Week Nine - 2014 in Images

Day 57 - Full Studio

With the Nikon D3200 at the repair facility for Nikon, and busy working on paintings destined for The Old Pass Gallery in Raton a lot of my photography lately has gotten shoved off to the side. Biggest photo shoot this week was Trinidad after I dropped off these paintings in Raton. So far nobody has ever visited my studio when it is in this type of total chaos but that is not unwelcome.

Day 58
Reflections of Trinidad

As soon as the paintings went to Raton I began going through my photographs to pick entries for the Ralph R. Solano Memorial Photography Exhibit in April. So it went from a mess in my studio to a mess in my computer corner. BTW, Day 58 above, is one of the photos I picked to be printed on metallic paper to be matted and framed for entry.

Day 60
Umbrella on Main

And when I sent Day 58 off to the printer I had not yet post processed Day 60 or it might have gone along instead of one of the other three I sent.

Day 62
Umbrella in the window

I love umbrellas and reflections and windows. I could looking back through my photographs mount a small exhibition on each. What surprises me are the number of umbrellas.

Day 61

Yes, the day numbers are out of sync because I wanted to place the photographs by subject. This is one of the photos I took off the beaten track in Trinidad. And yes, another reflection.

Day 63
Caboose House

I really want a caboose on my property. Prefer red but the green is nice. Really wanted to begin renovations but was satisfied taking a photograph instead. Hope to go back soon and take more photos.

Day 59

Will end this week's review with Day 59 which I took before departing to Raton and Trinidad.  It just seemed so out of place with the week's activities.

The Creative Process - Making the Hard Choices

Trinidad Reflections

I was recently in Trinidad, Colorado and walking along Main Street snapping reflections and a man stopped to ask me what I was taking pictures of. I pointed at the dirty window and told him to look beyond it to the world reflected in it. His face lit up when he saw what I saw. My hope is my work, be it paintings or photography, produce that epiphany again and again and again to all the people that do not stop and ask me what it is I am taking a picture of.

Artists create not in a vacuum or silence but within a world of their own making which exists only because of awareness of the world outside. My goal, as an artist, is to communicate to that world what I see. And my chance to do that is to enter exhibitions and contests and launch shows. I just sent four new paintings off to The Old Pass Gallery in Raton for the New Mexico Women Artists exhibit in March. And yesterday I went through literally hundreds of photographs to select four or five to have printed to enter in the Ralph Solano Photography Contest in April.

Between Seasons

It is not all about the photograph. It is about the photograph's voice. There are lots of photographers with fancier equipment that can catch every single crater on the full moon or stop a bird in flight across a marsh, but for me photography, like painting, is about the message. And so first the photograph has to speak to me even though it could have been months since I and the camera had that conversation with the subject or, like the opening picture of this blog, it could have been just a few days ago when I clicked the shutter.

Old Chevy

It could be one which has always been a personal favorite of mine. Or once I took and forgot I took until the photo review began again.

In the Rear View Mirror

I have two photographs already printed which I can enter into this exhibition. I can only submit five, but I found myself sending off another four jpegs to my printer. That is where photography gets expensive.

Burn

But the message never gets out of your head until someone else sees it. My head can be a very noisy place. Definitely not a vacuum or silence. And it has gotten noisier since I have been planning for my one woman show in July at the Main Street Gallery in Trinidad, Colorado: Meraki. The essence of myself I put into my work be it photography, painting or poetry.