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Still a good view, even when the park is dead in winter.
"Google's Top Result for search term 'Risky Lenghts' since 2010"
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Full Moon over Lake Michigan/Lake Shore Drive
My tastes and interest in Art has a lot to do with concepts in negative space: the idea that humans, and are expressions of ourselves, are full of the empty spaces that define us.
Last week I mentioned the Lacanian lack at the center of an individual’s existence and it’s relation to black holes at the center of galaxies.
Similarly, the space between individuals or between an individual and society, is akin to the space between celestial bodies.
It is the emptiness of space that makes the appearance of a planet, a star, a comment, or other phenomena striking.
Somewhere in my house, I have a copy of David Foster Wallace’s little book about then history of the concept of zero.
In that book, I would expect to find ideas that mathematical “nothingness” was an important concept in defining what was mathematically “something.”
Not everyone thinks in these terms.
One graduate professor told our class that an overabundance of white space on your page, especially because of long sections of dialogue, was indicative of an unskilled and possibly untalented writer.
This was stated as an unwritten, but important rule of the litterati.
Yet, I’ve had a tendency through out my life to be mystified by those empty spaces:
Hemingway’s In Our Time
Carver’s What We Talk About When We Talk About Love
Ellroy’s American Tabloid
Hammet’s The Thin Man
Or works that seemed smaller and with more breathing room than some of their more famous epics:
Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49
DeLillo’s White Noise
Kerouac’s Dharma Bums
I will continue to write sparsely. In a way, it is the one thing I know how to do best.
I’m never going to write like Kerouac or Fitzgerald or Joyce or Pynchon or DeLillo or Wallace.
As a younger writer, I tried. I became board within my own writing.
If I’m bored by my own writing, what can I expect my reader’s reaction to be?
The moon in the photo is nothing without the blackness between it and its reflection.
The dark sky isolates the moon as a light different from those in the city, it draws your attention to the moon through triking contrast.
The passive, natural moon is brighter than any of the lights man has made to shove away the darkness of night.
It’s reflection is so bright that it turns the boats into blackened objects on a white sea.
Man’s light is meekly reflected off the boats, giving you the barest glimmer of their white hulls on black water.
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Ok, in response to the demands of to the anonymous question asker (fictionz points out they can be SO demanding), two photos.
Hey, yes, both are partially obscured. I’m still shy. People who know me, know me. Others, well…
If all goes well, you’ll probably know exactly what I look like in a month or two. Maybe sooner.
As labeled, the one is my profile picture for Tumblr and Twitter, taken last summer in Chicago. The other is from New York City, waiting for my wife and in laws so we could eat dinner. Both are me messing with shapes and colors, rather than concentrating on detail and framing.
As for anonymous questioners, I always liked Jamie Drew’s take. They are all from his mom, and should be answered accordingly.
See those links there, for fictionz and Jamie Drew? You should be following them. They might just kick your ass if you don’t. Or maybe write you into a corner. Or maybe have a drink with you while they try to sell your kidneys. It’s quite possible I would do the same.
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And the other inspiring photographer for my book, Polly Chandler.
Sadly, like Traci & Ashley, she no longer has up one of the images that was a huge inspiration, enough that I would try and fight for it to be a cover.
This man here, he is my main character. I saw this picture well into the second draft a couple of years ago and saw everything in his face I was trying to lay down on the page for my character. It was humbling and inspiring at the same time.
Overall, Polly’s work is populated with the people that show up in my book. These are the people that live and work where the events take place.
The photographers who had such a huge inspiration on my work - they all reside in Texas. Coincidence? I have no idea. The book takes place in Wisconsin. Maybe that has something to do with it. I know more about Wisconsin and the upper midwest than I do Texas and the south. But something translated for me in the photography.
I just wanted to share these today, a little recognition to what has been pushed me along to get the book finished, and I guess pushing me further along to make the final changes I need to make before I can send it out to agents.
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i said i wouldn’t (by Ashley MacLean & Traci Matlock)
Traci Matlock & Ashley MacLean’s photography was a huge inspiration on my novel. Their outdoor photography playing a huge part in me getting the atmosphere of the location right. I notice now that since they stopped keeping up the joint Flickr account, a number of images have been trimmed away, which makes me a little sad. Maybe someday they will come back. I continue to hope so. There are about 100 photos you can view without logging into Flickr, but 150 more if you do log in. I don’t know why some are marked as moderate, for example there was a landscape diptych that I wanted to post instead of this polaroid diptych, but it’s labelled as Moderate and can’t be reblogged. I would say about half their work can be considered NSFW, just a warning.
Both continue to blog, Traci’s flickr is here and her blog here. She just had a poem printed in Gulfcoast. I haven’t read it yet, but it’s certainly a good achievement to be printed there. Congratulations, Traci.
Ashley has a tumblr at amaclean. If she has a flickr page, I haven’t seen it yet. She blog sporadically these days, and I wish there was more.
Without the two of them, I don’t think I would’ve finished the book. Their work was very integral to the feel of the setting of the book, and the setting is practically a character unto itself.
EDIT: I should probably say something more about their work. Mysterious. Haunting. Inviting. Fun. Sad. Muddy. Soiled. Dim. Colorful. Ugliness as beauty, beauty as ugliness. You at once want to be in the photo, and are also very afraid to be in the photo.
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EDIT: Whoops. I put know words here before. Diabolical is awesome. I wanted to share. That is all.
A midnight landscape with a film speed of around ISO 1250 with a 50mm f1.8 lens. It was toned as a black and white photo, with a purple tint to give it the feeling of mystery. So many of my summer time photos come from picking up my camera and tripod and just going for a walk. It reminds me of roaming my neighborhood with my friends. It also reminds me of a album cover, Probably because I spent a lot of time looking at cover art as a youth. On the night I took this picture is one where I wish I had an Hasselblad or a 8x10 camera. Though Im sure the result would have been different.
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Brilliant photo movie. Great music choice as well.
Mike’s obviously a good photographer, but there’s also something good going on here that takes even the usual “my vacation” photos and elevates it.
The sort of project that makes you want to try it. You’ll learn its not as easy as you possibly though, which usually makes you more in awe of the original creator.
iammattjordan:qcs:(via Holiday Matinee)
Mike Matas went to Morocco and Spain with his girlfriend, he took nearly 4,000 photos. This is what he saw.
(via hennnypotter)
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White lady, at the White Family plot.
At Cedar Grove Cemetery, in Portsmouth, Virginia.
Spooky
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via intershame.com
Thank God I’m not the only who sees this. The question is, how long exactly has Tim been getting these comparisons? Did he watch Dazed & Confused and say “Fuck yeah, that’s how I’m going to look like when I show up at Little League practice next year.”
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There’s something about this.
The old Caddy. The sign on the side of the building washed out by flood lights. The dark spots behind and in the car.
Years ago, while walking down a well lit suburban street at midnight, I saw a space of total darkness between two houses. My teenage self thought “If something bad is going to happen tonight, it’s going to come from there.”
It did.
This picture evokes the same feeling.
It’s not the light that’s the problem, it’s where there isn’t any.
Oh, and are you following diabolicalphotoblog.tumblr.com yet? If you’re not on tumblr, pull it down to RSS or follow the Twitter feed. Seriously. Do it.
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Shopping carts
Dude always takes great, eerie photos. Follow him if you don’t already.
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