# 6418-23 / common places • common things ~ life as it happened

all photos ~ (embiggenable)

IN THIS ENTRY I’M TAKING A CUE FROM MIKE JOHNSTON AND THE Texas gear nutjob, both of whom laden their sites with lots of personal, non photography data. That written, this entry could be labeled as 24 hrs in the life of me, complete with pictures.

On Monday morning I awoke to a glorious Adirondack summer morning. The cat drew me out to the back porch where sunlight dappled the scene and the air was cool and fresh. I made a picture.

Going back into the house for my morning coffee, I noticed that there was an arrangement in the kitchen sink demanding my attention. I made a picture.

After completing my morning routine, I got in one of our cars-we have 3-and headed off to a doctor’s appointment-a followup to my recent prostrate procedure. Did I mention that I live at least 30 mile from everywhere? Although in this case, I live a 1 1/2 hour car drive from my urologist’s office. It’s a nice ride that includes a midpoint ferry ride across the 6th largest lake in North America. I made a picture.

After being cleared for normal peeing duty, I met the wife for lunch along with a couple from Denver who were in town-Burlington, Vt.-to visit their son who is a clerk for a Vermont Supreme Court-aka: appellate court-judge. I did not make a picture.

Next up, after lunch-no, we did not eat a EL CORJITO, the wife, her from Denver bestie, and I took a walk down Church St.-a pedestrian shopping, dining, entertainment district on the way to where I had parked my car. Along the way, I noticed a bookstore-I really like bookstores-and we went inside where the wife purchased a birthday-it’s 10 days away-present for me; the BOB DYLAN ~ MIXING UP THE MEDICINE book. FYI, she won’t let me read it until my birthday, even though it sits tantalizingly close on the kitchen counter. I made a picture.

Upon leaving the bookstore I notice the EL CORJITO restaurant. I made a picture.

Then it was time for me to head home. The wife stayed behind-she had one of our other cars-to spent the afternoon followed by dinner catching up with her bestie. No pictures that I know of.

Upon arriving home, I made a picture of a tomato I had been wanting to picture. Made my supper. Re-watched Asteroid City. Went to bed. No more pictures.

# 6404-08 / mementos ~ the fog of memory

all photos ~ (embiggenable)

I’M AN OLD GUY, WELL INTO MY 7TH DECADE approaching my 8th. So, I have a lifetime of memories and fortunately my memory is very sound. That written, I have been thinking about memory + photography cuz…

… it has been postulated by serious thinkers-in academia-on the subject that, with the incredible magnitude of photographs being made, photographs are somehow replacing human memory and becoming the memory. Consider this from an essay in the book, A MATTER OF MEMORY ~ Photography As A Object in the Digital Age:

“…photography and memory have been intertwined for so long that their inextricable linkage has become a platitude. Most of us recognize that many of our childhood memories are more likely the result of seeing photographs of ourselves as children than they are actual recollections recovered from the memory centers in our brains….in recent years there has been a surge of interest in the omnipresence of photography and its effect on memory.”

iMo, this concept, re: photography effecting memory, is a bit of an academic dalliance; they gotta have something to do. But, be that as it may, that concept is not much on my mind. What is on my mind is popular idea that photographs preserve memories…

… right from the get-go, let me state for the record that I lean toward the idea that photographs are a fine visual reminder of a moment in the past but, despite their ability to present a picture of that moment complete with a lot of visual detail, they are, at best, an inciter of memories stored in the human brain. However, to be precise, only in the human brain of a viewer who was a participant in that moment. And, the memories that may rise to the fore upon viewing a photograph are, due to the nature of human memory, rather generalized, i.e, vague / “foggy” / imprecise, at best.

On the other hand, consider the photo of me in my pajamas… I know it’s a photo of me cuz the depicted face in the photo looks like the face I have seen in other photos from that time that I know to be photos of me. I can assuredly deduce that the picture was made in the attic-which my father renovated-bedroom cuz of the sloping ceiling line behind me. But, I have no idea who made the photo-probably my father but it could have been taken by my mother or my grandfather (he was an avid amateur photographer)-nor do I have even the vaguest idea the why photo was made. I do know that photo was not made in March 1960-as printed on the border-cuz we were not living in that house in 1960. March’60 was the date the photo was printed and considering the fact that my dad was frugal in his picture making-a roll of film could be in the camera for year or 2-the photo could have been made more than a year or more before that March ‘60 date.

All of written, here’s the thing about that photo…I have absolutely no memory associated with that moment in time. None. Nada. Zip. The image, and in this example also the actual print, is little more than a visual artifact about a past moment in time. It does not cause me to manufacture a memory. It is, primarily, just a picture.

That written, the photograph does, in fact, stir up a memory. Not of the moment but rather of someone not depicted - my father. The instigator of that memory-a memory that is very broad and generalized-is a detail in the photo that only I might notice, the aforementioned slanting ceiling line that testifies to the fact that the photo was make in the bedroom that my father made in our attic that he renovated. However, strangely enough, I have no memory of him renovating the attic.

In any event, all of the above written, I do have many photographs of a past moments in time that incite memories associated with that moment in time. And, to be honest, I have quite a number of photographs of past moments in time that remind me of moments that I might never have thought of if not for the photographic evidence. On the other hand I have far more memories for which there is no photographic evidence other than the pictures in my head: I am primarily a visual thinker after all.

In either case, and in my experience (your experience might vary), memory and the memories associated with them are rather enigmatic / ambiguous / insubstantial. And, iMo / experience, having a highly detailed photograph of a past moment in time does not make a memory any more detailed, memory wise. That is, beyond the detail of the literally depicted visual content. However, that written, what might appear to be an insignificant detail in a photography-think about the ceiling line in the above photo-could, in deed, incite a memory about something / someone / someplace that is not part of that moment.

Ok. I’m starting to ramble on. That’s in part, cuz I am still trying to sort a lot of this stuff out. But part of that sorting out is the 4 “ghosted” photos in this entry. I intend to make a photo book about photography + memory in which all of the photos will be ghosted in order to support my idea that memories-even those incited by highly detailed photos-are rather “foggy”.

# 6897-6900 / common places (not) ~ sneaking my iPhone into the OR

All photos ~ (embiggenable)

THE GENERAL CONSENSUS WHEN I SLIPPED MY iPHONE out from under my sheet and started making pictures in the OR was one of confusion; “what the hell.”, “doesn’t that guy know where he is?” That written, they went about their business and no one asked me if they should smile.

In case you have not figured it out by now, I will make pictures anywhere I can.

# 6891-96 / common places•things ~ some thing small is beter than the same thing big

proposed book spreads ~ all photos (embiggenable)

DON’T HAVE TIME TODAY FOR A LENGTHY entry cuz I’m heading off to the University of Vermont Medical Center for a prostrate reduction procedure. However, I have been giving thought to an idea, re: the medium and its apparatus, which is along the lines of this dictionary definition of a word that denotes a specific form of communication:

work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm

Any want to venture a guess about which word?

# 6882-90 / common places-things ~ I don't need no stinkin' sequences

all photos ~ (embiggenable)

IN AN ARTICLE ABOUT MOMA CURATORS OF PHOTOGRAPHY, it was written that:

“…Szarkowski’s innovative approach to exhibition design focused on the interplay between individual images and their collective impact as a series … He emphasised the importance of sequencing and presentation in the way that photographs are displayed, which shaped the way we think about photography today.”

Re: “interplay between individual images” / “impact as a series” / “sequencing and presentation” …

… I have viewed-in person-a pretty fair number of photography exhibitions (100+?) and I have a decent collection of photo books. The majority of those books and exhibitions-in galleries, museums, art centers, et al-have been solo exhibitions or monographs. That is, featuring the work of a single photographer and nearly always presented as a singular photographic “style” / genre, or, themed by referent. And, to be more precise, I tend to view only exhibits that would be classified (by most) as fine art photography; i.e. artistic expression, rather than documentary or journalistic representation.

Suffice it to write that most of those exhibitions / books have emphasized the collective impact of a series of like-minded photographs. I can not attest to how much effort was put into the sequencing of the photographs in those exhibitions / books inasmuch as, to my eye and sensibilities, much fine art photography-non document / journalistic-is not trying to tell a story but rather to create a feeling.

All of that written, I am working on putting together a book of my photographs which is based / organized under banner of good photographs. In this case “good” is defined as photographs that are visually engaging and interesting to view; the engagement and interest created, not by what is pictured (a real-world referent) but rather by how it is pictured (how I see it, aka: my vision). Needless to write, as a result of my discursive promiscuity manner of making photographs, I do not limit my picture making to a single given referent.

Which is not to write that narrowly focused referent themed bodies of work do not, over time, emerge from my cumulative body of work. I have, at last count, a dozen or so bodies of work based upon singular referents; my kitchen sink work as an example. And, I have individual photo books that illustrate each body of work. But…

… here’s the interesting thing I have come to realize - while viewers like-in a book or on a gallery wall-those various bodies of work, the books that viewers seem to like the best are the couple year-in-review photo books I have made. That is, books that are a collection of what I consider to be good photographs, regardless of the depicted real world referents, made during a given calendar year.

The photographs in those books are not trying to tell a story. Nor are they presented in referent-related sequences or chronological order. Most photographs are in color but a BW photograph might pop up here and there. And, while I am known for making square format pictures, suffice it to write, don’t try to pin me down on that.

If there is a unifying aspect to these year-in-review photographs, it is simply that they are all straight photographs. That is to write that there is no technical wizardry, special equipment, or art sauce applied. I just make pictures of what I see.

I am delighted that so many viewers of my discursive promiscuity photographs, as presented in my year-in-review photo books, do experience a collective, although often indescribable, impact from their viewing of my work. This reaction, despite the fact that I am disregarding, flaunting if you will, the conventional / traditional wisdom(s) of interplay between individual images, the importance of sequencing in the way photographs are displayed / presented, and the emphasis upon single subject bodies of work. Attributes to which I pay scant, if any, attention.

Apparently, or, at least to me, it seems that some people are capable of moving from one seemingly unrelated picture to another-in a book or exhibition-and, nevertheless, come away at the end of it all feeling that they have experienced a unified whole.

# 6879-81 / commonplaces-things • kitchen life ~ uncommon beauty

all photos ~ (embiggenable)

I WAS SEARCHING FOR A SPECIFIC STEPHEN SHORE QUOTE. Didn’t find it. However, in my search I came across this (an excerpt), written by Christy Lange, from a section-Nothing Overlooked-in the book STEPHEN SHORE:

“This was a new conception of the landscape picture….Each image is so sharp and detailed that it seems to have infinite centers of attention, or none at all. ‘If I saw something interesting, I didn’t have to make a picture about it. I could let it be somewhere in the picture, and have something else happening as well. So this changes the function of the picture-it’s not like pointing at something and saying, “Take a look at this”. It’s saying, “Take a look at this object I am making”. It’s asking you to not savor something in the world, but savor the image itself .”….Shore saw how the photograph ‘imposes order on the scene’ or ‘simplifies the jumble by giving it structure’.”

At the risk of sounding self-aggrandizing, this description of one of Shore’s pictures, Beverly Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, could easily have been written about most of my photographs inasmuch as, as mentioned in my last entry, I rarely make pictures that ask a viewer to “take a look at this”-aka: the literally depicted referent(s). Rather, I ask viewers to “take a look at this object I am making”-aka: the print in and of itself and the form depicted there upon.

Ya know, like in this entry’s pictures; for instance, I am not asking any one to “savor” the, as the wife calls it, clutter in a corner of my work room. Rather, my hope is that a viewer might “savor”, or at least appreciate / recognize, the form (Shore’s “structure”) I have attempted to illustrate as depicted on the surface of a print.

That is to write that I do not see so-called traditional beauty in the quotidian world around me but that I do believe that I make “beautiful”, visually interesting photographs thereof.

# 6878 / travel • common places ~ size matters - why I dislike nosey people

(embiggenable)

THERE ARE THOSE WHO VIEW MY PHOTOGRAPHS and come to the conclusion that I make pictures of people, places, or things. That’s somewhat understandable inasmuch as there are, in fact, people, places, or things in my photographs. That’s cuz, with the medium’s intrinsic relationship with the real world, it is very difficult to make a picture that does not include people, places, or things, or, evidence thereof.

That written, I rarely make a photograph whereby the making of which was incited by the depicted, literal referent. In fact, in most of my photographs, many viewers are confused, re: what exactly is it that I was making a picture of? That being the case, it is ever my hope that such viewers might experience a momentary revelation which enables them to see what I was actually making a picture of…

…to wit, a literal / actual depiction of how I see the world. And, to be precise, I see segments of the real world in random convergences of line, shape, space, color, and value. Elements that, when isolated from a particular POV and within a photographic frame create form. Form which can be pleasing / disturbing / agitating / confusing (take your pick) but, to my eye and sensibilities, always visually interesting. An interest which derives, not from what is literally depicted but, rather, from how it is depicted. Although, the depicted referent and the depicted form are inexorably joined.

So, all of that written, you might ask what does this have to do with size matters….?

… the size that matters is photographic print size. That is, if a picture maker’s intent is to depict form, a print must be able to be viewed in its entirety all at once. That’s cuz, the form to be seen in a photographic print can not be broken up into individual parts. And that’s cuz, whatever the “parts” of a photograph might be, they must work together as as an integrated whole otherwise the form falls apart.

That being the case, I would suggest that, while there is no one-size-fits-all print size for the viewing of form, there is a you’re-standing-too-close print viewing distance-dependent upon the size of the print-if a viewer wishes to discern the form to be seen in a print. That written, the “right” print size for the viewing of form must be determined by the viewing distance restraints of the viewing venue - a viewer must be able to stand at a distance from a print to allow for viewing its entirety all at once.

RE: nosey people. I hate it, at gallery viewing of my photographs, when viewers get nosey. That is to write, when they get their noses to close to a print to ever discern what my photographs are about. I have often thought about drawing a chalk line on a gallery floor to indicate the “proper” viewing distance. And, to enforce the idea, greet the gallery goers baseball bat in hand and letting them know that stepping over the line gets them kneecapped. Maybe even reinforcing that edict with a medic in attendance and an ambulance parked outside the gallery door.

@ 6868-77 / travel ~ excelsior, you fathead

birthday cannoli ~ (embiggenable)

Brooklyn ~ (embiggenable)

Cooperstown~ (embiggenable)

my kitchen + Brooklyn sink with window ~ (embiggenable)

EVERY YEAR-FOR THE PAST 5 YEARS-THE WIFE and I go to Cooperstown, NY where the wife has an annual conference. While she attends the conference, I play golf and hang out around the very upscale hotel on the lake. The trip also coincides with her birthday so we always go out for a nice meal. This year we also went to NYC / Brooklyn for a couple days before heading to Cooperstown (the home of the Baseball Hall of Fame). All of which brings me to the point of this entry…

….I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GONNA TAKE THIS ANY MORE…

To be precise, the “this” in question that makes me mad as hell is any utterance such as:

“It's fantastic for the things it's meant for and designed to do, but it's mainly a communication device. It can be exasperating as a camera.…they”-iPhone files-“fall far enough short of the best "real" cameras that ultimately they're just not terribly satisfying…”

iMo, those who make such utterances are; a) those who have not made the effort to understand the in and outs of how to use the iPhone photo making capabilities, b) those who are not using the RAW capture capabilities or c) don’t know how to process RAW files for maximum results, d) those who, like the commentator quoted above, are using older generation iPhones, and, e) those who are gearheads who make photos that are tack-sharp with saturated color and high dynamic range but are, nevertheless, rarely worth a second glance.

Now, to be certain, I am not proposing that an iPhone “camera” is ideal or well suited to every picture making task or that it can “satisfy” every picture maker’s aesthetic. However, that written, I am emphatically emphasising that it is perfectly capable of producing photographs that are as good-that is, expressing the intent of the photographer-any other picture making device.

Any one (me, being a prime example) who has used a wide variety of cameras-8x10 / 4x5 view cameras, medium format cameras, 35mm cameras, Polaroid cameras, and the like-knows that every camera has its own distinct peculiarities, both in their use and their rendering results. However, the only thing that matters to the picture making artist is that any given camera helps in producing his/her picture making intent.

All of the above written, just let me declare that, in a “perfect” picture making universe, I wish that picture makers would just pick whatever camera device is best for them and their intent and vision-if they even have one-and then keep their fucking yap shut and concentrate on making pictures that “satisfy” their eye and sensibilities. I might not like their pictures but that sure as hell it won’t be because of the camera they used.

FYI, during the 6 day trip I covered a lot of ground, picture making wise. l returned with 25 “keepers” which spanned multiple photography genres: landscape, street, people, night, and still life. All of the pictures were made with my iPhone 24 PRO Max camera device set to produce RAW files. And, to my eye and sensibilities, the results were very satisfying and, BTW, the “cmaera” served all of my picture making intents very well, thank you very much.