# 6489 / roadside attractions • flora • common things ~ picture makers just want to have fun

February 23, 2023

AS PART OF MY PORTFOLIO SUBMISSION TO GALLERIES, re: roadside attractions, an artist statement is mandatory. Writing one is always a bit of challenge cuz, if it were allowed, I would write one that stated, I made these pictures cuz I photograph whatever pricks my eye and sensibilities and I like the way they turned out.

However, that would be laughed out of court as inadmissible. So, instead, I am writing, in part, something that reads like this…

…. my eye and sensibilities impel me to make photographs of seemingly haphazard confluences of variegated flora and detritus …. (that) evince a riotous visual energy; an amalgamation of texture, line, shape, color, and value …. intimate landscapes that manifest-both literally (these are pictures of the real world) and metaphorically (the concept behind the work)-the essence of the energy and forces at work in the lives of all living things ….

For me, the challenge in writing an artist statement is to avoid telling viewers how to look at / what to look for in my pictures. I would not worry about this as much if it were possible to not give viewers an opportunity to read an artist statement until after they have viewed the pictures.

That written, I do believe that artist statements are intended to be read by gallery directors so that they can be assured that the work was made by a “serious” artist, not by some guy with camera who is just having fun.

Be that as it may, the statement is still a work in progress. However, I do have a deadline for a submission that is due by next Tuesday.

# 6482-88 / roadside attractions • flora • common places ~ drive by shooting

February 22, 2023

“Anything more than 500 yards from the car just isn’t photogenic.” ~ Edward Weston

DURING THE PAST COUPLE DECADES I HAVE amassed in the neighborhood of 150+ pictures that were made within 20 yards of my car; my car which was pulled over to the side of the road. And, in almost all cases the pictures were made with my feet firmly planted on the edge of the road. Hence, from that picture making M.O. comes the title, roadside attractions.

This practice is the not result of my being lazy or lame. Point of fact, I have ventured far from the road-10-20 miles into the forest / wilderness on foot or in a canoe-spending up to 4-5 nights in the backcountry. Needless to write, I make lots of pictures on those treks.

That written, what pricks my eye and sensibilities along the roadside is the abundance of intimate landscapes brimming with the potential for the making of photographs with a high content of visual energy /complexity. Tangles, thickets, and clusters of bio-diverse, indigenous flora / detritus present a riotously complex visual symphony of color, line, shape, and texture that, when isolated and “organized” within my imposed frame, conspires to give the eye no place to rest.

FYI, years ago, when I began this M.O., my son, the cinemascapist, had labeled this picture making practice my Jackson Pollock picture making state of mind (and eye).

In any event, I am assembling a couple roadside attractions print portfolios, together with a photo book, for submission to galleries. See more roadside attractions pictures in the new gallery on my WORK page.

# 6465-68 / windshields • hockey ~ and now for something completely different

February 13, 2023

***he’s a Vermont Lumberjack and he’s OK*** ~ (embiggenable)

***waiting in line for the ferry*** ~ (embiggenable)

***sunset as viewed from on the ferry*** ~ (embiggenable)

I BEGAN MY µ4/3 LIFE WITH THE PURCHASE OF an Olympus E-3 DSLR - pre-mirrorless era. After moving on to Olympus mirrorless cameras, I used the E-3 as a prop inasmuch as, when making pictures for commercial assignments, I had it around on shoots to validate to the client the idea-image wise (in the personal image sense)-that I was a professional photographer. In other words, pay no attention to those little amateur looking cameras which, of course, were making much better image files than the big impressive looking camera.

That written, this weekend past, I was tasked with making pictures of my hockey-playing (Juniors in the Eastern Hockey League) grandson (FYi, he’s playing his way up the ladder to college hockey). So, out comes the E-3, emerging from its current state as a paperweight, cuz it is, together with my 50-200 f2.8 lens (e10-400mm), my best tool for hockey action picture making. It has been so long since I have used the camera, that I had to almost relearn how to use it. Not to mention the time spent finding all the pieces - batteries, charger, cards, camera strap, et al.

In any event, one of the challenges of making reasonably sharp hockey action pictures is the problem, at ice level, of shooting through glass. That is, “glass” which is actually well scratched and marred plexiglass. Fortunately, a tele lens focused on a referent well away from the glass helps diminish, but not eliminate, the scratches and mars but, nevertheless, you are still shooting through what might be labeled as a pretty thick diffusion filter.

My grandson’s team, the Vermont Lumberjacks’-hence the spiffy red checked, flannel pajama -looking uniform-home rink is in Vermont and it requires a ferry ride across Lake Champlain to see a game. Last evening, on our ferry ride home, the wife and I were treated to very nice sunset which was very different from our midnight-a pitch black, cloudless sky before moonrise-ferry ride home after Saturday night’s game.

# 6460-64 / scrub • scraggle • tangles ~ creativity & imagination

February 8, 2023

“If you have a magic camera that can take a sharp, clear, well-exposed, well-focused, and color-correct picture of most anything, what are you going to photograph? And, at a deeper level, how are you going to express yourself using photography in a way that is individualized or idiosyncratic to you specifically…?…that personal expressiveness and a stylistic identity…” ~ Mike Johnston

FOR THE BETTER PART OF A WEEK I HAVE been struggling with the subject of this entry, i.e., creativity and the imagination in the making of photographs. Specifically so, in the cause of making fine art photographs. I wrestle with the concept of creativity / imagination, re: fine art photography, cuz, to be honest, I do not think it plays a part in the making of such photographs…

…Huh? Say what?

Isn’t creativity/ imagination the answer to Mike Johnston’s question, “…how are you going to express yourself using photography in a way that is individualized or idiosyncratic to you specifically…?…that personal expressiveness and a stylistic identity…” that sets one apart from the maddening crowd.

iMo, the answer to that question is quite simply, “No, it-creativity / imagination-is not the answer.”

To clarify my opinion, let me emphasize the fact that I am addressing the making of fine art photographs as opposed to the making of decorative photographs. That’s cuz, in the referent-centric, decorative photography arena, the repertoire of creativity / imagination most often, if not always, consists of the application of art sauce, aka: flashy technique, “unique” picture making POV (body position), special gear (lenses and the like), and the selection of traditional, spectacular / dramatic-so called “picture-worthy”-referents.

Whereas, in the idiocentric, fine art picture making world, the only application of what might be labeled as creativity / imagination is the use of the picture maker’s innate-not something you can buy at B&H Photo-“individualized or idiosyncratic” vision in the making of his/her photographs; the vision which directs-one might even write, “demands”-what and how a picture maker photographs. More often than not, he/she considers the referent and its visual essence as inseparable with no need to tart it up with any art sauce.

While there are many differences, re: fine art v. decorative photography, one primary difference is that decorative picture makers tend to employ creativity / imagination in the cause of making pictures that scream. “Look at me and let there be no doubt about what my pictures are about.”

Whereas, fine art picture makers have more respect for the viewer inasmuch as they see no need for cheap tricks in order to garner and hold a viewer’s attention and interest. And, in the brave and simple act of presenting to a viewer the unvarnished true-to-the-actuality-of-the-real-world that which has pricked his/her eye and sensibilities, he/she lets the viewer discern what their pictures are about.

“I think about photographs as being full, or empty. You picture something in a frame and it's got lots of accounting going on in it--stones and buildings and trees and air--but that's not what fills up a frame. You fill up the frame with feelings, energy, discovery, and risk, and leave room enough for someone else to get in there.” ~ Joel Meyerowitz

Moral of the story: if you need to think about your picture making, spend more time thinking and getting in touch with (aka: feeling) discovering, understanding, and nurturing your vison than you do about being more “creative”.

# 6443-50 / bodies of work ~ stumbling down a dead end street #2

February 3, 2023

***Life without the APA*** ~ (embiggenable)

***Adirondack Snapshot Project*** ~ (embiggenable)

ACCORDING TO THE IDIOT QUOTED IN MY LAST entry, I have apparently been “repeating the same basic work, for decades and decades, unaware that I have been stumbling down a dead end street”. That would be because I have been making pictures driven by my very own picture making vision. A vision that does not allow me to go careening around the technique / visual effects / gear-obsessed picture making landscape like a drunken sailor. To wit, I see what I see and that’s how that I see (all credit to Popeye who said, “ I am what I am and that’s all that I am.)

That written, re: careening around like a drunken sailor, I will readily admit to careening around the referent landscape like a drunken picture maker. A picture making condition condition (affliction?) that I call discursive promiscuity. To my eye and sensibilities, any thing and every thing is fair game for a picture making possibility. The result of that discursive promiscuity is that I have accumulated, over the past 25 years, at least 15,000 pictures.

One might think that that glut of pictures would make for a very unruly mess. However, that is not the case cuz, thanks to the guidance of my vision, the overwhelming majority of my pictures exhibit a consistent,-but not formulaic-very particular attention to form, aka: the “arrangement” of the visual elements-line, shape, tone, color and space-within the imposed frame of my pictures.

This “consistency” leads to a very interesting result; while I rarely work with the thought of creating a body of work in mind, nevertheless, I have, over an extended period of time, realized that my eye and sensibilities have been, and still are, drawn to specific referents again and again. The result is that eventually-many times over the course of years-I “discover” that I have, in fact-albeit inadvertently, created many bodies of work.

ASIDE the body of works illustrated above, with a few images each, are some of the bodies of work I have created, most of which were “discovered” in my library (as opposed to deliberately created). The are at least 6 more bodies of work I could display. END OF ASIDE

And, what I find interesting and very surprising is that, once a number of referent related pictures are organized into a body of work, the coherent consistency of vision is, quite frankly, amazing.

Makes me quite happy that I have not tried to “re-invent” my vision. And BTW, I really like the “street” I am on. It is not a “dead end” and, in fact, there is no end in sight as far as I can see.

# 6423-37 / comon places • common things • still life • people ~ meaninng schmeaning

January 30, 2023

***Quality butcher*** ~ Scotland (embiggenable)

“Photographs, which cannot themselves explain anything, are inexhaustible invitations to deduction, speculation, and fantasy.” ~ Susan Sontag

IN MY LAST ENTRY I PROCLAIMED THAT, re: the medium of photography and its apparatus, it’s the same as it ever was. I believe that to be true albeit with one notable exception; the Major League Division of the Fine Art Photography World. To wit…

Over the past decade or two, fine art photo galleries and art institutions have been taken over-I would venture to write”hijacked”-by the Academic Lunatic Fringe. That is, at the directorial level graduate degrees-MAs /MFAs-are the norm and, consequently, the work being exhibited or acquired adheres to the ALF dictum of meaning trumps visual content. Or, in other words, what a picture means is much more important than what a picture depicts. Concept is the thing, which quite frankly is to be expected of academia, aka: the home of ideas.

The unfortunate (iMo) results are two-fold; 1) most ALF pictures are, to my eye and sensibilities, visual flops, and, 2) the pictures are always accompanied by a bloviating art speak explanation, re: what the pictures mean. The explanations are, iMo, virtually indispensable inasmuch as the pictures, in and of themselves, are rarely self-explanatory. In fact, after being told by a picture maker exactly what his/her pictures are about, I rarely see in his/her pictures whatever it is the maker is trying to express.

“University presses [ed. +fine art photo book publishers] increasingly hold to the policy that requires books of pictures to incorporate “substantial” texts…. layering together pictures with the photographer’s words, [ed. or more likely an academic’s essay] but also sandwiching the concoction between slabs of social—scientific balloon bread. ~ Robert Adams

To be completely honest, I should make it clear that my dislike, re: this sad state of photographic affairs, is predicated upon a very selfish desire to be visually engaged when viewing photographs on a gallery / art institution (or even online) wall. That is, as opposed to pictures of the self-pyschoanalyzing, navel gazing “investigations” by some so-called lens-based artist’s obsession with the “intersection” of some aspect of a social-scientific balloon bread concept and his/her inner self/life.

# 6427-31 / nocturnal • common places ~ the night is filled with shadows

January 27, 2023

***fiddling*** ***while house burns*** ~ fireman taking a picture (embiggenable)

SPOILER ALERT: well, not really. However, this entry will divulge a key part of my intro for the Philosophy of Modern Pictures book/project. To wit….after a lot of thought and research, I have come to the conclusion that the more things change, the more they remain the same, or, as David Byrne sang, same as it ever was.

Ever since the introduction of the digital picture making age, there has been considerable caterwauling and lamentation-don’t get me started with the monochrome crowd who can tell you the day the music BW died-re: the landmark, tradition changing, revolution about how picture making has change. To which I call, BS.

A far as I can see, sure, sure, light sensitive picture making substrates has changed from film to digital, print making has changed from the wet darkroom to the desktop / software ”darkroom”, and making good pictures, technically wise, has gotten easier BUT, paraphrasing Robert Adams…"

“…the only thing that is new in art [insert “photography’ here] is the example: the message [insert “photographs” here] is are, broadly speaking, the same-coherence, form, meaning.”

In other words, the medium and its apparatus are still inexorably / intrinsically a cohort of the real. That is, we all continue to make pictures of real-world referents-you know, people, places, things. Sure, sure, the tools have changed, but the “message” remains the same.

Of course, one could argue, what about all that special effects / filters / digital constructions stuff? Answer: one of the earliest “movements” in photography was Pictorialism and continued through the ages with Jerry Uelsmann as one of many prime examples. However, virtually all of their works, aka: acts-of-the-imagination pictures, start with pictures of referents snatched from the real world.

iMo, and that of many others, those making acts-of-the-imagination pictures are not photographers. In point of fact, they are artists-often referred to as photo artists-who employ the tools of the medium and it apparatus to create images, not photographs. And, there ain’t nothin’ new ’bout that activity.

So, from my point of view (literally-how I see the world-figuratively-my picture making vision), everything is the same as it ever was.

# 6422-26 / common places • common things • civilized ku ~ what am I spota do master?

January 26, 2023

“I really didn’t have much to teach. I didn’t really believe in it. I felt so strongly that everybody had to find their own way. And nobody can teach you your own way…. in terms of art, the only real answer that I know of is to do it. If you don’t do it, you don’t know what might happen.” ~ Harry Callahan

IN MY SEARCH FOR A NEW BOOK WHICH IS built around a large number of digital photographers’ work-to date an unsuccessful search-my search query yielded up a seemingly endless number of landfill-worthy how-to digital photography books and workshops. Many with an emphasis on how to make so-called “fine art” digital photographs.

Needless to write, none-and I repeat, NONE-of the self-proclaimed “experts” were making pictures that had any resemblance to fine art. You can take that assessment to the bank based upon the absolute fact that, to my extensive knowledge, there is not a single bona fide fine art photographer on the planet who would even consider the idea of making a how-to book. That’s cuz they understand well the verse of poet X. J.Kennedy:

The goose that laid the golden egg Died looking up its crotch To find out how its sphincter worked. Would you lay well? Don’t watch.

Or consider this from Robert Adams:

“Photographers are like other artist too in being reticent because they are afraid that self-analysis will get in the way of making art. They never fully know how they got the good pictures that they have, but they suspect that a certain innocence may have been necessary.”

iMo, how to operate camera or use editing software-or, for that matter, process film and make prints in a wet darkroom-can be taught. In any case, it ain’t rocket science but hooking up with someone who can show you ropes can speed things along. But, while anyone can figure out how to make a picture, getting to the point where one’s pictures are considered to be fine art is not so easy.

The hard work arrives in the form of identifying and then understanding how one sees the world. That is, both literally and figuratively. No one can do that but you. For some it comes easy, for some its much more difficult, and, dare I write it, for some it is impossible. ASIDE Re: impossible; that’s where the “rules” of photography come in handy for those can’t figure it out for themselves. END ASIDE

The danger involved in looking for “expert” solutions to the hard work issue is that, upon choosing an “expert” from whom to get advice on how to make “great” pictures, one is more apt to become a photo groupy of sorts-aka: follow the leader-than one who is apt to free one’s mind from the boundaries of conventional picture making. As Brian Cohen says in the film Life of Brian:

You’ve got it wrong. You don’t need to follow me. You don’t need to follow anybody. You’ve got to think for yourselves. You’re all individuals. You’re all different. You’ve got to figure it out for yourselves.

Of course, as Brian exhorts the crowd to be individuals-”yes, we are all individuals” they respond collectively-they repeat all he has to say as dogma / doctrine. I guess that explains why all the “experts” are so successful at finding recruits for following their picture making “wisdom”.