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About This Website

This blog is intended to showcase my pictures or those of other photographers who have moved beyond the pretty picture and for whom photography is more than entertainment - photography that aims at being true, not at being beautiful because what is true is most often beautiful..

>>>> Comments, commentary and lively discussions, re: my writings or any topic germane to the medium and its apparatus, are vigorously encouraged.

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BODIES OF WORK ~ PICTURE GALLERIES

  • my new GALLERIES WEBSITE
    ADK PLACES TO SIT / LIFE WITHOUT THE APA / RAIN / THE FORKS / EARLY WORK / TANGLES

BODIES OF WORK ~ BOOK LINKS

In Situ ~ la, la, how the life goes onLife without the APADoorsKitchen SinkRain2014 • Year in ReviewPlace To SitART ~ conveys / transports / reflectsDecay & DisgustSingle WomenPicture WindowsTangles ~ fields of visual energy (10 picture preview) • The Light + BW mini-galleryKitchen Life (gallery) • The Forks ~ there's no place like home (gallery)


Entries from June 1, 2012 - June 30, 2012

Friday
Jun292012

picture windows / looking out ~ together at last

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All pictures ~ • click to embiggenThere is little more satisfying in the art and craft of picturing making than when a thematic body of work comes together as a cohesive entity. Granted, selling an office suite worth of my pictures ranks right up there, but, when you come right down to it, successful selling is most often predicated upon portfolio presentations - a kind of horse-before-the-cart thing.

So, as mentioned previously, one of my somewhat pressing objectives is to organize and edit my various bodies of work - currently numbering 9 very different individual bodies of work - into individual portfolios. The point of that exercise is to get those portfolios out to a number of galleries with the hope of having a few exhibits of my work. And, that objective met, to make some sales.

Friday
Jun292012

civilized ku # 2242 ~ topiary

Topiary ~ Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen

Thursday
Jun282012

civilized ku # 2241 ~ light fixtures

Light fixtures ~ Hyatt Hotel / Rochester, NY - • click to embiggen

Thursday
Jun282012

kitchen life ~ the raspberry pie was delicious

Raspberry pie stains ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack Park • click to embiggen

Wednesday
Jun272012

civilized ku # 2240 ~ I know they're out there

Corner of Main St and St. Paul St. ~ Rochester, NY • click to embiggenAfter my recent visit to Rochester - home of the Big Yellow Box and the place where I spent the later half of my youth (and up to my 38th year) - I have been wondering about my inability to find any Rochester-based photo blogs.

In fact, I am only aware 3 Rochester area photo blogs and, coincidentally or not, all 3 of those are based in the suburb/village of Webster, where (apparently) life is worth living. Those blogs are: Ken Bello's Oneowner; John Linn's A Second Look; and Paul Maxim's Yesterday's Light. I only know of these blogs because each of those picture makers visit The Landscapist and leave comments from time to time. But, alas (re: my interest in viewing pictures of Rochester, the city, as opposed to those of the place where life is worth living and far flung iconic locations), none offer any links to other area photo blogs.

My interest in finding / viewing Rochester-based photo blogs was recently piqued by my knowledge of a recent Rochester-centered picture making project by 10 Magnum picture makers as part of Magnum's ongoing POSTCARDS FROM AMERICA series.

In April of this year, 10 Magnum pictures makers - to include, Alec Soth, Martin Parr, Bruce Gilden, and Donovan Wylie (I am familiar with all of their work) - descended upon Rochester to spend 2 weeks picturing the city, its inhabitants, and its social culture, each according to their own interests and style. The work and styles are wide ranging (see some of results HERE). The picture makers lived together during the project and each was tasked with making 100 pictures.

I am not at all certain what the end use of all the pictures will be. Quite possibly they will be published in a form something like THIS (another Magnum collective project), which would be very interesting. And, most definitely something I would like to own.

In any event, and back to the subject at hand ... as interesting as the pictures from the Rochester project are (although many could have been made anywhere and some are too much about the picture maker than the referents - not exactly style over substance, but close), I would really like to view how Rochester-based picture makers see their city. As home to Kodak, there must be hundreds, if not thousands of picture makers, making pictures of all things Rochester.

I know from extensive experience as a judge of too-many-to-remember Kodak Camera Club photo competitions that there is (or was) lots of interest in picturing making in the Rochester area. Surely there must be a photo blogger or 2 amongst them and I would dearly like to know of their online whereabouts.

Anybody have any links or suggestions?

Wednesday
Jun272012

another office installation

Office installation ~ Plattsburgh, NY - • click to embiggenI just completed another installation of my prints in another office. In this case, 3 pictures from Tuscany + 5 (2 not shown) from the Adirondacks.

FYI, the pano picture is 5ft long.

Monday
Jun252012

civilized ku # 2239 ~ raison d'être / vive la différence

Lake Ontario beach ~ Rochester, NY • click to embiggenOn a recent entry, civilized-ku-2221-2221a, Clifford Gwinn (no link provided) asked/stated:

Isn't "picturing what you see" imposing a snapshot aesthetic on what you see? The purest truthful experience is just seeing the scene with your eyes.

It took me a while to respond to his question / statement because, quite simply, I had to think about it for a bit. Even though Clifford probably did not post his comment as a "trick" question, IMO, it is nevertheless a "tricky" question / statement.

my response: While Clifford's statement, "The purest truthful experience is just seeing the scene with your eyes", is, for the most part, undoubtedly true, the fact remains that making a picture of what your eyes see is the only way I know of to share that seeing with others. And, in the making of a picture, it is virtually impossible to do so without imposing some kind of aesthetic on the picture.

Even a picture made by a robotic device, say, a convenience store security camera, imposes in own unique aesthetic - a kind of bloodless mechanistic aesthetic, but an aesthetic nevertheless.

In the making of my pictures, I impose my own personal aesthetic which, it could be said, does share some similarities with the so-called snapshot aesthetic - a fascination of artists with the 'classic' black & white vernacular snapshot, the characteristics of which were: 1) they were made with a hand held camera on which the viewfinder could not easily 'see' the edges of the frame, unlike modern cheap digital cameras with electronic viewfinder, and so the subject had to be centered; and 2) they were made by ordinary people recording the ceremonies of their lives and the places that they lived and visited.

Indeed, most of my pictures exhibit center-biased "composition" and the edges can be somewhat messy / truncated with elements within scene cur off in mind sentence, if you will. And, it should go without stating for anyone who has followed my work for an extended period that I am very interested in picturing the place that I live and places I have visited, to include the banal artifacts of life which are found in those places. Inasmuch as those characteristics are borrowed from the snapshot aesthetic, many believe (and I would not contest that belief/opinion) that I impose such an aesthetic upon my pictures.

However, the truth of the matter is somewhat different .... in my desire not "to reform life but to know it", the aesthetic I "impose", which is part and parcel of my personal vision, is that of commonplace seeing. I center my primary referent(s) simply because that's exactly how the human eye works - if we fix our gaze upon an object or scene, it is most likely centered in our field of vision. And, while it's true that our vision has a peripheral component, I mimic that aspect of human vision by vignetting the corners of my pictures.

One of the primary purposes of my picturing MO (but by no means, the only purpose) is to mimic, as much as the medium and its apparatus allow, how people see the world. To replicate the act of, as Clifford states, a "truthful experience of just seeing the scene with your eyes". Or, as Stephen Shore has stated, to "structure the picture in such a way that communicated my experience of standing there, taking in the scene in front of me?"

So, all of that stated, I do, in fact, impose an aesthetic in the making of my pictures. Call it what you will, that aesthetic is part and parcel of what makes my pictures my own. That is how make pictures which reflect my way of seeing the world, aka: my personal vision.

That stated, I make no apologies for doing so. For after all is said and done, isn't that the point of making art? The act of presenting to the viewer of your creations, not only what you see but also how you see it.

And, in the best of cases, isn't that what makes art interesting - seeing how someone else sees things? And, in viewing such art is the opportunity to get outside of your self and, in the process, discover new things and ideas, or, at the very least to discover a new sensibility to bring to your own way of seeing.

That's how I see it.

Monday
Jun252012

civilized ku # 2238 ~ backyard blossoms

Flowers and propane tank ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack Park • click to embiggen