almost always present a dramatic view of the city skyline as seen from the top of Mt. Washington (not actually a mountain, MW is a very steep and high hillside right across the river from downtown Pgh. The pictured view is always dressed in a soft, alpenglow-like light which gives a jewel-like presence to the cities many glass enclosed towers.

It could be said that these pictures, in their own visitors-bureau-porn way, could be said to be 'accurate' - the view does exist and it is, at times, bathed in a soft glowing light. But ...

Once a visitor or resident descend from the lofty geographic and pictorial heights of Mt. Washington, the (by far) most commonly encountered view throughout the city is much more akin to that pictured above. In fact (and in 'truth'), the cityscape is mostly that of a worn-out, run-down, rust-belt urban environment. Somewhat depressing, in fact.

So, both representations are, in fact, 'accurate' but it would be my contention that only one of them is 'truth'.

Update on Tuesday, November 13, 2007 at 06:27PM by gravitas et nugalis

Featured Comment: Paul Maxim wrote, ",,,first you quote Avedon's famous line where the first word of the second sentence is "NONE" and then you conclude your little editorial by saying that your image (or images like yours) "is truth". So logically you are saying that your photograph should not be included in Avedon's generalization. Somehow, unlike most of us other mortals, you are privvy to actual Truth.

Only in your mind, Mike.

My response: "the truth" may, in fact, be only in my mind. Something that I think is true for most of us - we all have our own 'truths', many of which turn out to be shared' truths. But that's not really my main point.

If Avedon was implying that in and of themselves 'none of them is the truth', I am inclined to agree ,at least up to a point, but only if the pictures are presented in a void/vacuum. IMO, 'in a void/vacuum' means without the benefit of words. With words, many of them are the truth.

FYI - my little prison cell

My little prison cell • click to embiggenThis is where I have been spending my time the past day and half.

It's a really boring experience in as mush as you sit and wait for a press sheet to check and then spent maybe 10 minutes checking, finding issues, talking to the press guy. Then he goes away and you wait until he comes back with the next sheet.Then you repeat the above. You do this until the sheet is 'right', then you sit and wait for hours until the press run is done.

Then you do it again with the next sheet....

CN Tower ~ Toronto, Canada

Looking down from near the top of the CN Tower, Toronto CA

Hey all, I'm off to Pittsburgh, PA for a press check. I'll be checking in and maybe posting. In any event, the Wildness Close to Home Gallery is off to fine start. Keep it up.

fun on the beach

Screwing around on the beach • click to embiggenOne of the 'things' inherent in the Polaroid medium is the propensity to just have fun. The instant feedback one gets from viewing a print, as opposed to chimping, is very intoxicating, addictive and, if you give in to the urge, expensive.

I can state, without reservation, that Polaroiding is by far the most fun I've ever had with a camera. The Polaroid experience really promotes spontaneity and, at times, rather frivolous behavior, photography-wise. For me, it is also the one photo format that I use more than any other to photograph people.

I don't know exactly why this is, but I do know that people tend to relate to a Polaroid camera in way that is different than the way they react when you point a slr-type camera at them and I tend to act and think in a different manner as well.

Photographers talk about how their picture taking MO is different when they use a view camera as opposed to a small format camera. That's never been the case for me. I switch between those formats and my vision and style come through unchanged. It's only with the Polaroid(s) that I become a changed man.

Anyone else out there with a similar experience?

FYI ~ Wildness Close to Home Gallery is open

I have finally set up the new Wildness Close to Home Gallery. A link to the gallery is on the Navigation sidebar.

Over the next day I will be sending out emails with login info and posting instructions to those who asked to participate . If you asked to participate but DO NOT receive an email within the next day, please email me again.

Hope you've all been out picturing and have lots to post.

Boxing gloves ~ 2 views

Boxing gloves • click to embiggen2 variations for an assignment to create an illustration for a magazine article titled Vanishing Gyms. The assignment was for one picture but they ended up using both. The manipulated Polaroid was used as the feature picture and the 'straight' Polaroid was used on a sidebar.

I literally have 100s of Polaroids in a couple boxes that I must do something about. Fortunately, they are virtually indestructible.

big things in small packages

The boy when he was a boy

In addition to the boy's show, I visited a number of other shows - Ed Burtynsky's Quarries, Prabuddha Dasgupta's Longing, Alison Carey's Organic Remains of Former World, and few others. I'll be writing about all them shortly.

I felt privileged to see all of them - in each case, I felt as though the artist had invited me into their private world to share a few secrets. This was especially true of Longing. My other son, Jason, and I were alone in the gallery and I had sought out the owner/gallery director to ask a few questions. After just one question, she asked me, "Why not ask the photographer? I'll go get him." We had a delightful conversation about which I will write later on.

The biggest and best 'priviledge' of the day was none of the above. It came when I stumbled upon the exhibit The Polaroids by Andre Kertesz. It's no secret that I really love the Polaroid medium, so to wander through an exhibit of Polaroids made by one of the seminal figures in the history of photography was a pure delight.

As is my wont, I browsed the exhibit before seeking out the exhibition intro. This is my standard MO - look at the images first to get a first impression and then learn more about the artist's intent and read what others might have to say about it. Again, it's no secret that I think pictures without words - not captions, but artist statements, etc. - are only part of the game and The Polaroids exhibit is a case in point.

The pictures, in and of themselves, were visually interesting and intriguing - especially so because of recurring pieces of glass forms including one in particular. The pictures were very warm, intimate and primarily on a smallish scale. All of this created a feeling of a glimpse into a private/personal 'intimacy'. Very, very nice.

What I didn't know, and could not know, from just viewing the pictures was that 'following the loss of his wife Elizabeth to lung cancer in 1977, and nearing the end of his own life, Kertész was admittedly a broken man.

Alone and in New York, a city in which he never felt fully embraced, Kertész would once again retreat into the safe confines of his Fifth Avenue apartment overlooking Washington Square Park. Fortunately, it was the inspiration found in a small glass bust, discovered in the window of a local bookshop, whose figure reminded him of his late wife, which would trigger the artist’s remarkable recovery process. The resultant body of work is now the focus of this unique exhibition.

Turning to a relatively new technology, the Polaroid SX-70, Kertész worked through his overwhelming grief, obsessively shooting the bust alone and placing it among other artifacts he and Elizabeth had collected together over the years. Taken from within his apartment, he photographed many of these still-lifes by placing personal objects against cityscape backgrounds, which were often reflected and modulated by glass surfaces ... ' - from the exhibit press release

It should go without saying that, after reading the press release, the pictures took on a whole expanded meaning. They were no longer 'just' visually interesting and intriguing pictures. For me, knowing what I now knew, the pictures became (as the press release also stated) '... powerful metaphorical and literal symbols of life, love, loss, death and mortality.'

IMO, pictures without words are 'just' pictures. They may be visually pleasing and a delight to the eye and even, to certain extent, the mind and the soul but knowing, at the very least, intent of the maker can enrich the pictures to an incredible degree.

FYI - a couple points of interest. The SX 70 camera was a gift to Kertesz from Graham Nash of the famed Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and who, in addition to being a musician, is also a photographer and collector.

The Polaroids themselves were for sale. They were from the estate of Kertesz. What I found interesting about this is that, of course, the Polaroids were truly limited editions of 1. No negatives. No reprints. Nada. 1 and only 1. When they're gone (sold), they're gone. That's why I purchased the book. You should too. PS The book costs under $30. 1 original Polaroid costs $9,000. Take your pick.

I was also immediately struck by the coincidence that another seminal figure in the history of photography, Walker Evans, also received as a gift (from a dentist who was doing dental work for Evans in exchange for prints), a Polaroid SX 70 - a camera which he also used for a few years at the end of his life to create a significant body of work which, like Kertesz, was also his last.

civilized ku # 60 ~ New York, New York pt. III

Hugo and the meat eaters • click to embiggenHugo never made it to his dad's exhibit. He was having too much fun with his girfriend who lives in Brooklyn. Who wants to go to a photo exhibit when you can end up sharing a bed with a girl? Not me.

On Friday, Hugo had a whirlwind tour of NYC - not his first - that included the American Museum of Natural History (which he really enjoyed), his first subway ride (5 of them), Times Square and a ferris wheel ride in the Toys R Us store, and a few good looks at the King Kong building - the Empire State building which he recognizes as the place where the airplanes shot King Kong.

He had a great time. A much better time, in fact, than a few of the hung-over adults dragging their sorry asses around behind him.