views of the northeast

after abe

high tide #6

i spy

high tide #5

Is there anything so infuriating as incomplete news?

I think I may have won something. But, er, I'm not sure. Just before I left for winter break I put in a submission for the annual photography contest at school. Of course, as so often happens at the Museum School, the actual logistics such as when the judging would be, how we would learn the results, etc., were all obscured by a vague artistic fog (I hate that artistic fog): you'll find out when you find out. Just this afternoon I got email from one of my teachers congratulating me on the ___ prize. I was never so surprised because if I have won, no one has bothered to tell me!

Now I'm all anxious and hopeful --and frustrated. Is it true? Has she mistaken me for someone else? Did really I win? What did I win? To place at all would be quite nice. Even third prize is a thousand bucks --I wouldn't turn my nose up at that!-- but heavens, I wish I KNEW.

high tide #4

watching fireworks over manila

It's A New Year

... with no mistakes in it yet.

high tide #3

high tide #2

Second in the series: pulled by the moon.

high tide #1

This is the first in a series of twelve seascapes that I'll post over the next month.

snow-covered wreath

Snow day, slow day... Not much on the agenda except a little cleaning up and a lot of printing. I really haven't given away too many of my photographs because I'm afraid of being that crazy friend/relative who inflicts badly knitted socks and popsicle-stick picture frames on anyone within range. But my wallet is feeling very student-ish this Christmas so photos it is. I can't shake the feeling that it's almost as bad as giving fruitcake, but you gotta do what you gotta do!

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I will have a nice surprise in store when I go to December-Sale pickup tomorrow. I know I sold at least one print at this year's sale but a couple more would be even nicer!

eyes

porter square bird life

I went out to run some errands this afternoon and was treated to the sight of this hawk chomping on a pigeon.

awake at midnight --the eyes on the bedroom wall

No photoshop--just good old-fashioned smoke and mirrors. That's my eye looking through a homemade keleidoscope/projector; the camera was on a tripod behind me.

lion dance madness

This weekend one of my best friends got married at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem. During the reception they treated their guests to a great lion dance performance put on by students from a local martial arts academy. Those boys sure get a workout! What a fun thing to do as a kid.

And isn't this guy the cutest little ring-bearer ever?

patchy fog

Yup, it's kinda soupy in Cambridge.

it was a dark and stormy morning

Yesterday night was the first "heating" night of the season as far as I'm concerned. A slightly damp and chilly day, toasty radiator and the fleece jacket finally came out. Woo hoo! Enough of this 90 degrees business, bring on fall...

scrapbook envy

I've been afflicted by a sudden attack of scrapbook/collage/journal envy. I don't know where it came from, and yet there I am in the Paper Source, biting my lip and wondering if it would be sooo bad if I bought just a few more sheets, or some ink, or a bottle of sprinkly powder or whatever it is. This is why it's scrapbook envy: I don't know how to use any of this stuff; I just lust after it. I only wish I were the person who knew what to do!

I've made attempts at keeping scrapbooks before but they've always been kind of unsatisfying. The traditional bound book doesn't seem to fit my personality. I like to shuffle my pages around. And I hate most of the paper in ready-made scrapbooks. And I'd rather print my own darn pages. And I dislike post bindings. The obvious solution is a ring binder but those seem to be a choice between the plastic things from Staples or the pastel-colored monstrosities that cost an arm and a leg and scream "WEDDING!". And the loose rings are always flopping around and annoying the hell out of me. (Clearly, the real issue here is that I am picky and easily annoyed.)

BUT! This week, I finally figured out how to make the loose binder rings stay put. I don't know why bookbinding books don't just tell you this. I admit, the metal rings don't look as nice as those elaborate sewn bindings, but I can't be the only person who likes them.

Hehe. Now I know enough to be dangerous.

trees

Arnold Arboretum

smoke and mirrors

Help! I've become obsessed by building contraptions!

The disease started just before spring break with a few sheets of plexiglass and a bottle of plastic cement and it's all been downhill from there. Yesterday I got a handful of cheap lenses, built a cardboard box, sandpapered a square of acrylic for the ground glass, and voila! The beginnings of a box camera. I think it's my geeky side asserting itself after a year of art school. There may not be a lot of great photography going on, but I'm having a lot of fun!

inside out 2

inside out

another rainy night in beantown

Woken up by the howling of the wind.

x-ray vision

house of cards

Okay, so no one's going to hire me as a steel cutter right at this moment, but I think my house of cards is pretty cool! I'm kind of surprised that it stands up, but it does. And as with all houses of cards, the precariousness is part of its charm. Just don't shake the table.

submersibles

When I'm standing at the edge of the water and a wave comes slowly up the sand it seems as though it will keep on rising forever until it floods the whole world.

it was a great morning

Clearly, no one else is spending their spring break at this beach, but that's all the better for me! There was no one around except a couple of distant birders who set up their scopes on the boardwalk and didn't bother coming down to the beach. All the tracks are mine --a perfectly blank and empty stretch of beach to splash around in; everyone else's footprints had been erased by the last high tide. The water wasn't even as cold as I thought it would be, though I was still grateful for my boots and gloves. A good outing.

radio tracking trees

fun with plexi

So I built this plexiglass box and I had some fun with it. See, this is what happens when you take an intro sculpture class; suddenly you're all, like, "I've got clamps!* Quick, what can I glue??"

attack pigeon

who's really in charge at the state house

Shortly after this shot was taken this goose and a friend swerved in my direction and began to advance in an alarmingly purposeful manner. I was getting kind of worried until I realized there was a woman standing behind me spreading a bag of breadcrumbs.

*Sounds like some horrible disease, doesn't it?

the weather changes while you walk

Well! Yesterday's storm sure moved quickly. I had an errand to do at school before lunch and then I decided to walk to Park, with a quick stop at the Pru to get a bite to eat. There was barely anything on the ground when I left the MFA area, but there was plenty by the time I got to Park Street. By early afternoon it was shovel time, by evening cars were getting stuck on the street, and then it rained overnight and most of it washed away! Kind of makes your head spin.

Towards the beginning of my walk, near the Christian Science Center:

Copley:

Here's what it looked like by the time I got to the Public Garden:

The park was almost deserted: just a few pedestrians and joggers, two guys out walking herds of dogs, a few forlorn ducks pecking in the mud of the drained pond, and a flock of pigeons huddled in the shadow of the brick border of the pond. More anon. I'm restless and I need to get out and walk somewhere.

last night's lullaby

Ice pelts the windows. (stereo)

the storm begins

Today's winter storm is getting going! (Heh. Happy spring break, everyone!)

aaargh

Can I just say: Lightroom is a $@^& memory hog! I hate it. I mourn the loss of RawShooter.

flyover

I've been having fun playing with flash these days. I suppose this is a response, of sorts, to seeing Alex MacLean's work at the Harvard Museum of Natural History last year. Except, alas, I own no plane! So I have to use my imagination instead.

You can let the movie "fly" on autopilot, or explore on your own by clicking the mouse. Press the space bar to stop.

look

I was printing some photos from the set I posted a few days ago and decided I rather like these on their own.

stupid photographer tricks

Awake at midnight and bored, with camera.

rainy day walk

Photos from that rainy day week before last. I took a long walk and enjoyed myself thoroughly, splashing in puddles. But I paid for my fun by getting sick afterwards!

sick day

A cold, a sunny window and a cup of egg drop soup.

About a month ago I rearranged my living room furniture in order to make room for a drawing table in the corner but it wasn't until today that I discovered that the couch is now drenched in late afternoon sunlight. I'm sure I'm going to hate it in the summer but on a day like today when the wind is literally howling, there's nothing better than a seat in the sun! All my windows are square in the path of the wind. I visited the apartment across the hall and I swear it felt 10 degrees warmer. I went back home and turned on the space heater.

surf play

Life's tough when you're a camera.

wave train

the view from the pru

I like how the reflections from the windows are kind of hanging out there in space.

Rain!

Oh hell, forget this art stuff. I like kicking through puddles.

catch

It was a beautiful winter morning! I wish we'd had more of them this year. This funny scene crossed my path as I was ambling through the Common on my way to class. Truthfully, I wasn't in any hurry to get to school --I'd rather have watched the dog running around and the gulls doing loops in the sky. I love watching gulls on mornings like this. They are so exactly the color of a winter sky that when they tip their wings just so, they seem to fade in and out like ghosts.

China & Altered States

Last week I went to see Edward Burtynsky: The China Series at the Tufts University Art Gallery. On view alongside the Burtynsky exhibit is
Altered States: Views of Transition in Recent Photography featuring six other photographers. The entire exhibit revolves around the effects of large-scale industry, urban expansion and mass consumption. The exhibit represents a huge body of work that really conveys the staggering scale of all of the things that fuel our material lives --massive shipyards, factory floors that seem to go on forever, huge dumps of cell phones or circuit boards. All of these images give rise to a mix of emotions: as images the photographs are very beautiful; at the same time the sheer excess and the transformation of huge areas into basically one enormous machine is repellant and kind of scary; and to top it all off I at least also felt a kind of awe and envy because of the sheer wealth and power and energy embodied in all that industry. It's amazing as well as sobering and well worth seeing.

On a personal note, it was interesting to see this exhibit after having (briefly) visited China last May. The western region, where I was in, is on the tail end of China's industrialization, so I didn't see the full force of it as I might have if I'd visited the more industrialized regions of the country. But even so it was impossible not to get the sense that this was a country that was booming on a mind-boggling scale. There was massive construction everywhere: superhighways that looked like they were finished yesterday (and probably were), new housing developments, huge wind farms, oil cities sprouting out of what looked like empty desert, the works. Burtynsky's images were particularly interesting to me because they gave me an inside look at things similar to what I'd glimpsed from a distance as a casual visitor.

Unfortunately, the gallery space itself did not show the work to full advantage. In particular, the muted lighting literally made it difficult to see the work. Burtynsky's photos in particular have a really striking graphical quality that owes a lot to the color; it's hard to get the full effect when you're squinting to see the print. I got more out of sitting down with the gallery copy of his book than I did from viewing the live work. And the limited floor space alloted to the "Altered States" exhibit did nothing to convey what a large body of work each of the six photographers has.

Urls for some of the artists in the show:
Edward Burtynsky
Sze Tsung Leong
Chris Jordan
Xing Danwen
Josh Winer

The Tufts gallery is about a 15 minute walk from the Davis T; you can also take the #96 bus.

cutlery

I think this one came out pretty cool! I don't remember how I set up this shot --I think I was probably shooting through the bottom of the glass, which is why it looks so distorted. In any case, fun!

easily amused

More fun with the sink --a sponge's eye view.

fun with water

Mark suggested exploring the landscape of a kitchen sink, though at the moment I'm more inclined to do seascapes. Some of last night's camera fun:

shore life

I saw a snowy seal sitting by the sea shore.

wave study

listening to the beach on a stormy day

opening

light

More waiting for the bus.

bus stop

Waiting for the #39.

walking home

trees

over and under

More photos from yesterday's outing! If you have trouble with the slideshow you can also see them here.

this season

fall explodes

water landing

Air traffic on lake hibiscus, forest hills cemetery.

thinking of some other sea

surf fishing

(click for larger version)

I'm still alive, just overrun by the tide, rather like this solitary fisherman at the beach. Big rolling waves this morning --I could hear the roar and crash long before I got in sight of the water. I got soaked up to my butt several times by accident. Good thing the water is still wa