squares² # 7 ~ common beauty / beauty in common

civilized ku + ku ~ in the Adirondack Park • click to embiggen

squares² # 6 ~ common beauty / beauty in common (made easy)

People + food + civilized ku + ku • click to embiggenIt's finally here, the amazing picture making thing you've all been waiting for ...

Have you ever wanted to take a beautiful photograph EVERY time? Well with the _____, you can! The _____ is designed to make every photo beautiful because of it’s artistic and amazing effects. It’s created to take what you see and make it into something even more beautiful than it already is. It makes photos have real meaning, and it makes photos tell real stories.*

Picture making meaning, beauty, artistry, and EVERY-click-of-the-shutter success made easy. Haven't we all been yearning - in fact, secretly lusting - for a picture making thing which can " take what you see and make it into something even more beautiful than it already is." Who would have dreamed that a picture perfect world is just a picture making thing purchase away?

I mean, it's like getting your money for nothin' and your chicks for free. And, you don't even have go all bangin' on the bongos like a chimpanzee.

*taken from a marketing email for a picture making device which shall remain nameless.

squares² # 5 ~ common beauty / beauty in common

ku + civilized ku + food together • click to embiggen

squares² # 4 ~ φῶς γραφή

civilized ku + ku together • click to embiggenI imagine most in the room know that the Greek words, φῶς γραφή (pronounced phos graphê), are the Greek root words for our word, photography - φῶς = "light, γραφή = drawing / writing (FYI, I studied Latin (4 years) and Ancient Greek (3 years) in high school). That is why, on occasion, photography is described as "drawing / writing with light".

Light is indeed that which we light writers (aka: photographers) know is indispensable to the making of our art/Art and we all know that trying to picture a black cat in a coal bin is difficult. However, without light, that task is absolutely impossible. Or, to state it another way, light sensitive material + no light = nothing, picture wise.

That written, some picture makers think making pictures is "all about the light". If it weren't for the fact the most picture makers who subscribe to that theory have turned golden / dramatic light into a picturing fetish, I would agree that, at times, a picture can be "about the light". However, for me, light is most often a facilitator in the making of a picture but not at all what the picture is about.

In any case, when I make pictures that are ostensibly "about the light" (although never wholly so) and the making of which are instigated by the qualities / characteristics of "the light", those pictures are invariably responses to a wide range of light quality / characteristics, not just a Pavlovian response to one particular kind of light.

It would be very safe to say that I am not a one-trick pony, or, as the wife's mother said, a "Johnny one note" when it comes to making pictures "about the light".

squares² # 3 ~ common beauty / beauty in common

squares² ~ all together, in my mind and eye • click to embiggenAs mentioned, I have ruminated for quite some time - measured in years, not months or days - my propensity for discursive promiscuity, picture making wise. Most of that time inside my head was spent thinking, not about my picturing MO, but rather what to do, presentation wise, with all of those discursive pictures. While I have half a dozen or so referent focused bodies of work, those bodies of work taken all together are minuscule, # of pictures wise, relative to the now 4,000+ and rising # of pictures which, IMO, fall into the discursive promiscuity picture making realm of things.

That written, the solution to my presentation quandary would seem to be at hand ...

While I have always recognized that the best of my discursive, but nevertheless vision unified, pictures would need to be printed and displayed in a presentationally cohesive manner, the exact manner of doing so has, until now, escaped me. However, having essentially boxed myself into a corner by writing and talking about the notion of unified vision as evidenced across a diverse body of pictures, I had to get down to brass tacks and cash the check my mouth was writing.

As a result of that effort, I have arrived at a plan of creating a series of square prints, each with 4 seemingly unrelated, referent wise, square pictures (all printed on a single sheet of paper), or, to put it another way - squares². Each squares² print will be created in 4 sizes - 24"×24" (edition of 20), 36"×36" (edition of 10), 48"×48" (edition of 4), and 60"×60" (edition of 1).

The initial plan is to create, over time, multiple 20 squares² picture collections. How many collections? Who knows. I have enough pictures to make 200 20 squares² picture collections but that's not gonna happen. However, the number 10 sounds like a nice round doable number.

I am actually rather excited about this project simply because it's all coming together / starting to make sense.

squares² # 2 ~ common beauty / beauty in common

diversity, all linked together in my eye and mind • click to embiggenDuring my recent visit with the Curator at view, one of the points we discussed, re: my pictures, was the continuity in vision which is evident across my diverse (referent wise) bodies of work - a topic I recently addressed in the civilized ku # 2299-2305 / ku # 1160 / rain # 20-22 entry under the heading of "profligatographers":

Profligatographers, unlike many who make theme / referent related work, make unified bodies of work which are made coherent by their concentrated efforts on the simple act of seeing. Despite their seemingly promiscuous choice of picturing referents, a Profligatographer very often has a distinctive personal vision / manner of seeing which pulls everything together, body of work wise.

The Curator, after viewing all 5 of my folios, most definitely saw the overarching vision which I believe unifies all of my pictures. That is, with the possible exception of my single women pictures. She felt those pictures to be less controlled / structured than my other work, an assessment with which I agree.

My single women pictures are much more referent biased than most of my other pictures. In my other works, while the referents matter, there is much more visual evidence of the deliberative use of natural color, shapes, and space within the frame, all of which come together to create the design / form as viewed on the 2D surface of the print. And, IMO, it is the coming together of all of those elements which is the overarching visual bedrock of my vision, that is, a quality / characteristic which is most often described as "beautiful prints" (in and of themselves, independent of the referent).

That written, my pictures are more than just visual. Moving beyond the illustrative, my intent is to address / illuminate, picturing wise, what I consider to be the beauty to be found in the commonplace - those things which are looked at in the passing parade of everyday life but to which little attention is given. To bring attention to the fine details of everyday life as opposed to the grand spectacles thereof. That M.O. is, IMO, the other overarching implied bedrock of my vision.

To my eye and sensibilities, taken together, my explicitly stated (the referent / the illustrated) way of seeing and my implied (the illuminated) meaning(s), create the overarching totality of my vision. And, I don't believe it takes a genius to understand and/or see, in all of my work, that the visual quality of my prints emphatically underscores the implied meaning(s) to be had / found therein ..... beautiful prints + common stuff = common beauty.

Or perhaps, on the other hand, some of you might think that I and my pictures are full of s**t. In any case, opinions of all kinds are encouraged and welcome.