June 19th, 2009 § 0
I love finding what I want. I came across this grilling brand that has movable type while I was at Harbor Freight yesterday. I can’t wait to try it out. I have been shopping steak brands for a while but I hadn’t found one like this yet. It was 8 bucks so I pretty much had to buy it.
On a side note, this was shot with a Canon Powershot G10, which is quickly becoming the first camera I grab for everyday photos. It is pretty fantastic for most anything.
June 10th, 2009 § 0
I have left my academic safety net. No more critiques, no more guidance. I am free to do what I want, for better or worse. I have been getting reconnected with my own work flow. I just got some film scanned and I have been editing down some shots. i figured I might as well post a set of them here. It’s my site, so I do what I want.
June 8th, 2009 § 1
someone threw the Mary out with the bath water
I have been eying up this spot since the snow melted. I’m not sure it’s my favorite image ever, but I thought about making it for a long time. The site used to home to a farm, which was demolished in various stages. The house was burned by the fire department (for practice?) The site used to adjoin Hoepker Road until they moved the path of the road north about a quarter mile. All the buildings are gone, but they left this shrine. They couldn’t bring themselves to tear down the little grotto. It made for an interesting juxtaposition and for that I thank the superstitious wrecking crew. In the distance the new Target stretches accross the horizon. This outdoor niche will soon have more neighbors, and I am curious how long it will stand.
I looked up bathtub Madonna and lo and behold there is a pretty good Wiki post about them here.
June 8th, 2009 § 0
I might be a part of the problem. I stopped thinking of the edge of town as a problem and more as just a unique space. It is a landscape in flux. The agricultural land that borders any town is always subject to change. The value as cropland can swing towards more valued uses. My community, Sun Prairie, has been steadily growing for a couple of decades. Since 2000, the population has increased 24 percent. My neighborhood was a part of that boom. It is a large subdivision, detached from most of the town. Construction is done here and many of the homes are about 10 years old now. In between our borders and the rest of the town is a patchwork of strip malls, stores and empty lots, much of the space is still being farmed.
Three years ago I became interested in the edge of town. I did a photographic study of various local communities. Originally I think I was doing it in protest. I have since realized that you can’t stop progress. What I can do is work on the inside, and talk with neighbors near and far about what we can do to tweak our own land use.
The product is a set of panoramic images, they depict the changing edge. There is a clashing of aesthetics, the rural and the suburban.
June 3rd, 2009 § 1
These are the time I will never cherish. The after the facts, and because I have to’s. It has been a busy year. The milestones outpaced the everyday, and we are behind on a lot of things. I have been switching between projects, sending off resumes and housework. There are many things I enjoy, keeping a home can be satisfying. I like working on the exterior, trimming, mowing, pulling. But the sweeping, wiping and putting away is getting to me. The wedding is over, and now we have new stuff to put away, but where does old stuff go? A part of me feels like escaping and finding errands to run, but that only postpones the completion of anything.
So I procrastinate. This post is living proof of that. In the five minutes that I have typed about how I hate cleaning house, I could have swept a room, sorted a counter top or scrubbed a toilet. I am ok with that. There’s always later and tomorrow or even next week. I will just have to do it again anyway.
May 22nd, 2009 § 0
Fred Hopside Down Glass filled with Berwick Brown ale on a sunny Friday afternoon
May 21st, 2009 § 3
Film isn’t dead. Kodak has given us s new emulsion to use. I recieved a free 35mm roll of Ektar 100 from a Kodak rep at the 2009 SPE conference in Dallas. I loaded it up in my trusty AE-1 and mounted up a 50mm lens. It felt good to shoot with a 35mm again, and I was excited to see what this new film could offer.
May 21st, 2009 § 0
I am excited for the weekend. Three days of great weather, which means I will most likely go through a bag of charcoal. I have meat thawing in the fridge and film holders loaded and ready for action. As if I haven’t taken enough photos of meat and grills and the like. I can’t tell myself to stop.
May 14th, 2009 § 0
I have yet to post my series of suburban panoramas, and I will soon. I have been revisiting the concept, and using my own space for inspiration. I got the urge again after shooting some panoramas of art installations. I am less concerned about the seamless quality this time around. I like the 360 degree view and the distortion of space. It makes my yard look far larger than it really is.
May 12th, 2009 § 0
I am proud to announce that this Friday I will be donning a cap and gown and graduating. My MFA is terminal, and now starts the part of my life where I finally become a contributing member of society, when I see fit. It has been a long road. I started the college experience back in 1999, and have pretty much been on the academic teet for 8 years straight (with a short stint out when my kids were born). 8 years, one whole presidential administration, countless pairs of shoes, a lot happened.
Now, it’s time to find work. What a great time to be entering the workforce. Would you like fries with that?