urban ku # 24 ~ whining about the weather

from here to there • click on photo to embiggen itI'm back. There was no entry yesterday because I have been without cable/internet for the past 24 hrs. A construction crew severed the main optics cable for the entire region.

The From here to there diptych was photographed late Thursday afternoon around 5pm. The obvious referent in both photographs is Whiteface Mt., which, at 4867ft., towers over The Flats in Wilmington (in the LH photograph). Also notice the grey pallor and crusty snow.

The connoted in this diptych, at least for me, is that of a melancholy winter-of-discontent. As has been the case for the last few winters, there have been no winter storms and only sporatic snowfall. There has been lots of extended way-below-normal cold spells - night temps well below zero and daytime single digits - which are always accompanied by significant wind with brutal wind-chill factors.

The net result is a winter(s) that make staying indoors a very desirable, but highly unsatisfying, activity...or should I say, inactivity. And this from a guy who loves to head up into the High Peaks for a few days of sub-zero winter mountaineering/camping - bagging a peak in a driving snowstorm, waking up to and smelling a thick blanket of fresh fallen snow, snowshoeing/xc skiing though birchy alpine meadows/glens in an almost eery snow-dampened quiet, eating a warm dinner by candle/latern light in a snug and cozy winter tent.

Let me tell you, there's a huge difference between a -5F with gentle snowfall day in the woods and a +10F with -15F wind-chill day in the woods. No matter how prepared you are, the first is a distinct pleasure, the second (as a steady diet) is usually pure agony.

ku # 456 ~ punctum - I can smell the jeep

Graveyard • click on photo to embiggen itWhen I stayed for over-night visits at my grandparent's house (Mark Hobson - The Early Years, 3-8), my long-gone great uncle James, who lived with my grandparents, use to take me along on walks with his dog, a german shephard, in the big cemetery which was just across the street, up a small embankment and across the railroad tracks from the house (Syracuse, NY). The most memorable highlight of the walks was trying to find the gravestone which was a full-sized effigy of a reclining german shephard.

This photograph is not of that cemetery. It is of the one and only cemetery in my little village of Au Sable Forks. There is no reclining german shephard gravestone and, when I created the photograph, there were no conscious memories of walks with great uncle James.

When viewing the photograph, the memories have come rushing back - great uncle James, his dog, the walks in the cemetery, the german shephard gravestone, the window light in my grandparent's bathroom, and great uncle James' broken down jeep. When I visited their house I think spent more time "drivng" that broken down jeep than I spent with my grandparents and great uncle James.

Of course, the jeep never actually left its final resting place there in the driveway, but, man, the adventures I had and the places I went on my "drives"... I couldn't begin to remember any of those "trips", but now, 55 years later (give or take a few years), the smell of that jeep interior is as vivid as that of this morning's coffee.

Are you ever surprised by an unexpected punctum when you view one of your own photographs?

Featured Comment: Billie Mercer wrote: "Strange how images can help us remember smells. I have one of Linda Butler's images from her Shaker series. It is of knit gloves and when I look at that image I remember my Mother's hands buttoning the back of my dress and tying my sash but most of all I remember the smell of hands. Strange because I can't remember my Mother ever wearing a pair of knit gloves."

urban ku # 23

Behind the stores on Main St., Au Sable Forks, NY • click on photo to embiggen Recently, I've been encountering quite a few half-lit trees. Figured that I better start photographing them.

I have also been feeling the urge to revisit still-life photography, a genre in which I toiled (commercial and editorial) for decades but never really explored Art-wise. I have no idea where this will lead, It's just another redux itch I need to scratch. Keep you posted.

urban ku # 22 ~ apparatus embodies conventions and assumptions about picturing

Trailer at Fern Lake • click on photo to embiggen it I recently came across a book, Photography: A Very Short Introduction by Steve Edwards. I don't own it yet - it's on its way to my house - so I can't really comment on it but Doug Plummer has opined that "The semiotics of photography has never had such an accessible vehicle as this book..."

OK, perhaps, but, try this excerpt on for size; "At the heart of any criticisms of photographic realism is the idea that apparatus embodies conventions and assumptions about picturing. While the consequences of the staged, manipulated, or mocked up image are readily apparent, recognizing the deep conventions underpinning the apparatus can be less straightforward. However, these conventions are no less important for serious understanding of photographs; if anything, the relative invisibility of these determining assumptions makes them more worthy of attention and more insidious in their effects."

I think I understand it.............I think...and that's why I posted Trailer at Fern Lake with this topic. FYI, I created the photograph one day when I was out picturing.

Make any sense to you? Can you relate it to my photograph?

I'll wait for some comments before I chip in on the matter. And, oh yeh, this is a no-time-limit open-book test. You will be graded on a curve.

Featured Comment: Paul Maxim wrote (in part): "...if the rest of the book is written like this paragraph, I'm not jealous that you're going to have it and I'm not. Talk about obtuse language.....My interpretation of what he's talking about (which hinges entirely on my definition of "apparatus") is that our photographs are affected tremendously by our methodology...."

publisher's comment: Without a doubt, Paul is on the money regarding meaning "which hinges entirely (the) definition of 'apparatus'". I suspect, although I can't be sure untill I receive the book and read the chapter titled, Apparatus and the Image, that "apparatus" means much more than just hardware, photographic technique and aesthetic decisions. In fact, I think that those items are probably the least of it.

Again, I suspect that Mr. Edwards, being an academic and all that entails, is probably less interested in the hows than he is in the whys - the (deep) underlying social and cultural conventions that trigger response assumptions in both the photographer during the act of picturing (creating photographs), and the observer during the act of, well, picturing (observing photographs). If you also throw in a heaping spoonful of semiotics - the study of signs and symbols as elements of communicative behavior, I think that you will be much closer to Mr. Edwards meaning of "apparatus".

As far as my photograph is concerned, think of the trailer as a "sign" or "symbol" with underlying communication significance that might create "determininng assumption" on the part of the observer.

PS - everybody gets an "A" just for thinkng about it.

urban ku # 22 ~ the nature of truth

At the intersection of I87 and Rt 9N - Keesville, NY - click on photo to embiggen I find it interesting that in a political age dominated by truthiness, the word "truth" incites reactions of distrust, suspicion and, I might also add, relativism. Not necessarily unwarranted, but interesting nevertheless.

Certainly history is replete with disastrous examples of the populous letting their critical-thought quard down and jumping willy-nilly on to a bandwagon driven by someone without a proper driver's license. The inevitable train wreck that follows is always quite ugly (can you say I-r-a-q?).

Critical analysis - vigilence - is a hallmark of a well-informed public. Discerning the truth of a matter is vital in all walks of life and doing so is not always an easy ride. What bothers me is the fact that so many people have given up the task and lapsed into relativism - one person's "truth" is as good as any other person's "truth". Just make certain that your "truth" is a comfortable fit with all of your prejudices and preconceptions and everything is hunky-dory.

All of that said, I don't want this to turn into a small-scale version of the cultures wars. This discussion is about photography in general and landscape photography in particular and the idea of creating a New Landscape Manifesto. A manifesto that expresses ideas about a photographic concept that is created in the context of our time - a time when, Truth be told, the landscape (a.k.a., the environment) is under assault from the acts of humankind like it never has been before. A time when it is fair game to ask, "Does Art matter?" A time when it is fair game to consider whether landscape photographers who aspire to create Art have a responsibility to pursue, if not the "truth", then, at the very least, the spirit of fact in the landscape that surrounds us and of which we are an integral part - not just passive slack-jaw-ed awe-struck bystanders standing in the shadow of the landscape's "grandeur"?

BTW, please keep in mind that my purpose here on The Landscapist is not to speak ex cathedra, but rather to bring up ideas and notions about the medium of photography in general and landscape photography in particular that I feel are worth considering and, hopefully, discussing.

FEATURED COMMENT: Paul Butzi wrote (in part); "...I think if not having a culture war is your goal, nearly all of it (this post) is on the wrong track. If you're not speaking ex cathedra and you want discussion, but you don't want the discussion to rest on a foundation of conflict, then voicing your own political opinions is probably not the best way to proceed."

publisher's response: Paul, good point and much thanks for the feedback. Let me clarify a little more.

My political aside (can you say...) was indeed a political statement but I didn't mean for it to politize my much more general premise regarding the consequences of letting one's critical-thought guard down. After last night's State of the Union event, it just popped into my mind as a ready example of the premise. Nevertheless, your point is well taken. The political aside probably did politize the general premise for many readers.

Re: not wanting the discussion to rest on a foundation of conflict - Actually, I do want to read conflicting opinions on the subjects raised here. If Art matters, then personal passions and convictions must be involved and some of them will inevitably be political in nature. I am not ruling out things political but I will always try to steer the discussion back to the photographic relevence of things political.

Case in point - Environmentalism and Conservation/Preservation have been politized. "Serious" photographers (see Group f64 manifesto in which the phrase "serious photographer" seems to mean [as I read it] someone who has moved beyond the pretty picture and for whom photography is more than entertainment) who have the landscape as their referent studium can not, or least, should not be ignorant of the fact that their connoted punctum will address (amongst other things) things political.

My hope is that differing personal passions and convictions can be discussed without resorting to unruly contentiousness. If not, there is always the moderator's delete button.

a very old urban ku # 21

A trip back in time - click on photo to embiggen it On the trip back from south Jersey yesterday, we finally had the opportunity to introduce my grandson Hugo to his namesake's house - the Hugo Freer (my 14xgreat grandfather) house in New Paltz, NY. Hugo Freer and 11 other Huguenots founded the village of New Paltz 1677. Today Huguenot Street is the oldest continuously inhabited street in America with its original houses. Hugo Freer's house dates to 1692.

I especially like visiting the house at night when I seem to be better able to sense the presence of things past. Hugo (28 months old) seemed to be more interested in standing on the front seat and "driving" the car. He'll be back again many times and I'm sure that he'll grow to appreciate his connection to something special.