Five: Songs From 2009

Cub Country - Lone Tall Pines



The Mountain Goats - Ezekiel 7...



William Elliott Whitmore - Mutiny



The Thermals - Now We Can See



Eels - Prizefighter

Exhibit: ninety-three at Hot Shops

I'll be unveiling ninety-three with a small show in May 2010 at the Hot Shops Art Center in downtown Omaha, Nebraska. The opening will be part of Hot Shops' open house weekend.

This has been a long time coming and I'm excited for an opportunity to get more of the project out for people to see. I'm still not sure how much of the series will ultimately end up on display at this point, but there will definitely be quite a few images that haven't been seen yet.

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The above image is Mullen, Hooker County. Hooker had the smallest population in the state when they assigned counties numbers for license plates. Outside of the town of Mullen, there's roughly 1 person for every two and a half square miles in the county.

Image: Lyons, Burt County (alt.)

This image is from ninety-three, one of the many that I love but will probably not find their way into the final series. The fence(s) were set up in downtown Lyons, a small town a half hour or so north of Fremont, Nebraska.

I'm currently putting together another project to go along with the yet untitled series documenting the areas surrounding where my parents and grandparents grew up in Iowa and Nebraska. Both are moving along well, still evolving. I hope to get a chance to exhibit at some point in the near future with the Metro Photo Club and unveil something new.

Iowa: Day Six

Another day spent scouring the Iowa countryside for family memories and little towns. I continue to be amazed by just how much local history my grandfather knows. It's incredible. The weather continues to be unseasonably cool, almost jacket weather.

The photograph above was taken in Belle Plaine, Iowa. It's a marker for the old Lincoln Highway, the first road to cross the United States.

Also visited: Laurel, Haverhill, Chelsea, Marengo, Williamsburg, Parnell, North English, Keswick and Guernsey.

Iowa: Day Five

Today finds me headed back east to Grinnell, Iowa to work a little more on my current project. It was a gorgeous day, perfect temperature and lots of blue skies. I skipped the interstate for most of the way, instead relying on state highways I'd never taken before.

Above is a photograph of Searsboro, Iowa. It's a tiny place a dozen miles or so south of Interstate 80. There's not a lot of the town left these days.

Also visited: Neola, Minden, Avoca, Walnut, Marne, Atlantic, Wiota, Anita, Adair, Casey, Menlo, Stuart, Dexter, New Sharon, Lacey, What Cheer and Montezuma

Five: Influences (As Of Right Now)

William Christenberry
I am drawn to Christenberry's unique approach to visual history. His photographs of the same structure over many years depict the changes, both deterioration and rebirth, of unique landmarks throughout the southern United States.



William Eggleston
Eggleston gave us color photography, or so history will ultimately read. It's hard to be a color photographer without mentioning his influence. I do struggle a bit with the haphazard look of some of his compositions, but, when everything comes together, few can match his genius.



Robert Frank
My first photo book was Robert Frank's The Americans. I received the book as a gift after randomly listing it on a Christmas list. It didn't take long for me to get hooked on the idea of traveling the country, photographing everything along the way.



David Plowden
David Plowden has photographed many subjects over the course of his life, everything from trains to steel workers. But what resonates most with me is his work in small town America, especially his A Sense Of Place monograph. Plowden's photography of rural Iowa and other states has a sort of quiet, dignified quality to it that I hope to be able to approach some day.



Ed Ruscha
Although more famous as a painter, photography is what Ed Ruscha uses as a sort of visual sketchbook to gather ideas from. His photography is often mundane; a collection of buildings along a single street or a series of gas stations. But his use strong use of typography translates this work into iconic imagery.

Image: Boyer Chute (2009)

Today felt like a good day to get out and hit the road. I revisited a couple places I wanted to photograph, Fort Atkinson and Boyer Chute, and spent some time near Prague in an attempt to work on my latest project. At this point, I'm still not exactly sure how to pursue the whole idea. It is time to evolve and grow. Just need to figure out how to go about it.

The above photograph is from the Boyer Chute National Wildlife Refuge. It's a nice quiet place, tucked into a bend in the Missouri River east of Fort Calhoun.

Also visited: Fremont, Cedar Hill, Linwood, Abie, Bruno and Prague.

Image: Untitled (2003)

I spent a day off last week going through my old image files to make sure everything is backed up multiple times. This photograph was taken for an intermediate photography class for a pushed film assignment. It's still one of my favorite photographs.

Going through early photographs is always a bit of a revelation. There's always a surprise; something that had never really caught your eye before. The lack of a preconceptions can make for surprisingly interesting work. After looking through hundreds of black and white photographs, I find myself wanting to move back in that direction. Maybe next year.

Five: Films with Photographers

Blow-Up (1966)

Take the consummate swingin' 1960's photographer with his womanizing too-cool-for-you lifestyle and put him right in the middle of a murder mystery. Then give it the kind of symbolic ending that makes a great majority of people hate European films.

The best scenes in Blow-Up find the photographer endlessly enlarging negatives to better see the evidence of a crime that may or may not have happened.


City Of God (2002)

A young man chooses between a life as a gang member in a violence-plagued slum in Rio De Janeiro or something more. He is drawn to a camera, ultimate choosing to document the tragedies around him as a means to rise above the poverty and hopelessness of his situation.

City Of God is a powerful statement of perseverance and one of the best movies that many have never seen.


One Hour Photo (2002)

A lonely and psychotic man works in the photo lab at a big box retailer. His obsession with one of his customers gets out of hand, causing him to lose his job and embark on what he sees as a noble mission to punish a husband for his infidelities.

Robin Williams plays as convincing of a psychopath as you'll ever see. He's remarkably creepy and unsettling, but somehow we feel compelled to empathize with him.


Pecker (1998)

A wide-eyed kid from Baltimore takes some photographs of the people in his neighborhood. A snooty New York art dealer discovers his work at the local deli and turns him to a star in the art world. And John Waters directs, so there's a good dose of filthy humor and outright bizarre characters.

Pecker is a love-hate sort of film. Either you laugh and eat it up or you sit and think about how much you despise everything about it for two hours. I think it's brilliant.


Rear Window (1954)

What's a photographer to do when he is confined to a bed in his apartment? Spy on the neighbors across the courtyard with a telephoto lens, find one of the neighbors attempting to cover up a crime, and end up face to face with the murderer himself after he knows he has been discovered.

I'm a huge Hitchcock fan, and Rear Window is one of his best. It's brilliant how the entire film is shot within one apartment and its view across a courtyard.

Iowa: Day Four

With nothing but rain in sight, I headed home from Burlington. I'm looking forward to getting back to central Iowa to continue working on the family project. Most of the ride home was spent trying to figure out just how to approach it. It's daunting to try to work in a different way, but I think it'll make for a stronger series in the end.

The photograph above is from downtown Burlington. There were four bikes hanging on wires above an intersection.

Iowa: Day Three

I've made it down to Burlington, in the south-eastern corner of the state. It's an old river town on the bluffs of the Mississippi.

The photograph is a detail of one of the buildings downtown.

Also visited: Gulfport and Hamilton, Illinois; Fort Madison, Montrose and Keokuk.

Iowa: Day Two

Today was spent meandering all over the countryside in Iowa and Poweshiek counties with my grandparents. We covered a lot of ground and family history, many places that are almost non-existent today. I had forgotten how beautiful it is out here, rolling hills and valleys with green as far as the eye can see.

Pictured is what remains of the country school that my grandmother first taught in after getting her teaching degree. It's very nearly gone forever.

Also visited: Brooklyn, Carnforth, Victor, Ladora, Millersburg, Hartwick, Deep River, Montezuma and Malcom