A long weekend gives me ample time to think about a new project. The draw of nature continues to inspire my photography. A 90 mile drive north and west of Albuquerque landed me in the mountains north of Grants, NM. The forests rise towards Mount Taylor. A perfect place to explore the abundance of trees that somehow continue to exist in a world of threats, both natural and man-made. My camera leads me to this place, my mind pushes me to wander further. Off the dirt road, among fallen trees, under a light dusting of snow… what will be revealed to me?
2022:43 The Blues
Cyanotype week in my studio. Damn right, I got the blues.
2022: 42 Falling Leaves
Autumn is the most beautiful season, in my opinion. Something about the temperature, the light, the scents… and above all, the leaves. Greens give way to red, gold, yellow, orange and brown. Each tree releasing their foliage in one final, triumphant burst of life affirming color. The texture of trees and of leaves has been a current fascination for me. In some ways I think I’m making up for a general disinterest in nature as a young person.
This morning, our mulberry tree in the front yard performed its annual ritual, releasing all of its leaves at once. I laid in bed and stared out the window, watching the leaves flutter to the ground… sometimes one by one…sometimes in clumps. It was a peaceful, meditative way to start the day and embrace the season.
2022: 41 First Impressions
My wandering path away from straight photography has taken me on a surprising journey. Discovering alternative ways to make imagery has felt more personal, more unique, and certainly more tactile. Case in point: I returned to the Rio Grande bosque this week, an environment I’ve photographed numerous times over the past three or four years. This time, instead of taking my camera, I carried a pad of newsprint and some charcoal for sketching. I don’t possess any real drawing skills (hence my predilection for photography) but I ended up doing a series of relief rubbings, or as the French call them: frottage. Placing paper on rough surfaces of tree bark and cut logs and rubbing with charcoal, I was able to make new images in an environment that I thought had shown me everything it was going to reveal. The act of rubbing also engaged me in ways that went beyond just seeing. There are trails made by bark beetles scattered across many fallen trees in the bosque. Their destructive paths etched onto the stripped trunks of now dead trees. They produce wonderful patterns and textures, and they provided me with a new way to visualize my own path. Twisted, organic, wandering, yet expressive.
2022:40 Putting Things Together
What do images say when they are paired together? Maybe nothing special. Maybe something extraordinary.
2022: 39 Twenty Four Frames Per Second
The line between moving pictures and still photography is thin, and vast at the same time. So much in common, and so much much unique to each. I have played with moving imagery throughout my life, in parallel yet separate lanes from my still photography. This week, some of those lines bot blurred, some of the lanes got crossed.
I took a film workshop this past Sunday, run by the cinematic renegades at Basement Films. I got to play with old 16mm movie film, culled from an archive of educational and industrial films. A few arms-lengths of old film, hand manipulated, then spliced to create a loop. Think of it as a handmade animated GIF.
There is something magical about film: the feel of it, the look of it, the tiny replications of reality. Even more so when laid out in strips, 24 frames making a second of moving imagery. Each frame its own sliver of time. Each frame its own still photograph.
Central Ave and Morningside SE
2022:38 The Light
Many years ago, before I moved to New Mexico, I read somewhere about “the light.” The unique New Mexico light. The convergence of altitude, lack of pollution and maybe, something else, something magical. The light here is something I can take for granted. I sometimes resent the sunshine that arrives almost on a daily basis…300+ days a year here. Oh, please just a few more cloudy, overcast, grey, rainy days. But then, I roll up to my office, and see a simple street corner, bathed in perfect October light. No clouds. No filters. This is what “the light” can do; what it can show. And I am reminded, and I am grateful.
2022: 37 Black Hole Sun
I often think about the status of the art of photography. Is it diminishing in value? Is it more ubiquitous, hence less important? Is it a means of expression that is less relevant than it once was? Has it been tarnished by its sheer omnipresence? Many of us who use this medium as a mode of expression probably wrestle with these questions. Yet, we continue to toil away at our craft, ignoring the change in the weather (metaphorically speaking.)
Daido Moriyama, a photographer I greatly admire, once released a body of work titled “Farewell Photography.” One could interpret the title as his own personal goodbye to the medium, and a look at the images from this series would certainly validate that opinion. Grainy, overly contrasty, scratched, water damaged and generally abused, the photographs felt like an extreme that could not be returned from. We know from history that Moriyama did indeed return from this precipice in his personal work, still photographing to this day. However, if we look at the title as a broader statement, I think its relevant to consider the idea of saying farewell to photography as something that still resonates today.
The image above is a film leader from a roll of 110 film I shot earlier this year. A simple, throwaway strip of film stock. But when I scanned it, I saw other things emerge. A sky, devoid of the brightness of the sun. Ab scorched landscape. The universe in a smattering of dust. An existential landscape. The end of straight, photographic representation? Is this even a photograph? It is a piece of film, exposed in a camera, and contextualized by my eye, my brain. Is it nothing or is it everything? Perhaps both? Is it a wrench thrown into the mechanisms of the forever churning, social media fueled, torrent of images? I’ll leave that for you to ponder.
2022:36 Panacea
I often struggle with boredom, as noted numerous times in this blog. When boredom sticks around too long, it’s dark sibling depression is not far behind. I could put it more poetically, and say that melancholia and ennui are frequent visitors to my life; part of an ever growing segment of humanity, I know, I know. In any event, the only thing that keeps the wolves at bay, it seems, is activity. Idle hands are the devil’s playground, no joke. I’m grateful to have my little art studio where I can keep my hands and my mind occupied when not much else is going on. No need for grand artistic statements; sometimes it’s just doing “the work” that is its own reward. It’s the process, not the product, after all. Case in point, I started making little, mini zines this week. One sheet of paper, folded a few times, then bound in some scrap test prints. Voila, instant art. Oh, yeah, these things are small. See battery photo above for scale. No matter, it’s a great little exercise in assembly, sequencing and focus. Not sure what I’m going to do with these. They accumulate quickly. Most likely I’ll distribute them freely, most likely anonymously. Small visual haikus for the universe. A small ray of light from the darkness.
2022: 35 Boredom
“Boredom is the dream bird that hatches the egg of experience.
A rustling in the leaves drives him away.”
- Walter Benjamin
