Amost Time to Go

A stack of announcements just came from the Houston Center for Photography. Always a happy moment! We're going to Houston on Wednesday for the opening on Friday. The weather in Houston has broken from 100-plus degrees down to the 90's. It's fall-like in Boston, so I think we'll enjoy the warmer weather.

Bridge

Here's a new picture. Over the past year and a half, I've been going back and forth between working on this series (Selected People) and a series of abstractions (Artist's Statements). It's unusual for me to do two series at once, but who says I can't? I guess I'm excited to be showing Selected People at the Houston Center for Photography in September, so it makes me want to extend the series.

This picture almost makes me blush. It depicts what I don't like about taking pictures: being conspicuous. I took about 200 pictures to make this composite, and these were most of the people who noticed me. It was a busy summer afternoon, and the tourists were streaming across the miniature bridge in the Boston Public Garden. I must have photographed well over a thousand people. But pretty much only these people's eyes flicked across me and my little camera, which was perched on the stone railing of the bridge. There is no way to know if they were annoyed, as they appear to be. And they are not really staring at me, since I am standing and the camera's lens, which they are looking slightly down at, is at waist level. They may have been frowning at their companions or at the perfect summer day, for all I know. But they certainly capture something about photography.

You're Invited

Shipping News

I haven't blogged for a while. Sometimes I feel like it, sometimes I don't. Do I now? I do. Because I'm very excited about my upcoming show at the Houston Center for Photography. Is the opening September 9 at six, I think? Almost definitely. Is it in the main gallery? Yes. Do I have 22 pictures from the series Selected People? I do. Are Jason Dibley, Christian Cutler, Bevin Bering of the HCP fantastic? How can you even ask? They are. Is there a mighty exhibitions committee behind all this, mysterious as it is benevolent, which deserves my gratitude and affection? True, truer, truest.

The picture above is of the little entryway to my apartment. It's filled with 249 pounds worth of pictures in 15 boxes. A strong man would be happy to weigh this much and 15 is my lucky number. (13,603 square inches of pure, clean, fresh photo. A retail value of $29,700.) The boxes are addressed to the HCP. They will get there maybe on Wednesday (it's Friday, now) and Jason, Christian, and Bevin will put them on the wall. You can stand there, dear reader, and look at them as much as you like, if you happen to be in Houston this fall and are inclined that way. I will be there for the opening. I will be happy and talkative. The UPS man is gone now, my boxes in his truck.

Lines

 I've been walking around a lot lately, taking pictures of lines.

Artist's Statements

These are the pages from a little book I made in which I collected sentences from artists' statements that I found with Google and paired them with abstract photographs I concocted in my studio. (Click on an image to make it larger and the text more legible.)

Fruit and Hand

Two more Fruit Is Good for You's, although I may have to change the name of the series if I keep doing more body art (aka Body Art). I do plan to do more human work, in fact.

Fruit Is Good for You

Here are some new pictures from a series I'm starting (click on image to enlarge). I thought of calling it Rational Fruit, but changed my mind. I bring this up because it gives you an idea of what I am thinking about these pictures. They take a lot of work, but I've got another five or six going now. They might take a few weeks because I have to let them sit or redo them if they are not quite right. God, I have a lot of patience, but only when something seems really worth doing and exciting. Otherwise, I get bored easily. I am looking forward to spring and getting outside to take pictures.