Elysium

The Mid-Career Artist Makes Art Amidst a Career

2011-07-12T14:58:00.000-07:00

Where about this whole thing started...

...and where it seems to be taking me.

What is this Wondrous Place?

2011-07-06T20:09:00.000-07:00

I spent the weekend outside of Ely, MN at a lodge on White Iron Lake. It's a pretty amazing place. I could sit in a kayak on that lake forever. But it was, after all Independence Day weekend. So of course, there was a parade as well.

Even saw some Twin Cities friends on the parade route!

Pride Parade in the Celebration Capital: New Orleans

2011-06-30T16:41:00.000-07:00

We saw brass bands, cajun dancing, a flash mob, and the epicenter of daily news reporting in NOLA...and then it was Pride day....

Who is Jason Dottley, anyway?

An Education: The Lexicography of Katrina

2011-06-23T16:09:00.000-07:00

Each year - usually in June or September, my colleague Becky Olstad and I head to New Orleans with a group of student photographers and filmmakers.

This is a tremendously gratifying teaching experience, because one gets to watch the students gestate over the week into more confident, skillful and artful practitioners. As a Chair of both Film and Photo prog

rams, this is also a golden time for me to understand the usefulness, or lack thereof of equipment, the efficacy of the curriculum, and to get meaningful feedback about the programs through simple observation of work practices and verbal abilities.

We plan little trips here and there to immerse them in...well, New Orleans. One of those trips is to the Times-Picayune. Every year the Photography Department generously allows our student s(and the two instructors) to meet them, and shadow their assignment for a half day.

Yesterday was that trip. we always split up...A couple of students and I went with photo-journalist John McCusker. Who was on assignment to cover the ground breaking of the new WYES tv studio. We learned that sometimes the best pictures to be made are those that don't conform to the camera-ready moments created to be photographed. John made a great picture of the station's general manager in the doorway of the soon-to-be demolished original studio (built in 1957). We also had the privilege of meeting Dave Walker, who was writing the accompanying article.

After the assignment, John drove us to Gentilly, and walked us up on to the bridge over the London Avenue Canal (very near where one of my tree pictures was made on Warrington), explained the levee breeches to the students, how the levees were built and why they failed, and shared his own story from the massive failure of the Federal Government built levees in 2005.

I learned something too. Language is important. It seems simple, but I think John might have cleared his throat a little if I'd said, "Katrina" just now. Understanding that the language of even description and problem-solving (especially the dismissive lack of compassion in saying something aloud like the very oft stated, "Well it's a swamp, what did they expect.") in a community living with the impact of catastrophic disaster and the PTSD that comes with it, can be the most damaging wind of all.

This bit of monologue, delivered by John, stuck with me most of our whole conversation: "Three days after the levees failed, people are still dying in their houses, and the Speaker of the House said, "I'd have to think long and hard about rebuilding that place. Looks to me like a lot of that place could be bulldozed." That's the speaker of the House. So the first words out of his mouth aren't compassion for the dead, compassion for the 100,000 plus people who are homeless. The first words out of his mouth are, "well we've gotta think about what we're going to do...." Now, is that the sickest thing you've ever heard?"

He also spoke to the students about the term "Media"..."What does media even mean?!" He rattled off far more than I can recall (I had video to aid in my last quote), but he said the disks we record are media, the news we watch--get specific was his urging. I guess that is journalism, isn't it? Scratch away at the surface of everything you hear, get specific, ask questions, keep at it until you get down to that kernel of truth. Think. And never ever say the events of August 2005 were a natural disaster.

So thanks, John, for the schooling. You are a mean driver of both a car and the truth.

PDN Photo of the Day!

2010-12-18T09:27:00.000-08:00

This happened yesterday. But even cooler was hearing from an arborist who, after Katrina, relocated from New Orleans to Eureka Springs, AK with his family. He took the time to email me and say that the work touched him. It meant a lot to have someone who was from New Orleans, and an arborist, take the time to get in touch and say he liked my work.

It also reminded me about my end-of-the-year contribution to Parkway Partners NOLA. As artists, I know many of us are focused on that check to an arts-related non-profit, etc. This is an organization that is partnering with the Parks Department of New Orleans to re-plant the city. They are a solid organization with a hopeful purpose, so if you too are thinking about donations at this time of year, I urge you to consider Parkway Partners. Let's face it, a lot of us are cutting one down for Christmas. Why not help plant one back where it will really count?

Happy Holidays.

A Week of New Experiences

2010-10-05T20:16:00.000-07:00

I got back Friday from a week in New Orleans with my colleague Becky, and nine students. When your week starts like the below, it would seem hard to top. But this Second Line was followed by Cajun dancing at Tippitina's, fishing villages, Walker Evans, Times-Picayune ride-alongs, and fried catfish served on a shaded porch. I want to thank my students who through their projects, everytime we do this, teach me more about this city that has taken my heart.

In the DVD of Your Art Life, What are the Extra Features?

2010-06-16T17:09:00.000-07:00

I seldom reminisce about being in school. You might think this may be because five days a week, I still go to school. But mostly it's because I don't miss the sleepless nights, reading things I don't want to, or tuition. This is true until I have a day like today, when I get to go back to school. I was selected to participate in one of the Creative Capital professional development trainings on maximizing presence on the internet.

When I received the bios on our seminar leaders last week, I was floored by the people who were going to be leading the training, Steve Lambert, Brad Lichtenstein, and Dread Scott.

I started my day across the table from a guy with a ball jar full of what I imagine was wheat grass juice next to a dogeared black portfolio case--it was like an episode of "The Next Great Artist" on Bravo. But Miles was nowhere to be found, and stereotypes really were few and far between. And you know, I don't mind pointing out the ironic. The truth is, we need a heck of a lot more representations of artists like the people who led this workshop today, and a lot less of the caricatures TV is delivering to the greater non art making public.

What was really spectacular about the day was that the 30+ people in the room were visual artists, composers, musicians, performance artists, and writers, and we were as diverse in their knowledge of how to market ourselves, particularly in the multitude of vehicles the internet has to offer-- and in spite of that, Steve, Brad, and Dread managed to keep it interesting and followable for all levels.

The hard part of the day for me was goal setting. I'm terrible at it. But I managed to eke out a manageable goal: I want to have an average of 50 hits per day on my web site by June of next year. Time wise it seems manageable. And at a current rate of one to six hits per day (in spite of my fifteen minutes a couple of months ago thanks to Tinsley Mortimer), it's a stretch to get to 50. And criterion three, falsifiable? Heck yeah.

Of course, with all the superb interlinking of Facebook, Twitter, use of an aggregating program for efficiency, and strategic friending and following, who knows? It could get to 53. There were far too many take-aways to share here, and still get a tweet in before sundown, but the stand outs were Brad's philosophy on privacy settings issues: "Keep what you want private off the internet." Then there was Steve trying to get us to think about ways we can create what was referred to as a "sticky web site": Figure out what the extra features are going to be if your web site is a DVD of your art practice. I think it was also Steve who, in trying to get us to think about the idea of small giveaways--be they limited edition art or tips and tricks, "Stealing artist techniques from the internet is not a great way to steal money. There are no Nigerian scams to steal money with directions on how to construct a video game cabinet."

Anyway, all in all, I've come away really rejuvenated by the day, and wish I had been accepted into more of the available seminars. All of this was funded by the Legacy Funds approved through a Minnesota constitutional amendment to create a small sales tax increase through 2034. What an amazing gift. Thanks MSAB, Springbord for the Arts, neighbors, legislators, and tourists. If this one day helped me get so much further along in the marketing of my work, I cannot imagine how many lives these funds will touch thousands of artists here over the next 24 years!

The Perfect Application

2010-06-05T12:56:00.000-07:00

Recently, in our semi-annual ritual (at a bar of course), my friend Chris and I found ourselves seventh-guessing the words and images we'd selected for the most recent grant/exhibition/job from which one or both of us had been rejected. I reminded him of an email he wrote to me in February, and how I'd said that it should be his next grant proposal. And I really meant it--it had it all--a good story that spoke about the work, the repetition of paths, the need, and it was funny...but alas, he did not use it.

I get why he didn't--aside from the preposterous word limitation, in the end, we all believe that we have to be serious, because this may be our year! And we shouldn't waste this chance on silliness. We work in a field where we are expected to create our work regardless of financial ability, pay to get our work seen by the people who make a difference in the field, pay to frame and round-trip ship our work, should it be selected, give it to museums for deep discounts or give it away altogether, let our galleries pay their rent with our share of the sales proceeds, etc. We shouldn't waste this chance on silliness. I know. It hurts to read, doesn't it?

Maybe we ought to embrace the silliness. Uh, no, I know you already do by participating in the field of art, I mean tell your real story. Make these judges remember what it takes to make your work, and make them remember you.

Without further ado, I give you, the words he should have used:
"I feel I have to admit something to you, quite reluctantly. Sometime in the winter of 2008, when we were all crazed with beating that little Welsh prick's impossible quiz, I gave you a ride home from the bar. No big deal. About three months later, I embarked on my cross-country Photographic-I-Just-Quit-My-Job-Lost-My-Girl-What-Will-I-Do?-Journey. That was in May, and I had, like the good planner I was, packed for summer. Well, it was still winter in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Freezing my ass off on the south shore of Lake Superior, wearing virtually every piece of clothing I had packed, I ventured into the car for a book of matches I hoped would be lurking under the passenger seat. Low and behold, I found the matches, and a nice warm New Orleans Saints cap. It is arguable which was the bigger life saver but the hopeless smoker in me will lean toward the matches. I can take a little frost bite of the ears. I hate to listen anyway. Regardless, I owned that cap. I wore it for the entire month of May, all across Michigan and upstate New York.

Anyway, when I got back I thought of returning it to you, but the little bastard in me thought, no, lets make it a joke. I drafted a thank you letter from Ray Nagin along the lines of "This is a gift for your tireless interest in our civic plight." I even downloaded the city letter head. It seemed a little mean, so I shelved it and instead found the whiskey that I had stored at the liquor store down the street. The hat stayed in the car, beneath the passenger seat, next to a now purposely planted book of emergency matches and a bone that did not agree with the dog.

So, a few days ago I left Minneapolis for Wisconsin on another quixotic mission, following the route of the fur trade as a meta-narrative for all of the range work. Well I'll be damned if I didn't forget my hat, which is pretty silly considering it is February and not May. I was cursing my stupidity all the way from Menominee to Eau Claire, where I was headed to drop off the dog.

Being unemployed and broke, I didn't relish the idea of dropping ten bucks on a hat. Well, miracle of miracles, when I got to Eau Claire and let the dog out, the movement of the seat unearthed the Saints hat. Halla-fucking-llueia. I discharged the dog, ate from my parent's fridge like a teenager, and set off on my way to Green Bay, the nexus of the fur trade in the continental U.S. and the home of the Green Bay Packers, my home team and secret heroes.

Well hell, the light was so so but I spent the whole day making the same pictures I always make and a few I had never thought of making, all the while being sneered at by people. I chalked it up to a general uncivil disposition and went about my day, trying very hard not to make any photographs of shop windows, errant vines, or murals. (2,1,3. Can't help myself.) Anyway, the light fades and I make my way to the motel I booked through Priceline for 20 bucks. It is right across the street from Lambeau Field. (Here is a good time to mention that throughout the entire day I encountered only three people not adorned in some way with Packer's garb. And I encountered a lot of people.) Anyway, I'm checking in and the behemoth of a man behind the desk, be-decked in a Packer's sweatshirt, baseball cap, and sweatpants, will not talk to me. I am using my best "I just had a shot of whiskey, I know how to shoot the shit" dialogue and he won't make eye contact. After an awkward couple of minutes he slips me the key, (Yes, key. The room was 28 bucks.), and says to me, "It should have been Farve's year. Enjoy your room."

Bewildered, I take the key, grab my shit from the car, and head to the room. Only upon entering the room and seeing my reflection in the nicotine yellowed mirror, Saint's hat and all, did it occur to me what an egregious sin I had committed, and how my safety might be in question in Green Bay.

Anyway, sorry I stole your hat but I sort of got what was coming to me. The night is still young, I might get more.
Chris
P.S.
You can have it back if I survive, but no way am I washing it."

My Brush with Reality

2010-04-11T10:07:00.000-07:00

I'm not ashamed to admit it, I check my Google Analytics. I don't do it too often, because it's usually a mind-bendingly depressing reminder that I am making pictures in a huge vacuum....presently with an empty bag. Let's call 7-10 hits a "banner day." Anyhoo, imagine my surprise last month when I wandered in there to make myself feel bad about, well-- myself, and I'd had 743 visits in one day. I started to dig, wondering why if I'd been featured on one of the photography blogs, none of my friends had mentioned it. I've stopped feeding the things, as I grew weary of seeing melancholy color portraits--figure in the center of the frame, insert bed-chair-makeshift curtain made of tablecloth-charming provincial table-beach-Louis XVI sofa...but I digress...I'm not very good at the analytics, so it took a lot of rock-fishing, and my friend Tom, before I discovered that my web site had been a link from a review of a new reality television show called High Society, that features a Manhattan society darling (sort of), called Tinsley Mortimer. No, it's not a typo. And yes, it does sound like the name of a feline, not a human adult.

Apparently our central character was a Sponsor at the Bal du Bois in Richmond, Virginia. No, it's not a typo. They decided that "debutante" had become a derogatory word, so they now call them "sponsors." At least they do that in Richmond. I photographed the 50th Anniversary of the Baldu Bois about four years ago (and would welcome the opportunity again--if anyone on that board is reading), and have a very slim sampling of the work on my site. It was an absolutely fascinating, foreign yet familiar scene of a celebration of womanhood, and a solid charity fund-raising. My interest was the preparations and the relationships between the generations of women. In speaking with the Sponsors, I found out that there is this whole season, where each young woman hosts a party, and the others attend with one of three escorts (who are not suitors) that are determined to serve as a sort of chaperone, I suppose, through the season. I was dead sick that night, and felt like death, I've wanted to return ever since, but the Bal, isn't so googlable, if you will. Which is why the television critic at Slate.com used my photographs as a link to reference Ms. Mortimer's past.

I felt a certain obligation to watch the show, and forced a friend to watch too (sorry Justin, again, and truly). It was repugnant (a far shorter assessment than the Slate.com one which afforded me my head swelling numbers on Google Analytics). So it wasn't a photography blog, but it was kind of better.

PDN and the Plight of Photographing in Haiti

2010-01-20T15:26:00.000-08:00

"Photographers in Haiti Face Shortages of Fuel, Water, Housing, and Food"

That's what the headline reads. In retrospect, perhaps there was another way to put it, so the barrage of Onion parodies didn't flood the airwaves, but it happens to be what the article is about. David Walker and Holly Hughes posted a piece on the PDN web site last Friday, that had the audacity to discuss the problem of making work in the terrible crisis continuing to unfold in Haiti.

The piece talked about how photographers are sleeping, getting around, sharing transport, and now carrying generators, to operate and make their pictures. It talked about danger. I don't know, because I've never been a conflict photographer, but in reading this piece, I inferred that it is far worse than most situations in which photographers find themselves. It was a cautionary tale at moments, but it was for the most part informative to this middle-aged photographer and educator.

Now the criticism of the piece in the comments portion was that PDN shouldn't be talking about the poor photographers, they should be talking about the poor Haitians. Perhaps these online readers aren't familiar with the magazine's byline: "News, techniques and inspiration for the photo professional." This is a magazine for photographers to learn about equipment, other photographers, business practice, publications, and the list goes on. What it isn't is a newspaper or news magazine.

I lead a travel & study program to New Orleans each summer with my colleague Becky Olstad. The mission of this program is to re-image New Orleans (still in many areas desperately in need of recuperative attention), and tell the story of the city now. The students are encouraged to push past the pictures of water lined houses with exes on them, that flooded (forgive the pun) the portfolios of a preposterous number of us in the profession post-Katrina. They make them. They get them out of their systems. Then they get to work. Shooting is the way we digest what we see, isn't it? They don't need to make those pictures for long though, because every story is a Katrina story in some way, whether it's the 95% resettlement of the Versailles community within months after the storm, the growth in a permanent Hispanic population after the influx of labor from Texas in the initial rebuild burst, or a bar with a Dixieland band that just keeps playing through it all.

The evidential, now cliche, imagery serves to spread the word that this is New Orleans now to all of the people attached to that student. The challenge to develop story telling skills and a personal vision is what grows from those first "same" pictures. But I am amply aware of my luxury of critique of the repetitive nature of the glut of photography right after Katrina...ah, hindsight. We haven't the right to stop photographers trying to show us this tragedy in Haiti. And there is no way to know there has been too much until we start repeatedly hearing things like "my Katrina project." But in the mean time, I want my students to know that New Orleans as dangerous as it is, isn't a real experience of photographing in disaster, its aftermath. And of course I do not mean to diminish that. So this article and the critique of it will be a part of our curriculum come April when Becky and I start meeting with our next group.

I applaud Hughes and Walker for taking the story somewhere else, and for enlightening us on the conditions a student will face, if they choose the courageous path of photo-journalism.

And I hope all the photographers down there stay safe. Thank you for making sure we see the story, all of it.

Some of the far-more-brave-than-I are:
Los Angeles Times photographers Carolyn Cole, Rick Loomis and Brian Vander Brug.
Ruth Fremson, Michael Appleton, Ozier Muhammad, and Damon Winter for The New York Times
Carl Juste, Patrick Farrell, and Jose Iglesias for the Miami Herald
and so many more...

On the Act of (Shameless) Self Promotion

2010-01-10T13:15:00.000-08:00

My old friend, Gordon Stettinius, posted a newsletter via email this week. Like most artist newsletters, it had the usual news of shows and work. But like anything from Gordon, it was peppered with colorful turns of phrase such as, "...I have pledged to use my thighmaster three times a week. If I can firm up my thighs and ass, I am certain good things are going to start happening for me..." just to see if we are actually reading.

More than a year ago, Gordon started collaborating with a local portrait photographer (in Richmond, VA) who has been documenting these sort of full-on transformations of Gordon's appearance--smarmy 1970's lounge lizard; famous albeit older has-been wrestler; prom queen. Gordon started making them as the ubiquitous follow-up swag we as photographers are expected to send to the curators, publishers, and various folks of import, after these portfolio review events. He would autograph them, and enclose a note of thanks, but in the voice the character portrayed. Quickly, these became highly sought after. Curators called and emailed him thanking him for the swag (this never happens for others). I really wanted one, but Gordon wouldn't trade for

one. He said I had to do him a favor or have done something meriting an acknowledging mailing. Without knowing it would be a grand enough act, in December of 2008 I gave Gordon one of my reviews at PhotoNOLA. He let me know a "thank you" would be in the mail. I was thrilled, until the day the full color 8x10 glossy of Gordon's colonoscopy arrived (autographed of course).

Unsolicited email newsletters from artists I meet around the country, are usually met with a bit of ire (peppered with jealousy over whatever stellar opportunity has merited the mailing), particularly when headed with a date like "January 2010", implying a monthly infraction is about to ensue, as did Gordon's. However instead of that usual opt-out-but-I'll-know-you-don't -care sentence at the end, Gordon, coupled with a much more Emily Post influenced statement, the following haiku:

with shameless email,
more than you will care to read,
i puff myself up.

Gordon, I will never stop loving you, your work, and your never-ending ability to make me laugh on an otherwise miserable winter day. I can't wait for the February 2010 edition of your email newsletter. Also, it's time for that annual check-up and I'll be waiting with eagerness by the mailbox...

Epilogue - Return of the Dummy

2009-12-17T09:06:00.000-08:00

It's graduation time at my college. So before me tonight, I will see a fresh crop of photography books--the kind students make to garner photo assisting gigs. For the last year-plus, on top of the "book" we've required students to produce and design their own photography book and self-publish in our Photographic Essay course. Some really exceptional stuff has come out of this--watch out world!

Highlights of PhotoNOLA:

Best meal-
Sake Cafe.

Worst meal-
It involved pink tissue paper.

Longest swim-
To the openings Saturday night.

Most flattering review moment-
When a reviewer asked to be kept abreast of my travel schedule to S.F.

Best review advice-
When a reviewer chastised me for not bringing a little of all of my projects...don't assume they want to see portraits; they may want landscapes! He totally saved my butt.

Most memorable review moment-
When a reviewer raised a hand as through to stifle a yawn, then picked his nose.

Second most memorable review moment-
When Tom came busting out of the review room and told Gordon, "Eight minutes. It would have been six, but someone was in the seat when I got there."

Best idea from a fellow photographer-
The photographers should get to vote on the best of the reviewers. Fair's fair.

Best reviewer-
Oh, the vote would be private...

I need to acknowledge the good people of the New Orleans Photo Alliance, who put together the most civilized, fun, humane, and productive review I've been to (though I've only been here and PhotoLucida). Lori Waselchuk and Jen Shaw are true masters of a great event. Thank you.

After the cap and mortar boards are returned tomorrow afternoon, I'm going to start unpacking my brain from the last week. I am so excited about the ideas the reviewers gave me for my photography book. I can't wait to get started. Of course, I have to frame a whole show and get it shipped to Nebraska by Monday...soooo...maybe over Christmas...uh and to that reviewer who cared: My travel schedule to S.F. is December 23 (late) to January 2nd (mid).

Day 2 - The Dummy Strikes Back - Part 4

2009-12-16T05:27:00.000-08:00

Here's Woody Woodruff in front of his work at Richard McCabe's show at Home Space Gallery. I really don't know what he's doing--i think he may have thought he was on a roller coaster for a minute--an excellent metaphor the weekend's activities...

So I walked into the review room, and reintroduced myself to the publisher. I told him that I'd struggled with the book dummy because of a number of factors, not the least of which was ensuring that it wasn't a blank-photo-blank-photo sequence. Then I plunked the beast down, and said that I realized that this was the polar opposite of the dummy quality the panel had just said they wanted to see, but that the book binder in me couldn't do it any other way. He noted that the xerox comment was really in the interest of their inability to look in a short time, or even return a dummy when unsolicited, due to volume of submissions. I offered that I had the one with sloppily cut 3" prints and glue stick. He passed.

We talked about the sequence. He paused on some pages and laughed at the photographs (they are funny, some) he commented on the high quality of the printing. He liked the three picture two-page spreads. He had the best idea about the center group of images of the people preening and passing my mirrored window: Make them the end sheets. I loved this because, related to the earlier conversation regarding what the book was really about, it would help better depict the confines of the ship as destination. We were in a groove. We were collaborating. This was the publisher who said out of the 3-4 books he did a year, he usually liked to include one "unknown" photographer. I was going to be that one!

He closed the book and said it's really nice. He flipped it over looked up at me and said, "I'd like to go through it again." More great ideas. I'll tell you, there is good reason why someone who has been able to maintain the quality of this imprint for the length of time this man has, is successful. He's really good.

He finished a second time, ran his hand over the silver stamped, Japanese silk cover, and pushed it a bout three inches in my direction and said, "It's not really for me, but have you tried Darius Himes?" Well, of course I have, but he's right, it will be much more a Radius-type project when I get it into the form I want it.

--Do you hear that, Darius? I'm going to be back at you with edition two.

We talked a bit after this moment of heartbreak, about the challenges of incorporating the lengthy cruise diaries as sections of text, set off from the pictures, on different lighter paper. He mentioned that he was doing something similar currently on a book. Again, a really unbelievably astute and dead-on idea--and he even said I was welcome to lift it. As we parted, I joked with him that if I managed to get my book out first, I was going to tell people he stole the idea from me. We laughed.

I met with another curator after that, who simultaneously seemed quite interested in both projects, but managed to scoot me away after the five-minute warning bell. Who knows? I'll follow up anyway.

Day 2 - The Dummy Strikes Back - Part 3

2009-12-14T20:32:00.000-08:00

Some stats the panel shared—first by Morton, then echoed by the others were that the average distribution ability of a photography book is 3,000 to photography audiences, at it’s best. Thus the book must have an appeal that stretches beyond that audience to a broader appeal of subject area. Stop rolling your eyes. Yes it’s obvious, but this is about how to package yourself to the publisher—to raise the red flag and yell “Pick me! Pick me!” We as photographers—particularly those from the purely fine art background, tend to believe that thinking about marketing on the level of molding one’s “yap” (as my current favorite photographer Tom Wik calls it) or even project to emphasize the credible market to the potential publisher, is impure in some way. By being so lofty, however, the photographic artist almost promises to continue to feed the pay-to-play culture so rampant in our field.

Publishers (and in particular the kind who make quality books like those on this panel) stand to make little money or even recoup their costs, even if one’s book stretches beyond that 3,000 piece run benchmark. And the photographer, usually nothing, according to Conner Risch in his November 16, 2009 piece, “What Makes A Photo Book A Bestseller?”

So having convinced myself thoroughly that a book was well out of reach, and no longer knowing why I wanted one so badly, I discarded my pink tissue-papered lunch box (don’t ask--$15. Really, $15 NOPA?!), and skulked down the steps to the portfolio waiting area for the big one. The one I’d have died happy just having had request to see a dummy last year….
Ooooh cliffhanger….

Day 2 - The Dummy Strikes Back - Part 2

2009-12-14T06:31:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was exhausting. I had a really productive conversation with two different museum people, and a rather docile response from another. At lunch there was a panel on publishing. It had four photography book publishing people--Darius Himes (Radius Books), Jack Woody (Twin Palms), Robert Morton (Independent; formally Abrhams), and Michelle Dunn Marsh (Chronicle Books & Aperture). The most problematic issue with the panel was that there wasn't enough time allocated for it. So it was extremely brief. It was most interesting to hear arguably the most interesting people in publishing describe their histories. Jack Woody described a time when the stock of photography books was so large that his sofa was made out of them, and said that after 20 years doing nothing but publishing books, he's "not qualified to do anything else." He spoke about how the old Heidelburg presses fell out of favor in the U.S. when offset became prevalent and going in search of these work-horses in Japan where they had come into new lives as vehicles for printing porn! He found a printer there, and for fifteen years printed the marvelous gravure editions for which Twin Palms is known. He also spoke of the heartbreak of no longer being able to create printing of that quality. Woody is really a rare one. His demand for quality, he admitted, has kept him from printing certain photographers' work because he couldn't produce the quality he felt the work deserved. Wow.

This story led to the panel talking about the standardization of print, and how smaller imprints like Radius and Twin palms are able to take the time, and the 3-4 proofs, making for the quality results we all know of them. Paper really has become the true arbiter of quality in book publishing, and this coupled with finding printers (and here I'm hazy on the print-speak) who make great duo-tone and tri-tone separations is the way this group is distinguishing itself. Morton retired some years ago from the huge Abrams imprint and now works independently--as an agent really--for a couple of projects in which he really believes.

There's tons more to report, but packing beckons...so I'll get the rest posted later today.

Day 2 - The Dummy Strikes Back - Part I

2009-12-13T07:50:00.000-08:00

Since we're in NOLA--here's how it is: This is my friend Robert Green's house. It's a Make It Right Foundation home--the Jolie/Pitt Foundation's project to resettle the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans with resident homeowners who were there before the storm. Robert has a virtual museum of recovery about his story and the story of Tennessee Street in the form of clippings, photographs, and ephemera he's collected in the last four years. It was a great pleasure to finally see him able to stretch out and live after so much time in a 200 square foot trailer.

My first meeting this morning was with a newer publisher, but someone who is as well really great at discussing how to edit, and even getting you thinking about everything from sequencing to what the photo book is really about. I guess that, above all, was my biggest take away from the meeting, in fact. He said essentially that because there are all these different possibilities of ways to extend the project as a book, my job now is to know what it’s about. When you decide to put pictures together and have them speak for you, they need to say what you want them to. He’s not sure I know that.

I think he’s a little right. Because I wrote cruise diaries for so many years—mostly about my mother’s awkward fit into the culture of the ship, and of course, our fights—there is this other part of the story that seems to be about my mother and it either needs to be severed or integrated. And maybe the biggest epiphany from this meeting: It’s up to me. And my question today will be to this panel—Is the role of the photographer not only as such, but as the strongest voice in editorial?—I think perhaps it is now. In the past, I’m betting it was the publisher/editor’s job to make these connections—to curate the book. How and why did this occur? We’ll see at noon.

Next up: Curator of a Southern museum, that I adore…

Day 1 - PhotoNOLA - Dummy Wars

2009-12-13T05:30:00.000-08:00

And a little on NOLA: This is my friend Woody Woodruff of Red Wiggler Community Farm (and a photographer) discussing the Lower 9th Ward project to build a moving pen for goats that will be used to mow down unoccupied lots. Students who made the best design at Tulane's Architecture Department are building it.

I broke out the dummy yesterday, and after a few initial pawings, and finally comfortable with other people touching it. Unfortunately, the first person who reviewed it an independent project packager, didn't really like it. It's always bad when you talk more about the cruises than the pictures. And it's really all over when they ask where the cruises went. Check, and check. **Also as a side note, it turned out I hadn't met with him before...how can there be so many publishers you forget who's who?** Moving on...I did have two other very productive and delightful meetings with photo editors from two different magazines. My first meeting with one of them was really amazing--poster child for portfolio reviewers--he not only referred to my web site (and how it sucks--I know) but remembered ever project I had on there. Brilliant, no introductions necessary. The funny thing is that this was the lowest ranked reviewer with whom I'd been matched--in other words, I didn't really sign up for him. He works for a magazine that I wasn't sure would be all that great of a match, but since he's the photo editor for features, it turned out to be.

So as the the state of photo book publishing, one friend who met with one of the book types said that the reviewer informed her that he did maybe 1-2 projects a year now, and that nobody was publishing. I'm not sure that's true. I'll find out more today at the book publishing panel at lunch time.

Dummy

2009-12-11T08:49:00.000-08:00

It’s the time of year when the bloggeratti like to anoint their top-however-many lists of the best photo books of the preceding year. These often have a certain air of, obviousness peppered with big names. I commend Darius Himes for having a couple of years ago actually put a photographer’s self-published book on his list a little before the current avalanche of publish-on-demand outlets.

Andy Adams over at Flak Photo (a damn fine treat for your daily RSS feeds), and LiveBooks have decided to launch a conversation—a cross-blog query on the future of the photo book. Andy asked me if I would address this topic and participate in this conversation. You can too, just click on over. You know, I could wax poetic, but every ten years someone with a pen (yes, I said “pen”) and an audience declares painting dead. Will there be an expansiveness of the “valid” forms of the photography book? Sure. Already eroded is the photo book as the designator of having “made it.”

But I tell you, that sexy new-photo-book smell, the joy of rearranging the shelf to accommodate that yummy David Maisel that can’t stand up on the tallest shelf I’ve got, the signed ones inscribed by the photographers to me thanking me for having put their show together at the gallery at which I used to work—out of my cold dead hands you’ll pry them, Kindle!

My tack on the conversation will unfold in the next few days from the trenches…

A really expensive dating game.
In 2007, six years after first returning to photography from a lengthy hiatus as a nationally exhibited book artist, I attended my first portfolio review event, Photolucida. How does a photographer explain these affairs to a non-photographer? It’s speed dating for photographers wanting to meet someone who will marry themselves to the photographer’s work. I had shared work in a similar format at my annual SPE conferences, but it didn’t have the portent of traveling to a venue (in this case Portland, Oregon) paying an enormous fee ($425-$725), and eating the hotel cost of a five night stay in the pricey-at-a-reduced-rate event hotel. There aren’t a heck of a lot of hobbyists here. You have to have a certain level of confidence in your work, your potential career, and the value of an event such as this to even entertain the thought of investing the cost of a nice European vacation or an Epson 3880 (plus ink) to do such a thing.

It was at Photolucida in April of 2007, where two fairly astute and well placed people in publishing first suggested that were I to take the Pictures of the Floating World project to the form of a book dummy, they’d like to see it. And what did I do? Nothing. I kept making pictures. I kept showing the pictures, and continue to do so, but new projects, and work, and life, and fill-in-the-lame-excuse got in the way. It happened again last December at PhotoNOLA. And it was with a publisher whose firm is one of two in the world that, well honestly? I could have died happy having been asked for the dummy. The brass ring, all the way. And what did I do?

When the list of reviewers cropped up for PhotoNOLA this year, with it were a bevy of publishing mavens, including two of the three described above. I did something that sounds preposterous to even read on my screen. I put them at the top of my list. And made myself the most expensive deadline of my career: December 10.

Dummy. The object of the dummy is to show the work in the form the publisher knows best—bound, but to leave the object with a light enough footprint to both transmit the photographer’s vision for this form of the work, and be inviting of the collaboration and thumbprint of the person with whom you want to work. So for the last three months, I’ve been scanning, employing a wonderful assistant, spotting, using a glue stick and cut-paper, freaking out, sorting, procrastinating, printing, reprinting, cussing, and consuming more than a few moments with abject self-doubt. The result is the most exquisite object ever to contain my work, It might have a little too much polish, but that’s the bookbinder in me. It has red mulberry end sheets. I felt it a nice subtle reference to the Ukiyo-e prints from which the title is derived. I also looked at it once at the bindery, last Friday, then wrapped it up, put it in a box and never reopened it. Take that self-doubt! No fuel, no fire.

I brought the glue stick and cut-paper version in case I need it to be crappier. I brought the glue stick too. And the tree project, and the new Cultivar project, and 50+ loose large prints form Floating World, the requisite “leave-behind” contact-info-and-reminder-image-laden postcards, business cards, mini-books, and two spiral-bound iPhoto versions of the dummy. I had to check a bag. The prints are in the passenger cabin, along with the dummy (me), oh and of course the gorgeous book. Take that self-doubt.

I could have died happy.

The Sonic Blog - künstlerische Fotografie & mehr

2009-11-02T16:47:00.000-08:00

Hey--somebody blogged my Elysium project in Germany. And they credited the work (sorry Manchester, irresistible)! The Sonic Blog--with which I wasn't familiar has a very simple mission it appears, to present a new photographer almost every day.

On the about page:

"The Sonic Blog is a weblog dedicated to art photography. The main focus is on contemporary photography in Europe and the USA.

Beside introducing miscellaneous artists, there will be book presentations, exhibition dates (mainly from the Rhine-Ruhr-Area, Berlin and Hamburg) and Interviews.
If you want to feature an event or your work in The Sonic Blog: just sent an e-mail to sonicblog[at]sonicsites.de

I live currently in Duesseldorf, Germany, and work as a software specialist. Moreover I’m a photographer myself."

Yesterday's feature was an artist, with whom I have some affinity both in my geographic mooring and subject, Alan George. Anyway--thanks, Peter Feldhaus.

More Fodder for Copyright Infringement in the Name of Critique

2009-10-25T07:53:00.000-07:00

I don't think murals set in the urban landscape are necessarily meant to be ironic. Generally speaking they are referential to a historic time gone by or artistic promotion of social and political issues. It is the photographer who perhaps points out by editing-in irony, where it's found. Should I not make a picture of a tree, clearly either a remnant of a time before the building and parking lot, or a volunteer, because there are too many ironic connotations stemming (pun intended) from a painted rural setting surrounding it? It is in fact the willingness of nature to thrive either voluntarily or by our nurturing efforts that is of interest to me. I think perhaps it's sweet that the neighbors and business owners who facilitated this work of art wanted it to create a context for the sole citizen of nature in its proximity. Is it I who create the irony in the fact that urban dwellers think of a plantation as the natural world, and the setting reads as if the tree is looking back at the carnage bestowed on its ancestors in the name of agricultural economy. I'm just pointing it out.

Here's an image by my friend and colleague Justin Newhall (©2009 Justin Newhall).

In his project, Historical Marker, he sought to trace a meandering path along and in the bleeding margins of the Lewis & Clark Trail. It's a beautifully quiet group of pictures, that many times use juxtaposition of the natural and man-made to trace eloquent reminders of the perils of the pursuit of the expedition. Off topic here, but Justin will be delivering a talk at the Midwest SPE Conference this Friday in Minneapolis at 10:30am on his new project, Northern Studies, which is no less than brilliant.

The work I'm doing while refining some of the other projects, traces the route between my childhood home, San Francisco, and a town called Guernville, where my family spent a week each summer camping in the Armstrong Redwoods. Guerneville and all of the towns surrounding it, were once thick with the giant redwood trees. The Armstrong State Park is an ironic leave-behind stand of trees, meant by Colonel Armstrong (a logger) to preserve the majesty of the Redwood Empire. Now Guerneville is a strange place with a dirty beach along the Russian River, that is far more bustling and tidy in my memories of summers in the 1970s there. And every so often, there's an ironic mural reminder of the transition of this region's economy from natural beauty it's asset, to extractive logging, to tourism the result of the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge in 1937. And if I make a picture when I see one, so be it.

and a couple more....

2009-09-27T09:07:00.000-07:00

Peter Tran and Katie Taylor

And another senior...

2009-09-26T10:50:00.000-07:00

Stephanie Griffin is another of our September graduates.

More Seniors from Summer

2009-09-25T05:19:00.000-07:00

Nick Lindemann is one of the two graduating seniors who were on this summer's Travel & Study Program to New Orleans. He did a project on the NOLA Fire Department, with particular attention to the St. Bernard Parish stations and went as far as Delacroix.

My Summer 2009 Grads!

2009-09-24T14:14:00.000-07:00

I'm showing web sites from my graduating class in the next few days---here's the one I could find on Google--hint hint--use your name as your URL...I give you April Wiser, who is leaving us for Paris, France and SPEOS for post-grad studies!

Cliches of Photography: Publishing Uncredited Work on the Internet

2009-09-22T19:41:00.000-07:00

One of the wonderful tales of the history of photography is that of the invention itself, and who can claim credit--there are so many--Nicephore Niepce and the heliograph; Hippolyte Bayard (my personal favorite), the angry left-behind fellow who didn't cut the sweet deal Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre did....the race to be first in France; and the exceptional innovations that happened in the years after 1839 when France traded a pension for the opportunity to share the shiny direct positive wondrous daguerreotype.

Meanwhile, in England, one little thing held everything back to a snail's pace: The Patent.

The Brits like to boast that the lovely Talbotype was the true inception of the medium, because Talbot's process, of all emerging at the time, most closely matches the negative/positive darkroom many of us learned back when darkrooms were more prevalent. But because Talbot patented his process, and thus charged for the right to use it, it just didn't take off like the shiny, and openly shared polished beauties available to the world courtesy of the French...It's a lesson for all of us in how being proprietary can hold one back.

So in the spirit of sharing, I happily share with you the uncredited, unreleased usage of my work by Manchester Photography and it's proprietor, Mark Page (who clearly has a good sense of humor as so many of his photographs contain the very cliches he brings to light in his blog):

I do think if one is going to criticize the work of living artists, one might have the courtesy to post a link to the body of work from which it has been culled, let alone the name of the artist from whom it has been borrowed. Just think how many months ago I might have discovered this had it been tagged in any way what so ever with my name.

Ah, but ironically it was in a post today at Hippolyte Bayard - a blog really worth reading - that I discovered my and numerous others' uncredited work, along with charming observations by the author:

---"the name slips" him...

On Hippolyte Bayard even, the artist whose work was highlighted from this list of "young photographers...cynically turning out what the big US galleries are showing" (hey--thanks Mark--at 43 I don't often get referred to as young), Joelle Jensen, was credited.

I have a pretty good sense of humor (that's humour to you, Mark). But honestly, grow a pair. If you are going to be a critic, name your subjects, credit the work you are using, and try not to overlook the most obvious cliches, such as wan nude teenagers set squarely in the middle of pictures, oh...and self-important narcissistic photography blogs.

My Other Hat (or one of them)

2009-08-21T15:35:00.001-07:00

I'm the Chair of the 2009 Midwest Regional Society for Photographic Education Conference. Today, we opened registration! The theme of the conference is Freeze/Thaw: Cycles in the American Heartland, and I'm proud to say that our Keynote Speaker is author Ian Frazier, and Featured Speaker, Alec Soth!

Register for this one early folks: It's cheaper and you get priority placement for portfolio reviews!

The Mid-Career Photogrpher Redux

2009-08-10T21:04:00.000-07:00

I'm in an exhibition of recent acquisitions (see my last post on this) at the Southeast Museum of Photography. It opens with a reception and lecture on September 12th at 5pm. The exhibition runs September 12, 2009 - February 12, 2010. And another incredibly nice thing: One of my pieces is featured on the Museum's splash page. Anyway, if you are going to be in Daytona Beach, Florida in the next five months....

The Photographer's Acquisition

2009-07-12T11:05:00.000-07:00

A long time ago, I met a photo educator who told me a story about a famous photographer he'd known many years earlier (the latter of whom had died decades earlier). The George Eastman House had acquired a group of pictures from the well known photographer. However he didn't feel confident about his printing ability--not enough so to merit the home into which his pictures were about to move. So he asked his friend (the educator) to print them for him.

At the time he told me the story, I was a student worker at the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, and a budding curator and photographer. I was also far too early in my career as a photographer to appreciate the plight of this artist from his perspective. My first thought went to the GEH, who thought they had vintage prints, created by the photographer himself. "Don't tell them." said the educator. I've agonized about this for years. The educator has left this world now too, and I'm not telling.

But I digress. I spent today, in addition to weeding and trimming an unruly Trumpet Vine, preparing prints for my first museum acquisition. If you read this irregular blog with any regularity, you'll recall I already agonized over printing for eight images to be reviewed by the McKnight Photography Fellowship panel back in May. When I printed those, I did have in mind that if they weren't treated improperly by the fine Walker/McKnight staff, that I'd be able to cull the five images from that group. And as I scrutinized them today I realized that I cared more about how they looked, their condition, the evenness of fixative, the very anomalous flaws in the ink jet paper, much more than I had when I first examined them for McKnight. The financial gain for these prints was potentially far greater for the grant than the acquisition, but somehow...

Today, I'm not sure the notion of value for "vintage" photographer-printed print can be what it once was. Many photographers do not print for themselves anymore, instead entrusting White House Custom Color, or a small custom printer to produce high quality ink jet prints. The file is king! However, when working with the latter kind of service, even that may be tweaked on behalf of the photographer. The once sacred act of lending one's own voice via the craft of fine printing has gone the way of the enlarger--er, well not in value, I suppose, being that silver based printing is becoming increasingly rare=$$$.

I'm not really sure why grant panels seek prints to view anymore, given that many of the finalists used WHCC to create their portfolios in this case. I debated this with a friend last week. He thought it was the act of expression of what the pieces might look like "at scale". Perhaps. But the panelists aren't monkeys. They are highly respected practitioners and curators. I think they can imagine scale. But it can no longer be a judgement that the work samples themselves are reflective of the photographer's skill as a printer. Though perhaps it does reflect on whether the photographer has the good sense to farm out what they can't do for themselves--be it becuase they don't have the skill or haven't made the investment in their work to produce inkjets for themselves yet (this is pricey). I don't mean to cast fear in the hearts of the collectors, who have finally become comfortable with this newer print medium with which I too, have had an uneasy courtship.

And like that photo educator demonstrated to me those many years ago, the veracity of authorship of the original has always been a matter of trust and assumption. Rodin...Brady...
Koons...

So four out of five prints met with my satisfaction. I was completely comfortable with the print, but there were some funky indentations--I suspect water drips in the paper production process. I still don't feel like I'm the best printer in the world--I was a terrific silver printer, but ink jet is literally a new medium--as different as photography and lithography. But if a museum is going to believe in me enough to collect my work, I will be the the photographer and the printmaker collected.

The Photographer as Archaeologist of Her Own Life

2009-07-06T09:52:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I went to Gustine, California with my cousin Ellen (1st, once removed) and her husband Sam (unnervingly patient with the Haley women). Sam is our family genealogist, so he actually put it in my head to look with my camera at Gustine last year--which prompted my first exploration in late December.

My goal yesterday, was to deliver a book of photographs of my grandparents' house to the current residents. I met the new owner's father in December, and he toured me through the almost finished place. I wasn't prepared then, but very much want to return and photograph the space again--I hope to hear from her now--post-book delivery. I also wanted to photograph the 4th of July Parade, because in the many excavations over the last three years, I've found vintage super 8 footage of these Gustine parades from the late 60's and early 70's.

When we got our chairs set up and were getting settled in, Ellen suddenly noted that she thought she saw our cousin Margaret (another of my mom's first cousins, who lives in San Jose) across the street! We were all unlikely sightings in our own right--me from Minnesota, Ellen and Sam from San Rafael, and now Margaret and Steve from San Jose, yet here was this accidental reunion in a waning town that connected us all.

After the parade, we ended up going to the Jorgensen Ranch--another blast from the distant past that yielded yet more connections from the daughter and grand-daughter of Eleanor Jorgensen--who I noted to them, made the best lemon bars on earth--ones to this day, of which I invoke the memory aloud, every time I happen to have one, to anyone who is in hearing distance.

Joanne Jorgensen, who we visited with yesterday, and her sister and brother just did the most exceptional thing; they have placed their 289 acre ranch in and easement trust that guarantees it will remain farmland in perpetuity. Just a few miles outside of Gustine proper, the ranch has been in their family, and actively farmed for over 100 years. In the mid 1970s, the family started leasing the land to be farmed by a neighbor. But in the ensuing years, and really as recently as two years ago, the subdivision mentality has started to reduce the amount of ag land in the area--a couple of neighboring farms have been subdivided into "ranchettes". So now the Central Valley Farmland Trust will protect this important heritage, and food source (the ranch produces walnuts, alfalfa, and beans).

It was an amazing day, and I didn't make any of the pictures I wanted to--except for one--of Joanne with her mother's recipe rolodex.

The Conscientious Photographer

2009-06-22T19:18:00.000-07:00

My colleague Becky and I have brought nine students to New Orleans for your Travel & Study Program again. We did this together in September too. I had the second shift to the airport to pick up the later flying students, so I missed the tour with the students today--so you should go to our class blog and read about that. My student Kristyna took her first ever flight today. It got me to thinking about when my father (who was born in 1912), might have first flown, not because he had stuck close to home (though I suppose, he had), but because commercial airliners were young, and we as a culture weren't nearly as wanderlust-filled in those days. I have found, in the same basement where the chromes of my first Christmas had been living, a set of chromes from a commercial jetliner flight in 1958 that he and his first wife took to Mexico City for an international conference on General Semantics. Picture after pciture after picture of the jet engine's metalic sheen against the silver-deteriorating cyan-magenta sky. Was this his first flight? The volume of pictures might imply it, if there weren't a volume of pictures for every moment, be it a dog walk or first Christmas.

The Hobbyist

2009-06-14T12:37:00.000-07:00

Often photography competitions have different designations for amateurs and professionals. My mother was prone to introducing me as a professional photographer on our cruise trips. It would make me giggle. The simplest definition of a professional would be one who makes money at the activity in question. I make money with a day job. Most fine artists do, well, the ones not making photographs of pretty stuff. I have a day job that relates to my role as a photographer, but I do not make money from my photographs. How could I? The film, the processing, materials to print, framing, the epidemic shift of cost of shipping to exhibitions (and back) now always in the hands of the artist...

Does that make me an amateur? I sure have felt like it this weekend. I built and packaged five boxes for ten photographs going to an exhibition in Virginia. It was nice out. It was nice out for the first time in recent memory. So, I asked myself: What would an amateur do? I set up a card table outside and wrapped those babies.

It was nice. I enjoy the repetitive things sometimes, and once getting over the sticker shock of having six new frames built, four refits, the packing peanuts, the tape, the cardboard, I let myself imagine a life where I was able to dedicate a careful day to art every day. Then I realized that it wouldn't work, because the boxes of unsold art would fill up the place in my car where I would have to sleep at night.

Mattera makes it real....

2009-06-11T22:05:00.000-07:00

How do you define success? As I spoke briefly with my four grads today, I thought about how that answer shifts through time as we age. Like the ever shifting desired date of retirement at the whim of the stock market, so shifts my own perception of why I make things (I make book works as well as photographs). Right now, it just feels like a great big expensive indulgence. Am I doing enough good? Am I making enough connections to find success, whatever that means this week? I don't know. I'd love to be back at that place where my students are now: successfully at the end of college; full of great skills, and endless possibility. Then I think, wait...is possibility only the domain of the emerging professional?

Joanne Mattera has a beautiful path or two to share here.

vrroooom....and the fourth grad this quarter is...

2009-06-11T21:43:00.000-07:00

Keith Long, who loves cars.... check him out by clicking here.

one more upcoming grad from my program....

2009-06-10T05:34:00.000-07:00

Audrey Johnson was in the New Orleans Travel and Study Program. She's primarily concerned with portraiture. Check her out by clicking here.

Another graduating senior....

2009-06-09T11:54:00.000-07:00

Heidi Shub is moving to Florida when she graduates--really nice work. Watch out Florida! Click here to see more.

The next big things...

2009-06-08T20:22:00.000-07:00

It's graduation time, and taking a cue from my current favorite blogger, Sean Justice, this one's for my students...I'm going to feature my upcoming grads for the next several days. Really, because I was irritated I couldn't google the lot of them this afternoon. Hopefully you clicking on the links in the coming days will help--enjoy. Here's one who has a really nice diverse portfolio, and a serious and responsible streak like no other. Mitchell Stier.

If you are going to be in Portsmouth

2009-06-07T10:30:00.000-07:00

An exhibition featuring ten of my pictures from the series Pictures of the Floating World, will be on display in Portsmouth, Virginia later this summer as a part of the exhibition Pictures of People: Contemporary Portrait Photography.

Visual Arts Center
Tidewater Community College
July 12 - August 27, 2009
Reception: July 11, 7pm

757-822-1888 ffi

Pictures I Like Today

2009-06-06T15:51:00.001-07:00

I keep meaning to post these artists when I find them, but life gets in the way. I really enjoy Brad Moore's work. He has a picture on his web site, very much like one I've been meaning to make--totally different geography, but similar props....it'll be different, you'll see.

The Mid-Career Artist Meets the Mid-Career Artist

2009-05-31T15:52:00.001-07:00

The Expert Artist

2009-05-30T15:08:00.001-07:00

The Ingénue

2009-05-28T20:24:00.000-07:00

I was particularly bleary-eyed with paper work of one sort or another last night at 6, when I went into one of my classrooms to find one faculty member showing another how a piece of equipment the other didn't use very often operated. It is always amazing to me, and shouldn't be, when I see teachers teaching teachers. I saw it once late in the hotel in New Orleans--the first time we took students. When it happens, there's the delight of newness on the face of both parties, because who better than a teacher of the same medium to show a new technical thing--they get it fast on that simple notion of it being a new tool in the same language we all speak (light)--so there is the delight on the face of the one who saw and understood the magic instantly, and the delight on the face of the one teaching, to have that instant gratification of instant absorption of what they have just taught.

What a wonderful gift, to be a teacher.

The Emerging Artist

2009-05-26T05:14:00.001-07:00

The Mid-Career Artist

2009-05-24T17:43:00.001-07:00

What do we find when we peel back the layers of personal memory, the photographs that grace the family albums, and those items carefully placed on public view, carefully dusted week after week for a lifetime? For two years, nine months, and 13 days, I have been on an archaeological dig through my parents' accumulated closet basement, cupboard, tote bag, underwear drawer, vacated apartment contents, on a path that has and continues to lead me to ask, "What the hell were they thinking saving this?!"

This, can be anything ranging from various and sundry broken toasters to moldy bedspreads from 1950, on any given day. The last year plus has been digging into the storage area containing things from my father's life from the time he and my mother moved into the apartment in which I grew up, dating back to, well...before he was born. My father was born in San Francisco on December 12, 1912. Instead of you doing complicated subtraction in your head, let me help: 1967 - 1912 = a whole lot of living's detritus.

Having come of age in the Great Depression, my father was frugal, and mindful of what might be wasteful--such as throwing away a broken toaster, broken stereo components, broken pipes, or magazines. By the time recycling became a normal practice, he'd held onto magazines for a lifetime, and it seemed a waste to recycle such an archive. So he put them in the basement, built monumental bracket-and-board bookshelves, tied them up in one to two year stacks and tucked them under things, or stacked them in cardboard boxes. He subscribed to Psychology Today, Architectural Record, House Beautiful, Sunset, Architectural Forum, Playboy, Art & Architecture, and Behavioral Science, to name a few. He was also very involved in General Semantics, the American Institute of Architects, and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. He received and kept all of their journals - The AIA Journal, Magazine of Art, General Semantics Bulletin...the list goes on.

Yesterday, on day three of my four day sojourn to continue the digging, clearing and preparing for the second estate sale, I received word that I hadn't received the fellowship for which I'd been a finalist. I was stuffing stiffened, moldy wool pants and 40 year old fish bait into an already overflowing garage bag when the email ding sounded on my phone and dashed my hopes.

I made a rule for myself at the end of last year, that I'd start behaving rationally when it came to expenses for art making. I've been at this for fourteen years since graduate school, and decided that I had so much film shot, that it would be a good time to take my New Orleans project to the studio for a while, and really examine what I had before spending hundreds more dollars to shoot more. The marvelously fulfilling, but incredibly time-sucking day job I have, and my second night job, were only partially funding the whole enterprise. And they were keeping me from being able to keep up with the shooting, at the scanning and printing end of the work. So I decided to start scanning, organizing, printing, and promoting the work I had made, while starting to shoot closer to my home-place in northern California.

In these excavations over the last few years, I've unearthed a multitude of information on a tree-planting effort my father and his first wife, Clesta, undertook in the late fifties. What they started became a program called San Francisco Beautiful. It's a big part of why I became fascinated with the trees in New Orleans, and it's why I've made a couple of sojourns out of San Francisco, back to the Russian River area where we car-camped in the seventies.

So in that moment of deep despair, expletive still hanging in the mold filled air near the garbage can, I began another trip upstairs from the basement with an arm full of magazines off-dusting in my reddened face. It was then that I spied a large, brown, loose paper surrounding a stack of what appeared to be over sized newspapers. One of the things I can be grateful for in the kingdom of pulp that is mine, is that we didn't get into the newspaper hoarding habit so common to folks of my dad's generation. So the little package surprised me. It was right on top of the shelf where the Playboys and AIA Journals had been. I balanced the load I was carrying on my left hip and reached out for the top shelf, and peeled back the paper. Old newspapers...The Examiner was on top. "JAPS QUIT! Truman Says." Hmm. I dropped the pile and gingerly freed the group from their perch and went upstairs for light.

As quickly as the motivation to make work had been sucked away by three strangers in a drier, warmer, and likely bon-bon filled, museum basement in Minneapolis, it returned, as I found the copy of the May 26, 1937 edition of The Examiner touting the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge. My father, whose first and best love was the city of San Francisco, crossed the bridge on opening day with his parents and grandmother. He had that edition, V-E Day, the day the Bay Bridge opened, and many more. But it was the subtitle on the full page photograph of the Golden Gate that gave me a shiver, "...The Waldo Tunnel, portal to the Redwood Empire, is shown in the background." I'm not much into hocus-pocus, or fate, or what have you, but I'm willing to take messages where and when they come - like when any David Bowie song (recorded prior to Serious Moonlight) comes on in a public setting where you are about to sit down. I was granted in another way yesterday, to make my pictures anyway.

Sean Justice covers my NOLA Travel & Study Program!

2009-05-14T13:18:00.000-07:00

Just s quick shout out to Sean Justice who has written a really beautiful blog about my New Orleans Travel & Study Program! See it here.

Sean and I met on an elevator in Portland last month. I said, "You look familiar." He said, "So do you." I figured he was being polite, but pressed on with my usual laundry list...Minneapolis? New Orleans? San Francisco? Albuquerque? (Yeah--bet you didn't know that about me did you?)...couldn't figure it. Then the elevator stopped on 10--we were at PhotoLucida--Benson Hotel. We both got off. I think I said, "Maybe it was from the tenth floor." We parted ways--I dropped some things in my room, picked up others, and realized I'd forgotten Tucson. I walked out my door...he was walking out his door at the far other end of the hall. "Tucson?" I asked. "Tucson. Whoa."

I'm not sure if we were friends. I'm not sure whose friend he or I was friends with, but we were fast friends at PhotoLucida. He's made the most interesting travel photographs I've ever seen--that's all I'm saying--you have to click to find out more. But you'll see. Thanks Sean.

Pay to Play: A Fellowship of Hope...or Hoping for Fellowship

2009-05-09T08:29:00.000-07:00

I'm obsessed I guess. Economic downturn has meant a strictly reduced shooting schedule for me and many others this year. So I'm thinking about what Swan says about setting your marketing budget and sticking to it--portfolio review events/conferences/etc. all fit into this budget. What about extra special the-best-prints-you've-ever-produced portfolios for one-time review by a grant panel? Is that marketing? Sure. If there are three panelists, and two vote against you, you may not get the grant, but the third person might be curating the next Whitney Biennial (dream big). That portfolio, though unsuccessful in this context, might lead to something. I had such an experience at PhotoLucida, where Emiliano Paoletti recognized my tree project from the Critical Mass disk his boss had received to review.

Coincidentally, I find myself currently in the enviable position of being a finalist for a prestigious regional photography fellowship. The second round involves providing the fellowship administrator with eight prints, and the option of one installation (contextual) print. In this round, should you choose, you may select different work than you submitted in the first round. Hmmmm....like in the first round, where I agonized about whether to share a couple of pictures from the project I'd like to have funded, I am now agonizing about whether to mix it up and share different images than the initial 15. Ultimately, I gave them a taste. You know how it is at the beginning of a project: It's like the first two pancakes. You are happy they made it out of the pan. But until you make 20 more, you don't see that those first ones weren't real zingers, and they end up in the trash can (read: dog). Most of the work I did in my first four trips to New Orleans are no longer in the pull of images I'd put together for an exhibition.

I know I want to go ahead and print some nice clean prints. My knock-about box of pictures has been knocked about quite a bit from its numerous PhotoLucida pawings. Now which ones....?

So in the most preposterous series of procrastination tactics, I've tirelessly gone over in my head who else might be "up" for the fellowship; dug up half of my garden; agonized over whether to print these two pictures that are from the new series; tried printing at a friend's house (I like the velvety quality of the matt paper, he has PK inks, thought I'd see what that looked like); emptied my entire closet and commenced installing one of those octopussian closet inserts (from which I'm procrastinating by blogging now), tried to imagine my perfect fellowship judging panel, decided to cull prints only from what I already submitted, started researching the Amur Maple planted on the boulevard by City of Minneapolis to avoid having trees that get tall enough to interfere with power lines; pondered putting in two or three new images....you get the picture (pun intended).

I feel like a pageant contestant--you gotta be liked to get this far, but ass lifting tape, and vaseline on the teeth are a small price to pay to get the crown--sure, I wouldn't be here if the pictures weren't of interest to this panel, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to make the best prints I've ever made? I can't even begin to fathom the ability this fellowship would provide me to make the pictures I've only been able to make in my head for the last six months. Quite annoyingly, if makes me a little emotional. So I'm going to knuckle down and make these mind-blowingly beautiful prints, right after I feed a couple of pancakes to the dog.

And play we do.....

2009-04-27T21:15:00.000-07:00

It’s not really news to anyone in my field: The museums don’t have money to buy; the galleries aren’t really taking on any new artists; and they’d love to have this work, but……

Another form of pay to play that I find perplexing is the self perpetuating cycle of the need to have continually evolving lists of exhibitions, engagements, and sales in order to keep one’s resume robust. This is particularly germane to those of us in academia for our day jobs. This prompts us to respond to the enthusiastic but budget-apologetic museum curator: I’d be happy to work out a sizeable discount on a number of works acquired at once,” or “I’d be happy to donate a work to your collection.” While yes, it is a quick way to discover if they are blowing smoke up your nether-bits (ass—sorry—euphemism couldn’t cut it there).

Fairly often, my students come to me when about to exhibit for ideas about pricing. I say the usual things about this being a mixture of their stature, name recognition, scale of the work, editioning or not, etc. But the last sentence is, “The price should be high enough to value the work enough to give it up, but not be so low that if it doesn’t sell, you’ll fall into a depressive tailspin.”

Never, never offer to donate your work outright unless you are prepared for the possible loss of the façade a curator is trying to create for you that their hands are tied. You know most of them are human and want to be civil. Write it in a letter later. Everyone will feel better than if you lean back on two legs of your chair and say, “What’s it going to take for me to get these pictures into your collection?”

It’s not going to be an easy year for those seeking tenure. It’s already been a lousy year for those seeking positions as news spread of hiring freezes and search holds across the United States. So I get it: That museum acquisition is important to you. But might I suggest something to preserve our dignity and the value of our work. If someone is genuinely interested in collecting, and requests a discount, rather than lower individual print prices, donate one print for every three or four purchased. Your sales prices of record remain in tact, and the whole “suite” of images gets into the collection.

Oh the digressions--Jason Houston, Photo Editor from Orion Magazine, gave a really great noontime talk Sunday about getting your documentary skills out there and still get paid while helping a non-profit or NGO. While allowing the museums to have our work, and granting us our tenure-ready resume lines, we can also be paid to address the things we care about. The two-tiered approach Jason suggested was simple: Educate your client and help them to include you in their grant writing for the next project they are doing. I don’t think this will work for every struggling non-profit (I mean the behemoth museums are struggling), but he’s right. At some point, we do have to get the pay to play mentality out of ourselves, so we can prove that we value our own work by valuing it first ourselves.

So I guess it's time for a recap--my time at PhotoLucida, in a few simple sentences that my reviewers (roving and stationary) will likely recognize as our time together, and no particular order:

- Is it twenty minutes yet?
- Oh stop it, I am soooo forty.
- Oh, Blue Sky, sure...good idea.

- Please don't send Chris McCaw to hurt me, I promise, I'll make the project bigger!
- Please, have all the swag I brought--it's better off in your hands than my satchel.
- Is it twenty minutes already? (I'd love the excuse of an exhibition to visit _____!)
- You remember my pictures from an unsolicited submission? **blush**
- Oops, I guess that was only the fifteen minute xylophone, but since I'm packed up....I'm going to go ahead and head out...I think I smell something burning.
- I truly don't care if you show my work, you are interesting to talk to.
- Wait, I thought you hated that first portfolio? Of course I'll meet with you later and show you more!
- Yes, I showed them to Blue Sky.
- The small ones are $400! (I'd love the excuse of an exhibition to visit _____!)
- How about I educate you on the history of photography for a couple of minutes, so you can catch your breath?
- Yes, I met her yesterday. She thinks I look great for my age!...Oh, yeah, she also seemed to like the work.
- Well thank goodness, this didn't suck as much as everyone said it would.
- Well if you'd like to throw a show together with these and some of those archival images, I think it would make a smashing exhibition. (I'd love the excuse of an exhibition to visit _____!)
- Has it been twenty minutes already?
- Have you heard that xylophone yet?
- So you don't want to see trees? Or do you?
- Yes, I showed them to Blue Sky!!!
- I cannot emphasize enough, I'd love the excuse of an exhibition to visit _____! I can babysit too, whatever...sign me up.
- I think you gave me that flier already.
- It's s-t-u-m-p-t-o-w-n....

I do not want to see trees....

2009-04-26T14:51:00.000-07:00

**Sorry--late in posting. Call me what you will. I call it "exhausted". At least I was moving my fingers on the keyboard yesterday....!

~~~

I'm blogging from the "roving room" at PhotoLucida. This is a room where, I am scared to pay too much attention to the writing, because I'm waiting to see Allen Maertz from the Exhibition Committee at Blue Sky Gallery, and if I don't stop my constant feigned attentiveness to the current person being reviewed--a great body of work--Rita Maas--ok--not feigned....if I stop looking around, someone else will slip in and grab him. It's like a room full of hungry piranhas looking for a concrete opportunity or good critique, as if they were yummy little pockets of schooling fish. Or maybe we are the schooling fish.

Damn it! My time came up, and he needed to head to a review upstairs--they should have signs on their backs that we can sign up on, or at least with their expiration date and time.
Onward.

~~~

I didn't blog the last two days of Lucida, because I had six reviews one day and another four the next, and I was fairly brain-dead by the end of it all. In fact I didn't go to the gallery crawl Saturday night--that's right--I DIDN'T GO TO THE GALLERY CRAWL. Don't judge me. There's no sales tax in Oregon, and Dana made the transgressive suggestion that we go shopping instead. Okay, judge me a little. We also had a really nice meal at Dragonfish at the Paramount Hotel. I’ve eaten at this place every time I’ve been to Portland! It’s fairly low priced, has sushi plus an Asian fusion menu. They tried to burn the taste buds out of our heads with the Guacapoke, but other than that, it was a fine meal.

Before and after dinner, I had a chance to talk to a number of my colleagues about the different possible opportunities that arose during the day, and how to interpret certain cues with regard to what they really meant. Because these review events aside, pay to play is really all we do as artists in the United States. Few of us rise to the art-star level, but multitudes of us are pretty decent talents, with art related day jobs, or a combination of incomes derived from both. But at the end of the day, if we weren’t paying in materials, free time, and organizational memberships to enter juried member competitions for which we have to pay an exhibition fee and round trip shipping, we wouldn’t be taking the time to do the long form at tax time. At least sometimes we get a refund…

On Saturday I had interesting meetings all around, representing people from Italy, Lithuania, San Francisco, some island off the coast of Washington, Daytona Beach, and Madison, Wisconsin. The broad strokes I can share? Generally speaking, the ability to laugh at the over-indulgences of the American people is alive and well abroad. And that north to south, and east to west, people can see that the indignities being wrought against the street trees of New Orleans do represent a mirror to the lesser infractions in our own communities.

I also found myself starting to rewrite my artist statement on the latter body of work with every conversation I had—or rather, refine it. It strikes me that the value added piece of the day was not what was being said to me about the work but how the reviewers reacted to what I was saying. In the end, I don’t really need to say anything. People seem to get the work as a general topical snapshot of an urban forest, regardless of what I say (with the glaring exception of a roving reviewer who said that nothing I said about my work was in it—should have learned right then to stay out of this confounded roving room.) But understanding the scope of possible readings of the work with words will certainly help me control and contain the message going forward in grant applications, and other like places where a few notes on a page tell the intended audience that you are serious as a heart attack about your work.

At noon, Swan gave a talk that rocked, as usual.

Sunday I had the Features Editor for PDN, the Director of The Photo Review out of Pennsylvania, a local gallery owner, and the Director of Admira and Foto&Photo from Milan.

How many times have I concluded a review with the words, "I would love to have the excuse of an exhibition to visit ________"? Four.

What didn’t they want to see? In no particular order: Pictures of flowers nudes, trees (uh oh), rocks, formal or traditional landscapes, and “any more of Bush-Cheney except on trial for war crimes)”.

...Purely, strictly, formal(ist)

2009-04-25T00:33:00.000-07:00

Your daily dose of all-things-Lucida will follow, but I figured someone I haven't yet asked might be reading this, so if you know anything about this picture--for instance by whom it was made--please email me. It was among the "artifacts" in my parents basement in one of the recent strata excavations. It has some sort of dye bleed on the back, implying it may be a dye-sub or something.

I had some truly good meetings today. For the most part, I met with people with great energy, good gab, and think I have a good shot at a show in a city I really love to visit. also really enjoyed my conversation with Jason Houston from Orion. I think he may have the coolest job around. Both he and Tim Wride (No Strings Foundation), have made me think the most

Oh! So add, "outside confirmation you are on the right path --and nobody else is on it" to my personal list of why to go to a portfolio review event. I've realized a couple of different times in the last two days, both in my own reviews, and in looking at everyone else's work at the big Porfolio Walk last night, that having peole like the ones who are reviewing tell you they haven't seen what you are doing before is a really good thing. We don't like to admit it, but generally you could throw a dart in a room full of photographers, and it would land on a portfolio with work that has been done in some way before.

Tomorrow I have two festival curators from abroad, a rep-type, a couple of curators, and a fairly nifty online magazine operator. Six in all, in three clumps. At one point in the day I will have three back to back. This makes keeping one's sequencing together difficult. I received a good tip in line today on how to conteract that. I'd explain it, but it was visual in the way a coach explains, on a little dry erase board, how you are going to defeat the Dallas Cowboys-I'll let you know how it turns out.

What don't they want to see?

In no particular order:
Commercial work; documentary photography of depressing and hopeless scenes; photographs that are strictly formalist; purely fomalistic stuff (this may be the same as the former, but I wanted to be sure that I'm not convinced that "strict" and "pure" are the same, unless you go to a nice traditional German school); furry animals of all descriptions; those which rely on serious digital manipulation; your friends at parties (pseudo diaristic); tattoos

Pictures of Themselves

2009-04-24T00:04:00.000-07:00

I couldn’t get the temperature right in my room last night. When I got to the hotel it was about eight. The room was stuffy. It didn’t seem like the air system was on—not a big deal, it’s Portland. I opened the windows. High floor; Windows that open; I’m going to take this as a vote of confidence in my portfolio by the hotel staff and leave it at that.

I had supper with Mary Ellen (my PhotoNOLA BFF) and Dana Fritz (terrific photographer from Lincoln, NE) at a restaurant that was good two years ago, called Typhoon. It’s not now.
I was pretty wiped out. I’ve been really working hard and long hours at work the last couple of weeks, and staying up late getting my portfolio ready for this event, but a bunch of colleagues were in the hotel lounge when we returned, so I stayed up chatting until about 11:30. By the time I returned to my room, not only had the outside air temperature dropped, the air conditioning in my room I’d presumed didn’t exist when I turned the little knob all the way to the left had kicked in as well. Brrr.

Today’s reviews were each good in their own way. I also had a marvelous conversation with a fellow artist and writer about why we come to events like these. Back in January when a few blogs were soliciting feedback on what reviewees were looking for at portfolio review events, many people fawned over the value of a great critique. After a highly unscientific, series of questions to various folks, I can tell you I am not alone in this: The majority of people here are coming here, and spending an enormous amount of money to do so, for concrete opportunities above and beyond everything else. There I said it. I paid, and I want to play!

Obviously, it’s not that simple. The real purpose of these events for artists should be to give easy access to individuals to whom you might not be able to connect, whether because of distance or level of position/accessibility. For the reviewer these events provide the gift of uninterrupted time to really look at work, a good volume and diversity of it, in a relatively short period of time. Should they be capable of providing a good critique? Darned tootin’. Should it be all they have to offer? Well, I don’t think so.

I do know that photography has a good many anonymously nominated awards. The ability of a photographer to attend an event like this means that they get on the radar of a good number of people who may be anonymous nominators, or jurors for a grant one might be a candidate, etc. In other words, the circuit, not just one review event allows one to become a fixed quantity on the minds of the people in charge.

As for me? Well tomorrow is one of my really exciting reviews—the picture editor of Orion Magazine. Also, I’m seeing a New York collector, a Boston museum curator, and a European photography festival curator.

What don’t they want to see? In no particular order: Nudes and pictures of themselves. Whew.

Obviously Digital

2009-04-23T08:35:00.000-07:00

Oh yeah, about that “pay to play” notion, I’m about to play, and I’ll be paying for heck knows how long for the conference cost, flight, hotel and mandatory leave-behind swag.

I’m on the plane to Portland. Since my mother’s death two and a half years ago, and the subsequent monthly runs to my family home in San Francisco to go through the pack-rattery of lives lived starting almost a century ago, I’ve racked up a good deal of frequent flyer miles. Which is how I find myself in the lap of first-class luxury on this flight. But can tell you? Jess Nolan has ruined it a little for me. Jess is one of the growing ranks of my fabulous alumni—one I hold dear, because she now maintains a blog based on a challenge I issued to her a few months after she graduated, when she came into my office and told me that one of my faculty had told her she had to choose between being a flight attendant and a photographer—she couldn’t be both. I told her to make one picture a day—start a blog—sigh—which is how I came the other night to read about her first class experience from the flight attendant’s perspective. She said that the passengers had drunk her out of house and home…she clean ran out of liquor. So now, every time the flight attendant comes by with the bottomless bottle of red wine, I think about poor Jess. It was a long week though, Jess….

I’m sorting through the reviewers the disembodied algorithm selected for me. Tomorrow I have four. I’m pretty excited. I’ll have one of two reviewers from this massive photography festival in Pingyao, China, The Director of the Rayko Gallery (where, incidentally, I rented darkroom space to print after college—gulp, when they were on Polk Street), Tim Wride the Curator of Photography at LACMA and Director of the No Strings Foundation, and Johanna Hurley, co-founder of Radius Books, and more significantly, has 30 years of experience in the book publishing industry. Wow. It’s a little overwhelming to type. I guess I’m a little nervous. I also wonder, after four days of reviewing—even if they love my work, will these four even remember me by Sunday?

Okay, okay—what don’t they want to see? In no particular order:
Close-up images of rusty metal tractors or cars
Super-conceptual, over-intellectualized work
Obviously digital work

I Do Not Want To See.

2009-04-10T16:49:00.000-07:00

It was bound to happen. I've been saving up. And while I've shown great restraint, for which I think I am due credit, I will now utter the words: Pay to Play. A good deal of bl-atter (blog chatter) was dedicated to this topic in December and January, after PhotoNOLA. I have a good many things to say on this subject, but feel it might be a deterrent to an honest meeting if a reviewer thought I'd be publicly reviewing the review later. Might I express, colorfully, that the reviewer behaved toward me as though I'd run over her dog? Why yes, but I certainly wouldn't name names.

Like in my comments on 20x200, I find it interesting to deconstruct things of which I am a willing participant or patron. And thus, on this eve of PhotoLucida, as I find myself again eternally grateful to Laura Moya for doing a bang up job of getting her stable of fantastic reviewers to give very detailed descriptions of what they do and do not wish to see. I also find myself amused at the possibility of creating a body of work based on a number of the items some of the reviewers have listed as things they do not wish to see.

A while back, NPR ran a bit on a piece of music that combined just enough objectionable elements as to create a statistically hated piece of music. It had children's choirs singing about labor, elevator music, operatic rap, harps, among many other things. I think it was based on some poll of listeners on what they wouldn't want to hear.

Why yes, you do know where this is going. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you my next artistic challenge:

Porn, artists dancing in the forest, banal photos of the sides of old buildings, the pursuit of the banal in general, digital abstractions, your dog, self indulgent nudes, pretty landscapes, rock stars, work you did in art school (unless you have just graduated), archiving stuff in the houses of dead people, my disheveled house and the people with whom I do drugs, play poker, have sex, paint graffiti, etc., because I am a unique kind of bad ass

I think statisticians would agree, that photograph of the outdoor buffet on the site of the abandoned ammunition plant, in which your nude model is taking not one but two desserts while dancing artists circle a threesome involving a dog in the background, should not be in your portfolio when you get to Portland....especially if the landscape is pretty.

Oh crap, did I just describe a Joel-Peter Witkin? Keep it under your bed with the Larry Clark wannabes, and the other stuff you did in graduate school. And I believe, in rereading the above compiled list, there is still room for dogs playing poker. So bring those.

In all seriousness, when investing as much money as one does to attend one of these events, a 123 page guide helping you to decide who would and would not be prudent to meet is a gift. I do however find myself eliminating some folks, even ones who sound like they might be a good fit, because they say they have an interest in one thing, but when going to the web site, it's clear they really do not. In one case I found a gallerist had expressly defamed the kind of work one of their own represented artists was making. Are they confused? Or do they already have their quota of that style? I move on, in any case, I don't have work like that...it wouldn't be a good match.

Some bios or likes and dislikes are so delightfully written, I find myself tempted to meet with them, because they seem smart--capable of a good chat.

I'm going to leave it there, one good chat away from PhotoLucida, and a scant nine days, and monumental eight more prints to make.

A referral for a referral....for a....

2009-03-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the wonders of Google Analytics, I just found an awesome blog Urban Canopy News from Casey Trees. Casey Trees, it turns out, is a pretty rockin' organization with the below as their mission for the urban forest and community of Washington, D.C.:

"Casey Trees plants trees, trains people to become Citizen Foresters, engages thousands of volunteers in tree planting and care, teaches students in District schools about trees, monitors the city's tree canopy and provides guidelines for better planting space design so trees will thrive in the city."

Their blog, in addition to giving me a little nod in February, covers news of urban canopy all over the world. Numerous posts can be from the same day, if the news cycle is busy with things green. Check it out.

Saturday

2009-02-26T19:08:00.000-08:00

Saturday was the day when the men in my mother's family went duck hunting. I was too young and not the right sex. And today, for the first time, I have been able to travel the path that led to the all-day ritual of plucking, cleaning, and eventually preparing the duck dinner. For the last two and a half years I've been excavating the remnants and pieces of evidence of my parents' lives. Some days I dive into piles of architectural drawings from jobs my father did when he was my age now.

Today, I went duck hunting.

We Interrupt These Rants for an Important Message

2009-02-22T12:08:00.000-08:00

I'm in a couple of upcoming exhibitions, near and far. It turns out we are in Kansas anymore. At the Lawrence Percolator, I am in an exhibition called Trees I Have Known, and here in the Twin Cities, I have several pieces in An Uncommon Landscape. The reception for the latter is this Thursday, February 26th from 6-8pm. If I have any Kansas readers, well...that one opens March 14th @ 6pm. Click on the titles or the pictures FFI.

Question #2: Is 20x200 Good for Photographers?

2009-02-14T08:19:00.000-08:00

I'm moving on to question #2 in my breakdown of my October post, "Is Jen Beckman's 20x200 the Nasdaq of the Art World?" I think we've sufficiently hammered the coffin nail into that first one, no?

Question #2, is 20x200 good for photographers? It's a very complex question. In the October post I tried to work my way around the many arguments that can be made in either direction. So if you will indulge me in a careful, point by double-edged sword razor-sharp point (I'm talking to you Sophia)... :

Financial Gain
If we harken back to yester-month, before the bottom fell out of the bottom, by Beckman's own attestation in her response to my October post, the artists get 50% of gross. In the good times, that meant a $6,000 / $6,000 split between the too. Keen! Most artists know that a guaranteed take of that size on an exhibtion that cost nothing to produce, is a pretty sweet deal. Of course, if after a couple of weeks you've only produced an ego-busting $380 / $380 split, wellll...you still didn't have to frame it, on the up side!

Reputation and Name Recognition
Again, let's go back a year. The momentum was high. There was an air of anointing for the unrecognized artists, and fun great deals on the better known ones. Being selected by Beckman for 20x200 was regognition on a grand scale. But several months ago, when things became slightly shaky, and there hadn't been a sellout in a good long time, I started to wonder if it was such a repuatation builder. As an educator, I am often faced with the daunting task of helping a student price work for their first exhitibion. I usually share what I think is average for a person of their place in the field, but then say it's a very personal choice. I usually offer that the price should be between the amount at which they'd be reimbursed for materials, time, and talent, and at the low end, a price high enough that they wouldn't feel like a failure if it didn't sell.

"...it's hard to put a dollar amount against the exposure that comes with releasing an edition. Suffice to say that it's immense, and often game-changing." -Jen Beckman

So what if it's a couple of weeks in to your edition, and you've sold 28 of the little ones and one of the medium? Could be game changing. In this waning economic time, something like 20x200, can for the artist become a very expensive direct-mail alert that they might not be that great. Many established artists will either make special small, unique editions only meant for fundraising auctions, or not donate at all. This way, when the public record created by an at-auction failure (or rather, failure to meet retail) occurs, there is no market equivalent in their retail venues (galleries). Sure, we can think it's due to the economic times, and in part it is, but somewhere in the back of our heads are the Beth Dow and Paula McCartney recent sell-outs...and we wonder.

I won't lie, sometimes there is work on the block at 20x200 that breaks my heart. There are some incredible photographers waiting for you at 20x200--- undeservingly victims of a slow economy. Things are trickling out of the virtual door at the rate of 20 to 30 small prints on each edition. As I graze the drying grasses of 20x200, I have to ask a new question: "If you have a gallery, and you have shows, why on earth would you risk sales failure in such a public forum?"

When I first posed today's question, back in October, I wasn't sure the answer. Beckman rather perfectly stated the immense success possible in this forum. But here--now--today--the answer is, "no".

Question #1: A Response to the Responses

2009-02-07T08:06:00.000-08:00

Sophia Betz posted a few days ago on my first dissection of my October 2008 post "Is Jen Beckman's 20x200 the Nasdaq of the Art World?". She was reacting to both my post and to Andrew Shroeder's comment on my post. First to react to Andrew's priceless and coincidental assertion that it would be ironic to see Matt Siber's The Untitled Project go on the block at 20x200, in a final act of the sell, sell, sell, world that Andrew seemingly so despises. A mere 24 hours after his post, Beckman debuted her Wednesday photographer, Kevin J. Miyazaki. Miyazaki had two pieces on the site, both from his Fast Food series. Ironically, the work has similar underpinnings to Siber's project, with it's familiar but fading logos-- and more amusingly, the work is about our consumptive society both figuratively and literally. I'd think Jen was giving Andrew a white glove slap--perhaps all three of us--but it's highly unlikely that Miyazaki's boast (also on 2/3/9) was the result of an eleventh hour invite by Beckman. These editions while simple to purchase, require a good deal of planning, careful and proficient printing, and the time and wrist strength consuming signatures on 222 "You bought some art it's official" cards.

But, as usual, I digress....

Betz jumped around a bit, addressing something she observed in the latter part of the October post (Down girl! We aren't there yet!). I was trying to create a staged conversation in the fictional buyer's internal mind about whether to buy or not to buy (okay it had a heavy dose of me in it). The internal dialogue being about whether the $20 buyer isn't also a little interested in the potential "value" of a picture that has been an instant sell out.

I said, " I and every other person eagerly poised at their computer midday on Wednesday, as the soft fleshy part of our index fingers wait, poised gently on that mouse for the email alert, press down and collectively think, "Well, maybe I can get $40 on Ebay." As often as I get a beautiful one from and up and comer with some accolades that make them sell out in an instant, I find something I just love, and watch as my purchase is rejected as a "good investment" by the marketplace--three hours later, still 183 available. Damn it....I am watching now, as today's limps slowly toward a sellout. And I find myself sitting here thinking...Two hours later, still 57 available. Whew, I didn't buy it."

The statement, was not intended to imply that I'm only in it for the perceived value of a sellout. I only buy ones I really like--though I did once buy one speculatively, but the brown cardboard envelope is still unopened in my flat files--lesson learned. However, I was trying to describe my and many of my friends' --let's call it "addiction" to the rush of deciding quickly: Do I like it?

But bringing it back home to Question #1, "Do I like it?" isn't enough for me and many others these days. But even in that, it still isn't ever, "will it be worth something some day". I'll leave that to the collectors.

Question #1: Is 20x200 the Nasdaq of the Art World?

2009-01-31T22:49:00.000-08:00

Question #1-
Is 20x200 the Nasdaq of the art world?: Very possibly.

Well before the abysmal results of the fall auctions, 20x200 had started to slow down in sales. Where earlier on, the 8x10 editions had sometimes sold out in minutes, now they averaged sales of 60-100, but for a bump from a Mickey Smith that turned up somewhere in there. I have chosen to focus on the low priced editions, because to me they represented not a population of consumers who would as likely go to buy a “print” at Z Gallerie, but of artists, and would-be collectors with more modest funds with which to buy art. I have chosen the 8x10s, because it is this very population, that had in a few months gone from freely impulse buying, to a more careful consideration betrayed by both lagging overall sales, and lagging time in which the work was moving. It represented to me a foreshadowing of things to come. Art, fantastic art, at $20, had become a luxury. I proposed then, as I see it has come to pass now, that 20x200 was a microcosm for the end of the salad days (for the immediate future) of the market.

Flash forward several months: In today’s New York Times, it was reported that Southeby’s (a publicly traded company) has dropped from a high of $61.40 per share in 2007, to around $8 a share. L.A. MOCA, the Times also reported, has announced a reduction in staff of 20%, representing 32 full and part time employees.

In fact the only positive action in the implied value of art this week, turned out to devalue it to most. From Boston came from the disheartening news that The Rose at Brandeis University, is to have its holdings liquidated. Now I happen to have a dear friend very close to the situation, who says that the board of the museum and its director weren’t even informed of this horrible possibility until the University had already decided to sell. He said they are fighting it, but it all seems so dismal.

Back in fall, when Warren Buffet chose a bank to anoint with his financial confidence, and the first ill-controlled federal bailout had occurred, I wrote:

“I am watching now, as today's (offering) limps slowly toward a sellout. And I find myself sitting here thinking...Two hours later, still 57 available. Whew, I didn't buy it.

We're up now, at the end of the week, but after the long weekend, will the trend continue? Will the Tuesday sell out? Will it be fast? Does the slowness with which today's special edition is marching toward a sellout...55 still available...indicate a reticence in the buying market? Will Warren Buffet (who is the art collector equivalent?) jump in and buy out the rest? It doesn't seem like the infusion of the Mickey Smith a couple of weeks ago is going to trickle down.”

Jen Beckman didn’t cause the recession in the art market; she created a predictive barometer for it. And unfortunately, it’s proven more than accurate.

Much Ado About Something

2009-01-31T09:22:00.000-08:00

Back in October, on a day with almost too much clarity, I wrote a lengthy list of questions (with my thoughts on the answers) about 20x200, the Jen Beckman project that has filled my flat files with my latest manifestation of pack-rattery. I say too much clarity, in that I tried to tackle far too much in one afternoon. Consequently, much attention has been placed on question #4: "Is 20x200 good for Jen Beckman"? My ponderings on which have been widely misinterpreted as a villification of the most established distribution point for photographs: Galleries and Jan Beckman.

Wrong.

Asking questions should not be interpreted as an act of war against the questioned. That's how we got so far down that worm-hole called the Bush Administration.

Attention has been paid to the posting in varying degrees of reaction from Beckman herself (scroll to the responses) to Zoom-In Online's Sophia Betz. I also understand that there is a bit of a hum of "oh my!"s, quiet nodding, and chortles from a good many artists who hide in those fearful shadows where expressing their opinion might cost them something in their career.

So over the next several postings (I'd say days, but regular readers will know that that's not going to happen) I would like to revisit 20x200 question by question.

"Colleen Mullins is a fantastic photographer and proprietress of the blog Elysium"

2009-01-28T19:46:00.000-08:00

...so says The Bloggeratti. I think I just made that up. I like it. Say it: Bloggeratti.

Sophia Betz has tackled that little post from October about 20 x 200. Thanks for the props, and the continuation of the conversation. I'm going to say it here: It's okay to ask questions about the art world.

20x200 is to the art world, what the iPhone "apps" are to the software world...a completely public barometer for public endorsement of something--Both let us know how many others too have clicked on the 'buy' button--in this case art, in the case of Apple, well, a koi pond that nibbles your finger when you hold it up to the screen. And isn't that really a better metaphor for the photograph: You hold yourself up to it for a minute, and it can devour you.

...yet totally okay

2009-01-12T20:35:00.000-08:00

My project was featured on the blog Mrs. Deane (nothing is too amazing to be true) a week ago Monday! This is a terrific blog, so I was really surprised when a new "friend" on Facebook, SF photographer Charity Vargas (who has a super great book out on the place where I learned to drive my father's 1972 Volkswagon Bus--The Presidio) said she'd seen my work there.

The blogosphere is an amazing place. I'm not sure I've ever entertained dreams of European recognition of my work, but through the magic of this naked-diarist art form, there I am. Virtually. I've become wildly interested in the magic of Facebook. If I weren't too tired I might discuss what it means to know whom one's real friends are...but in the interest of relenting to my weariness, my real friend Andrew Schroeder had a wondrous blogospherian moment himself today, when he found his blog highlighted at mnartists.org

Props.

Decisivity

2008-11-22T15:36:00.000-08:00

Jorg Colberg posted a spoof YouTube challenge the other day in which the clip invited viewers to compete to make a good video. Quoting the blog from which he'd borrowed it, Mel Tritton's, he pondered, we all ponder, "Is Flickr next"? Well the answer actually is one I'd been meaning to post after seeing friend and Chicagrapher, Brian Ulrich speak at the Midwest SPE Conference a couple of weeks ago. It comes in the form of a grand experiment on Flickr, in which masquerading as an innocent photograph called, "Mario's Bike" is a very well known Cartier Bresson picture. Flickr is democracy at its finest. The experiment here had some ammusing results, and given that it was first posted on December 5th, 2005, I'd say Mario's bike has really flown. Excuse me, I have to get back to working on my YouTube entry.

The MinnePhoto Show

2008-11-19T21:45:00.002-08:00

I'm in a show, with a few friends, at the offices of Fallon...check it out online by clicking the nifty poster.

I'm also a part of the gala auction for the New Orleans Photo Alliance at the New Orleans Museum of Art to kick off PhotoNOLA!

Forest for the Trees

2008-11-17T19:54:00.000-08:00

Forest for the Trees

by Myoung Ho Lee · Interview by Mike Smith
Click through the photographs. They are sublime.

...and here's to you Mrs. Ker-er-sten

2008-10-29T14:26:00.001-07:00

Heaven holds a place for those who prey (sic).

Thanks to Jim Walsh and MinnPost for this terrific send up by Kissane.

Happy Halloween Mrs. Palin

2008-10-25T08:56:00.001-07:00

Is Jen Beckman's 20x200 the NASDAQ of the Art World?

2008-10-16T10:58:00.000-07:00

(I figured I ought to put up a tree picture, lest you came here for my pictures. This is NOT a 20 x 200 offering.)

Is 20 x 200 good for photographers? I ask the question, because as often as I hit the "buy" button, I sit back and watch the marketplace determine the relative worth/desirability of the art or artist. Predictably, the big names go fast, regardless of the quality of the offering. After all, it's my only chance of affording one--at the low bargain price of $20. I and every other person eagerly poised at their computer midday on Wednesday,

as the soft fleshy part of our index fingers wait, poised gently on that mouse for the email alert, press down and collectively think, "Well, maybe I can get $40 on Ebay." As often as I get a beautiful one from and up and comer with some accolades that make them sell out in an instant, I find something I just love, and watch as my purchase is rejected as a "good investment" by the marketplace--three hours later, still 183 available. Damn it.

When in one's career is it a good idea to be in the 20 x 200 club? Does an edition that isn't gone inside of two hours signal your gallery that maybe that one-person show next Spring isn't such a good idea? If you can't sell them for $20.... Jen Beckman sells our potential for $20, $200, and $2,000 every Wednesday, and we like lap dogs apparently keep running to the front of the line and yelling, "Pick Me! Pick Me!"

What if you don't have a gallery? You are already at a disadvantage, because history shows that there are only about 43 of us buying what we like regardless of pedigree of the artist on a regular basis. Good luck getting a gallery now. If you can't sell them for $20... Pick me.

Is 20 x 200 good for galleries? Well, it does help them figure out what in the general population will embrace. It lessens the risk, if you will, by the gallery in loaning that place in the flat files one tends to occupy for two years before they deign to put your name on their web site. Perhaps it speeds the rejection. Perhaps it fuels the fire. Either way, the gallerist becomes informed by the process, and it's good...for them.

The one question we needn't pose is, "Is 20 x 200 good for Jen Beckman?" On a good week, when the marketplace is eager, and we addicts overload Google Checkout, there can be gross sales of $24,000. One hopes the artist gets 50%, leaving a nice cushion of potentially $48,000 per month on top of the sales she generates when she, all to often, culls her picks from her own stable each month. "Well, no that 30" x 40" is no longer available, but in the flat file I have..."

20 x 200 is great for Jen Beckman. But don't forget, Jen Beckman is running a business, and she deserves to be paid for her work as well. Rent is high on the Island of Manhattan.

Nothing is forever.
Is 20 x 200 a determinate of the health of our economy? In the last two weeks, five of six editions have not sold out. If one travels back month by month, the down-trend is evident. Less people are risking the "BUY NOW" button, where in the early months, rarely could one pick up one of the small edition prints. Lately, they are plentiful. The special edition Thursdays are of greatest concern. They seem to happen on the weeks when things are either really slow, or really happening in the 20 x 200-mart. I am watching now, as today's limps slowly toward a sellout. And I find myself sitting here thinking...Two hours later, still 57 available. Whew, I didn't buy it.

We're up now, at the end of the week, but after the long weekend, will the trend continue? Will the Tuesday sell out? Will it be fast? Does the slowness with which today's special edition is marching toward a sellout...55 still available...indicate a reticence in the buying market? Will Warren Buffet (who is the art collector equivalent?) jump in and buy out the rest? It doesn't seem like the infusion of the Micky Smith a couple of weeks ago is going to trickle down. So for now, I'm going to sit on my little 8" x 10" investments and wonder: If a day comes, when Jen Beckman picks me, will I want picking?

I think if you use the landmark in that photo you might be able to find the spot...

2008-10-03T22:04:00.000-07:00

"There seems to be a lot of tree damage in this area..."

I have had an unbelievable week. Our students have done fantastic work, and many have really grown not only the scope and shape of their projects, but have made some really big growth spurts in the way they photograph...and two have taken watching COPS and eating Arby's roast beast sandwiches to unbelievable new heights.

Score one for the trees?

2008-09-13T22:05:00.000-07:00

I've started sequencing and winnowing the Elysium work to see if I can do what I'm constantly brow-beating my students to do: Tell the story, visually. The resulting self-published book has won an Honorable Mention in the Blurb.com "Photo Books Now" competition. There were over 2,000 entries from all over the world. It's one of those intangibly wonderful things, no pink ribbons (like my Minnesota State Fair Honorable Mention), just a nod and the nifty tags below and to the right. So I thought I should put them up somewhere. So here it is; the proverbial frame, around the proverbial diploma....The best part of this perhaps, is that the award ceremony is in San Francisco next Friday, on my birthday. It's at Bimbo's 365. So thanks, Blurb, judges, teachers, from John Bloom through Karen Wirth and all the in-between...and thanks w. for making me look up and see the forest for the trees.

elysium

urban canopy loss ...

By colleen mullins

Book Preview

Happy Anniversary

2008-08-29T09:26:00.000-07:00

News cycles are tricky things. Katrina had the misfortune of striking in what, three years later, would be a slight inhale by the news media between ObamaObamaObama and McCainMcCainMcCain.

Perhaps as the candidates, one exhaling--now finished with his nomination, and the other inhaling--preparing to accept his, might take a moment to consider, "What should I get New Orleans for the third anniversary of Katrina". Well, absent something more intimate and showing not only a deep commitment to New Orleans and all she means to this country, you know, the kind of surprise dinner to feed the city or roof to house the homeless that says, "I remembered, and gave this special day some thought", there is always tradition fall back upon:

Traditional Third Anniversary Gift: Leather
Modern Anniversary Gift: Crystal/Glass
Travel Anniversary Gift Ideas: Luggage

According to Susan Breslow Sardone the "web's foremost expert on honeymoons and romantic getaways", you should think about taking New Orleans for a little getaway this year. Since leather is the traditional third anniversary gift and Hurricane Gustav is bearing down and promising a Category 3 trip down memory lane, why not get New Orleans a nice leather weekend bag to pack away a few delicate underthings--property deeds, family albums, pets--and sufficient means to get away this time. Don't leave her and her people standing for days on end in the hot sun waiting for a bus that never comes, destined for a surprise destination. She doesn't want a redux of the honeymoon, when she got off the plane in Salt Lake City thinking you were taking her to Houston.

And no ignoring her this time.

She wants you to give all your attention to her, because she's always been there for you--She read you Tennessee Williams wearing just a thin sweaty silk slip, reclining on that bed in the walk up on Elysian Fields. She nursed your hangover after that really, really, bad night during Mardi Gras in 1972. She introduced you to Jazz. She made you gumbo, and taught you what it was like to crave a fresh oyster on the half shell.

You need to make this year special--everyone is watching after all--don't think her ex, France, isn't standing down beneath her open window calling out deep from a soggy place beneath a little too much kir royal, "Hey--New Orleans! New Orrrrleannns!" So make it splashy, because come Monday you are off the hook for another year, and you can go back to that complacency so comfortable, for another year.

Why we make pictures

2008-05-10T20:33:00.000-07:00

I don't know. It was a catchy title though, no? This is my friend, colleague, and fellow photographer John Marshall. He's in a cemetery in New Orleans. It's from the 50's. I want to kow what caught his gaze, don't you?

Blind Ambition

2008-04-30T08:22:00.000-07:00

Typically a reader of this intermittent posting is met with some sort of missive about trees. But I have decided to go ahead and entertain you with the most ludicrous interaction I've ever had with a vendor, well of anything:

Chat InformationPlease wait for a site operator to respond.
Chat InformationYou are now chatting with 'Stephanie'
Stephanie: Hello, how may I assist you Colleen?

Colleen: Hi--I need the status of my remaining 4 blinds, and tracking numbers. The order umber is 25986

Colleen: number

Colleen: Hello?

Stephanie: Sorry. I am here.

Stephanie: Thank you. One moment please.

Colleen: ok

Colleen: at least there's no awful hold music like on your phone system!

Stephanie: Thank you for waiting. The production time frame for Solar Roller shades is approximately 7 business days. Your order went into production on 4/23/08 and is on its 6th day of production. Your order will not have a tracking number until the order has shipped.

Stephanie: I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. The total turnaround time frame is about 15 business days.
Colleen: A rep on the phone yesterday told me the solar shades and the roller shades were going to ship yesterday.

Stephanie: Your order has not shipped and the delivery time frames are listed on the website.

Colleen: I have tried to no avail to utilize the order status feature of your web site. I live in MN. I am having these intalled in CA. I am having them delivered to a cousin in San Rafael. So A real estimate of timing...and a real answer after twenty minutes of hold music yesterday is all I expected from S&N.

Stephanie: The production time frames are available on the website.
Stephanie: It is 15 days.

Stephanie: I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Colleen: For the roller shades?

Stephanie: There is no tracking information available for your Roller shades.

Colleen: You see yesterday, when I was under the impression that my full order was delivered (because that was the impression I was given in an email from you guys), I called you to make an appointment for installation...which you guys did--you took the request--forwarded it to the installer--he called and made the appointment--why can't your computer system tell the person I'm talking to that the shade order is incomplete?

Colleen: How can there be NO INFORMATION about the roller shades?

Stephanie: You are responsible for checking the order you received to make sure you have everything and contact smith+noble to set up your installation appointment.

Colleen: Fine. Let's start over.

Colleen: Where on your web site may I obtain up to date information on my order?

Stephanie: What information are you looking for?

Colleen: I am looking for an estimate of arrivel, I am looking for a full accounting of my charges, I am looking for some evidence that the order was placed correctly--I have never received so much as an email receipt acknowledging this order. It's in the ethos...

Stephanie: You were advised on 4/29 the Solar shades will ship on 5/1/08.

Colleen: No, he told me they were shipping today.

Colleen: Or last night--I think the roller shades weer elast night

Colleen: Can you, right now, please email me a receipt for the charges to my credit card?

Stephanie: You would receive that on your billing statement. We sent you a copy of your order and the amount charged on 4/23/08.

Colleen: I did not receive it. Can you please send it to me right now? My email address is colleen@colleenmullins.net

Stephanie: I can have it resent to you. It will be done within the next few hours.

Colleen: Please understand that I know this is not your fault. The company you work for has fundamentally changed from when I have dealt with you in the past. I just need an order confirmation.

Colleen: Thanks. The guy yesterday said that would happen too. But then, he also apparently was making up when my roller shades were shipping.

Stephanie: Order confirmations are normally sent when placing your order online. I apologize you did not receive the email.

Colleen: But may I ask again, how is it that you can have absolutely no estimate of when the roller shades will be completed?

Stephanie: I did not say the Roller shades have not shipped.

Colleen: I was forced to call in my order due to having used your measure and install service.

Stephanie: There is no tracking number listed.

Stephanie: That does not mean there is no tracking number or that it has not shipped.

Stephanie: I will need to contact the factory to get the tracking information.

Colleen: Yesterdaay--I spoke to a man who told me that the production was complete and that they should be shipping later yesterday and that a tracking umber just hadn't been produced yet.
Stephanie: I apologize if you were advised that the order did ship, I would not confirm that unless I had a tracking number to reference. If you were advised the order should ship that is not an actual confirmation.

Colleen: Wow.

Colleen: OK--to recap--I can count on the solar shades shipping tomorrow (May 1)? Or I can't because I don't have a tracking number...? Per your earlier statement, "You were advised on 4/29 the Solar shades will ship on 5/1/08. "

Stephanie: Roller shades have a 13 business day turnaround time frame. If you do not receive your order by the 13th day I would recommend contacting smith+noble. For the Solar shades 15 days would be by 5/13/08 I will refund you 10% of your order if you do not receive the order within this time frame.

Colleen: I was just speaking of the solar shades. I haven't gotten to the roller shades yet--I'm trying to simplify this conversation. Did you mean "solar" or "roller"?

Stephanie: You should have the Roller shades by 5/9/08.

Colleen: But without a tracking number, this is a non-binding estimate of time frames?

Stephanie: Rather than going back and forth over this. I am going to contact the factory specialist and follow up with you within the next 2 business days regarding the status.

Colleen: Thanks. I'm sorry. I just have never had the experience of having no information or anything beyond my note after spending $XXX on something from a reputable company. I'll also look for the "resent" order confirmation later today. Thanks.

Stephanie: Your order is on time and not past the estimated delivery date.

Colleen: ...And I understand that. It's just that have never been able to view any document that gave me an estimated delivery time.

Stephanie: The time frames are listed on the website.

Colleen: Where on the web site?

Stephanie: Go to Solar shades and Roller shades. Click the View detail tab.

Stephanie: I am having an agent resend the order as we speak.

Stephanie: you should receive an email in a few minutes.

Stephanie: Can you confirm the email address? It can back to us.

Stephanie: Do you have a spam folder?

Colleen: Oh I see. You don't mean MY order. You mean the general predictions. I can see this. I am simply trying to get a handle on how many times my cousin will need to stay home in the next week and a half to wait for the blinds. When I ordered them, I was told I'd receive and email when the items shipped and a confirmation of purchase. I received neither. My email address is Colleen@ColleenMullins.net (two LLs and two EEs in Colleen--Two LLs in Mullins)...

Colleen: I have a spam folder. S&N regularly sends me promotional emails that get through just fine--and thee is nothing from you guys in my spam folder either.

Stephanie: If you are having someone wait for the package, even after the Solar shades ship there will not be a tracking number for a few days. They are shipping from over seas and there will not be a tracking number for this until it reaches the LA port and is scanned by UPS and sent out to be delivered.

Colleen: And the roller shades?

Stephanie: Let me know if you received an email just now.

Colleen: Nothing yet...perhaps we could try work--not so many double letters: CMullins@aii.edu

Stephanie: I am going to contact the factory specialist and follow up with you within the next 2 business days regarding the status.

Colleen: Still nothing in my email...

Stephanie: The copy of your order was sent to both email addresses.

Colleen: Ah ha! I got the confirmation of my order. Fabulous....

Colleen: Um, hang on here--is this just the installation?

Colleen: This only has the charges for installation--nothing of the cost of the blinds.

Stephanie: One moment.

Colleen: By the way--let's stick with the work email--it's actually coming in from you--cmullins@aii.edu

Stephanie: I will have a copy of your order sent to you within the hour.

Stephanie: Is there anything else I can assist you with?

Colleen: Thanks. That should do it.

Colleen: Whew.

Stephanie: I noted your account and I will contact you in 2 days.

Stephanie: Expect an email on Friday.

Colleen: Thank you Stephanie.

Stephanie: You are most welcome!

Colleen: Do I close the window now?

Stephanie: yes.

Stephanie: Thank you.

Heck of A Job!

2008-04-23T05:26:00.000-07:00

Mr. President:
Under one tree, cannot be buried the years of neglect and ineptitude your administration has wrought upon New Orleans. But at least it will suck up a little of the hot air you blew on the steps of St. Louis Cathedral a few days after the storm and declared, "The great city will rise again."

One One Hundred Twenty Fifth of A Second

2008-03-30T07:13:00.000-07:00

before

I spent two days and a dawn shooting before my students got to town. Upon their arrival, I noted myself simultaneously not making the pictures I wanted to take, but instead writing them down for the next time, and making pictures on the stops students wanted to make, that normally I would not--actively trying to find a picture in a location that held little in the way of that for which I am usually scanning.

after

I think I see the optimism I've long been trying to interject.

W Magazine Mixes Fashion into the Disaster Landscape

2008-03-28T07:56:00.000-07:00

I am curious to see the spread in W--some 60 pages shot by Bruce Weber. I'm not sure I buy that fashion with a disaster backdrop isn't using Katrina, even while directing the gaze of W readers to the (sadly) contemporary landscape of New Orleans, than in many places remains unchanged from 2005. It also celebrates little charms of the city that are alive and well. This article was in the Times-Picayune earlier this week (click on the picture to link o the story):

I'm in the City Pages!

2008-03-28T05:56:00.000-07:00

My show has a blurb in the City Pages' 'A-List" this week. There's also a photograph published (though cropped) in the front index!

2008-03-24T20:30:00.000-07:00

16 students from my photography program, and two faculty arrived in New Orleans today. The tour was a crazy awakening for many of them--this surprised me. We had them view "When the Levees Broke". I tried my best to describe the vastness of the devastation, and the pervasiveness of it--even today...but this proves further to me that this was a very right thing to do..to bring fresh new eyes to a place waiting to recover with molasses-slow reaction from the help agencies. Hopefully their eyes will be more people's eyes on the situation.

We had to "plan b" our kick off dinner, because Jaun's Flying Burrito decided to pick this week for renovations, but managed to split the group into two clumps of nine and eat in adjoining restaurants...because it's hard to find a table for 19 on the fly...my favorite comment, "What are all these people doing out on a Monday night?"

Answer: "This is New Orleans".
(Answer in my head: "This isn't Minnesota.")

Elysium gets some press...

2008-03-21T13:29:00.001-07:00

In case you missed the opening, my exhibition in St. Paul is running through April 12th. Lex Thompson wrote great essay for the exhibition, which (excerpted) is appearing now at MNartists.org

I'm off to New Orleans to shoot this weekend. Then, on Monday, 16 of my Ai students and two faculty are joining me! I'm really excited to see how they edit this evolving world through each individual viewfinder.

Exhibtion of Elysium Opens in St. Paul Tomorrow!

2008-02-28T06:47:00.001-08:00

The Exposure Project: The Effect of Disaster Photographed

2007-07-08T09:07:00.000-07:00

It turns out quite a few folks are having conversations--no wait, isn't a blog by nature a monologue?--about the ethics of photographing in New Orleans post-Katrina, as well as the numbing effect the pervasiveness of imagery has had on the national conscience (or rather, un-conscience). Good reading, in particular can be found at The Exposure Project: The Effect of Disaster Photographed. Also check my sidebar here for other rants and such.

I believe, as I've said here before, that these images do have a cumulative effect. I in fact felt it before my first trip to New Orleans last September. I was sick of 1st year anniversary tributes. I admit it, I was completely oblivious. Water line? Seen it. I didn't even intend to go to the devastated areas of NOLA, I was so sick of Katrina. I made a comment to the friend I was visiting there, that after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in San Francisco, there was a line around the City, a crack, about a foot from the ground. I asked him if the water line had become that to him. This pervasive reminder. He scoffed, "I was in New York on September 11, 2001. Nothing can be compared to what happened in New Orleans--9/11 is a joke by comparison. Don't even try." There is an effect on the people of this place that is so profound, one can only know it to go there and talk to folks. Spike Lee did a very good job with his When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts, in depicting the anger, despair, and feeling of abandonment so present in the clearing air of post-Katrina New Orleans.

The fact that struck me most in driving the streets after Richard made that comment, was that nothing had changed in this city since the photographers had left. And I still remain conflicted as to whether the photographers can come back and inject a little adrenaline into the conscience of Americans, or if they will simply turn up the drip on the Novocain.

Other Artists Visiting New Orleans

2007-06-08T08:00:00.001-07:00

There's been an awful lot of carpet-bagging with regards to the aftermath of Katrina. Though in the case of photographers, I can't say as I've seen a photograph later than a couple of months after the storm. I'm not sure if it's good that they've gone, so the redundancy of water-lined houses with their receded flood-water-scattered contents stops desensitizing the nation into comfort with its complacency, or bad. They wouldn't be hard pressed to find such scenes today. Much is unchanged, while the photography world abandons New Orleans—the perfectly styled studio of disaster—and quickly clamors to the marketing of their prey. Am I any different?

If you are in New Orleans right now, there's a great artist named Takashi Horisake who is working on an incredibly ambitious project to cast and entire shotgun house in latex for the Socrates Sculpture Park in Brooklyn, NY. This project does just what artists should be doing right now—it gets the word out. Sharing with New York and it’s millions of visitors that this isn’t three months after the storm; it’s today, and it’s not pretty. He needs really cheap throw away paint brushes, tarps, and a lot of DEET for the moquitos. Go check him out and lend a hand or bring hi some water. He's working hard, it's hot, and he's running out of time as he tries to stave off the city's desire to demolish the house he is casting. They waited almost two years, but suddenly, this one needs to go...hmmm.

Fastest changes; Slowest progress

2007-05-22T20:00:00.000-07:00

My attachment to nature is awkward. The windmill I joust is the preservation of a forest invented by man, because it is the forest in which I grew up; an urban forest my father planted in the inner-Richmond district of San Francisco in the 1950’s. His forest was formal-- a tree or two for every house, neatly planted in a row—street trees. It is the association with order and urban renewal, the spiritual epicenter of my father’s forest, that I found an interest in the real potential it has to re-unify community or to regress to the inhospitable.

It is estimated that the Hurricane Katrina took 70% of the urban canopy of New Orleans—so well known for it’s moss draped Louisiana Live Oaks, stretching their great twisting arms up to 50’ on either side of their massive trunks and undulating roots. So the decimated urban forest lay broken in the streets, on homes, across the now barren City Park. But it is not that damage on which my photographs now gaze, but on the damage, at the hands of man that followed.

A majority of this damage to the remaining 30% of the urban forest was caused by the Army Corps of Engineers trying to beat paths into the slowly draining city. However, the swath they cut was liberal, and homeowners report widespread intentional cutting to trees on private property.

The Corps was followed by the utility companies, who cut enormous damaging chunks out of the middle of trees (nicknamed “Y” trees) to make easy the work of re-powering the city and it’s surrounding parishes. Homeowners have had to make difficult decisions about their trees as well, sometimes cutting away massive, low-hanging branches that blocked the way of the trailer they need in their driveway or yard, to live. Demolition crews often take trees down, making easier the job of removing the broken remains of houses, and if they don’t, sometimes girdling the trees by stacking the debris around them curbside, then using them for leverage in waste removal. And then there was the widely reported clear-cutting of trees near levees, again by the Corps of Engineers, in order to more easily clear away the ruins, particularly in the Lower 9th Ward.

New Orleans had a long-standing tradition of treating its street trees with care, one it upholds today. These trees are not just as significant to the skyline of New Orleans as is the Eiffel Tower to that of Paris; they are the New Orleanians’ oldest dearest friends. The friends that remind them that no matter what happens, they too will weather the storm.

The photographs here, often of the same places over time (I will have been 11 times in the last year come October), as certain trees thrive after being submerged in 8-10 foot water some 19 months ago, and others lose the battle. It is my strongest commitment to not only help to preserve and restore the urban forest of New Orleans, but to get the word out—this city is far from the path to recovery, with hope its residents’ greatest asset. Tens of thousands of homes and people remain dislocated. The face of this disaster has only faded for those of us who have only the nightly news to bear witness.

My hope is that in documenting the decimation by humans, and the areas of hope, people will find a model for more careful thinking about the urban forest, even in the face of disaster and its recovery.