After We Left

I originally started this as a mock-up for a fabric piece I was thinking about. However, after adding such a large number of layers I just decided to let it be as a digital collage. I'll print it onto paper, but stitching it is out.

The theme behind this piece is one that I draw from frequently - what happens when humans disappear from a place. The idea that nature will quickly cover over the traces. I find that to be a strangely comforting thought, especially seeing how horribly we have and continue to muck up our environment.

Trees from an Imaginary Memory

Zero Image pinhole taken May 2014

For whatever reason, this forested path reminds me of Russia. Not that I've ever been there or that the trees are the same trees you'd find there. Perhaps it's the result of having read so many Russian novels. There were frequently dachas described in the books (especially in Tolstoy), so perhaps this is the image of the environs surrounding the dachas I imagined while reading.

It's interesting how I create "views" for settings I read about in books. In a lot of cases, the imagined location actually has nothing to do with the book. Perhaps it's a location association built from the era in which I was reading the book and my daily travels. I remember associating a particular corner of 42nd St. by Grand Central Station in NY with Faust. Obviously it had nothing to do with Goethe's novel, but perhaps I think of that corner because I was frequently in that area while reading the book. Then again, I associate a particular scent from my childhood with pharmacies (actually a very pleasant smell...not medicinal at all...I can't even describe it). I know that Proust talked about scents triggering memories so maybe it's all part of the same apparatus of building memories - places, descriptions, scents, flavors - all tucked away in obscure areas of the brain to be triggered by what appears to be random.

So this photograph is my triggered memory of a place I've never been. An imaginary memory.

Georgia likes baked goods

Georgia at the Rocking Horse Bakery, Winthrop

My friend, Georgia was a good enough sport to sit for this pinhole portrait. I can't remember how long I made her sit still, but I think it was about 2-3 minutes. Taken with my Zero Image pinhole when I was in Winthrop, WA a couple weekends ago with my mother.

Georgia is a big fan of baked goods which is why this post has the title it does.

Bean Plant

Bean Plant - Othello, WA

Shot with a Zero Image pinhole box camera on Worldwide Pinhole Day 2014.

Lower Crab Creek Road

Lower Crab Creek

Shot with the G9 and then altered in Lightroom.

My photo for Worldwide Pinhole Day

Lower Crab Creek Road, Washington State 4/27/14

Worldwide Pinhole Day was a great success (I only speak for myself since I have no idea how anyone else feels about it). We drove to Eastern Washington and took photos along the Lower Crab Creek Road, which is located in the Channeled Scablands. If you've never seen the Scablands and you live in Washington, you should change that right away. They are beautiful, geological wonders that were created by the great Missoula floods which took place in the range of 13,000 - 18,000 years ago.

The weather was incredibly beautiful on Sunday. Blue skies and big poofy clouds that created interesting plays of light and shadow on the landscape. I took the image above using my Zero Image pinhole camera and TMAX 400 film. You can see the piece in the Pinhole Day gallery. It looks surprisingly good for an online gallery. If you go there and then search for photos from Washington State, you can see works by other pinholes, including my friend, Karen Howard.

Wander around the gallery site a bit and you might get the inspiration to join us next year for Pinhole Day.

Japanese maple

Japanese Maple in Spring

Taken with my Lubitel 166.