Thursday, October 27, 2011

japr interview

Interview of me by KC.

kc - Do you have a title yet?

Lucid Premonitions. It just made me think about foreshadowing of dreaming and stuff like that. Dreams can foreshadow, they can repeat, they can be a reflection of the day or they can be something you want to see in yourself, such as wishes and hopes… I think they serve lots of different purposes for different people. I would hope and I think it'll be different for every viewer. However, I don't want to say this one is about this and this one means that. It’s about the dreams, but I don't want to narrative every dream for every person.

kc - With your video do you still want it in a frame alongside your other images?

If it works out. I have 5 boxes that I'm creating. I might cut pieces of certain transparencies out and overlap them to give an optical illusion. That way they create this narrative going through different layers. I was thinking of 4 images for sure, and in one box maybe having a movie. I want it to look similar with the same box structure so it's not disconnected.

I liked the idea of having to look into these boxes and have it be really small and personal like that person is entering the dream state on their own. I think it is a way of looking at how different people dream differently. Such as black and white, really realistic, weird abstract images, flashes, or sometimes your brain connects them like a narrative so they seem super real. It seems like a whole event you went through throughout the night. Being able to watch something and have it feel like a whole story. I thought that trying to control what your subconscious is doing is weird. I wanted to do that by taking these images and turning them into a tangible object. I plan on cutting out parts of the images. Some of them seem to start repeating in a weird way, so if I had little hints of certain images hopefully you start to see this connection like “oh I've seen that before, like déjà vu”... I wonder...

kc - A certain symbol?

I wouldn't say that. But if I deal with repeated images I wonder if they would start to become symbols. After you see something so many times... does that make it a symbol? I think that certain things can definitely become a symbol if it repeats itself enough times and starts to represent something else, remind you of something.

kc - An installation more than just photographs. Was that important? Why?

Technically I guess you could take them off the wall and they could be these little boxes you carry around with you. With it being lit up I think the image begins to be projected in your mind. I don't want to slap a picture on a wall and I've dealt a lot with alternative processes in the past. I don’t want it to read as just here's a picture. I almost feel as though sometimes an image loses its value in a way. It becomes another piece of paper and I don't like that. While at the same time, I don’t think just putting it in a frame necessarily adds importance either. I thought it'd be interesting to separate the images and see how they could work together and relate; and I think that goes along with the theme of the dream state. I thought it'd be interesting to work in a different way.

kc - Do you think everyone will see it as photography? Or will it be a question?

I don't know, I don't think so. What else could it be besides photography? It's not really a photograph, but I’m still playing with that idea. I don't want it to demean my work but if someone were to label it I suppose it could be a photographic installation? But not really.

kc - Do you think this is going to change the way you work? Layers, one dimensional?

I think it’s broadening what I'm capable of. I am definitely acquiring new skill assets through my JAPR. Physically having to build things is an important experience to have so you don't get stuck in the same craft. It's nice to be talented and very skilled in your field but it’s also nice to have a wide range of skills. I've done images with multiple layers before but they just felt flat. I wanted to enter in and explore this more because you could tell there was more to the image and I think that shows more in these layers. But I don't want it to be super obvious. I think it'll let people in more and allow them to bounce back and forth within the image. I think it might open up a new door.

Working commercially I felt like it's a lot of the same thing. I was finding a way to make it different and I always got the comment.. oh that's a Christy picture and I took that as a compliment more so than anything else. I guess it was the start of me finding a style.

kc - It's definitely in color?

Mine are color. I'm still debating about dealing with black and white though. I was wondering about making one layer grayscale. I was working with getting my structures built and now I'm going into the images. I’m thinking more into cutting them down, taking parts out and playing with them, and mixing them around. It might create its own new dream. It's like I'm dreaming while I'm working. Now I'm in control, which is something I was thinking about. I want to keep it somewhat personal; my dreams are color, but to let others get into the work I feel like I might have to explore the black and white, and if that's important? And if that matters? I guess that's something that I'm struggling with.

kc - sound with video?

I don't know if that will enhance or take away from it? To dictate what people are hearing, to help them get into it more? Those are two questions I probably need to ask in class.

Molly Allen

1. Is the type of clay you are using important?

Yes I picked clay called soldate because it has extra grog which allows me to work on a larger scale. It is easy to work with that clay body because it can be attached and reattached at many stages.

2. What is your overall concept?

During this semester I have been exploring how all the mediums I work with fit together, I have been searching for similar meaning with in the work. In my mind they seemed separate and the most I searched for meaning I realized that they all have one major theme in common. Contemplation.

My earlier photo work consisted of girls wearing dress’s floating in a watery landscape that looked surreal. To me that was contemplation of surroundings, or the space one inhabits. It is interesting to me because when someone is floating, they are most likely thinking and every time I float I think of where I inhabit and how I fit into my surroundings. I have always been very interested in the feeling of weightlessness and how it feels to be submerged in water. When on is submerged they get a brief feeling of how integrated they are into their surroundings.

One of my most successful installation projects “freckle map” was also a form of contemplation. The map was contemplation of body, or one physical presence. I had plotted all my major freckles, and in that process I was contemplating my body. Looking at it in a way I had never before.

Finally in my ceramic work, I make female forms with animal heads. These forms a female, simply because that is my gender. They are the final stage of contemplation. The contemplation of a being, of self. This is different from body; because body is physical and self is being, ideas, morals, thoughts and soul. The figure are in a standing position but I wanted their bodies to be posed in stances that someone who is thinking would stand like.

3. What do the animal heads mean?

The animal heads are ment to be different personality traits. A bunny is fragile and skittish, they seem like they are nervous all the time, or are constantly scared, so it represents anxiety. While the frog, I feel is a pretty passive creature they are more likely to react then to act first, while a bunny is the opposite. An octopus represents hidden aggression, or secrets that people hide. The octopus is a creature of the deep and all we know about that is they fight. The only reason we know that is because when they die and wash on the shore and their skin is full of scars from past encounters. Last, the crow is a animal dealing with omens and superstition.

4. How are you going to glaze each figure?

I am going to use a stain to bring out their raw features. Either black or green. They will all be the same color, I want it to be less about color and more about figure.

JPAR interview. Brett

Interview With Brett Varga

1. So start us off with a brief bio, where you are from and how you got started?
Brett- I am from Virginia Beach, Virginia. I’ve always been into art, even when I was young, but in middle school that took a back seat, because the school didn’t provide certain electives. I got back into art my junior year in high school, my teachers realized I had some real talent and some room to grow so the next year I was taking ap. art. And that really got me back into it. After that I went to Utah State and from there my art has continued.

2. When did you decide you wanted to be an artist?
Brett- Pretty much when I was applying to Utah State. After I graduated high school I had a good amount of work. Once I got accepted into the art program it was pretty much solid. If they didn’t except my portfolio then I probably would have gone down a different path. So I would say around 08 was when I decided.

3. So what is your current JAPR idea? (Materials, Techniques, Content, Ect.)
Brett- My current JAPR idea is about disconnect, and how we deal with life through this disconnect. Ex. Lets say someone is explaining a story about how they were surfing this huge waves but in reality they were just sitting on the beach all day or the waves were a lot smaller then they say. So it is going in that manner… One-sided stories. And that what my JAPR is about. Pictures of kids doing stuff but I’m changing them so that the meaning changes as well. That’s were the idea of a video came in, a porno with all the sex and sexy parts taken out, in turn it becomes comical. This show is a venue that articulates how people propitiate an image of how they want to be perceived. It’s more like creating humor then being so serious, I feel when you’re able to laugh at something, it’s easier to talk about. So my project will deal with kids attending a fictional school, its not poking fun at SNC, and if so I can defend that, but it’s about a bad college that not good for your kids. Putting themselves out there like they are a great school. Like any huge company does today. Ex. Coke-cola, BP. When you’re only hearing one side of the fence your really not seeing the whole picture.

4. And what would you say your overall theme is for JAPR? (Just a Few Words)
Brett- How appropriation is created through not seeing the whole picture, and how that meaning changes drastically. So when your only seeing one side and “they” put a spin on it, the meaning is completely different from the true meaning.

5. What do you see yourself doing after JAPR?
Brett- I don’t think I’m going to go right into my BFA, I think I’m going to wait till my senior year. I think I’m going to take a break because I plan on doing something pretty big for my BFA. Something that has this interactive experience. I want every piece to be interactive in someway but it wouldn’t be so clear-cut. Ex. One idea I had was a picture frame on a clean wall with bubble wrap inside. Everyone wants to touch and pop bubble wrap. Or a fish tank with a fish and just enough water where he is flapping around and a glass of water next to the tank. Stuff like that, but also getting more comical. That’s what I’m trying to do, more so then just generic art. What about a piece that is extremely small and you have to use a magnifier glass to look at it. Just stuff like that.

6. Any influences or anyone you look up to when it comes to your work?
Brett- My one friend Alex Bernett, I look up to him a lot. He’s kind of an idiot but he has really good style. One of my favorite artists is Jackson Pollock, “spatter paint guy” I don’t really look up to him but his story just because it shows that the artist world is just full of shit. And lastly Stephen Chesley an artist from back east.
?
Brett- I am from Virginia Beach, Virginia. I’ve always been into art, even when I was young, but in middle school that took a back seat, because the school didn’t provide certain electives. I got back into art my junior year in high school, my teachers realized I had some real talent and some room to grow so the next year I was taking ap. art. And that really got me back into it. After that I went to Utah State and from there my art has continued.

2. When did you decide you wanted to be an artist?
Brett- Pretty much when I was applying to Utah State. After I graduated high school I had a good amount of work. Once I got accepted into the art program it was pretty much solid. If they didn’t except my portfolio then I probably would have gone down a different path. So I would say around 08 was when I decided.

3. So what is your current JAPR idea? (Materials, Techniques, Content, Ect.)
Brett- My current JAPR idea is about disconnect, and how we deal with life through this disconnect. Ex. Lets say someone is explaining a story about how they were surfing this huge waves but in reality they were just sitting on the beach all day or the waves were a lot smaller then they say. So it is going in that manner… One-sided stories. And that what my JAPR is about. Pictures of kids doing stuff but I’m changing them so that the meaning changes as well. That’s were the idea of a video came in, a porno with all the sex and sexy parts taken out, in turn it becomes comical. The whole show is a vehicle for a metaphor that people propitiates themselves to be better then they are. It’s more like creating humor then being so serious, I feel when your able to laugh at something, its easier to talk about. So my project will deal with kids attending a fictional school, its not poking fun at SNC, and if so I can defend that, but it’s about a bad college that not good for your kids. Putting themselves out there like they are a great school. Like any huge company does today. Ex. Coke-cola, BP. When you’re only hearing one side of the fence your really not seeing the whole picture.

4. And what would you say your overall theme is for JAPR? (Just a Few Words)
Brett- How appropriation is created through not seeing the whole picture, and how that meaning changes drastically. So when your only seeing one side and “they” put a spin on it, the meaning is completely different from the true meaning.

5. What do you see yourself doing after JAPR?
Brett- I don’t think I’m going to go right into my BFA, I think I’m going to wait till my senior year. I think I’m going to take a break because I plan on doing something pretty big for my BFA. Something that has this interactive experience. I want every piece to be interactive in someway but it wouldn’t be so clear-cut. Ex. One idea I had was a picture frame on a clean wall with bubble wrap inside. Everyone wants to touch and pop bubble wrap. Or a fish tank with a fish and just enough water where he is flapping around and a glass of water next to the tank. Stuff like that, but also getting more comical. That’s what I’m trying to do, more so then just generic art. What about a piece that is extremely small and you have to use a magnifier glass to look at it. Just stuff like that.

6. Any influences or anyone you look up to when it comes to your work?
Brett- My one friend Alex Bernett, I look up to him a lot. He’s kind of an idiot but he has really good style. One of my favorite artists is Jackson Pollock, “spatter paint guy” I don’t really look up to him but his story just because it shows that the artist world is just full of shit. And lastly Stephen Chesley an artist from back east.

Kath interviews Jessica

I feel like you are an observer. You are either microscopic or a long way off – you are rarely at ground level. Why observe rather than interact?

I feel that by observing, I am interacting – there is no way to separate myself or my preconceptions from what I am looking at. I am the type of person who sits at home and thinks about stuff on either a very intense level or a very grand level … I don’t particularly care for expressing the mundane every day event as a mundane every day event. I like to either to get in very close and observe what life is like from there, or step back and look at things and observe things on a grand scale. Up close is very intense and personal, while far away is more dreamlike and removed, and I’m interested in how those feelings work.

Why does the comic book venue work for you?

It’s only been in the past couple of years that I’ve started working in comic form, but really I’ve always been very interested in sequencing. When I want to get something across I don’t want to limit myself to one image. Seeing images change from one thing to the next is really interesting to me, and the comic medium is perfect for telling a story that progresses from one thing to another. It also allows for words, which I love; I’m really interested in how words and images can affect and influence one another.

Comic books have become quite sophisticated from their original form it seems…

Comic books have a reputation for being something that can’t enter the world of high art, that can’t compete with fine painting or installation, so that’s why I tend to call them ‘graphic novels’ – that phrase has more gravity to it. They’ve earned this reputation of being lowbrow. I think comics are high art!

You have returned to the physicality of carving out this new work in lino for a handmade book- how does this best work toward your theme and content?

When I am working on something very process based, like carving out a lino plate, I get into the flow very easily with those repetitive movements. It lets me think about the concept of what I am doing; that’s important, that there is a process element to it. I enjoy it because it is something that I have always done; I enjoy the feel of these things as I am making them. Process clears my head so I can think about what’s going on in the work.

You are doing a lot of layering in this book- how is that going to inform the story more?

Layering is a really interesting concept because it speaks to what I am trying to do in all of my work, which is to get at those layers, that tension, between what the real world is like and what you perceive it to be like. There is so much that happens between the real world and you observing it. There is this cloudy layering process that is constantly happening: by the time you actually understand what you are looking at, it has already gone through so many filters and preconceived notions in your head that it’s something else now. There is no way to purely look at something.

Currently you are letting the images guide the narrative- explain!

I very specifically wanted to start this project without a goal in mind because I do definitely over think and over plan the narrative aspect of storytelling, which can trap you. That can lock you in and prevent you from going in directions that could be more successful. Also, stylistically I am trying to break out of the really rigid, cross-hatched, very tightly defined style that I tend to use; that feels like a crutch, or like a safety blanket. It looks good, but if there is something that isn’t working and I can’t figure out what’s wrong, my first reaction is to go back in and do more of those little lines. That’s not fixing the problem, that’s just making it look a certain way. I’m trying to attack that idea of having everything pre-planned. Know what the problems are and figure out a way to address them.

Where is this particular story going…?

The symbolic imagery, a lot of the umbrella heads, gives it a base in something anxious. A lot of holes that I have used pretty regularly for the past few years, hands coming out of the holes, rain coming down, flooding the place. Flooding being another aspect of anxiety - being overwhelmed. Hooks come down, pick up the people, drop them on dry land and one of them looks down and there is a mass of worms. I had not used worms much before which surprises me because I have a lot invested in them as an image.

I have an idea of the overall story concept, but half of the decisions come about while actually printing the stuff, which has not happened yet; once printed, I can communicate more about it.

Why do you think umbrella man is still with us- you mentioned he has been around since 2007?

It was an image that came to me from watching people in the rain in the city. Seeing how all these people were turned in on themselves, walking and passing each other with these protective barriers, not interacting with each other. All going their separate ways, hunched. I replaced the head with the umbrella. It represents anxiety and that feeling of isolation and being closed off from other people, even when you are in a big crowd. Anxiety and isolation are feelings that I tend to explore a lot because they feel like baseless, overpowering emotions. A lot of us experience that; it’s a prevalent feeling in modern culture. The work that I do tends to address the way that individuals create these states of mind for themselves, and what the effects are, how these feelings can color everything you look at.

Is umbrella person a version of you?

Umbrella person is a version of anybody who has felt anxious, so I would be included in that, but it’s not specifically me.

Do you think the person will be around for a while?

I think that it will persist for a while until I really flesh out why it keeps popping back up; I have a lot of repeated images that I can’t stop working with until I understand them, or why I’m using them. It could be around for a bit.

Your narratives then seem to be the fleshing out of potential emotions rather than a story line that goes from A to B. There does not seem to be a plot…or is there?

With this particular project it is a fleshing out of a sequence that overall will give you and understanding of an emotion. Previously I have done story work with a plot and dialogue, a sequencing of events that’s meant to be read in a line. With this project, I think you can open it to any page, read it in any order, and still get the right sense. My emotional story telling goes in a spiral. You can enter at any point.

Why are your figures asexual? You can’t put a gender to them.

That’s very intentional: it’s supposed to represent anyone who has been in this situation, which applies to both men and women. I’m working with these genderless figures because I want it to be applicable to anyone who looks at it. If I’m talking about an experience which is specific to women or men, or needs that sense of a gender divide, then I will absolutely create male and female figures. Genderless figures apply universally, and I want this story to apply universally.

Color?

I have used color! But I am very, very picky about when and why I use color. There is something about black and white that is much more powerful and direct for me. Since my work enters subjective points of view or more intimate perspective on things, it doesn’t need to look the way that the real world does. If I’m going to use color, it had better be for a reason; it needs to create an atmosphere, or give meaning to an object, rather than color for color’s sake. A colorless world fleshed out in little hatch marks feels right to me. And then there is always that formal choice which is - god, I love black and white!

JH interview with KM

Q: When I look at your work it always strikes me as something very based in process- do you start with the process and use that to hone down an idea, or do you approach it with a concrete concept that you want to convey?
I typically work where there’s a scene or a picture that I’d like to actualize. I like the formal qualities of imagery. I like making things. I think it’s interesting that art used to be about the end product, but now art can be just about process. For my upcoming BFA show I am being fairly process-oriented. It has been really interesting because it’s not how I normally work. I’ve done process, but I have an end goal -A gets me to B and I want to get to B. I’ve never actually done process for the sake of process until now. The multitude of crows I have been working on might not even turn up in the gallery. At first it really was about a narrative, A B C, and now I’m finding it’s more about a place of reflection or contemplation that still has elements of narrative. I think using process has changed my articulation of what I am trying to communicate.

Q: When you’re working with a single repeated image, say the crow, repeating it again and again over a range of media, does that image transform for you? Do you start finding new ways to physically execute the image, and do your feelings and thoughts about the concept of it start to change?
I’m usually very visual. I like to look at something to execute it. I generally always like to be looking at the thing that I draw- whether it’s a still life, a figure, and a photo. And what I’ve found, working with the crows, is that I’ve started to let go more and more of what it is that I’m looking at. I’ve gotten to know the figure so well that I’m able to take liberties; I’ve started drawing it without reference points. Then it becomes more about the line quality or the materials or the emotion.

Q: The basic storyline behind the crow imagery is something that does come from a very deeply personal place, but the crow itself as a symbol can be interpreted different ways - can you talk about where the dividing line is between being very personal and out there, and telling a more universal story?
The crow is a loaded figure. He’s unique and a good symbol to use because he does have multiple meanings; he’s a good thing to use as personal that speaks to the universal. I can use him to be very particular for me, but he’s also able to be viewed universally. The kickoff point was about death and loss, so he definitely references that, and I know that that’s obvious. In the end that’s what I am trying to say: something very obvious. I don’t think our society gives us the space to mourn very well anymore; I think other societies really include it as a cultural practice, or a ritual, and it’s very inclusive. I think it’s very institutionalized and hidden away now. Once you’ve moved past the funeral, society forgets and you can be treading water and still in a difficult place emotionally. This is my platform to ask people to step into that physical and emotional space with me. And it’s essentially a thing that we’re all going to have to face, or have faced. It’s not like I’m asking you to enter an experience that you might never touch on.

Q: It’s the one universal experience.
A: Right, exactly. I originally intended the crows as the messenger; now I really see them as transition, and it’s not just my personal transition of dealing with grief, but transition to the other side for the person that dies.

Q: Generally, when you’re making work – apart from this particular show – where do you fall on that line between talking more about your personal experience versus introducing something that everybody can relate to?
I always seem to be more interested, and I’m still very interested, in the formal qualities: aesthetics. I can get really interested in just one patch of paint, or a square inch in a painting. I feel like my work, generally, isn’t terribly, terribly personal – because I am so interested in the formal. This show is a departure for me. I’ve chosen something that’s far more difficult for me to try to actualize. I always thought of the BFA show as this end piece, but really I have to look at it as an emerging. I didn’t have anything else I could have done; grief and mourning tend to color everything so I didn’t have a way of producing anything else. This avenue is to ask the viewer to go there with me. It’s to say; it’s not over, it’s not done, and as a society you need to understand that it is ongoing and that we need to be more receptive to it. As artists I think we’re lucky that we get to express ourselves in various ways, but otherwise we’d all be in therapy, behind closed doors.

Q: I’ve heard you say a few times that you don’t consider yourself an artist. Is that a position you still hold?
A: I’m sort of mixed on it. I feel ‘artist’ is a responsibility; I’m not sure that I can live up to that responsibility yet, because I still feel really young artistically. But at the same time I feel I need to create the mantra, “I am an artist,” because I think that affirmation in itself might change the way I think of myself. So I’m torn. I think putting voice to things can sometimes change the way you think about something.



Thursday, October 20, 2011

Due Tuesday (10/25): Transcript of Interview

At the beginning of Tuesday's class, you need to have the transcript of your interview completed. Have a hard copy ready to turn in. It doesn't have to be the full transcript of the interview -- you can concentrate on what you think the most interesting or pertinent sections of the interview were -- but have a minimum of five paragraphs of your interviewee's answers typed out. Each person is responsible for transcribing the interview they conducted -- ie., you're typing up the interview as the interviewer, not as the interviewee.

Sam and Brett -- since you weren't in class today, I'm going to have you interview each other, rather than the person you were originally paired with. Please have you interview done and transcript completed by Tuesday.

Also, those of you who have been lame in updating your blogs -- pick up the slack.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Assignments for Thursday, 10/20

For Thursday's class, I want you to do three things:

1. Prepare at least five questions for the person you're interviewing in class. Make sure the questions are specific to their current work. No general "So when did you decide you wanted to be an artist" stuff; the questions should specifically address the content, themes, and technique of their current work.

2. Bring any recording device you may have (whether phone, computer, or digital recorder).

3. Read Lexy's poems, below -- it'd be nice to talk about them, at least briefly, next class.

These are the interview pairings:

Kath & Jessica
Kasey & Christy
Lexy & Bianca
Matt & Sam

Molly interviews Brett
Brett interviews Victor
Victor interviews Molly

Show poems

Why I Can't Sing to You
we stare forgivingly
cheap neon stars
growing faint
that feeling you slipped about me
my disposition to nervous laughter
worn-out pages of exhausted excuses
free-falling face down 
the obsession of wordless songs 
and the overwhelming traces of our choices
drowning each lobe
parallel figures white flags 
and I wish there were lyrics to sing to



[no title]

your eyes can't help but close
they've left us in this room alone
your bed is stiff
don't struggle to move for me; I'll fit
each breath brings 
this overactive nausea
closer to my mouth
I convince myself I smell
your high school cologne
July heated pavements on our backs
a kiss in Zippo-lit garage corners
this time I wish your mom would walk in on us
your words blocked 
by a deafening rattling in your lungs
my words blocked
choking cowardice
so I run most fingertips
back & forth on your knee
hoping it will pinken
ignoring its resemblance to my bent elbow
wake up, wake up
I'm enveloped in lines of panic
trying to make up for the last 1,384 days
and I breath so deeply
I break through all fabricated familiarities
the smell of 
empty Kleenex boxes
monitored room-temperatures
bleach white pillows
enables instant paralysis
I silently plead
wake up, wake up
so I can continue to not say a word to you



Taking Pictures at the Ocean

with each step we take
two to your one
grinding salt and sand
I wonder if you're thinking
about the space between your toes
I try to fill the empty space 
between my first two toes 
clenching them tight 
forcing closure to this humanly void
the first overlapping 
strangling the second
because the phantoms between
remind me too much 
of the lack of us





Wrong Turn
slick fingers 
retreat through yours 
to race to my mouth
to tear at the anxiously red bits
of my bottom lip
your questioning fingers are rough with mine
strangling them again
if these knuckles were necks
they’d go limp
you’re trying to manufacture
a sense of security
I feel your heartbeat against my pinned wrist
You’re feeling my pulse, not my heartbeat.
my pulse buried itself
in my eardrum
banging on it
begging to it
spelling out arbitrary words
and I’d choke on my own breath
if it wasn’t holding those words back
Are you sure we’re here? 


Appointments
“She”
the name casually assigned
by your shrink
twice a week
this damaging orange bottle
chemical assurance 
why you've been placed
in this morbidly tidy space
for the last 42 minutes
two undiagnosed 
broken right hands
two unhinged
broken bedroom doors
two less-than mutual
mutual separations 
one bottom-heavy list of
things thrown against a wall
defense mechanisms 
against retaliation
her tears, your targets
and any chance of a clinically
healthy approach at intimacy
for either of you
suffocating under the debris
“She” 
chokes down guilt 
a few times a week
but she doesn't have to come here



Shoot-out

I cry just to calm you down

and don't worry about your grip
that chair clearly aimed for
wreckage or my dropping jaw
I begin to shake
the buckles on my boots echoing my movements
I'm wearing weathered cowboy boots
the spurs fall silent
I don't shoot
but you fall to the ground
I pray you never get your hands on a gun again


[no title]

it lines
her teeth
her mouth
her tongue
tipping the 
crest of her
top lip
when she
tells you
her name

Salvagery show: You Gotta Enter

Here's the link with the info -- Nov. 5 deadline:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=247247048660835

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Interview with Chris Talbot (September 23, 2011)

1. Lets just start off with a brief bio, where you are from and how you got started?
Chris- I’m from Malibu California. Moved to Tahoe when I was 13, and I’ve lived in Incline for 35 years now. I try to spend as much time during the winter overseas. My specialty is taking photographs. I can do very little things very good but I can take photographs very well… I’ve learned the whole spectrum of photography from shooting kids, weddings, portraits, into the food industry, hospitality shots, lifestyle and all the way through into extreme lifestyle stuff, sports and finally landscapes and that’s what I’m most proud of is my landscape photography… My job is to photograph everything that is not sad, not bad, and that’s not mad in this world.  I don’t want to be the guy catching all the images of Libya or the horrible things in life. I’d rather show off what’s good and what keeps us going to be better people or to sustain for our children and our grandchildren… My bio is I am a good photographer and hopefully I care about the world, especially my family, start there and move you’re way out and if you can help other people.
2. When did you first discover your creative talents?
Chris- My dad gave me a camera when I was 18. I was on my way to school in Hawaii. I spent my first 2 years at the Chaminade University of Honolulu and I still have the camera today and it’s all cleaned up… When I was 18, my dad gave me that camera that inspired me to really start shooting… (Camera was a Minolta T202) I took it around the world, I had it with me with a 15mm lens on it and that’s it, that was my direct research project at USC and I got a really good portfolio from one lens on one camera… I’ve got 15 cameras and I use mainly five of them and the other ones are hard to get rid of.
3. Could you tell us about some of your work?
Chris- The stuff I’m doing now, the one that pays the bills, is shooting developments, hotels, trying to show off the amenities of the place. Trying to show of the beauty…Try to create things that are not there yet… I’ve got an edit all day long. I’m doing a new property called Shaffer’s Mill in Truckee Ca. It will be very nice one day but we have to show it off to the people and potential clients… Doing that stuff is fun but it’s not fun, what I like to do is get to my landscape photography… I should be shooting this afternoon… I tend to shoot a lot on the north shore and on the east shore. I don’t get over to the west shore though… I’m doing a lot of portraits as well… Wedding seasons is ending and I’ve done 38, which is low for me, normally I do 50… Weddings are insane, I’ve done 850 of them, and they grow on you… 
4. What is it like to travel the world doing what you love?
Chris- Really fun… the anticipation is one of the greatest feelings in the world… the trips that I take and sometimes my wife and baby take, and we done this a couple time to Vietnam… Those trips are very fun… Travel is different then journey, I journey when I go.  Once I have a curtain amount of time set aside and some money set aside and some jobs in there, so I can go out there and know I’m going to make some money… We will be spending sometime in Saigon…We be going in January, will be there for 3-4 months… To be honest with you, I can work a lot more there then I can here… for small hotels, larger hotels, golf courses… that tends to be the future of photography… There are a million pictures of Niagara falls and Emerald bay, the key is shooting stuff that’s hasn’t been to photographed yet.
5. What was your most enjoyable location to photograph? 
Chris- I really like photographing Thailand or Southern Cambodia, and there is another place called Phu Quoc, Vietnam. Those places were really fun. And I just went to Con Dao last year… This place had tiger cages and torcher. It’s like there Alcatraz… When I got there it was a great location, right now it’s my favorite place to go in Vietnam, its quiet and up and coming… Actually I probably haven’t been to the place I like the most…Palawan is probably my next place… and I want to go see Borneo… the answer is, I probably haven’t been there yet, cause its always what’s next is the coolest thing… the one last place that I went to that was really exciting to shoot… Tahoe… Tahoe and Nevada…  It my state and my hometown. There so many images out there that no one has taken...

6.  What inspires you to keep going and how do you keep your self motivated?
Chris- Money. Money is important.  I have a friend who is an artist as well. He came up last month and saw all my posters and canvas around town… I thought he was going to say, “Dude you sold out”, we used to talk about that, you can’t sell out. But what it comes down to is making money, and if you want to be a photographer you have to make money… The benefits of running your own business and doing what you want are also part of it. But making money is the key because we have to survive, and now I have kid… Before I was cursing around Asia for 12 years having a pretty good time, and shooting everywhere from Japan to Singapore.  So many times I think I did 15 trans-pacific return flights in that time… Travel is the best thing for you, the best thing for you.  You know the best reason for travel? It grounds you…  I’ve seen how the world views the world, not just how we as a western society, but there is so many different thoughts. 
7. Any influences or anyone you look up to when it comes to your work?
Chris- Frans Lanting
  Galen Rowell
  Ansel Adams
8. Any advice for aspiring artists?

  Chris- Identify… 80 percent of photography is getting the camera to the location and in position. 10 percent is Knowledge and the other 10 percent is pure luck…