Twisted

Shooting with a wide angle lens can lead to all kinds of problems. In modern digital cameras, the geometric distortions are usually corrected automatically, but when shooting on film, you get to see your lens's faults recorded for posterity, so to speak, along with the subject of your photograph. Of course, you can correct your scans a little bit if you are so inclined. In this case, too, the ravages of time have contributed to some of the sag.

Tasting notes: Leica R8, 35mm Summicron; Ektar 100, summer.

Geometry

During the early days of the pandemic, before folks started ignoring the lockdown, I found myself drawn to photograph schools and other public spots in my area. The vacant ball fields and campuses were interesting, of course, as subjects in their own right. And they certainly looked different in their stark emptiness. But I also enjoyed being by myself in these open spaces. I never felt compelled to make a body of work with 'pandemic' explicitly in the title the way many artists did. Certainly, the pandemic influenced everyone's approach to making photographs. I guess it just takes me longer to process these things, is all.

Triptych Tuesday

There was a funky old home not too far from where we lived that was designed by a well known architect. It had been neglected for years and was what the experts refer to as a 'tear down'. So one cold February morning, we drove out to the property and made photographs for a couple of hours. It was a lot of fun. The walls were notched and angular and gave very specific views of the trees on the multi-acre lot. I still remember the old place nearly 15 years on. Not long after these photos were made, the land was subdivided and is now occupied by several large, expensive, yet somehow very uninspiring homes. I am confident that the vistas are still pretty amazing, though. 

Art or Archeology?

I've heard it said that architecture, or let's say the built environment, is one of the main visual manifestations of cultural forces. Seems like a pretty solid argument to me. And I suppose photography is one of the best tools in our quiver to interrogate the built environment in order to explore these cultural forces. The close relationship between culture and the built environment is undoubtedly why so many photographers are drawn to making images of architectural subjects. These cultural forces draw us in like moths to a flame. A critical question, in my view, is whether we approach the work as archeologists or artists.

View From a Damaged House

A number of years ago, some friends of ours lived in a pretty fabulous home designed by a well known local architect and situated on a wooded multi-acre lot just outside of town. The home had not been well cared for or maintained over the years, but the beauty of the place won out over all the leaks and creaks. Once these folks relocated, though, the property was bought up by a local developer. The old place was what they call a tear down, and we knew we had to act quickly, so one cold morning, my wife and I spent a couple of hours photographing there.

Tasting notes: Nikon D200 digital camera.  

The Planes, the Planes

One of the upsides of minimal urban planning is that willy nilly construction is often more photographically interesting than its highly choreographed alternatives. At any rate, I was parking the car when I noticed these planes interacting in an interesting way. The only missing ingredient is some directional light. 

Tasting notes: Canon digital camera.  

Layers of meaning

A variety of advanced imaging techniques have been developed by scholars to assist in the study of historical palimpsests. It has been possible to decipher important documents, to discover that certain manuscripts had been written over with liturgical texts rather than being burned, and the like.

In a similar vein, sometimes it is just simpler to repurpose an old or ugly building rather than tearing it down. As a result, architectural palimpsests abound in the modern urban landscape. Might photography be a useful tool for artists to begin to understand these elements of their built environment?

If well seen, images of architectural palimpsests can make interesting abstract compositions in their own right. If done really well, perhaps the viewer is also invited to create an accompanying narrative that leads to some new understanding on their part?

Hitting the wall...

What is it about certain photographers and walls? The more banal and suburban, or decrepit and entropic the surfaces, the better, it would seem. In the interest of full disclosure, let me state up front that in the past I have spent significant time as a card carrying member of this group, as unflattering as it may be to publicly admit such a thing. I once heard a museum director dismiss this kind of photography as being trivial — a topic only an amateur with no access to interesting subject matter would undertake. Fair enough, I suppose. 

On the other hand, the idea that there is something of formal interest in some of the resulting compositions is defendable, right? Don’t such photographs provide information about the objects in front of the lens, or insights into the mind of the photographer?