This photo moves me. Also reminds me of a story I heard 2 years ago.

Something and Nothing.

I very much like the idea of photographing something and making people observe it or ask why it may be important. Or purely for reasons of formal qualities: color, composition, subject matter, lighting, etc. That is one reason I am intrigued by the Wall in Paris photo by Wenders. There's the beauty in the color, lines, shadows, and even the cracks along the ground. It makes that photo what it is and gives you a certain feeling.
I also like Something Is Missing by Jean-Marc Bustamante.
"The subject of the photograph is the entire picture and its layered complexity, drawn out of the process of walking and seeking pictures in the flow of daily life."
I love that this shows Bustamante as walking around and photographing what he sees. This is something I love to do. I will go on a walk and just photograph what catches my eye-or drive to a certain place to photograph what is around me. I love exploring the places I am at and seeing the beauty wherever I am at. This photo is reminding me of that. It keeps your eyes going through the photo as you look past the chain link fence in the foreground to everything that is going on in the background of the photo. I just love to look at it. It is taking the two vines on the fence-taking something simple, and using the business of the background to play into the photo as well. It is beautiful to me. And, fancy that, can't find the photo on the internet. Awesome.

This photo excited me. Wall in Paris, Texas. by Wim Wenders.

1000 Shot Project

Here are some photos I like thus far from my work-in-progress project. We'll see what happens.

Rineke Dijkstra

As I was reading I saw some photos and a concept that intrigued me by Rineke Dijkstra, a Dutch photographer. She did a series of photos in 1994 over a period of 4 months. The photos in this book are of 3 nude mothers, just after giving birth to their babies. There is one lady who is photographed with her newborn just one hour after giving birth. Another mother she shot one day after she had her baby. The third woman she photographed after one week of her child's birth. It is one thing you do not think about after the fact of the woman having her child. Dijkstra focuses on the impact of pregnancy and labour on the women. It is something you would not naturally think to do after a woman has her baby. Normally you would photograph her at the hospital holding her baby, all smiling and cute. The typical newborn and mother photos. But these, are taken of the women just standing against a plain white wall in the nude, holding their newborn babies. It is a different take on childbirth and I think it is a very interesting and intriguing idea.
Cotton states in this paragraph that "These photographs visualize the profound shift in the women's changing relationships to their bodies and the instinctive protection they demonstrate towards their newborn babies, something we might never have observed without such a systematic and detached photographic style."
I think that is very true. She photographs these women as no one would think to do. It is an interesting idea and a good way to see the effects of pregnancy on the woman's body and to see even their facial and bodily expressions at different time periods after childbirth.

If you want to see the photos i'll post a link down here.

http://images.artnet.com/WebServices/picture.aspx?date=20011115&catalog=14842&gallery=110889&lot=00315&filetype=2

Cloud Series

My series on clouds that I took last semester. I need to do more of these so there's a huge wall full of them. Because it would be amazing. 8.5x11 prints. Shot with a Nikon 35 mm film camera. Kodak 400 speed film.

The Photograph as Contemporary Art, Intro and Ch. 1

     Well, for one thing, as I read this first part of the book, it is amazing to me how much photography has been progressing and changing throughout the years. Going from the standard black and white photography, to color photography, shooting things around you to setting up a scene or narrative. Things change so much. In fact, they are always changing. You can't turn around without seeing something that is new or is the "new thing". One thing that I do love about the art world, is how it takes things that people use, for instance, the use of color, narrative photography, etc., and change it or add new things to it. I love that Eggleston and Shore revolutionized the art world by bringing in color photography and putting it in the gallery. Their photos are beautiful and worth taking a long hard look at. Which is one of the reasons that I am glad their work was put into galleries and museums so that we could contemplate them and study them and their different artistic qualities.  
     I also love the way that photographers go out and interact with the world as they do some of their projects. Take, for example, Tatsumi Orimoto, who "hid his face under a sculptural mass of bread and performed normal everyday activities". Going out into the world and doing these projects while photographing them, is a great way to do some experimental work. You get to see people's reactions, or get a point across, whatever may be your means for doing the project. Or just because you wanted to try something like that, I think it is a great idea and a wonderful concept. If I was a person who was in that community while Orimoto was doing his piece, I would be intrigued and it would give me ideas to possibly imitate that in some way.
     That is one thing I love about photography, is experimenting with different ideas and different aspects of art and photography. It is also a good idea because you may find something you love to do, and continue using that in your work.

Series on the LA River System

Hard To Believe

This is my first blog that I have ever set up in my life, so this is a pretty big step for me. Actually, I had to create this for a class, but will be using it for all my stuff in general. Enjoy the photos whenever they come up.