Searching After Wildness - journals of a photographic artist

There are three excellent photography shows opening in central Indiana galleries this weekend, with receptions on Friday, July 3rd. Go out and celebrate the goodness!

Pictura Gallery
Pictura Gallery in Bloomington is opening their Landscape Invitational show, featuring some of my new favorite photographers. I’m there as well, but well, I’m not a new favorite of mine, er.. I suppose.

Jul 3 - Aug 4
Landscape Invitational, Pictura Gallery, Bloomington, IN
Opening Reception: Friday, July 3, 2009 5 - 8pm

Dean Johnson Gallery
I also have a piece in the Black and White show, opening at the Dean Johnson Gallery:

Jul 3 - 30
Black and White Show, Dean Johnson Gallery, Indianapolis, IN
Opening Reception: Friday, July 3, 2009 5 - 9pm

“Not everything is seen in black and white, but it is in this show. Check out some of the best photographers in Indianapolis as they focus on the purest form of their art, in our Black & White exhibit.”

AV Framing Gallery
It would also be well worth your time to visit the AV Framing Gallery, with the debut of a new photography space by my good friends John and Joslyn Crowe.

Jul 3 - Aug 22
Life Has Moments: intimate and client work by John Crowe and Joslyn Virgin Crowe — Crowe’s Eye Photography.
AV Framing Gallery, Indianapolis, IN
Opening Reception: Friday July 3, 2009 5 - 9pm

I was overwhelmed, stressed out and losing motivation. But, there were things to get done. If I could just stay on task the world might not fall apart. I needed to prepare for an art show the coming weekend, there was still bookkeeping to do from the previous show and an approaching deadline for a freelance job. Not enough hours. The house was getting messier too. The lawn, overgrown. Piles of paper around my desk. I was running out of clean clothes. And, it was getting harder to like people, because all people do is generate more stuff to do.

Over breakfast, I mentioned my mood to a friend. Exasperated, I sighed, “Maybe I should take a walk in the woods.” “Yes”, David replied. He looked me deep in the eyes, the way you look at someone when you’re giving serious advice. “You should do that.”

Back at home, I recounted the breakfast conversation to my wife, Hannah. “Yeah, you should take that walk in the woods.” I nodded in agreement and promptly went to my office. I answered a few emails and fired up the accounting software. Sure, it would be nice to take a walk, but I was already behind on my work. It would be irresponsible to fall behind any further.

A few hours later,  Hannah came by. “What are you still doing here?” I blathered some excuses. Feeling defeated, I hopped into the car and drove towards my favorite park. It was painful to leave.

I parked the car, all along feeling sorry for myself. I walked into the woods, down a ravine and found a log by the river. And there I sat, on the log. I became still and watched the water flow by. About an hour passed.

It was just what I needed. Was it the meditation, the change of environment, or the peaceful quality of the woods? I don’t know. But I did know that things were going to be okay. Not only that, but I was grateful.

And then I picked up my camera and took a few pictures. I hadn’t taken a picture in weeks. I came home, lightened. On my camera was Root Swirl, the picture above.

“A lot of what I’ve done in my business life, I don’t think it really means anything. There’s this whole — you’re seeing a lot of it now with all the politics and bailouts — way to make money in the world but not really do anything to contribute. I feel like what we do is important. But it’s not financially rewarding. Who cares? As long as you can make it on your own.”

Quote from tech entrepreneur turned organic farmer Tim Young. Via New York Times Magazine.

I live in the city and I love it. However, something about living this way is not quite right.

I grew up in the suburbs. The backyard of my family’s house came up to a woods where we neighborhood kids spent a lot of time getting lost. We made hideouts, buried treasure and went on long explorations. If we explored really, really far we would get to the other side of the woods and arrive at a street corner with an ice cream shop. To my 9 year old eyes, those woods were practically endless.

That was my initial taste of wildness. Those years were followed by TV, Nintendo, classrooms without windows, cars, shopping malls, air conditioning and cubicles. The wildness went from the expected to the other. You may be familiar with “the other”. It is that which is different from your daily experience. We tend to fear the other and make up excuses. Dangerous, unknown. You could get kidnapped, or eaten by a bear. The other is uncomfortable. Humidity and bugs. Excuses or not, I want it. For my sanity, I probably need it.

Henry David Thoreau wrote:

We need the tonic of wildness…At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things by mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us because unfathomable. We can never have enough of nature.

“In Wildness Is the Preservation of the World”, is a photography book by Eliot Porter published in 1962.  The title was taken from a passage by Thoreau. The book is a masterpiece of color nature photography. It is a statement about the lure of wild places and a celebration of the beautiful in what we mistake as common. And here we are, decades after Thoreau and Porter. 

And here am I, living a life after wildness - after Porter’s book and after a time when the wild was a regular part of society. At the same time, I am after wildness - after, as in “in pursuit or quest of”. There is a struggle between my contemporary, city life and my need of the wild. This has been gnawing at me for the past few years and I suppose will be for some time. Looking at my recent photographic projects, the pursuit of the wild was there waiting for me to realize that I have been searching all along. 

This need for wildness in my life is now strong enough that it requires a name. At the same time, this blog needs more focus (photography pun, hah). Blog, I christen thee, “Searching After Wildness”. May we all learn something worth living for.

Business cards used to be convenient because they are sized to fit in a wallet. The problem is, everyone packs too many things into their wallets. When someone gives me a business card, it has to compete with stacks of receipts, grocery membership cards, lint and whatever else gets lost with all the little things in my pocket. When I get home, I empty my pockets and all that stuff ends up in a pile on top of my dresser. Eventually, I may go through them by stuffing them into an even bigger pile within a dresser drawer. The card is never seen again.

I haven’t had a traditional business card for a few years now. In its place, I have a postcard sized hand out. The 4″x6″ card has my contact information and a prominent image of my work. It’s large enough to not get lost in a handbag and can be noticed if filed in a folder. The image is large enough to be a mini version of my artwork, but small enough that people would be curious about buying a larger piece. People stick them on their refrigerators and tack them to bulletin boards.

I keep the cards fresh by creating a new design each year. Here are the last few.

2007

2008

I sent the newest version to the printer this morning. I changed the design to encourage action and interaction. People that like what I do feed into what I do which flows back out again. I like that.

2009

A few months ago, I met with some photographer friends to plan an upcoming exhibit. We needed to choose a topic. I immediately thought of doing a series about the people I live with, because people look at me funny when I describe my house. The house serves as a home for more than just my immediate family. In it, lives: me, my wife, my baby daughter, three single women (one a single mom), the single-mom’s 1 yr old daughter, two dogs and two cats. That’s me and six females, or eight females if you count the pets. There are a lot of cars parked in front.

Bursting with eagerness, I proposed that the group show should feature the topic of the “Contemporary Family”.

Well, then my daughter Ruby was born, and I ended up taking a bunch of pictures of her, rather than pictures of my housemates. And, that’s my entry for the exhibit. Although, the piece does include some of my housemates, so you can imagine implied wacky community dynamics if you’d like.

All this to say, that the exhibit is this weekend on Friday and Saturday night. It will feature my contribution “Holding Ruby”, as well as images from the other awesome INvision members. The exhibit coincides with the Wheeler Arts Community open house, which is a wonderful bonus reason to be there. Here’s the info:

Contemporary Family - an INvision photography exhibit
and the Wheeler Arts Community Spring open house! 

Friday, May 1, 2009 6-10pm
Saturday, May 2, 2009 6-10pm

Wheeler Arts Community
1035 Sanders Street
Indianapolis, IN

See you there!

In a deviation from my usual subject matter and stylings, here’s something that’s neither landscape, nor color.

I’ve been asked recently if I do portraits of kids. I said, have you seen my website and the type of pictures I usually make? Yes, he responded, I have. But, he continued, I mentioned that you’re a photographer to some friends of mine, and they wanted to know if you take kids portraits.

You see, my website is full of landscapes. Trees. And if I have people, the shots are more akin to street photography than portraiture. I was really puzzled.

But, his question does make sense. Of all the pictures taken in the world, I wonder how many of them are of kids. You know, the pictures taken to share with friends and family. It’s got to be a large percentage. Fifty percent? More? What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say “photographer”? Is it weddings and kids?

I wonder if this is similar to the reaction I get when I mention to people that I worked in the software business. It wouldn’t take long for them to ask if I’d help them fix their computer.

So, I’ve been contemplating, perhaps just a little, what goes into a portrait. Well, for my child, at least.

One on my recent projects, “Big Sky” is now on the gallery section of the website. View it here.

There are places where the trees are sparce, the cities become scattered and the sky revealed. The heavens, vaster than my imagination can hold, rests on broad shoulders of earth and stone. I am no longer at the center.

Most of these images are from the two month Camper Van Chuck road trip. There was a certain kind of pleasure in making images of broad landscapes, which I otherwise generally avoid. I avoid them because I want my images to have a bit of intimacy, a perspective that delves deeper than a flitting glimpse of a wide vista.

But, how could I ignore those luscious far reaching skies?  So, I go where the spirit leads. Or the gut as it may be, although I don’t think indigestion played a part.

You can see several of these images this Friday as part of the Open Studio walks. Come by and have a chat:

April 3rd, 2009, 7 - 10pm
First Friday Open Studio 
Studio #302
Murphy Art Center
1043 Virginia Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46203

In March, I await the news that will determine my year.

To understand March, we need to go back to January. At the beginning of each year, I spend a couple of weeks swimming in applications and planning my schedule through October. Most art fair applications are due by February.  There’s a bit a pressure in having to plan the whole year all at once. If I miss something in those couple of weeks, I’ve missed it for the year. There’s a show that I’ve missed two years in a row because the deadline has already passed by the time I start planning.

Each application consists of  3 or 4 images of an artist’s work and an image of their display. Along with that goes an application fee, ranging from $20 to $40. I applied to about forty shows this year, so the fees add up. The applications then get reviewed by a jury that decides who gets to exhibit and who doesn’t.  Some of the fairs will have a thousand applicants competing for one hundred spaces. Actually, not even one hundred spaces, because some of the artists from the previous year get invited back. If you’re one of the lucky ones that make it past the jury, there’s a booth fee that ranges from $200 to as high as $2000.

After the applications have been sent,  it’s up to fate or something. You hope the jurors aren’t too bleary eyed after viewing 600 applications before yours.  The responses start coming back in March. In March, I check my email a little more often than usual. I look for the mailman, flipping through envelopes for the latest acceptance or rejection letters. Who knows how each day will be, a celebration or a sigh? Most day’s there’s no response, just bills and junk mail.

After all that anticipation, here still hasn’t been any selling of art. If you’re accepted, you get the chance to sell art. That is, once you’ve created your latest series of work, edited down the images, printed, matted and framed, promoted the show, packed up the van and made it to the show site to setup and welcome the customers.

The process, when successful, is a series of victories of unknown merit. There is no top. With each step you may not even be getting anywhere more beneficial. And the higher you get, the more chances you have to fall. And yet each year I feel that my work is getting better and that I am getting farther. Or is it all just a delusion? I suppose the only sanity is to enjoy the journey.

On February 7th, 2009, I became a father. Welcome to the world, little Ruby. Oh, man is she a cutie. As you may guess, the past few weeks have been a doting mix of wonder, random sleep, foggy work and diapers. 

I’m gradually getting back into the routine of things. Life is sweet.