urban ku # 94 ~ ad infinitum

A wave • click to embiggenPicturing a wave in motion is hardly a new/novel idea. However, this triptych has given me an idea for a self-contained one-day project.

Next summer, weather and a few other things being favorable, I would like to return to the south Jersey Shore primarily for the purpose of picturing. The area is ripe with picture possibilities if for no other reason than the quality of light that is characteristic of the ocean shore - a characteristic that Joel Meyerowitz used to stunning advantage in his Cape Light project/book - a book that should be in any serious landscape photography collection.

Light is not the only reason I want to picture the south Jersey Shore. Things, the way they used to be, are disappearing at a rate and on a scale that is staggering. I would like to bear witness to the transition.

But, that is not the one-day project that I have in mind. I would like to set up my camera, secure inside a plastic baggie, and my tripod, legs wrapped in plastic bags, in a position roughly similar to the one pictured here. Starting in the pre-dawn light and ending in the last glow of daylight, picture a 3-wave sequence every hour upon the hour.

With sunrise/sunset times this time of year, that should result in 18 3-picture sequences. I envision them presented as 6×6 inch images, 1 sequence per 8×22 inch print and then mounted altogether, 6w x 3h, on 3×12 ft. white board under plexi.

civilized ku # 51 ~ relationships

Relationships - one to the other and everything else to everything else • click to embiggenThink about it this way - inside/outside, daylight/atificial light, younger/older, engaged/disengaged, gay/straight, one moment/another moment, seen/unseen, observer/observed, one picture to the other picture and everything else to everything else.

urban ku # 93 ~ portal/transition

Transition - mystic/rational • click to embiggenYesterday, pursuant to civilized ku # 50 Martin Doonan asked, "... are the great photos those that, even though only enjoyed for their connotation (the event/place isn't special to the viewer), have a deeper meaning denoted to the photographer? Thus, the photos that we appreciate most are those that we sense have meaning to the photographer, without necessarily knowing or understanding it."

When I view a picture - even my own - I assume that the photographer has a 'meaningful' connection to picture, if not the actual referent/object of the camera's gaze. Whatever the referent, I take it as a given that the photographer has pictured it for a reason - he/she, by picturing it, has 'elevated' it to a level of importance that should warrant the viewer's attention.

Whether the photographer has 'elevated' the referent for its denoted or its connoted qualities is often difficult to discern without the assistance of words - artist's statement, caption, title.

So, in answer to your question, I guess what I am saying is that I think it's difficult for a picture maker to make a picture that can be appreciated beyond its decorative qualities unless the picture maker has a 'meaningful' relationship to his/her 'subject' - the 'subject' being expressed through both the denoted and the connoted.

However, that being said, for the viewer, if a picture does not possess a personally experienced punctum - "... that accident which pricks, bruises me ... - Roland Barthes/Camera Lucida - no sense of the picture maker's connection to the denoted will help the viewer connect to the picture as anything more than decorative (if even that).

While most photographs offer only the identity of an object, those that project a punctum potentially offer the truth of the subject. They offer "the impossible science of the unique being."

urban ku # 92 ~ beach life at dinner time

Leaving time at the beach • click to embiggenWhile checking my daily recent came from stats, I noticed that someone had click through to The Landscapist from Pitchertaker, a blog by Frank Armstrong.

Frank must check in at The Landscapist enought to know that I had just returned from the Jersey Shore, as had he. If you would like another look at a few interesting pictures of the Jersey Shore, visit Pitchertaking and take a look.

There is also a link to Frank's 'formal' website which is well worth a visit.

Thanks for stopping by, Frank.

civilized ku # 50 ~ just plain civilized, or, it ain't what you eat, it's the way how you chew it.

A night out for diner at the shore • click to embiggenIt has been stated that all communication takes place the medium of signs and according to semiology (the role played by signs in the construction of meaning) photography is primarily concerned with 'iconic', 'indexical' and'symbolic' signs.

Very simply stated, iconic signs, in some way or another resemble, the object they stand for. A pictured tree, although certainly not a tree, bears a resemblance to the tree which is pictured. Indexical signs do not necessarily share a resemblance to the objects that they refer to but are nevertheless connected to it. A footprint signifies a causal relationship to human presence - we don't see the foot but its existence is signified by the footprint. Symbolic signs convey meaning through cultural convention and consensus. By convention and consensus in our culture, we all know the meaning red, yellow and green lights used to regulate traffic. These signs bear no resemblance to the things they signify.

So, here's my take on how this applies to a photograph using today's post as an example.

The photograph, as a sign, is iconic in as much the objects denoted in it truly resemble the things pictured - amongst many other things, does anyone have trouble recognizing this picture as 2 women a a table in a restaurant? The photograph, as a sign, is indexical in as much as there are visual indications of human presence that have happened or, in all probablity, will happen - amongst many other things, does anyone doubt that the near empty bottle of wine or the nearly full glasses of wine signify the act of drinking? The photograph, as a sign, is symbolic in as much as, amongst many other things, by convention and consensus, it suggests meanings of friendship, joy and pleasure.

Viewed in this manner, the picture not only only denotes the specific - my wife's best friends in a restaurant drinking wine - and has special/added meaning for her that the uninitiated viewer might not share, it also connotes through signs/symbols a somewhat universal experience that others can divine and appreciate.

urban ku # 91 ~ beach life at its best

Night time is the best time • click to embiggenEveryday by about 6pm, the beach people leave the beach. Except for a few walkers and even fewer runners the beach remains pretty deserted until the next day.

And so it is with photographers. While there is sizeable group of dedicated night shooters, they are definitely in the minority. I wonder why that is.

We haven't done a 'theme' gallery for quite awhile. Is there any interest in a Night Gallery?

civilized ku # 49 ~ civilized to within an inch of its life

Plastic fantastic • click to embiggenThe wife says that, at one time, the Jersey shore, Stone Harbor edition, had a sort of nativistic summer colony look and feel. I believe her because, scattered here and there, are very tiny hints of that era - a few small cottage-type summer places that remain amongst the upper-middle class subdivision dreck that is elbow-to-elbow clogging/gobbling up the landscape.

In any event, it was so hot and humid during the daylight hours that I took to picturing at night, wandering about like a stranger in a strange land. I'm new to the night photography game but I found that the night landscape spoke to me in a fashion not unlike that of my normal daylight picturing.

As I was processing and viewing some of my night images, I was struck by the lost history/culture of this place. By sheer coincidence, as I was taking a break, I came across this reference to the photography of Walker Evans -

...if it can be said that Evans’ work is essentially denotative, and its ambition is to name irrefutably what it shows, it must be added that, almost paradoxically, through the concentrated descriptive power of photography, his pictures also claim those other trailing meanings that lie hidden in things. By being so vividly, immediately present – and so compassionately unmasked – these objects, facades, corners of towns and rooms, and human faces not only report what they are, but also suggest the improvised, heartfelt, and difficult histories that brought them to the moment Evans photographed them.

This seems to describe much of my photography.

ps - the excerpt is from the essay, Evans and Frank: An Essay on Influence, the purpose of which is to describe the influence of Walker Evans’ American Photographs (1938) on The Americans (1959) of Robert Frank.

urban ku # 90 ~ beach life, extended version

Beach life - the triptych • click to embiggenIt's amazing how, even when you have your butt parked in a beach chair under an umbrella and aren't about to move an inch because it's so f-ing hot and humid that just moving your eyeballs makes rivers of salty sweat run down your face, there is still plenty of interest all around you to picture.

There are these lovely little vignettes that don't seem especially interesting in real-time but, when stopped in picture-time and viewed with a bit of reflection, they create a flood of real-time memories and associations. Even if the viewer doesn't share any 'beach' experiences, when the pictures are approached with a sense of curiosity, one can still be transported to a 'place' - mental, emotional and visual - that is new and different from one's everyday 'place' in life.