Bankrupt new constructions interest me as well as a marker of the recent recession. Bankrupt, foreclosed and abandoned, residential and commercial. The significance for me is the amount of money or rather credit that's put into all of this building only to have the dreams and lives of so many completely ruined. Less as buildings and more as broken dreams/lives as a symptom of American society's ever widening gulf between necessity and the capitalist dogma so many complain of only to buy right in.
Animal shelters kill over 90% of all animals. This number is considered good in Austin and is relatively lower than the rest of the country's average. Piles of euthanized animals can be seen on the loading dock of certain shelters every day. Piles of body bags. The pet overpopulation problem, although getting somewhat better in recent years, is oft overlooked and unheralded. Certainly some kind of activism involved in a project such as this.
Fish cleaning stations in different parks draw me viscerally. The smells, sights, tangible texture of fish effluvia death mingle with necessity, reality, sustenance and the excitement of a good dinner to come. These places possess, for me, an interesting convergence of life and death and a realistic look at the food chain.
Mountains of waste at a landfill. Huge earth moving equipment constantly burying the trash of the area into huge mounds on the outskirts of town...A metaphor for the modern dilemma of overpopulation? Search for a way to make this different then what others have done...different angles, perceptions, searching for something deeper than the obvious metaphorical possibilities.
Something elemental. Earth, Air, Fire, Water.........and Spirit. Five elements, five prints of each. Elements make up our world, matter itself. A general them to explore more in depth. What to shoot for Spirit, Fire? As a way to search for the inner-connectivity of all.
Alternate modes of transportation. Find a way to photograph those who are doing the most they can for the environment by using less fossil fuels. Riding bicycles, taking trains, walking, electric cars, scooters, etc. Must find some kind of context to create interest. This could end up inherently political.
Backyard wildlife. Although extremely hard and time consuming to photograph, there is an abundance of "urban or suburban wildlife" just outside of my backyard. Ecosystems and habitat constantly being affected by human sprawl yet still thriving in some capacity. Thriving in spite of shrinking habitat or slowly being destroyed, never to be the same again.
Continuation of Recreations, a series I did for advanced digital, wherein I traveled to many regional state parks and photographed tents, travel trailers, canoes, kayaks, and people, recreating themselves. Looking at the way we allocate and reinvent certain areas of land in a commercial or sociological way of "getting back to nature". What drives this desire. Is it sociological, instinctual, or both.
Nature abstracted. Searching for interesting composition and striking imagery by zooming in, cropping, or shooting from strange perspectives in order to abstract concrete creation. I think I would look for color cohesion primarily throughout the series, not sure what else I might find.
Generally search for human presence in natural environments. The interplay, good or bad, positive or negative, exists whether its photographed or not. I would seek to try and stay away from a documentary type or style of photograph rather get more in depth about what this interplay means to me and how to make this, if possible, intriguing. Interplay both found and constructed. Which has more impact, is it possible to decipher, does construction matter?
No comments:
Post a Comment