A blog about photography & transformative art
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Daily Blog
I have given up mass media. Or at least most of them. The screaming headlines, the mindless banter, the search for the bad in everything—it has put me in sour spirit. I am therefore fasting, something that seems utterly appropriate in this Lenten season. The quiet has turned my attention to walking. Alone.
It's been raining here in Northern California for about three weeks. The newspapers were complaining about the drought and now they're complaining about cabin fever. And they still say there isn't enough water. The chronic negativity of the media seems to be unconscious, bouncing from one negative thought to another. It's one big, collective, "Yeah, but..." It's like that one sad-sack person in your life that you're trying to avoid.
Lots of people I meet want to be artists. What they don't realize is that they already are. We come into this life bursting with creativity—enthusiastic little art creatures. Then it gets drummed out of us. Little by little, we get serious. We stop making art. But, creativity is our natural state and one day it starts to gnaw at us. We look around and all the castles we've built are hollow without creative expression.
The art market, like every other industry in the world, is suffering right now. Galleries, framers, and museums are businesses just like any other. People are scared and nervous and the world seems to be holding its collective breath. Yet, in times like these, art is our salvation. It is the essence of the human experience and can make the world warmer and kinder when times are tough.
I first visited Grand Canyon as a 14-year-old boy. This blog has chronicled those first impressions, particularly in my post, The Mules' Echos, the story of my dad taking me to the rim before sunrise. From the glimpse until this day I have made, collected, sorted, and edited thousands upon thousands of images. After awhile they just pile up—physically, digitally, and metaphorically—and it's hard to allow them to breathe and find their way into to daylight. How does one choose the best and how do would they hold together as a group?
"We're not out of the woods!" screamed the local paper's headlines. We're in the middle of drought here in Northern California and the paper seems to be relishing that fact. Never mind that the rain is falling, it isn't enough. And if it were enough, then there'd be floods. LANDSLIDES. Then just wait until fire season. All that rain will mean bad news for firefighters. Lots of growth to burn. Or, if there isn't enough rain that will be bad news also. Lots of dead growth to burn. Any way you look at it we're screwed. All the reporters love to say, no matter the nature of perceived relief, "It's a drop in the bucket." And if they don't say it they unfailingly find someone to quote who will.
The creative process has the same ebbs and flows as does the sea. The cycles come and go, the artist a mere conduit to some strange force pulling at the brain and psyche. When one surrenders to the artistic process, one allows the nature of presence to show up in the work. Forcing things never works. Usually a bad art day can be traced back to trying too hard and pushing too strongly. Sometimes the work wants lightness and air, sometimes it seeks the lowest point and wants to go past the dark edge. Allowing is the key. What is, is.
Yesterday I pulled out my Linhof 4x5 camera to photograph some original artwork for a client and fellow artist. I don't use the camera much these days except for utilitarian jobs like this. This is a shame. The camera is stunningly beautiful in every way; simple, elegant, a distillation of photography into its purist form. Yet, the very stuff the camera needs to stay alive is dying. Film is on the way out and soon it will be barely breathing.
Most people would tell you that, in a catastrophe, they'd try to save their photographs above all other material possessions. It's probably what I would do. Photos are symbolic of our memories. They are the physical manifestations of the important moments of our life. Yet, to equate them with life, is something of a trap.
Old storefronts have always saddened me. I grew up in New Jersey at a time when its cities were in terrible decline. Being in Paterson or Newark in the '70s would sadden my soul. Empty windows, cracked glass, once-proud signs now askew and burnt out, everything faded except for the hastily posted proclamations: going out of business, everything must go, for rent, for sale, down on our luck, going home, depressed, need a vacation, moving to Florida.
