# 6550 / common places • common thing • An Adirondack Survey ~ letting it all hang out

April 28, 2023

I AM APPROACHING THE An Adirondack Survey PROJECT finish line. 2 copies of the 110-page / 52-photos book are in production and 20 prints are ready for the folio. It has been a rather demanding physical-many hours in front of the computer-and mental-picture editing-undertaking.

RE: picture editing - the final edit of the book includes 54 photographs, selected from the nearly 300 photographs in the An Adirondack Survey folder. Selecting those 300 photographs from my 10,000 photo library was rather time consuming. Editing down to the final 54 photographs was quite challenging inasmuch as, although there were approximately 45 no-brainer inclusions, there were 8-9 photograph pages that were in constant flux-this photo in, that photo out, that photo in, this photo out, seemingly ad infinitum.

Then there was, for me, the seemingly inevitable happenstance of hitting the PRINT button for a POD photo book, any photo book, and, within 24 hours thereof, making a picture that just screams to be included in the book. Happened 2x after hitting the PRINT button for 2 “proof” books.

The other project component that required editing was selecting photographs for the print folio. The big question was whether to print selected “greatest hits” from the book-the purpose of the folio was to demonstrate the high quality of the prints-or to print photographs that were not in the book. I went back and forth on this question for quite a while. It wasn’t until I did a deeper dive into a few other body-of-work folders, during which I “discovered” quite a number of additional “greatest hits” that it became obvious that printing them would vastly improve the scope of the An Adirondack Survey collection.

All of that written, now comes the scary part of the project. Sending out the door a significant part of my picture making endeavors for consideration, a judgement of sorts, of a (possible) exhibition. Soar-and-fly or crash-and-burn time is soon upon me.

# 6543-47 / common places • common things • the natural world ~ the end of composition

April 16, 2023

***small Adirondack village*** ~ (embiggenable)

HERE IN THE ADIRONDACKS SPRING HAS SPRUNG all over the place with great vigor . Yesterday’s high was 80 degrees with bright sun and blue skies. So, the wife and I, together with a good friend, headed out for a circuitous-down to the central Adirondacks and back-200 mile drive, ostensibly to pick up 3 cases of wine for our daughter’s wedding this coming weekend.

Along the way we sought out 3 raging, thunderous spring-melt falls and had a late lunch in Chef Darrell’s diner-his mouth-watering meatloaf for me-in Blue Mountain Lake. Naturally, I made some pictures along the way.

Today, while I was processing those pictures, I was thinking about the idea of “composition”. FYI, that’s a word that rarely enters my vocabulary in describing how I “arrange” things in the making of my pictures. Thinking about it, I believe that my deliberate disdain for that word and the picture making conventions it represents originates from my participation-as an consultant (my name is in the book’s acknowledgements) about the medium and it conventions-with Sally Eauclaire in her preparation for her landmark book, the new color photography.

Sally, to whom 100s of photographers submitted work, would, on a regular basis, bring work to my studio where we would spread it out on the studio floor. Then she and I would walk round the spread and she would asked me questions about various pictures. Questions along the lines of “how did the photographer achieve that look / result / effect?” She was not soliciting my aesthetic opinion. Rather, she had absolutely no experience, re: the medium and its apparatus.

In any event, one of the prominent things I took away from that experience was that, in the viewing of all that work from all of later considered masters of modern fine art color photography, I saw nothing in the photographs that evidenced any notion of conventional photographic composition. None. Nada. Not even a hint.

While those early color photographers were credited with many ground-breaking accomplishments, iMo, except for the traditional photo press / media who piled on declaring the work to be a “put-on…worse than amateur snapshots…these photographers can not be serious” and the like, little attention was paid to their notions, re: composition. It took someone-Sally Eauclaire-who was not bound by knowledge of conventional photographic composition technique to look at photographs from the perspective of the Fine Art World with its emphasis on the traditional elements of Art; line, shape, space, color, value, form.

In effect, those photographers stated, via their work, that composition, as it was formally recognized, was an aesthetic dead end. (you can quote me on that)

All of that written, I have written a mashup of my words together with words and phrases-borrowed from Eauclaire’s book-that reflect my notion of “composition”:

iMo, the best photographs are those made by photographers who perceive real objects and intervening spaces as interanimating segments of a total visual presentation; a discernment from which they create a delicately adjusted equilibrium in which a segment of the real world is co-opted for its visual possibilities, yet delineated with the utmost specificity. Their images, in printed form, exist simultaneously on a continuous 2-dimensional visual plane on which every space and object are interlocking pieces of a carefully constructed jigsaw puzzle and a portal through which a viewer can discern navigable space and recognizable subject matter.

Although, if I were to eschew all the art-speak, I suppose I could just quote Edward Weston:

“Now to consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the law of gravitation before going for a walk….Good composition is merely the strongest way of seeing.”

However, which ever way you wish to read / hear it, suffice it to write that there are no “rules” for good composition.

# 6519-29 / common places • common things ~ have camera, will travel

April 3, 2023

***through the sunroof opening of my car*** ~ (embiggenable)

***a tree grows in Brooklyn*** ~ (embiggrnable)

DROVE TO NYC THIS WEEKEND TO SEE A Broadway play. Had no real intention to make pictures but, as it turned out, I made enough pictures to make a 20-picture POD book.

Stayed with extended family-the wife’s brother’s family-in Brooklyn. After the play met with more extended family-the wife’s older sister’s and older brother’s family members-for drinks and snacks at an Irish Pub in the NYC Theater District.

Had no real intention to make pictures but ,nevertheless, I made enough pictures to make a 20-picture POD book. And, it was while I was in the Times Square / Theater District, I discovered that I should return to NYC for 2-day photo project-photographing food carts. The picture making possibilities are, seemingly, endless. And, I get tingly all over just thinking about the dusk hour possibilities-colorful food carts together with about a billion neon lights + video billboards. Might even need some anti-seizure meds.

In any event, as is often the case, during this trip I did not make a single picture that included a family member. Although, there was one related harrowing event. After getting a passerby to agree to make a picture, the family members clustered together for a family picture-lower Manhattan skyline in the background. On a strongly-held anti-cliche picture making principle, I refused to participate-neither the making of or being pictured therein-but, after the picture was made, the SOBs bolted over to where I was hiding / sulking and had another picture made.

Rats. Foiled once again.

# 6513-18 / common places • common things • people ~ an adirondack survey

March 30, 2023

THE AN ADIRONDACK SURVEY PROJECT IS MOVING right along. Picture editing has yielded a 165 photographs body of work. 50 of those pictures have been selected for use in a 12x12 book. 20 of those selections will be printed for inclusion in a presentation folio for submission (+ the book) to galleries and art institutions.

And, the ink is flowing. Printing-on my Epson wide-format (24 inch) printer-of the folio photographs is a work-in-progress. A reduced size-10x10-“proof” book is being printed. That book is being produced by the same POD book printing source using all the same specs that the “final” 12x12 book will employ. The proof book will give an opportunity to check on each photo for reproduction accuracy and to get a feel for the editing sequencing. If necessary, modifications-color, brightness, vibrancy, et al-to individual photos can be made prior to final printing. And, it is possible that a few photos might be edited out and substitutions made.

All part of the final fine tuning cuz it all has to feel just “right”.

# 6510-12 / common places • common things • tangles ~ under snow detritus revealed

March 24, 2023

SPRING IS OFFICIALLY HERE AND I GLADLY WELCOME IT for 2 reasons; 1) I am sick of the rotating on-again, off-again winter we have been experiencing, and, 2) all of the dead autumn detritus mixed with early emerging spring growth is prime time for picture making.

The pictures in this entry were made last year during the very short window-for picture making-between emerging spring growth and full-on spring growth. Not only is the timing critical but, for my desired picture making result, so is the weather, or, more accurately, so is the light. That’s cuz soft, overcast light is required / mandatory for my intentions.

And then, there is the full-frame vs square-frame thing. For reasons not determined / understood, last year’s pictures were made utilizing the full-frame format. Apparently, I guess that, at that time, that is just the way I was seeing it. I like the result so this year it’s on with same show, framing wise.

# 6507-09 / kitchen sink • common places • common things ~ putting it all together

March 23, 2023

*at someone’s house-*NOT MINE-on St. Patrick Day ~ (embiggenable)

***a few samples from my*** An Adirondack Survey ***work*** ~ (embiggenable)

I HAVE NOT BEEN THINKING ABOUT BLOG WISE THINGS over the past week or so. Rather, my time has been occupied with editing out from my photo library approximately 120 pictures for my emergent body of work, An Adirondack Survey ~ as seen in pictures.

The body of work is comprised of pictures-in and of the Adirondacks-that were made over the past 22 years-the length of my Adirondack residency-of my picture making life. Many of these pictures were exhibited as converted-into-snapshot pictures in my solo gallery exhibition, Adirondack Snapshot Project (there are a few samples on my WORK page). In the case of this iteration, the pictures are presented as simple, straight photographic color prints.

In any event, the kick-in-the-butt instigation for assembling this body of work was the re-reading of a 1976 press release from MOMA-announcing the opening of the Color Photographs by William Eggleston exhibition-in which John Szarkowski was quoted as expressing the idea that:

…these photographs are perfect: irreducible surrogates for the experience they pretend to record, visual analogues for the quality of one life, collectively a paradigm of a private view….Eggleston, who lives in Memphis, Tennessee, finds his private, even insular subject matter in the commonplace realities of that city and its environs….While his photographs comprise a remarkable and surprising commentary on contemporary American life, his work is more the engagement of a personal vision than a social document.

My reading of the press release, taken in its entirety, caused me to look at my Adirondack pictures in a new light inasmuch as:

my photographs are visual analogues for the quality of my life, a private view of subject matter found in the commonplace realities of the Adironacks where I live. My photographs-an engagement of personal vision rather than a social documentary-comprise a somewhat surprising-as in rarely seen before-commentary on contemporary Adirondack life.

In order to circulate this work, I am in the process of making a 20 print portfolio and a 50 picture hardbound book for submission to a number of galleries / art institutions. And, I must admit to a degree of fear and trepidation inasmuch as I am laying it all on the line-my personal vision wise-with the submission-to important regional galleries / arts organizations- of this significant collection of my picture making life’s work.

# 6506 / common places • common thing • winter ~ I don't want / need no stinkin' metaphors

March 16, 2023

IT WAS WRITTEN BY SOMEONE somewhere (or so wrote Stephen Shore):

“Chinese poetry rarely trespasses beyond the bounds of actuality… the great Chinese poets accept the world exactly as they find it in all its terms and with profound simplicity… they seldom talk about one thing in terms of another; but are able enough and sure enough as artists to make the ultimately exact terms become the beautiful terms.”

If there were to be a credo for making straight photographs-bits lifted from the visceral world with such tact and cunning that they seem true-iMo, this would be it.

# 6502-04 / seeing red • common places • common things ~ united diversity

March 12, 2023

OVER THE COURSE OF MY PICTURE MAKING YEARS I have been accused, or at least it has been “suggested”, of being obsessed with the color red. The actual fact of the matter is that I do use the color red-when I see it-as visual element in many of my pictures. However, yet another fact of the matter is that I have never sought out or specifically look for the color red.

“I don’t have to have a single point of emphasis in the picture. It can be complex, because it’s so detailed that the viewer can take time and read it, and look at something here, and look at something there, and they can pay attention to a lot more.” ~ Stephen Shore

Like Shore, I make visually complex pictures for the same reason he seems to do so; pictures that are “so detailed that the viewer can take time and read it, and look at something here, and look at something there, and they can pay attention to a lot more.” In my own words, my pictures tend to evince, as a result of their complexity, a high degree of visual energy as seen across the field of a print. iMo, there is very little better than a splash of some repetitive visual element or another in a picture to get a viewer’s eye moving around that picture.

The screenshot included in this entry is used to illustrate another aspect of my use of the color red. That is, to my eye and sensibilities, I find it is quite interesting and somewhat surprising how the same visual element, when shared across a referent-diverse group of pictures can hold that seemingly disparate group together as a coherent body of work.