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IT HAS BEEN QUITE A WHILE SINCE I made a decay and disgust picture. That may due simply to the fact that a resident of the house has been remarkably scrupulous about keeping the frig clear of such picture making items. Perhaps it is time for me to start cultivating and harvesting such picturesque items.
That written, I have no idea what my decay and disgust pictures mean.
you only live once ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
MERRY HOLIDAYS, EVEN THOUGH I AM A DAY LATE and a dollar short (as the saying goes).
Actually, due to a mis-communication between the wife and myself, I am more than a dollar short on account of the fact that I spent $540.00USD on a very limited, recently released bottle of Bob Dylan’s Bootleg (Vol II) bourbon. FYI, the bottle is adorned with Dylan’s Sunset, Monument Valley painting. The leather case is individually numbered.
However, one question remains, drink it or save it as an investment? Last year’s Bootleg (Vol I ) limited release is sold out. Currently it sells for $1,000.00USD on the secondary market. And, the price will only go up.
I’ve been taking my temperature more often lately ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
the light switches are in the off position ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
carpet protects the porch floor from heel marks ~ (embiggenable) • iPhone
ON MY LAST ENTRY, A COMMENT WAS LEFT BY STEPHEN McATEER:
Some people I used to read on the internet seemed to think that a photograph had to have 'Meaning' to be any good….My own view is that it is a good photograph if it pleases the eye. Meaning does not interest me in the least.
To clarify my thoughts on meaning to be seen / found in a photograph, I believe every photograph ever made has some meaning or another, even if only to the individual who made it. However, that written, once the photograph is offered for viewing to those other than the maker, what the photograph means (if anything) is anyone’s guess.
Truth be written, I spent a lot of time, used a lot of internet space, and typed a zillion words over the years (on this blog and my previous blog) speculating / festering, one might even say “obsessing” about meaning in photographs. ASIDE: Stephen might even have been taking a shot at me, re: “used to read on the internet” wise. END OF ASIDE That endeavor was due primarily to my concern, re: did my pictures have any meaning? That concern was based up my very loose acceptance of the idea that “a photograph had to have 'Meaning' to be any good”.
After intense and protracted looking for meaning in my pictures, I discovered that, shockingly, there was none to be seen / found. However, what I did find was that all of my “good” pictures shared a common characteristic - that is, they all incited feelings and sensations instigated by their visual-senses activation. There was nothing to" “interpret”, nothing to “understand”. Their “goodness” was predicated upon how a picture looked and how that “look” pricked my eye and sensibilities.
If how a picture looks is the basis for a viewer to look for meaning in a picture-literary, cultural, art theory, historic connections, et al-so be it. I am not suggesting that there is nothing of the sort to be seen /found in my pictures. However, in the making of my pictures I am not trying to instill / insert any meaning. My intent is to make visible the experiences I see / feel as I traverse the planet-with my eyes wide open-in a manner that pricks my eye and sensibilities and of those who view my pictures.
That written, and despite the fact that the visual referent(s) depicted in most of my pictures is not what the pictures are about, some of those pictures can, and do, hold special meaning for me.
So, when all is written / said and done, I do not see meaning v. pleasing to the eye as mutually exclusive ideas. My only problem with meaning in photography is with those who elevate meaning, aka: content, over form. Or, when doing so, eviscerate a picture by dissecting / breaking it down into pieces.
FYI, you may noticed the non sequitur-like captions with the pictures in this entry. I am playing with the idea of mis-direction, re: providing a caption to a picture which causes a viewer to try to figure out what a picture is really about cuz it can not possibly be about what the caption seems to imply that it is about.
from Life Without the APA body of work ~ (embiggenable) 8x10 view camera + µ4/3
LET ME BEGIN THIS ENTRY WITH A VERSE FROM LYLE LOVETT’S Here I Am song (it will make sense later):
Given that true intellectual and emotional compatibility
Are at the very least difficult
If not impossible to come by
We could always opt for the more temporal gratification
Of sheer physical attraction
That wouldn't make you a shallow person
Would it?
Add to that a link to a Stephen Shore picture, Holden Street, North Adams, Massachusetts. FYI, the street image in my picture in this entry was created long before I was aware of Shore’s picture. Nor was the composite image made with a single thought of imitating Shore’s picture.
OK then, now I can move onto the point of this entry…
I was skimming through a book of Stephen Shore pictures, interviews and commentary when I came across a commentary, re: the aforementioned linked picture, by Joel Sternfeld. The commentary, which ran to 7 pages in length, started as follows:
Stephen Shore’s photograph of a summer morning setting on Holden Street in North Adams, Massachusetts, appears to be a picture replete with dualities, the most obvious being that of town and countryside. The brick commercial buildings bookend a panel of green hills and blue sky as if the entirety were a early Christian altarpiece. The most sacred panel, the center one, contains an image of a deity , which in the secular case turns out to be a wooden building of pure white. The building stands in front of a mountain, a standard symbol of spiritual elevation.
After this “Christian altarpiece, sacred panel, deity, standard symbol of spiritual elevation” Art Major-ish search for meaning, aka: interpretation, Sternfeld-whose pictures I admire-goes on 7 page literary, cultural, architectural, historic, photo theory laden exposition / academic treatise that, iMo and for me, adds little, if anything, to the pure visual senses enjoyment of just looking at the picture. Which is not to write that, for Sternfeld, it does not matter inasmuch as all his interpretation stuff goes to the cause of justifying his appreciation of the picture cuz, without it, it’s just a picture.
Nor am I suggesting that my Life without the APA picture(s)-and pictures like it made by others-do not contain dualities, symbols, cultural / literary references, et al if it is a viewer’s propensity to “see” such things. However, my intent in the making of those pictures was simply to illustrate how the Adirondack forest preserve might look like-and consequently, feel like-without the protection / oversight of the APA. And, in doing so, create pictures which tell that story without requiring that the viewer have a Phd in Art History or Art Theory to “get it”.
In any event, back to Lyle Lovett and the relevance of his lyrics to this entry.
It seems to me that Joel Sternfeld (and others like him who are given to the nearly compulsive desire to discern meaning and interpretation in pictures) needs to find a feeling of “true intellectual and emotional compatibility” with a photograph-a feeling which is “at the very least difficult If not impossible to come by” (for mere mortals)-in order that he not succumb to the temptation of “the more temporal gratification of sheer physical attraction” to a picture and thus descend into the realm of becoming “a shallow person”.
Adirondacks / Blue Mt. Lake, NY ~ (embiggenable) • Nikon F3 / color negative film
Finger Lakes Region, NY ~(embiggenable) • view camera / color negative film
Rochester, NY ~ (embiggenable) • view camera / color negative film
INTERESTINGLY ENOUGH VERY FEW “SERIOUS” PICTURES MAKERS, Adirondack residents wise, (if any) make pictures which make visible the hand of humankind in the Adirondacks. Picture wise, I mean pictures made for display in galleries, et al. Even Adirondack Life Magazine, in its annual Adk Life calendar, selects reader images which, surprise, surprise, evidence only pictures made in the god’s-own-garden genre.
That written, I was honored to have a multi-page-one picture per page-feature spread in Adirondack Magazine. The feature was not an assignment, rather it was of pictures selected from my picture library. I am happy to write that there was not a single god’s-own-garden picture to be seen therein. On a side note, the art director had the courage to use my dead deer in a pickup bed picture. And, lo and behold, the feature was awarded an Award of Merit at the International Regional Magazines Award Event.
You can read about it and see the spreads here.
first spread ~ (embiggenable)
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WARNING: RANT TO FOLLOW…I just gotta get this monkey off my back…
…a couple days ago, I come across-over on T.O.P.-yet another exquisite example of Landscape Porn adulation. You know what to expect, picture wise, when you read picture descriptions like…
“The photographs are consistently beautiful, running the gamut from stunning vistas in perfect evening light, to dramatic storm-scapes, to telling details. Without exception they are technically immaculate, stunningly detailed, with a beautiful yet restrained color palette.”
Or, perhaps I should write, I know what to expect - puerile, romanticized, schmaltz / dreck. To be certain, uninspired, follow-the-camera-club-landscape-picture-making-rules landscape pictures are rather commonplace and, to be honest, should not be grounds for near apoplectic fits on my part. But the fact is, they most often incite such a reaction to my tender landscape picture sensibilities.
However, it is not the picture’s visual qualities-or lack thereof-that sets me off. Rather, it is the ongoing perpetuation of the big lie. Once again, I quote John Szarkowski (from the Introduction to the Robert Adams book, THE NEW WEST):
“As Americans we are scarred by the dream of innocence. In our hearts we believe that the only truly beautiful lanscape is an unpeople one. Unhappily, much in the record of out tenancy on this continent serves to confirm this view. So to wash our eyes of this depressing evidence we have raced deeper and deeper in the wilderness, pass the last stage-coach stop and the last motel, to see and claim a section of God’s own garden before our fellows arrive to despoil it…[N]ow however we are beginning to realize that there is no wilderness left…[A]s this recognition takes a firmer hold on our consciousness, it may become clear that a generous and accepting attitude toward nature requires we learn to share the earth not only with ice, dust, mosquitoes, starlings, coyotes, and chicken hawks, but even with other people.”
Just in case you don’t get it, let me be clear, pictorially, I am sick unto death of sappy, escapist, god’s own garden sentimentality. Walk as far you will into the so-called untouched-by-humankind wilderness, but the fact remains, there is no such thing as untouched by humankind.
My position on this situation, picture making wise, falls directly in line with the words of Robert Adams in his book, WHAT CAN WE BELIEVE WHERE:
“In common with many photographers, I began making pictures because I wanted to record what supports hope: the untranslatable mystery and beauty of the world. Along the way, however, the camera also caught evidence against hope, and I eventually concluded that this too belonged in pictures if they were to be truthful and useful….[A]s much as I try to stay away from abstactions, I often find myself asking three questions, and I repeat them here as a point of entry into this book: What does our geography compel us to believe? What does it allow us to believe? And what obligations, if any, follow from our beliefs?
So, some might think, shame on me-Adams, Szarkowski, et al-for even suggesting that a picture maker might have, in some situations, obligations in their picture making endeavors. What am I, some kind of a picture making commie, socialist, bleeding-heart, pinko? How dare I even hint that a picture should be truthful and/or somehow actually useful? You know, useful, as in, more meaningful than its use as an object of escapist decoration.
And, please, do not try to rationalize such escapist tripe as playing a part in raising people’s awareness of / appreciation for “nature”. Given that such pictures have been adorning walls, calendars, books, et al for generations, the evidence-the current state of the planet’s environmental state / health-can only support the fact that it ain’t getting that job done.
FYI, if you are wondering why I am so passionate about this issue, it is simply because I live in very unique place, the so-called Adirondack Park (it’s not a park, it is a forest preserve) the largest publicly protected wilderness area-and the largest National Historic Landmark-in the contiguous United States-bigger than Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Glacier, and the Great Smokies National Parks combined.
The place is unique in that Adirondack forest preserve is a combination of public and private lands dedicated to the practice that the public lands are protected-by the NYS Constitution-as forever wild and together with the private lands are under the regulation of the Adirondack Park Agency, created in 1971 by the New York State Legislature to develop long-range land use plans for both public and private lands within the boundary of the Park. To date, this regulated public / private land use has demonstrated that humankind and the natural world can co-exist to the benefit of both. Read more about it here
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JOHN SZARKOWSKI WROTE (c.1976):
…it is true, as I believe it is, that today’s most radical and suggestive color photography derives most of its vigor from commonplace models…[I]n the past decade a number of photographers have begun to work in color in a more confident, more natural, and yet more ambitious spirit, working not as though color were a separate issue, a problem to be solved in isolation (not thinking of color as photographers seventy years ago thought of composition), but rather as though the world itself existed in color, as though the blue and the sky were one thing….[they] accept color as existential and descriptive; the pictures are not photographs of color, any more than they are photographs of shapes, texture, objects, symbols, or events, but rather photographs of experience, as it has been ordered and clarified within the structures imposed by the camera.
And, speaking of experience, here’s what Joel Meyerowitz had to say:
“I don’t want to talk about one aspect of these pictures over the rest. The fact is, I’m trying to photograph the wholeness of my experience. I’m trying to pass that experience back into the world…[T]hat’s what it’s about-the location of the subject, it’s about the passage of the experience itself, the wholeness, though you back into the world, selected by your native instincts. That’s what artists do. They separate their experience from the totality, from raw experience, and it’s the quality of their selections that makes them visible to the world.”
Add to the idea, re: Szarkowski’s and Meyerowitz’s photographing experience, Meyerowitz’s sensation of “feeling”…:
“I see things-this is my life-I look; I make visual images…[I]t’s what I’ve done since I was a kid. I feel things…[I] love sensations. But ,within the limited range of sensations that I am responsive to, certain optical things excite me...[I]f I am in a good place, where there’s lots of visual activity, I become supersensitive. I receive many signals and I pick and choose among them.”
…and I have started to think that I need to reassess the idea of so-called “vision “ as it is most commonly bantered about / understood in the “serious” amateur picture making world.
Pittsburgh, PA ~ (embiggenable) iPhone, c. 2019
Rochester, NY ~ (embiggenable) 8x10 view camera, c. 1981
Rochester, NY ~ (embiggenable) 8x10 view camera, c. 1981
JUMPING INTO THE WAY-BACK MACHINE, c.2010, I received an invite to the opening reception of the exhibition, Pioneers of Color ~ Stephen Shore, Joel Meyerowitz, William Eggleston, at the Edwynn Houk Gallery in NYC. Knowing that Shore and Meyerowitz were to be in attendance, I drove to NYC through a nasty snowfall cuz I was not going to miss opening night.
Meyerowitz was my inspiration for diving into large format color picture making. Hence, I adopted his picture making MO - 8x10 view camera with tungsten balanced (3200K) Type L (long exposure) color negative film. The exhibition was fantastic and my perseverance in getting there was rewarded with a nice conversation with Meyerowitz wherein we both shared our surprise and amazement with the expanded color range and highlight / shadow detail we were getting by scanning our color negatives and printing the files with high-end inkjet printers.
FYI, the resulting prints were so different from the results from the same negatives using the C-print process, that we both felt as if we were viewing a brand new picture. The difference was simply amazing.
2 of the Pioneers / me sniffing a Meyerowitz print ~ (embiggenable) • µ4/3