Day two of my week-long series on American colors in celebration of the 4th of July.
I Found this American scene while photographing near the railroad tracks and Arkansas River in
Tulsa back in 2006. I think it was part of a run down garage next to a run down house. But that
really didn’t matter. What mattered was the undesigned, unanticipated beauty of the American
colors in such an unlikely spot.
4th day of my series of Color Compositions taken at the Cherry Street Farmer’s Market in Tulsa, OK
I didn’t set this up except to ask the woman if I could take her photo just the way she
was. She had the tattoo and she had the flower just like that.
A continuation of the Color Composition series I started last week. The photos were
all taken on a very bright and sunny morning at the farmer’s market as part of a
photography group I was leading that day where we focused on color and composition as
the defining factor in a photograph.
I just had to catch up with this woman and ask her to if I could take her photo. She
was standing right next to this table and the red/red/red was just too luscious to
resist!
Cherry Street Farmer’s Market, 6/14/08, Tulsa, Oklahoma
This wasn’t really taken in London, it just feels like a victorian London scene, ala
Jack the Ripper, so I titled it that.
The shadow is actually me shining a small flashlight on her face during a long
exposure. I didn’t realize the shadow would be there but when I looked at it later it
certainly had a very cool effect, adding to the content of the image.
3rd in a series on ‘night’. It was a very hot and humid night and I loved that she had
that sheen or glow of heat on her. I also loved the blue/red compositional element of
the door and wall behind her.
2nd in the week long series on night images. The idea was to capture both the cute,
sweet smile all the other photographers were trying to get from her and then have her
turn her expression into a scream, similar to the graffitied image. I wanted to try to
capture the feeling of the surface pretty and the interior pain someone might feel at
the same time.
“A Genius is someone who simply has fewer stop signs in their head.” part 1
This week and next I am dedicating to those things that keep YOU from doing art. I
have 10 ‘Stop Signs’ that can stop you in your creative tracks faster than a head-on
with a semi. They may seem harsh, but that is because they are. Just imagine Simon
Cowell talking to an artist instead of a singer and you will get the attitude I am
trying to put forth here.
Stop sign #1 – it’s boring. Answer: No, YOU are boring. Not the place, person or
event. If you can’t take interesting photos wherever you are, then YOU aren’t
interesting and you aren’t interesting because you aren’t INTERESTED in the world
around you. Look at details, look from the floor, look straight down, look in a corner.
I saw this as we were walking into Eskimo Joe’s in Stillwater, Oklahoma. It was the
hostess leaning up against the glass brick seen from outside and it was as boring a
scene as you can imagine. I bet thousand of people have gone by that glass brick
when someone was leaning up against it and not one noticed or took a photo. Why not?
Because they didn’t expect to see anything worth noticing and weren’t paying
attention. Pay attention to unexpected angles and views.
We were staying the night at the Inn at Price Tower, Frank Lloyd Wright’s one and only
freestanding ‘skyscraper’ in the world (it’s 16 stories high so it isn’t crazy tall by
any means). It is about 50 miles north of Tulsa in a town called ‘Bartlesville’ which
was the founding home of Phillips Petroleum. It has an art center on the first 2
floors along with a gift shop. We always find unique and interesting things in the
shop when we go there and this time we found an engaging and happy store clerk along
with the usual stuff. She said one of the statements in the piece to us and I kept
hearing the rhythm of it in my head after, but with different content each time and
that was the basis for the other ‘truths’ in the piece.
I had gone down to Oklahoma City from my home in Tulsa (about 100 miles) to drop off my presentation for the upcoming Photoslam event. I decided to take the day and check out some galleries down that way, something I really hadn’t done before.
When I entered the ‘Untitled’ [art space] gallery this woman was at the door greeting people, explaining the current show, etc. She was very helpful about explaining how the show came about (it was a year end showing of multiple grant recipients’ work).
We got to talking about me being an artist since I had my camera with me, and I asked her if she was as well. She turned out to be an art historian in training, going to college.
The gallery was somewhat dark, but there were large windows in the front that let in great ambient light. Her eyes, as is obvious, were brilliant blue. I told her about my reason for being in OKC, and explained the ‘truth’ project I would present at the show. I asked her if she would be willing to pose for a collage from the truth series as well and she thought it would be a cool idea.
One of the artists in the gallery had large constructions. One of the constructions had a shredder attached to it that was churning out shredded paper very slowly. Photos of that, with photos of her were the perfect combination for what I learned about her as we talked; her life, doubts, fears, wonderings, etc.
She was waiting for her man, a traveling sportsman, the longest they had been apart,
she had a new car, was hoping he would like it, he was tall, buy maybe not tall enough,
she goes to school full time and works full time, it’s been hard but she is excited to
see him, she was hoping she was in the right place.
Tulsa International Airport, Oklahoma
7/29/06