I wanted to say something a while back and it has been bothering me this whole time. I even tried, but I don't think what I said was really... I don't know, "It".
My interest in still lifes goes back a ways, and as I told you already, I realize that I have had a bias against representational art which is silly because I couldn't even paint badly if I tried, let alone as well as the people I have dismissed. In October, I went to a residency in North Carolina called Elsewhere, and while there I created a body of work. Photographs. They were photographs of objects available around the space of the residency, because this all took place in what had been until several years ago a Thrift Store. These photographs were taken with Mamiya 6x7 camera, which is maybe in some way important. This camera was the one I used 10 years ago to shoot abstract close-ups of bottles from a collection I had amassed for this purpose(and continue to expand to this day because, well, maybe I am not done with that body of work even if it has been 8 years since I last shot one of those bottle photos). The images were in some ways a return to that way of working I had started back when, arranging bottles in front of the lens, with the sun setting in the West. I stopped taking those photos – which were all shot on my porch – when they tore the 100 year-old Duplex, that I had been living in for six years on top of a hill overlooking Lake Union in Seattle, down. I didn't think of those as still lifes, but technically they could be considered as such. It would be useful if I could show you some of those images, but maybe that will have to wait.
At Elsewhere I found myself working with different things, not simply glass bottles. I found myself wanting to explore the idea that collections of objects could be arranged like a collage, or a map, representing ideas, or clusters of ideas, or trains of thoughts or trajectories or narratives. In Songlines, Bruce Chatwin talks about the idea that song predated language as a tool for mapping one's journey through the landscape. I wanted to see if there could be a visual equivalent I could create out of the relationships between objects in space.
There is, or was, an exhibit at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. Maybe these things exist everywhere, but that's where I saw it 18 years ago. It consisted of a closed clear box that had a pool of Mercury in the bottom. As you watched, you could see these little streaks form of tiny raindrops of Mercury that would materialize from thin air and drop to the bottom, creating consecutive ripples in the pool. Ostensibly the piece was to demonstrate the existence of tiny rays that travel through space. These rays or particles or whatever they were were said to be so small (I have to take their word for it because I didn't see them myself) that they passed through everything in existence without bumping in to anything. The only way we know they exist is because as they streak by they generate just enough charge to crystalize some of the vaporized Mercury as they pass, which causes the lines of tiny silver raindrops to form for the time it takes for them to realize their independence and plummet to their ultimate reunion.
I think ideas are like this and I keep thinking that somehow I can show this... (to be continued)
4.27.2008
Yesterday was a big day. Later I'll post some pictures and write some things and backdate it to make it seem like there is no lagtime in blogland.
Now, there is a mostly empty glass of a Bordeaux that was two Euro at the store yesterday. That, and us. Ok, make that an empty glass. I like to joke that I am not a glass "half-empty" or "half-full" person, but a "as long as I can get a refill" person. Perhaps that's why people like the idea of reincarnation, the is always a refill.
There is a branch of Mahayana Buddhism that took root in China a long time ago - when an Indian monk known as BodhiDarma (also known as Daruma in Japan) went North and spent 9 years staring at a cave wall (and is considered the founder of Shaolin Temple) - which then spread to Korea and Japan, called respectively Chan or Zen (as we know it in the West) that you have probably heard of as it has become extremely popular as of late.
Zen is a glass "always full" kind of perspective. I'm still working on that one.
Now, there is a mostly empty glass of a Bordeaux that was two Euro at the store yesterday. That, and us. Ok, make that an empty glass. I like to joke that I am not a glass "half-empty" or "half-full" person, but a "as long as I can get a refill" person. Perhaps that's why people like the idea of reincarnation, the is always a refill.
There is a branch of Mahayana Buddhism that took root in China a long time ago - when an Indian monk known as BodhiDarma (also known as Daruma in Japan) went North and spent 9 years staring at a cave wall (and is considered the founder of Shaolin Temple) - which then spread to Korea and Japan, called respectively Chan or Zen (as we know it in the West) that you have probably heard of as it has become extremely popular as of late.
Zen is a glass "always full" kind of perspective. I'm still working on that one.
Still life, with sounds of China
An afternoon to recover.
An afternoon to lie of the couch, which is only two cushions wide, forcing me into odd and uncomfortable contortions as a matter of course. But then, if I were a river I'd overflow my banks regularly as a matter of course, so it's no surprise. It's actually quite remarkable how much misery we are able to put up with, given the right circumstances.
An afternoon to listen to "Release the Cheerfulness, China - Ground Up 2" the new CD field recordings and street and classical musics from Jason Kopec of Noise|Order Recordings. It was part of a crae package from home and a great way to lie on the couch.
An afternoon to wonder what the hell to do with my life.
An afternoon to lie of the couch, which is only two cushions wide, forcing me into odd and uncomfortable contortions as a matter of course. But then, if I were a river I'd overflow my banks regularly as a matter of course, so it's no surprise. It's actually quite remarkable how much misery we are able to put up with, given the right circumstances.
An afternoon to listen to "Release the Cheerfulness, China - Ground Up 2" the new CD field recordings and street and classical musics from Jason Kopec of Noise|Order Recordings. It was part of a crae package from home and a great way to lie on the couch.
An afternoon to wonder what the hell to do with my life.
Insert Text Here
Mention email from local reporter apologizing for the fact that the piece about what we are doing here, including the open house with the "Good Neighbor Soup" isn't in the paper for some reason that isn't entirely clear. Maybe they didn't like the photo.
4.26.2008
Naturally, after a full day of presenting, souping, drinking and visiting those of us left at the end went across to road for ice cream. Monique, Jason, Mary, Albert, Alan "Ginga Din" Purves and I had Ijs. Well, everybody except for Mary, who was "Full of Soup" which may or may not be a Dutch phrase translated. I too was full of soup, given that I had had, like, 15 bowlsfull, but it was very good.
Albert, Monique and Jason had the BoerJoungers.
Alan had the Walnut and, on my recommendation, Aardbei (in a cup).
I had a Chocolade/Walnut, because I thought everybody was getting doubles. That and I wanted to get this business over with and have something that wasn't Strawberry. It was ok. The Walnut is intense, with a bit of a licqueur cast to it. The Chocolade is fairly mellow and didn't stand up to the Walnut as well as I had hoped. Perhaps the Hazelnoot might have, but I think that would have been too intense. As it was I was worried I had gone over the top with the double to begin with, and Alan's story about drinking the three very strong Ekus in Belgium and (well the story has a long and visceral part in the middle, which was quite funny but a little gross and while it had a happy ending it was a bit much on a full stomach) perhaps I should have had the strawberry. Or a coffee, which I still want but she still doesn't have.
From now on I am just going to have the Strawberry and be done with it.
Albert, Monique and Jason had the BoerJoungers.
Alan had the Walnut and, on my recommendation, Aardbei (in a cup).
I had a Chocolade/Walnut, because I thought everybody was getting doubles. That and I wanted to get this business over with and have something that wasn't Strawberry. It was ok. The Walnut is intense, with a bit of a licqueur cast to it. The Chocolade is fairly mellow and didn't stand up to the Walnut as well as I had hoped. Perhaps the Hazelnoot might have, but I think that would have been too intense. As it was I was worried I had gone over the top with the double to begin with, and Alan's story about drinking the three very strong Ekus in Belgium and (well the story has a long and visceral part in the middle, which was quite funny but a little gross and while it had a happy ending it was a bit much on a full stomach) perhaps I should have had the strawberry. Or a coffee, which I still want but she still doesn't have.
From now on I am just going to have the Strawberry and be done with it.
Albert arrived with the film. He also brought Alan "Gunga" Purvis, the Scottish percussionist extraordinaire who along with Albert and Jody Gilbert will be performing improvised musical works as part of today's program of happenings.
Much as I suspected, the light in the Cheese Hall is lackluster, and, worse, many of the images have the quality of being an exercise, rarely breaking through from the idea into...
This is the thing. I came here to engage with this place and to see if I could make artworks worth the effort. I also, given my own interest in still life as an approach, was interested in the whole Dutch tradition of Still Life in painting, and thought that by taking this on as a form I could both explore and learn while trying to create here. Of course, formal exercise is not in itself enough: I didn't come all the way here to practice scales. Given the work I did at Elsewhere (trying to use objects to "enact" narrative passages through a performative modality), and the ideas behind the earlier Bottle photographs (that they stood for people and how they expressed light as a spiritual metaphor), an artistic tradition that embraced an ethic of "in the words of St Thomas Aquinas ‘a corporeal metaphor of things spiritual’"
promised to be right up my alley.
I like the idea of talking about the things that interest me, as well as the people I meet and the experiences I have, through photographs of objects arranged out on a table. So far so good. I also like inviting people to bring me things they think are interesting for me to add to the mix. It echoes nicely Monique's soup piece, where people contribute and then the final result is shared (even while it remains Monique who is doing the cooking). Still in order for it to really work it's going to take time, and practice before it becomes a fully fledged way of working.
For example: Still Lifes often have immediately recognizable "returns" (by this I mean a trope that can serve as an identifying characteristic) such as a skull or a scale or a butterfly that symbolizes rebirth, etc. Do I go out and get a pewter water beaker because that says "Still Life" like nobody's business? Of course not, that would be cliche, even cheesy in a not good way (unless I got a nice glass one, ummm). What's more, part of what makes still lifes compelling is their technical difficulty. It is easier to take a photo of a pear than to paint one well. Not to privilege painting however, because in some ways it is easier to paint a pear than it is to photograph one well. But I digress.
What is it that makes a still life come alive? Resonate with significance? Knock you out?
Love. And I can spot it's absence a mile away.
Much as I suspected, the light in the Cheese Hall is lackluster, and, worse, many of the images have the quality of being an exercise, rarely breaking through from the idea into...
This is the thing. I came here to engage with this place and to see if I could make artworks worth the effort. I also, given my own interest in still life as an approach, was interested in the whole Dutch tradition of Still Life in painting, and thought that by taking this on as a form I could both explore and learn while trying to create here. Of course, formal exercise is not in itself enough: I didn't come all the way here to practice scales. Given the work I did at Elsewhere (trying to use objects to "enact" narrative passages through a performative modality), and the ideas behind the earlier Bottle photographs (that they stood for people and how they expressed light as a spiritual metaphor), an artistic tradition that embraced an ethic of "in the words of St Thomas Aquinas ‘a corporeal metaphor of things spiritual’"
promised to be right up my alley.
I like the idea of talking about the things that interest me, as well as the people I meet and the experiences I have, through photographs of objects arranged out on a table. So far so good. I also like inviting people to bring me things they think are interesting for me to add to the mix. It echoes nicely Monique's soup piece, where people contribute and then the final result is shared (even while it remains Monique who is doing the cooking). Still in order for it to really work it's going to take time, and practice before it becomes a fully fledged way of working.
For example: Still Lifes often have immediately recognizable "returns" (by this I mean a trope that can serve as an identifying characteristic) such as a skull or a scale or a butterfly that symbolizes rebirth, etc. Do I go out and get a pewter water beaker because that says "Still Life" like nobody's business? Of course not, that would be cliche, even cheesy in a not good way (unless I got a nice glass one, ummm). What's more, part of what makes still lifes compelling is their technical difficulty. It is easier to take a photo of a pear than to paint one well. Not to privilege painting however, because in some ways it is easier to paint a pear than it is to photograph one well. But I digress.
What is it that makes a still life come alive? Resonate with significance? Knock you out?
Love. And I can spot it's absence a mile away.
"Things to do while Monique is in Meppel"
-- clean the livingroom
--- clean the bathroom
--- clean the kitchen
--- take all belongings up to the skyroom
---tidy up skyroom
----set up drinks in the kasshall
---make sign for streetside
--- make dinner preperations (lists, food. etc)
--- move images to monique
-----sweep the kasshall
----bathe
--- clean the bathroom
--- clean the kitchen
--- take all belongings up to the skyroom
---tidy up skyroom
----set up drinks in the kasshall
---make sign for streetside
--- make dinner preperations (lists, food. etc)
--- move images to monique
-----sweep the kasshall
----bathe
Mary's instructions for making tea
"First you have to tilt the Honey jar, that's very important. Then you put about as much honey as can fit on a small spoon into the cup and pour the tea in. Then you have to stir it."
4.25.2008
Longwinded confessional
I am interested in Still Lifes because I find myself taking them, making them. It wasn't always this way. For a long time I fell into that category of Photographers who only captured what was in front of them. I felt, as I suspect many photographers do, that my job was to see, observe, witness, without "doing" anything. That kind of distance, that seemingly rigorous discipline not to interfere, not to move a single thing – that line in the sand that had the taste of an "ethic" – well it made sense at the time. I don't condemn it, but my sense of things is somewhat different now. Even when I spent years taking pictures of bottles, arranging them in front of my lens, quickly because the Sun was rapidly dropping to the horizon over Queen Anne Hill, I imagined that I was on Safari, hunting nimble game. Somehow it was important for me to not be in total control of the process, as if that made a difference. Perhaps I wouldn't call that an "ethic", more likely "a metaphysic", again as if that made any difference. I don't think I could ever be completely in control of the process; whether because of inability or lack of necessity is incidental. But what I know now is that it is impossible to be completely objective. To be here is to be complicit, to witness something is to take responsibility for it's coming into being.
At some point I realized that I had been brought up with the notion that being a Photographer and being an Artist were two separate categories. I have spent ten years and change trying to be the other instead of the one. Ironically I find that I'd like to be both, and it's a matter of finding the assumption switch. Lately I have realized that I had another given when it comes to Still Lifes. I'm not a painter and I can't draw. In many ways I have known that I got into photography because I wanted to create, and that photography was a compensation for the belief that you weren't an artist if you couldn't draw. Along with this came the perverse bias against representational art. Not knowing how difficult it is to try and record what you see by hand, I am suspect of people who try. This of course is non-sense, but it is connected with something deeper. I am suspect of people for whom the craft dominates the work. When someone only cares about technique, or slavishly recreates a tradition, or advances to a point where they can "pass" without going deeper into difficult territory, then I find myself dismissive. It's funny because while I know enough about photography to hold high standards, I apply my bias liberally. We all do, I suspect, and it's a matter not of being a Saint, but of sinning less. The fact is we are generally the ones who suffer most from our blind spots...
This is a lead in to tell you that I have found myself looking down on still lifes, and representational art in general, only to face the fact that I can't tell the difference anymore between abstract and representational, between still life and moving life. I'm not trying to be cute, here, it's just the way it is.
At some point I realized that I had been brought up with the notion that being a Photographer and being an Artist were two separate categories. I have spent ten years and change trying to be the other instead of the one. Ironically I find that I'd like to be both, and it's a matter of finding the assumption switch. Lately I have realized that I had another given when it comes to Still Lifes. I'm not a painter and I can't draw. In many ways I have known that I got into photography because I wanted to create, and that photography was a compensation for the belief that you weren't an artist if you couldn't draw. Along with this came the perverse bias against representational art. Not knowing how difficult it is to try and record what you see by hand, I am suspect of people who try. This of course is non-sense, but it is connected with something deeper. I am suspect of people for whom the craft dominates the work. When someone only cares about technique, or slavishly recreates a tradition, or advances to a point where they can "pass" without going deeper into difficult territory, then I find myself dismissive. It's funny because while I know enough about photography to hold high standards, I apply my bias liberally. We all do, I suspect, and it's a matter not of being a Saint, but of sinning less. The fact is we are generally the ones who suffer most from our blind spots...
This is a lead in to tell you that I have found myself looking down on still lifes, and representational art in general, only to face the fact that I can't tell the difference anymore between abstract and representational, between still life and moving life. I'm not trying to be cute, here, it's just the way it is.
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