Plymouth Cheese screen door ~ Plymouth Notch, Vt. (embiggenable) • iPhone
Queen Connie ~ Leicester, Vt. (embiggenable) iPhone
I use the word "serious" (always in quotes) to indicate my picture making that is intended to be create something more than a non-"serious" documentary-type picture. Most often a non-"serious" pictures would be made on my travels or when I just want to picture something I see that's interesting but not a suitable referent for a "serious" picture. The 2 pictures in this entry are good examples of "serious" / non-"serious" picture types.
My intent with the Queen Connie pictures was simply to record a quirky roadside attraction which, as I later discovered, is # 16 on TOP 50 AMERICAN ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS list. The picture could incite thoughts / comments regarding the strange and sometimes wonderful weirdness than can be found in roadside attention-getting business advertising / promotion items that dot the American landscape.
Often such things are indications of someone's joyful exuberance and, iMo, are worthy of note. That written, there is no heavy lifting, meaning wise, in the making of this picture nor is any required to enjoy it.
On the other hand, there is the Plymouth Cheese screen door picture. This picture was made when my eye and sensibilities, that is my seemingly prenatural sensitivity to color and form, was pricked by what my visual apparatus (eyes + brain functions?) determined to be stimulating. At which point I make a picture.
For my picture making, it really is that simple ... walk around with eyes and mind open and wait for lightning to strike my visual apparatus. The only "work" involved is arranging, by means of arriving at the best POV, those elements into a relationship within my imposed frame which tickles my visual fantasy, by means of "feel' not thought, and there you have it.
In a very real sense, the preceeding paragraph is fodder, if not the actual content, for an artist statement for any of my bodies of work. However, for most of my bodies of work, some other words are needed. In the case of my picture windows work, the words-the fewer the better- would come from answering the question, "Why am I attracted to picturing fragments of the outside world from an inside-out POV?"
In attempting to answer that question, It is quite probable that I have to get uncomfortably close to writing some academic lunatic fringe narcisstic phsyco babble, an endeavor I am loath to undertake. However, simple is as simple does, so...
Were I to venture a guess-without enrolling in psychotherapy for a couple of years-the answer might be that I am viewing the outside world from the safety and comfort of an inside space. While that is true, and rather obvious, in a literal sense, it is probably informative to make the leap to the figurative sense of inside / outside ....
.... I am looking at the "outside" world from the "inside" world of my psyche, a comfortable place to be. Without a doubt, I have always had a rather stolid-bordering on Stoicism ([dictionary definition] "living in harmony with the divine Reason (also identified with Fate and Providence) that governs nature, and are indifferent to the vicissitudes of fortune and to pleasure and pain"- relationship to and with the "outside" world. In practice, I keep a rather snug, but by no means complete, rein on my emotional state(s)....
....which I believe is evidenced in my picture making inasmuch as I make "straight" pictures, unembellished with grand and glorius visual jestures, from a rather dispassionate picturing POV. In other words, I do so from the comfort derived from staying within (inside) the borders of my psyche.
So, perhaps my picture window body of work explains the picture making M.O. I have for all of my work. Or, perhaps not. Maybe, the only artist statement needed for all of my work is that I like making pictures, aka: the joy of photography, and sharing with the world how and therefore what I see. Revelling in what pricks my eye and sensibilities and attempting to prick the eye and sensibilities of others.
FYI, notice that I did not state sharing with the world why I make pictures. That's only important for me to know.