A rat faced dog and a muddy floor

One photograph, ostensibly about nothing at all and maybe seven years old, made me want to write thousands of words. I was compelled to tell the story of the moment, everything that had led to that moment, and everything that came afterwards. I wanted to describe how all of that described me, how all of those things before and after made an awful lot of awful sense—and that things that had happened since might have been misunderstood, but were really just surrounded by other pictures of good things. Even when I was in the middle of some personal tragedy, feeling overly dramatic, they were still pictures of good things.

Instead I described something much more finite, instead I told just the story of why there was a rat faced dog on such a muddy floor.

45ish miles and 1ish photograph

And a poor one from the phone, again, of course.

I would say that “I don’t know what happened.” How could I go on a 3 hour ride and only take a single crappy iPhone photo—how I could travel to Nebraska and the only photograph I come home with is one someone else takes?  I started to write that, but really—I know exactly what happened.

It was a culmination of frustration, self-doubt, a loss of identity, a lack of understanding and purpose in my work. The things that usually bother all of us at any given moment became what making work was about. The ideas never stopped coming, but the psychological and emotional elements of my process were snubbed out by my insecurities.

I busied myself with fretting about things rather than making them. I wrote a lot, and looking back I did take more photographs than it felt like I was at the time, but the substance of what makes my work mine wasn’t there. And of course that just led me even further away from the work, from myself.

It feels good to be working towards what I should, again. Projects that were on the cusp of being something more than ideas are sitting on my desk actually being something. Comps from yesterday and last month and last year are staring at me waiting to become real. Notes and phone numbers and plans are on little orange post-its and they are filling up my heart and mind just the way they used to.

Blessed dog walks in Englewood

Regarding the debate of an iPhone as a proper photographic tool—
I primarily use my iPhone to poorly document skies on dog walks.

When driving through Nebraska

and you ask the person sitting in the passenger’s seat to take a photograph of some train graffiti so you can share it with someone, it looks like this—

Does your Grandma’s nursing home have a shoe mirror?

Mine does.

Three photographs from the National Western Stockshow

My day job is decoding buzzwords.

1. I’m 19
2. I’m 20
3. I’m divorced
4. I’m twice divorced
5. I was born both a man and a woman
6. Former junkie
7. Gang-member
8. Former cokehead
9. I killed my parents
10. I’m French

Over-seen.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

It is inevitable to end up in an over-photographed location. But what do you do with that? How do you move through that space, with a keenness that can allow for new, relevant images?

It’s not a new problem, but it is a useful one.

A month or so ago I drove over Trail Ridge Road. with M. The light was like nothing I’d ever seen there before. Insane clarity on one side, a storm growing on the other. The typical haze cutting through the distance.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

Anytime you travel through that park, you can’t ignore the endless folds of earth—that from corner to corner as you wind up and down the road—can quickly turn from otherworldly to eminently sled-able. Living in Denver, it is a conceptual “backyard”, but the surprising tameness that exists within the extremes can sometimes feel like the edge of a suburban development.

The ligature of the road itself, carved into this place, leads to pull-offs and paths through the tundra, but you never do find the tract homes. It does take you through simple and clear opportunities to make rather nice photographs.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

The drive we made wasn’t about making photographs, though, it was about getting out of the city. I didn’t pay the $20 fee with any conceptual framework in mind. I didn’t want to make an ironic statement about preservation. See that kind of light for yourself, though, and what would you do? Try to make some pretty pictures, that’s what.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

Operating only on a half-conscious level—regarding actively trying to make unique National Park images—I ended up finding myself attracted to the simple layers that cut across those prehistoric rises, falls and fissures. The swaths of plain tundra overlapping and softly receding towards those daunting ridges—and the tiny human elements that only recently found their way in to install roads, walkways and informative plaques.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

These images are a poor representation of this area. Truth be told, any image would be. They are, however, as accurate a description as I could muster for where we were that day.

Hi, Colorado.

Rocky Mountain National Park, 2010

After nearly 5 months out from Toronto, things are making both more and less sense than ever.
Hi, Colorado.

Bye, Toronto.

Toronto, Ontario 2010

See you in the Fall, maybe.