urban ku # 11 and a link to a commentary for your consideration

I am rarely without a camera. Too much interesting everyday life comes at me to ignore.

In an article - In Defense of the Non-Luminous Landscape - Colin Jago expresses his views on the subject very well. Check it out.

Stephen Durbin

The image here is part of an ongoing night photography project. I seem to be especially drawn to interesting lighting around windows, and I also like the geometric shapes formed by building facades like those here. In this case I was originally shooting the window on the right as main subject, but when I stepped back and saw the far church appear, a new composition was born. Mainly because of the church, I like this one in color, though I usually work in monochrome. I have to say that, for me, this verges on being a "pretty picture," as has been much discussed on this site. What do you think?

See Stephen's superb BW photography

Happy Days

Just back from Pittsburgh, PA where I wrapped up another 36 page Adirondack/Lake Placid Winter Travel Guide - this is a 2 pg. spread from the guide. I provide concept, design, copy development and supervision, photography, pre-press and press proofing. It's an absolute labor of love.

urban ku # 10 and Tibits

It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see. ~ Henry David Thoreau

He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe is as good as dead; his eyes are closed. ~ Einstein

Ed Richards ~ The Landscape of Hurricane Katrina

Every vision of Katrina is different. Coming to Katrina with local knowledge and personal connections, as well as a technical knowledge of hurricanes and their impact on the land, my images have their own perspective. While little appreciated by the national media, all of the areas inundated by Katrina have been flooded before by hurricanes, and some, such as the Mississippi Gulf Coast, have been utterly destroyed in the past. Knowing this has happened before, and will inevitably happen again, I see these images as part of the long term saga of the Gulf Coast, rather than images of a unique tragedy as this has been seen by most other photographers. I continue to photograph the region as it rebuilds. While I hope I will not photograph it destroyed again, I am documenting fragile areas spared by Katrina, including GPS locations, in case, as with Katrina, there is nothing left after the next storm.

I live in Baton Rouge, 70 miles up river from New Orleans, and I know the southern Gulf Coast from many perspectives. In my day job, as a law professor at LSU , I study the governmental policies and natural forces that underlay disasters such as Katrina. While I am concerned with the welfare of the people displaced by the storm, my interest as a photographer is the impact of major storms on the land and the built environment.

I shoot 4x5 black and white film, which I scan and print digitally. I shoot in the classic landscape tradition, seeking out graphically powerful images, usually defined by their position against the sky. The high resolution of the large final prints gives a strong sense of place through allowing the viewer to see details in the debris, and other cues which transform the strong graphic images into real life scenes. This detail is lost on the WWW, requiring the underlying graphic structure to
convey the power of image.

Aaron Hobson

My wife says that if I were cheating on her, this would be the perfect excuse. Out every night once the baby goes down, for a few hours exploring more nightscapes. My alibi is always on the memory card. On this particular night, a tall, sexy, naked, tree and I had a little get together and to make my conscience even more guilty it happened in a dark alleyway.

publishers note - I'm in Pittsburgh on biz. Things will be back to norml tomorrow

urban ku # 9 and a commentary for your consideration

Another Rt. 9 roadside attraction.

Last night I was re-reading bits and pieces of The Photograph As Contemporary Art. The book is as readable a piece as I have found that deals with the topic of "...the ideas that underpin contemporary art photography before going on to consider their visual outcome."

Illustrated with 217 photographs - I find most to be "beautiful" although there is no classic "beauty" to be found here, the book does a very credible job of meeting its stated goal of being "...a survey (of motivations and expressions that currently exist in the field), the kind of overview you might experience if you visited exhibitions in a range of venues...independent art spaces, public art institutions, museums, commercial galleries...in major art centers such as New York, Berlin, Tokyo, or London." The photography is divided into 7 chapters/categories, not by style or subject matter, but by "...grouping photographers who share a common ground in terms of their motivations and working practices.

The reproduction of the photographs in the relatively small (6"x8.5") soft-cover book is excellent and there seems to be just right number of words to get the job done without becoming tiresome, obtuse or opaque. The book is also very afforable at only $19.95US (list price - it can be had for substantially less from online vendors).

That said, and in no way diminishing my recommendation that this is a must-have must-read book, I was reminded as I read last night of my recent Tidbit - Interpretation is the revenge of the intellectual upon art (Susan Sontag).

The "Intellectual" in this case is Charlotte Cotton, the author/photo editor of The Photograph As Contemporary Art. As near as I can tell from a Google search, Cotton is Head of Cultural Programmes at Art + Commerce in New York. Previously, she was Head of Programming at The Photographers' Gallery in London and a Curator of Photographs at the Victoria and Albert Museum from 1993to 2004.

As mentioned, I think CC has done an admirable job with this book and she has managed to pull together a group of photographs that appeals very much to my eye and sensibilities - amazingly, for a collection this diverse, nearly every single photograph in the book gives me cause to stop and consider. Most are a visual treat to my eye and they all are capable of engaging my intellect and emotions all well.

OK, so where's the rub/revenge?

I have been oft accused of being a pointy-headed pin head. In some quarters I am known as "Blovius" (from to bloviate - orate verbosely and windily), and, I've have made it well-known that a photograph must engage my intellect as well as my visual sense, so this might sound a little odd to some, but, when CC writes about specific photographs, her words - though they be right in number and not tiresome, obtuse or opaque, - seem to suck the life out of the photographs she is writing about.

It seems to me that CC, in perfect concert with most of her "high-art" brothers and sisters, needs to sublimate emotion to intellect. It is as if she (they) needs to don a mantle of cool intellectual detachment from the photography (art) lest she be tarred and feathered with an emotional (unprofessional?) attachment to her subject. The writing is all so academic, clinical and cold.

While much of the writing is instructive, eventually, I start to long for a simple and direct, "I love this photograph. It reaches me where I live." kind of thing. I need a little emotional foreplay with my mental constructs, otherwise I might foresake the arts and sit around reading the dictionary. Know what I mean?

Perhaps, the problem I have with this book - which I find representative of much writing about photography as art - is found in the first paragraph of this commentary (from the second paragraph in the book), wherein CC (in concert with most of her peers) puts ideas before going on to consider their visual outcome.

That's butt-assbackwards in my book.

Michelle Parent ~ Red pig

This is the backyard of an artist. I was drawn to the scene because of the red pig. There was a playfulness here that I liked. It seemed odd, but at the same time, just right. I didn't just focus on the pig, because I wanted to be sure the viewer could see the Vermont farm scenery that it sits in.

I have done some computer work for this woman and her art work is always bright and cheery and fun with a lot of crazy color schemes run rampant. I have been taking care of the office while they are on vacation and have been seeing this scene from the window. Today it just felt right to go out and capture it. Besides, I hadn't clicked the shutter in a while and felt that itch and the afternoon light was so nice tonight before the clouds came in and the sun set.

Joel Truckenbrod ~ Dusk, Cascade River, Minnesota

In response to Ana's comment: From what I've seen of art-school culture over the past few months, I think there absolutely is an almost superstitious fear of formal beauty. It's a very interesting experience (in a tear-my-hair-out sort of way) to have gone from the NPN-like culture where my photography is considered to be quite ugly to the art-school culture where I'm constantly being beaten up for my love of formal beauty. Both of these extremes seem somewhat pathological. -

Having recently graduated from art-school myself (BFA in painting), I found myself having flashbacks to some of the very same issues. Specifically, the notion of formal beauty was a big "no-no". When pressed, my post-modernist professors would submit that there was nothing wrong with formal beauty (as it is different from "pretty")...But, virtually any work that went down this forbidden road was dismissed - unless something was done in the work that would directly challenge, diminish or (preferably) poke fun at the "beautiful" leanings of the piece. My conclusion was that formal beauty was perceived as a threat and was viewed as part of the visual lexicon of "lower" means of artistic expression. Of course, the irony to the whole situation was that the more I was told how formal beauty was boring, uninspired, cliche, often kitsch, etc...the more intrigued I became with it. Though I my paintings didn't really attempt to confront this "issue" (I actually wanted to graduate), I found photography and began to approach the camera as a way to come to terms with some of these questions that I had. I did this on my own time and of my own ambition, which is probably why it has taken a hold of me more than painting ever did - and why I spend all of my time with my camera rather than my paintbrushes these days. After photographing now for almost a couple of years (and also being outside of the school environment), I feel like I'm beginning to find myself in my photography. That's not to say my many questions have been answered. In fact, more have probably arisen, which is something I welcome. They are of my own choosing though, which seems very important. At some point, the choice must be made to pursue those things that internally trigger us, things that we know hold "truth" - even if various groups and cultural/artistic viewpoints tell us no. Even though my professors would probably be appalled with my change of directions, I have never been more engaged with my artwork than I am now.

urban ku # 8 and a mini-commentary for your consideration

Near Au Sable Chasm on Rt 9 (motel row) in Keesville, NY.

the commentary - After just over a month of blogging presence, it seems that The Landscapist has struck a chord with a growing audience of photographers (primarily) who are interested in landscape photography that has moved beyond the entertaining pretty picture. It's reassuring to know that I am not a lone voice wailing in the wilderness - the interesting comments and mini-commentaries from participants is lending a rich and hoped-for components to the blog. Thanks very much> It gives me the energy to carry this thing on.

As far as I can tell, there is an consensus of sorts emerging around a few salient points:

1. Beauty - other than it's not "pretty", is it "good" or "bad"? Is it something to be sought or avoided? As, Cory Freeman wrote. "I seem to be struggling lately with not wanting to take a picture of something that might be regarded as just a pretty picture. I would like to make an image that expresses more than that."

2. How do you do it? - not technique-ly wise, but rather, as has been asked, "How do you photograph an emotion"? or, more specifically, as Brian wrote. "Maybe we should talk about what it means to have talent in photography(pub's emphasis)...Is it the ability to see scenes in a certain way? Is it the innate ability to "feel" whether a particular composition works or not? Is it the ability to turn the emotion felt in to an emotional image? ???"

3. "talent in photography" - When discussing photography as an art, there is very often, IMO, the erroneous tendency to lump photography into a generic one-word-catch-all of "art". Photography certainly shares some basic similarities with other arts but photography differs dramatically from them in its unique relationship to the "real". I believe this warrants considerable contemplation when discussing items #1 and #2.

Good topics.

Now it seems to me that if you are hanging out around The Landscapist (or other similarly inclined blogs) and pondering these ideas, you are, at the least, on the road to arriving at some recognition - I am not certain that anyone ever arrives at the "answers", which, IMO, is an important part of the process - within yourself of the answers you need to find (or at least pursue) in order to move along your path to more meaning-full photography.

I hope that these topics - but not limited to - are explored more fully by an ever-expanding number of voices here on The Landscapist.