Life is Messy.

"At some point, you have to make a decision. Boundaries don't keep other people out. They fence you in. Life is messy. That's how we're made. So, you can waste your lives drawing lines. Or you can live your life crossing them....I've had a lot of time to look back on my life. And the things that I remember best – those are the things I wasn't supposed to do and I did them anyway. The thing is: life is too damn short to be following these rules."

Let me begin by saying that it's usually a pet peeve of mine to quote TV shows/movies, especially those that can be annoyingly cliche, but I have to admit that I am a devout Grey's Anatomy fan, and when I was thinking about this post these quotes immediately came to mind. So if this bothers you, pretend someone other than the creators of Grey's thought this up, which when you think of it is kind of true because the same thoughts have been said/thought by others, just not exactly the same way.

Annnyyywayyy....

I have a few goals/ambitions, not for this upcoming semester or year, but for the rest of my life. I'm not perfect, so I know I'm never truly going to be able to check them off of a "how to be a better person" list because it would be impossible for negative feelings, words, or actions to not creep up subconsciously or even, on occasion, purposely. That doesn't mean we are bad people, it's just human nature to feel certain ways out of instinct. We are a competitive and protective breed, and without those traits we wouldn't have been able to survive in this world like we do.

But literally in the last 2 days I have been informed about close friends and/or their relatives whose health is quickly and rather unexpectedly declining. I know that all of us have probably dealt with or are currently dealing with grief, and some to a much higher degree and impact than I am even capable of understanding, but I think we can agree that when death lingers near, all else in the world seems meaningless. So before I spend one more minute of my life dwelling on the past, holding grudges, fretting over that which is superficial, and not really saying how I feel, I want to lay it all out there as a reminder to myself of what is really important in life to me.

In no particular order, just as they come to mind, these are my life goals at this moment in time:

1. To appreciate my family, friends and colleagues right here, right now for everything they have done for me, even if we have had disagreements, even if our political or religious beliefs differ, even if it sometimes seems like we don't even speak the same language.
So to my fellow classmates and professor: Thank you for pushing me to be a better artist, mentor and friend. I've never had such a close connection with a class before, and I've never felt so passionate about an area of study than what has stemmed from our photography class and meetings. Getting to know you all and sharing in your worlds of thoughts and feelings and art has been such a blessing to me, and I'm grateful for the time we had together in photography. Time that I will NEVER forget, despite its premature end. But I wouldn't really call it an end, because what has been taught and discovered in these precious moments will continue and always be a part of who we are and will become.

2. To say I love you more often, give hugs, smile even when it's hard, because someone out there will always, always, always be carrying a larger burden, and if they can make it through the day, so can I.

3. To spend time with family members I don't often see, or to call more regularly while I'm away, not just when something bad happens. Why do we always gravitate to those who are hurting and then turn away when we know that everything is okay?

4. To remember that we all make mistakes, and that it is possible to forgive and forget, even our enemies - those who just tore us down and made us feel worthless. It is likely that they suffer from just as much pain and know no other way to deal with life than to inflict that pain on others. If we treated each other with more compassion, for we never know a person from all 360 degrees, we would be able to recognize when others are hurting and find help for them, which in turn will hopefully help others. We don't have to "like" these people, but we can show civility.

5. To not give up because things don't go my way, or the way I had envisioned it to be. We can plan all we want, but ultimately life is out of our control. We can control how we decide to feel about a situation, though.

6. To fight the temptation to resort to old ways or to harbor old feelings, to stay and face rather than run away from my fears or insecurities. Because you never know what the future will hold if you only dwell on the past.

7. To see, to feel, and to experience life to its fullest. To use photography and art as a way to understand the beauty of this world, or to critique its shortcomings so that we can fix the problems that do exist in it, to the best of our ability.

8. To take time to make healthy choices, reduce my carbon footprint on this beautiful place, exercise, stimulate my mind through knowledge and new discoveries, relax, and reflect, so that I can set a good example for my (note: future) children and others around me.

9. To try new things, new foods, new activities, new ways of thinking and to embrace each for what they are whether or not they will become part of my routine. Change is good.

10. To keep a diary just for my eyes only (online or in a book) and write at least once a week, cataloging my thoughts and feelings, what is happening in the world, what I did, who I hung out with, what seemed important at the time, what I feared, what I longed for, and including photographs or poems, etc. Because one day my children and grandkids will inherit my belongings, and there is no greater gift than being able to literally relive your close relative's life.

This last goal stemmed from the latest photographer that Shane posted on the blog with the notes left around the house of this couple, which immediately made me think of my grandpa's diary that my dad now has and cherishes. Even knowing what the price of gas was or how bad the snowstorm was or what trees were cut down makes my grandpa seem less distant since his passing in '94, and I want to be able to give my descendants that gift...in addition to my own well-being, as writing is truly therapy for me. Why do you think my posts are always this long?? :)

One more.

11. To support the efforts of cancer treatment research, because even if I am not a doctor or scientist, I can help raise money and awareness. To remind myself that just because cancer runs in my family, it does not mean that I will share the same fate. And if I do find myself or my loved ones facing it in the future, that I will never give up hope, even until the very end. And to understand that even though my belief in/idea of God or heaven has changed over time, that I can find comfort knowing that "to dust we shall return."

Simply put, we don't know when our last day will be, and you don't want to regret being the person you are when it is your time. How will you be remembered by family, friends, colleagues and the environment? I want a fresh start. I want to be able to stay positive and strong in the wake of hardship. We only have one life to live. Will you cross the boundaries and get messy?

This post is dedicated to my 8th grade teacher, Pete Bauer, who just hours ago I was informed that his kidney cancer has returned and his previous one to two year time frame has been reduced to just a few days very unexpectedly. Also to my high school friend, Matt Krueger, whose rare form of cancer diagnosed in 2008 has returned and spread to his pelvic bone and abdomen after what was deemed a successful experimental surgery in D.C. last year. He and his fiance have decided to move up their 2011 wedding to this October. Another surgery is too dangerous right now, so he will begin more rounds of chemo to try to shrink the cancer.

I'm not a religious person, but I do believe in the spiritual power of prayer, because it gives us comfort and hope when we are in need, and right now these people could use a lot of that, and I ask that even though you don't know them personally that you keep them and all those who are hurting right now in your thoughts or prayers, and I will for you all as well. And also for Allyce Rupp and her family as her mom is in the hospital due to heart failure from cardiomyopathy. We can control some things, but others we cannot. We can only hope for the best.

Thanks everyone.

12. I'll try my best to be less depressing in my other posts. And to get back to photography, but these thoughts were crowding my mind and I literally could not even work on my homework until I wrote this.

13. To stop going to bed at 3 in the morning (refer back to #8) :)

For Samantha

http://www.carriethompson.com/home.html

What does it mean to believe?

In about six hours I'll go to the first class of my last semester as an undergrad. I should be asleep, but after my brain was recently rewired to associate 2:30 (bar close --don't worry I've been legal since yesterday) as the time to unwind, I felt compelled to write, so I figured, why not on the blog?

Over the last year I've begun to realize how intertwined photography (like any art/medium, I suppose) is with the human psyche, so I hope that writing about what's on my mind will lead me to discover something that I can also portray in a photograph. Words and feelings can't translate believably into photographs unless you - the feeling side of you - fully believe in them...right? Our thinking side often sends pulses of doubt to mess us up, but beneath it all we inexplicably believe. At least that's what I think...er believe...think, believe, think, believe... How can we be sure which it is?

If a photograph makes you feel something, not a superficial reactionary feeling, but a true emotion that stems from experience (either perceived mentally or physically), then the artist has succeeded. But what if the artist never felt that way, and instead someone just told them that's how they felt when they were exposed to the art, so the artist just went in that direction because that person told him/her to.

For me, fine art photography is about making the intangible tangible. Using images to express an idea. But I want to know if it is possible to embody/replicate a feeling through our viewfinder, or on a pad of paper. Humans are limited, but I have felt moved by art, music, writing. I know I have or I wouldn't be writing this. So there must be a way, but I feel like I'm circling the outer edges of my project and am unable to penetrate them, at least for the time being.

Mary's post about the movie Inception made me curious, so I went to see it, and, like her, I highly recommend it. I don't think this will give anything away, but just in case it does, read this part after you watch it.

---In one scene a character is so convinced that her world is not real that she does not fear death. But what lead her to this decision came from an idea someone else planted in her using a dream, even though she believed that it was her own idea. ---

The events that follow make you question the line between reality and fantasy, where you spend (or would like to spend) the majority of the time that is given to you, and what you would do if life had no limits.

This post is intangible, incapable of being fully understood. The words have been released from me and onto this screen in front of you, but the thoughts are suspended in a community of space and are no longer just mine to confront alone.

So what do we really believe in? Why do we believe those things? And why do we stop believing some of those things, or is there such a thing as completely erasing a belief from ourselves once it has been there, even for a brief moment?

Worthy Fodder

"We are confronted today with a dichotomy; as our equipment and materials constantly grow in scope and quality the creative and technical standards appear to be diminishing; there is a near-cult of photographers who seem to intentionally avoid the beautiful and precise image, concentrating only on subject and obvious function. My personal reaction to this attitude is a determination to go as far in the opposite direction as possible. I believe in the most beautiful and appropriate prints, and the most clarifying and revealing approach of mind, heart, and craft. I believe that firm objectives in this direction can fulfill the promise of photography as one of the great visual arts. However, we must always be logical in our critical estimates; most of photography is not intended as art and should not be judged as such. But if art is intended, compromise must not be tolerated"

- Ansel Adams

Where yo equilibrium at?

"According to the law of requisite variety, the survival of any system depends on its capacity to cultivate variety in its internal structures. Disequlibrium is life. Equilibrium is death. Prolonged equilibrium dulls our senses, numbs our minds, and atrophies our muscles."

ARTGASM

On one of my favorite websites,toxel.com, I found a Casebere-esque photographer, and while I thought of Casebere right away, Alvaro Sanchez-Montanes really makes these photos his own. I am in awe of the shadows and textures that are in these photographs. The way that the sand takes shape and creates either positive or negative space intrigues me. I haven't felt this way since I talked to all of you about how Irving Penn's food photography wowed me. hahaha.

Here's a peek.. (definitely look at his website though.. and click the image to get into the site) I couldn't get them from his site because he has a slideshow, but I got these off toxel.com.






Haha Mary.. AVS to me is like Crewdson for you :) I am amazed.

...Very Proud...2 things

1) I've been proud of the crits I've seen recently on this blog...especially the ones you've given to me. Observant, fearless, kind. Exactly what I'd expect from my best ex-students. Thank you.

2) I'm gonna need assistants on Broadway for various times/places between Friday, Sept. 3 and Monday, Sept. 6. If anyone is interested, could you reply with availability?

(Yes, this means I'll be around!)

Three more from the watering hole...

Baird!

Holy Shit! Watch this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhCn0jf46U

Anyone want to address motion blur/camera shake?

Sometimes, I can't see what's on the horizon...

...and never can I see beyond it.

Dad & I: Do the albums lie?

[Original photos of my dad and I in the kitchen from 1989-1993, sorry about the dust flakes!]

I've been flipping through old photo albums and my baby book and I have found a trend with the photos that I appear with my dad in: They are predominantly in the kitchen. Obviously as a baby I didn't determine where in the house I went, so by logic, wherever I was located was where someone else put me. So, basically, my dad must have spent a lot of time in the kitchen. That's where he did (and still does) the following activities: reads the paper, does his book work, eats his meals, and many times watches the weather or news in the living room from. This is where he cools down under the ceiling fan and grabs a glass of ice water during the summer, and where he sheds his layers and warms up from a long night of snowplowing in the winter. If we had room to put a bed in there, I'm pretty sure he'd sleep in the kitchen, too. This isn't some big revelation, I've known it all my life. But what makes me wonder, then, is why the pictures of us are mostly in this one room? My guess is that when he's outside around the farm, it's impossible to catch him when he's still. He's always on the go, and he always has been. Even now I know that I've got one opportunity to catch my dad if I need to ask him a question. Do it while he's eating --so a window of about 10 min, and I'm lucky if the phone hasn't rang for him in that amount of time -- but not while he's reading the paper, which 99% of the time he does while eating a bowl of vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce --it's his staple food. Dad always has first dibs on reading the paper, because he has to see and announce the obits before anyone else. "Well, it looks like I'm not dead yet," he'll say when his name and photo don't appear under the death notices. Did I mention my dad is sarcastic? Well he is, to the max, and to communicate on his level, you have to be too. With as stressed out as he gets, I think humor is the thing that keeps him going the most. But during a summer like this one where we have been mowing lawn consistently from all of the rain and humidity and he is backed up months on other projects, I can tell that his energizer battery is starting to drain. While my sister and I were working with him this past weekend he walked back to the truck after trimming, head down, completely drenched in sweat, the thick veins in his arms literally pulsating, and he looked up and from underneath his baseball cap he forced a smile and said, "I think I'm getting too old for this girls." So, what do you say to that? We all know that he works himself too hard, doesn't sleep enough, and intakes way more than the daily nutritional allowance in dough-nuts and soda. Yet you can't tell him to slow down or take it easy, because he feels like he's being nagged on and won't listen. Instead we give him a hard time and joke about it saying, "Come on, old man, let's go." I know it will elicit a smile and a slow, deep rumble of "Watch it..." to follow as he playfully shakes a fist at us. So, then, back to the root of the question: Why does my dad work like this - uncontrollably, as if some unknown force keeps pushing him to test his limits? And why did these photos of us, and even of just him, slowly start to change and fade away? That's something that I've got a lead on, but I'm waiting for it to all come together before I make my next post. Hint: I have to go look for our old family videos (and our VCR), too.

Videos

These videos are very inspiring to me. Before there was art for me, there was dance, so I use dance to still inspire me. I can't have one without the other. These routines recently seen on SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE. These two bring tears to my eyes, and what I would like people to feel when seeing my art...Not necessarily tears, but something...I think one of the worst things, is when people don't feel something at all for art. Enjoy... I am not a contemporary dancer at all, and used to hate it, but oddly enough they are that kind of dancing that just expresses something universal to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nm6MidMyFe8

{Everyones needs someone to fix, and to be fixed, themselves}

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub9h5LNW7dY

{Expressing Fear and learning to overcome it}

An invitation to see what you can't see

Still figuring- as an art, not math

Use it

While I have been wallowing in lack of motivation as of late; yes I admit it, I have been driving a lot. Driving allows me time to process those bizarre thoughts that eventually turn into a circus of scrambled small ideas that combine and become sort of whole due to this run on of ideas. I love when you drive and you realize that you have finally reached your destination, but you don't really remember any of the actions you took to get there. I, anyway sometimes daydream my way toward my destination. When the music is off and all there is to distract me is the road and the whipping of wind through the cracked windows, then is when I can truly dream. These ideas start as seedlings, something similar to the tickling of my foot that pushes my body to react with both a burst of great joy and panic that causes my body to withdraw from the action almost immediately. The withdrawing from the action represents my hesitation to pursue my ideas for photos and in the same token I am enveloped in the joy of thinking about where that one idea could take me.

During this warped time I usually dream about the equipment I could use if I had access to it and I ramble through the if this and if that's. But all that there is, is me and my will to do what I want. I have no right to limit my potential because I only have access to certain equipment. While I was bitter about this before I am learning to embrace it. I have very little financial freedom right now to spend on art. I have my smaller digital camera and access to the internet via Mary when I can use it (thanks mares). But why should this limit me? I would much rather learn to appreciate what I do have right now rather than dream up of what I could be using for equipment, etc. I have no stash of cameras on shelves or in cases. I work in a shoe store fitting way overpriced shoes to smelly feet. But I have what I have and I am where I am. If there is anything I can suggest for this post it is learn to use what you do have and appreciate it because not everyone has access to the same equipment that you may have, or access to the same people, jobs, etc. After a brief talk with Shane, I realize that there is only misuse of equipment. Every camera can take a photo, how do you take yours? YOur camera is your eye. Our eyes can see whatever they want to, so can our equipment. My digital camera allows me very little leeway as to if a shot will work or not but it also allows me to enter into more intimate realms than with a 35mm even. I still have my drive to take photos. Not even a smelly troll can take that away.

This summer has been humbling in terms of my art go. But an interesting quote from Bicycle Diaries often fills my mind:

"Maybe in a sense we are unique: the huge numbers of available combinations of traits, propensities, body types and experiences that make up each of us is unimaginably large. Our variety is immense, but still it must be restricted within certain boundaries or we wouldn't be able to recognize ourselves as types at all. What we are is somehow simultaneously "infinite," but always similarly shaped. Almost infinite variety within severely restricted limitations...Is anyone native to anywhere? I think, in most cases, not. And maybe, somehow, that might be where the answer lies."

Geir Moseid

I am intrigued by this guy. Like, Sarah Kaufman, I really appreciate his use of light and color. The color is so neutral in this pictures, but it really brings out the beauty in the skin and on the curvature of the bodies.

I think finding spaces, which Jacki was always really good at, and THEN seeing what could be placed in it, I always wanted to expand on. Sam is starting to do that I feel, and I believe it really works better then setting up the scene without being exposed to the surroundings first. Doing senior pictures these days, I have really opened my eyes up to places because of having to provide new ideas for kids to be posed in and new locations their friends won't have in their senior, wallet pictures.

I need to sit down with Jacki and discuss how she see those spaces...I also would love to brainstorm with anyone that has ideas for me...I need to get out of this dry spell. It's starting to get frustrating...

The Farm

New photos from around our farm (just cropped no touchups, unfortunately). Also, I'm starting to flip through family albums from the 60's to the present, and I'm seeing some really subtle changes in my family (funky hair-dos/hair loss aside). Thanks for that tip, Shane. More to come on that topic next week :)