# 6350-52 / common places • common things ~ I'm a shooter

December 6, 2022

I'm a shooter

he's a shooter she's a shooter we're all a shooter
aren’t you happy to be a shooter too?

I AM BEGGINING TO COBBLE TOGETHER A FEW words, re: the introduction essay, for the Philosophy of Modern Pictures project / book. The above words-tip o’ hat to the early Dr. Pepper I’m a Pepper tv commercial jingle-are the leading candidate for the essay title.

The use of the word shooter derives from the aforementioned mentioned-a previous entry-interaction with a young hipster-body jewelry, “cool” hair style + color, et al-bartender in an upscale restaurant bar who asked me if I was a “shooter”. I was confused-was she asking if I wanted a shot of bourbon? was I packing heat? Noting my confusion, she pointed out that she had noticed my cap with the KODAK logo. Thus informed of that, it gave me license to answer that, “Yes. I’m a shooter.”

Apparently the younger generation thinks it cool to be a shooter. That being the case, for purposes of the book, it’s good enough for me.

Re: we’re all a shooter - OK. I get it. Not everyone is a shooter inasmuch as not everyone has a picture making device, However, with the fact that 1.7 trillion pictures are made / taken (whatever) a year and that there are 8 billion humans on the planet, the average number of pictures per human is 125 per year. And, this might be a bit of a surprise, 92.5% of pictures are made with a picture making device which can also be used to make a phone call. Only 7% are made with a “real” camera.

FYI, while the book will have some facts, figures, history, re: picture making, the emphasis will be on how, as the result of the ease of making “good” pictures-i.e. sharp, correctly exposed, referent in focus and the like-the boundaries of what can be pictured and how it can be pictured has expanded like never before.

# 6347-49 / common places • common things ~ memory and conjecture

December 5, 2022

EVERY TIME I READ YET ANOTHER ARTIST STATEMENT written by a member of the Academic Lunatic Fringe, Photography Division, such as this…

….is a photographic case study based on still lifes that emerge from inherited trauma and post memory, exploring the family as an essential contributor to psychological and cultural processes across history….Immersing myself into this story, I fill the gaps with dreams, associations, and imagined scenes to create a narrative transgressing personal and national boundaries. The objects and architecture of the house become parabolic proxies and open a gate between the past and the present….By confronting a past spanning across four generations, a renewed sense of identity provides ground for a detailed investigation of post memory, mental health, war, and history.

…the first thing that pops in my head is this…

"...it's been quite some time since I read an artist speak so eloquently and clearly about the world beyond his/(her) own asshole." ~ Bill Jay

Now here’s the thing that gets me all agita laden…in this particular case-like most other ALF work-I really do not give a crap about the picture maker’s “study” about their inner life / personal make-up / struggles. AKA, “inherited trauma and post memory”.

ASIDE And, to be clear on the mater, I do not give a crap about any picture maker’s personal life. I might like to read / hear a picture maker’s thoughts, re: the medium and its apparatus, but, unlike the ALF crowd’s writing / art-speak (really? ….”objects and architecture of the house become parabolic proxies), I like to read / hear those picture maker’s thoughts expressed in good ol’ fashion, plain-spoken English. END OF ASIDE

But of course art-speak artist statements are long-winded gimcrackery cuz, to the ALF crowd, it is all about meaning. The actual referents are secondary. So consequently, again in this case (as is usually the case), the pictures are nothing to write home about and, to my eye sensibilities, offer little grist for prolonged viewing. And, no matter how long I look at them, they never attain the status of providing, for me, a “ground for a detailed investigation of post memory, mental health, war, and history.”

Of course, I am willing to admit that maybe I just missed it (the meaning) but, then again, I do not look at pictures for the purpose of finding “ground for a detailed investigation of post memory, mental health, war, and history.”

All of that written, I have to wonder where and when it was that Academia went so far off the rails as to propagate the idea that the very thing one sees on the wall of a gallery or in a photographer’s monograph is secondary to what the thing means. Not to mention the emphasis placed on the long-winded, art-speak infused, and TMI, re: angst and struggles, all of which is an attempt to drive home the exact meaning baked into one’s pictures. Ya know, just in case the un-washed, un-educated rabble don’t see it.

Re: my pictures - all I hope for is to put enough in them to interest and seduce the eye, cuz it’s a visual art, and, as a bonus, to stir in the viewer both memory and conjecture.

# 6345-46 / common places • common things ~ juxtaposition and disjunction

December 2, 2022

I HAVE ADDED A NEW GALLERY TO MY WORK page titled discursive promiscuity. The pictures are presented as book pages- that is, as they would appear in a book (or framed on a gallery wall). FYI, in a book, each picture would be on 1 page of a 2 page spread.

While my photographs do not strictly conform to a specific genre-other than my own personal genre, aka: discursive promiscuity-in the cause of presenting them in a book, I do wish to borrow from one of the tenets of the snapshot genre:

Subject matter is often presented without apparent link from image-to-image and relying instead on juxtaposition and disjunction between individual photographs.

… the work, aka: The Philosophy of Modern Pictures, goes on.