Cinemascapist ~ getting dressed
Wednesday, July 30, 2008 at 12:22PM 
Getting dressed click to embiggenEven though I am more than 400+ miles from home, I have been hard at work trying to post and entry. First on a PC laptop. No luck there, the "improved" SS software doesn't work on Explorer. Then on a Mac laptop. No luck there until I downloaded and installed Firefox. I wish a f**king pox on all "updates".
In any event, I'm at the Jersey Shore - one of my least favorite places on the planet but one of the wife's most treasured. Ah, the sacrifices one makes to insure domestic tranquility.
TO keep my mind off the oppressive heat/humidity (it's fair and mild back home in the Adirondacks), I am picturing like crazy. I guess it is just an extension of the Meyerowitz / plain seeing "coincidences" that I find myself at a summer place right next to the ocean - my very own "Cape Light".
Even though I hate this place and everything it stands for - conspicuous consumption and waste as new cookie-cutter, pretentious, and soul-less shore McMansions replace the quaint and somewhat indigenous shore cottages - I am still attempting to picture this place and its unique shore light without letting my contempt for it influence my picturing.
I am just trying to get into the spirit of the place and let the viewer decide where the chips may fall. As Meyerowitz stated in the Focus interview:
It's not about a picture of the place. It's about the spirit. If you can allow yourself to come to the photographic act from a spiritual doorway then you're likely to have experiences in the places you find yourself that seek to a deeper core of your being.
Now, I have to admit that I get a little hinky when people start throwing around words like "spirit" and "spiritual" in discussions about photography. Not because I don't think and believe that picturing can not be a spiritual thing - both the act of making and the act of viewing. It's just that those words start to sound a bit hippie-dippy, pie-in-the-sky-ish, cult-ish, and, rather "serious" and perhaps more than a little pretentious.
IMO, using those words tends to set up even more barriers to those wanting to make good pictures. In a sense, making good pictures has to do with, as mentioned before, just being curious and receptive. Not trying too hard to be "creative" or "clever" or "serious". Stop looking for "pictures". Where ever you happen to be, just look around and see what there is to see.
That is all I am trying to do for the next few days. No agenda. Just - stop. look. listen. However, you and I will have to wait for my return home to judge whether I have accomplished my intent. I left my darkroom at home.
BTW, thanks to the Cinemascapist for the use of his work.
Reader Comments (5)
Pretty nice to have someone like your son to fall back to :)
I've been lurking for almost two weeks now, and this has quickly been getting one of my favorite blogs. It's your writing as well, but your photography really strikes home.
It is something very familiar in your visual language that appeals to me. Yesterday's "Grand Prix Motor Lodge" is absolutely fantastic. The light, the composition, the perspective, the way you set these lamp posts into the foreground, all that has a deep inner logic. Same with the "Floating things", the "Hotdog guy" and "Barn and storm clouds".
There is a deep satisfaction in looking at these images, and it feels similar to when I am satisfied about one of my own. You know that feeling: tensions resolved, it is what I wanted it to be. This is not a feeling that I have with every brilliant work of art, and in fact most of the time I don't have it at all when I look at other people's images. So, obviously it's something in your sense for high drama that touches me. I really can't be more specific though.
Thanks, Andreas
Hi Andeas
thanks for the kind words and it's great to have you hanging around the place.
but, fyi and btw, I like to think that my son has me to fall back on ;-)
Fair enough :))
Of course the Jersey shore is ugly, but don't even think about heading to Ocean City, MD. where my wife's family loves to spend free time. What is it about the beach that everybody loves? My only problem w/ the beach is the 3 S's: sun, salt, & sand - otherwise it's great!
BTW, I've found the Firefox is the preferred browser for entries to Squarespace. This has been true since my earliest contributions to the Landscapist. It works fine, is not complicated, and doesn't require me to use it all the time. All my other browsing is done w/ Opera, so I know you can switch back and forth between Firefox and whatever other browser you've got all your bookmarks in.