Category: art

Amber’s Projecting


I met Amber a few years ago when she visited Paul. With the hat and heavy coat I didn’t recognize her. Reappeared in City Hall Park the other day. She was looking for me. Wants to work on a photography project with me for school. Her assignment is to find a local photographer to shoot.

She didn’t have a camera; lost the charger. I shot. She posed. We bothered a few passersby to hold a small reflector. The light at 12:00 poked through the bare trees harshly, bouncing off the metal sculptures. No time to head for cover.

Then we walked down to little park in front of the Men’s Room hair salon. Bitterly cold. Low, unremitting light.

 

 

 

Meatwad Wonders What


Needs to know which devil to attack first. As one of the survivors told me, “he need to give up the dope and the alcohol….” But which one first? And the where does he go? Cannot possibly seamlessly merge back into the system, unless taken care of. Do we? A line gets drawn in the sand. Join up to receive. If not, what?

So, what’s the problem? Heroin. Does he do a substitute? Alcohol? Can we dope him up to get him off the sauce? He has court cases. Will he be sober enough and healthy enough to go to a treatment facility? I make him laugh. He makes me cry. I want him to be well. Nothing I can do for him at the moment. He sits and begs. People look at me from the nearby diner, not happy about him being there and wondering why I do what I do. I don’t shoot them. They are only secondarily my subjects. Can my images change opinions? Who knows?

 

Impressionism at Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

One of the great museums in the world; one of the best exhibitions I have ever seen. Learned many things; didn’t realize that Dega’s ballerina wore a cloth skirt. Saw the art up close. Not that we haven’t been to the Clark several times to see Sterling and Francine’s collection, but this visit felt differently.

James Kitchen, Sculptor for Stavros

 

Stavros works with people with disabilities, finding them residences, services and anything that can make their lives more liveable and life’s equipment more accessible. James Kitchen who uses discarded materials for his works and donates proceeds to endless causes built this to provide imagery for Stavros. An artist cannot do better than when their art promotes social justice.

McCaffrey’s In Burlington’s Old North End

How many people can say that when they take their car in for service and the service manager says you need a new one of these and a new one of these, you actually believe him and order the parts? How many of you can say that when you take the car in and they say they have repaired it, that you think the car is going to be fine and the cost was fair? And, how many of you go to a place where if it isn’t they make it right? Well, I can.

Self With Greg Heisler Portrait

Phase II Final Assignment called for a revealing self-portrait. One of my classmates who drinks milk and says the white liquid defines her will submit an image of her in front of a milk locker in a grocery store. Me! On the wall hangs a portrait done by Gregory Heisler during orientation in January. Making people see more in themselves as he does defines my quest at Hallmark.

Couch Potato

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Phase II finals at Hallmark Institute of Photography. Just about half way through the program. Only recently did I think I was getting it.

Environmental still life. Flowers from Sigda in Greenfield. Potatoes from Fosters in Greenfield. Beer stein from the Salvation Army in Greenfield. Contact paper and drawer lining from the $ store in Greenfield. Blue blotter paper from some stationary store. Total expenditures around $15, not including gas.

My potato head came up with the idea. A kid accompanying his sister on a tour of the commercial studio, turned to his mother and inquired, “isn’t that Mr. Potato Head?” Frenchy replied, “who does it look like, you idiot?” “What’s he doing here,” the kid asked? “I am a photographer.”
But the real problem was that I couldn’d find furniture to scale. Seems like they don’t make furniture for real size dolls anymore. Wanted a TV or a computer to throw light. Settled for strobes. Gels colored the set too strongly, so I post processed in Lightroom3.

Never did anything like this before.

Home Depot Lights the GregoryHeisler Way

So, the story goes that Heisler’s luggage lost its way on some unnamed airline on the way North Carolina via Atlanta to photograph some big ticket exec. Knowing the complications of rescheduling, he and his assistant stopped at a Home Depot and bought a flourescent fixture, two daylight tubes and a shower curtain. They did the shot with a kit that cost less than a C note. Now he teaches lighting, using the same setup, albeit one attached to a light stand by a knuckle and a grill painted black.