work in progress

ending/beginning

i am almost finished  tinkering  with my "living proof" layout....because now i am just "messing"...fooling around any more would blow the  whole spontaneity feel i want with this particular book...this is one is to be loose , freestyle, a little reckless....just like the subject...not "coffee table" material....not even about pictures really...i only have about 5 stand alone "good pictures" in this book....for this book i am just looking for "totality" ...not "gallery"...

i have no idea how this book will "go down", but it is happening anyway...this book will not be seen until the fall....but it will be gone in my mind by tomorrow...done, finished.....start something new...

it is way past time to finally take the prints off the wall that have been up there for months...i need something fresh to look at...so i have been trying to decide between two upcoming books that have been rolling around in my head for years....my women portraits project  "you made me leave" which i may show you someday soon (one below)....or "off for a family drive" which is a "scrapbook diary"  lifetime of material for which  maybe even exerpts from this blog would be appropriate...who knows...

tonight i decided to put "family drive" up on the wall in the next few days and start playing with sequences etc etc..."you made me leave" can wait....just seems right now for "family drive"....i can still do a  few portraits  and also shoot my building since i want to spend as much time at home figuring out "family drive" as possible....the buiding shoot and "family drive" layout will feed each other...

i have no clue how i will pay for this time...for time not shooting generally means time without income...this will be the most important thing you will ever learn when doing a book....you just have to drop everything else....gene richards told me once that the reason he had so many books was because he did not get so many assignments....this is easy to believe...the two do not go hand in hand....

when i  shoot one assignment right after the other , there  no way i could get a book out....you have to "drop out" for weeks at least...so  this is my dilemma....get the next book going or go make enough income to keep the fires burning....

most likely i will have to figure out a way to do both....sacrificing one thing , juggling another, embracing this and rejecting that...eye on the prize...name of the game...

as roman emporer philosopher marcus aurelius foretold:

"if you work at that which is before you, following right reason seriously, vigorously, calmly, without allowing anything else to distract you, but keeping your divine part pure, as if you might be bound to give it back immediately; if you hold to this , expecting nothing, fearing nothing, but satisfied with your present activity according to your nature, you will be happy, and there is no man who is able to take this from you ..."

pictures from tonight

now i am just playing....this is not an edit..do not judge yet please please!!...now you can see i am not so good!!!..which i guess is the point....unless i am "on" on, i can shoot some pretty meaningless pictures...my sons even accuse me of taking the worst family pictures on vacation of all time!!

these photos come from just me going out in the hall this afternoon and seeing my next door neighbor devon and a passerby and then meeting  a few people on the roof i did not know...three women in the stairwell getting out of the wind....and then re-shooting the 10th floor door shot from yesterday i think.....one hour of shooting time, just a few minutes of finger on the button...i will know in a few days if i want to do an essay on new york...all seen from one building that will soon go away....a reminiscence...a sentiment of an age going by....passage......
just thinking...

10th floor

this is the floor to live on in my building....the 10th.....i live way way down on the 4th....my view is partially blocked by a brick wall that is the east side of the lumber company that is across the street...i am not unhappy, because i do see water and boats and seagulls.... but these folks up here on the 10th have a totally clear view of the manhattan skyline....they also have balconies that they can hang out on with their friends who must exclaim over their good fortune....

most people in new york who have any kind of view at all are paying a lot more in rent or mortgage than am i....the building i am in, the "kibbutz", will not last  much longer....i think we are all out in a year and a half....they will renovate this building....whoever has my even limited view next will have made a significant investment....

all of the photographers in this building have said they wanted to document our building...none of us have done it....one of us should....now would be the time for me since i am not leaving new york because i have to print my show...i am here at home for awhile....paolo pellegrin, chris anderson and alex majoli should be coming "home" soon and would provide good portraits....the characters in this building are endless....artists, film makers, models, sculptors and the like live here....i do not think there is anyone living here from the wall street crowd....but they would certainly be welcomed....

the social scene is so lively here that you really do not even have to leave this building to be entertained...rooftop cookouts, slide shows, music classes, raucus parties etc. could keep you pretty busy....if i leave my door open, there is a steady stream of visitors who either bring a six pack or drink the six pack somebody else brought.....i just found out today that a woman on the 10th floor has opened a therapeutic massage business....maybe she has one of those balconies....lorena ros, spanish photographer, gave me the massage therapist's business card, so maybe i will find out...

should i "do" this building as a little scrapbook???....i have a few frames already, but nothing too serious...maybe it should not even be "serious".....snapshots maybe....i made this little snapshot here about an hour ago from the 10th floor.....i will keep thinking about this one..

ok....no new pictures

some of you may come here to see what i have done lately...my big projects i have not posted here yet, but i do like to show  you  little things i have seen recently  or little snippets of larger works....well, honestly, i have not taken a decent picture since sicily over two weeks ago..i had two weeks in spain and somehow i do not have much to show for it in pictures....4 days in london...zero....well, for london, i kinda have a good excuse..i did get a nice picture of her by dinner candlelight, but she will not let me publish it on this blog...censored!!!

but, how could i have no good pictures from spain, one of my favorite destinations of all time??? no answer really, and no excuses....i mean i was out every night taking pictures, but something just was not happening for me...was i just having too much fun partying??? not a likely answer,  because some of my best work has come from me being wrapped bigtime into a social situation...

and, not so oddly, i knew i was not really getting anything special...never got "in the zone" with anything really....but, i think you "get in the zone" when you want to go there...you have to want it bad...and i guess i just did not want it bad enough....

so far in my photog life, i have never stayed "blocked" for long....but, it is something that happens......the pressure of needing  to put a new picture up here is killing me!!!

passion

i have not had much  time to edit  my work from sicily....three quick choices now  to just show what i will try to go for with a little essay during these two weeks in italy....passion for religion and passion for friends and family seem to be pretty obvious icons when one works in this culture...for me, these pictures are just so so....i must go deeper....i am rarely satisfied with my work in general...it never seems to work out  right....one of the reasons i always push push  forward is because whatever i did in the past is not quite good enough....

arlington

It takes three hours to shine a pair of shoes.  Brass buckles are polished five times per day.  Cadence, cadence and cadence...If a soldiers eyes move in the wrong direction he is pulled "off the line"....Move the rifle bolt too fast or too slow and the soldier is pulled  off the line..

the Honor Guard at the  Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery is an elite group of 25 men who feel that they have the best and most prestigious duty in the U.S.Infantry...they guard the remains of unknown soldiers from WWI , WWII, Korean War, and an empty tomb from the Vietnam War... Because of modern day forensics and DNA science there will never again be another "unknown soldier"......

What is known is the dedication of these  men  who  walk back and forth,  back and forth , eyes straight ahead in one hour shifts  24 hours  a day , rain or shine,  hurricane  or blizzard, sweltering  heat or icy wind........24/7  and hardly any time off....these guys represent dedication........i spent  two days with these men recently, "behind the scenes".....the only thing we really had in common were shaved heads...my shoes and shirt were clean , but , well, not much precision going on in my case.....most of these guys  had served in Iraq and all were ready to go back.....but they looked at this special duty as the greatest service to their country and few can pass muster .....we chatted aimiably, but we did not talk politics...

before their walk  the men prepare....sun glasses polished....long long looks in the full length mirror....expressions taught..rifles ready ..they critique each other harshly....and  when they ultimately resign from the military,  if they are ever caught in any violation of "the code of honor", which would include any drug violation for example, their names would be removed from the Roll of Honor forever and disgrace would follow them for the rest of their lives....

bangkok portraits

bangkok nightlife...this was my assignment for "9 Days in the Kingdom", a group effort to be published in a large coffee table book this fall...an international collection of photographers were spread out all over Thailand to "do their own thing"....when my colleagues heard i was doing "nightlife" they all said "oh david, just perfect for you"....

but, there was one little catch...almost none of the people in the "nightlife biz" wanted to be photographed.....so, i did what i always do...i stuck mostly to one club so everyone would get to know me....but, even then, they were skittish....finally, i realized i needed to hang around before the club opened....these pictures were made about an hour before "showtime" when the girls come in to get dressed and have their dinner....i left before the show....my girlfriend was waiting for me....she does not like to be kept waiting!!!

nairobi portraits

i had never before been to africa......i had never before tried to use powerful strobe lights in the noonday sunlight.....the challenge i gave myself was to see if i could combine my so called "street shooter" style with power light portraiture of some of the people  who make up  nairobi....the works here are  from kibera,  a slum neighborhood  squeezed right up next to a wild game park at the edge of town....

sunday morning is just an amazing time in kibera....almost everyone is off to church....despite the ramshackle nature of this neighborhood, somehow everyone was wearing clean, pressed clothes...their sunday best...pride personified.....my jeans and shirt were surely wrinkled....

this little taste of africa only whetted my appetite for more....but, i never got out of nairobi.....i only saw, and became mesmerized by,  this too crowded, too noisy, too dirty, too dangerous city.....most tourists land in nairobi , spend the night, and head out the next morning for kenya's  spectacular game parks....one day i would like to do the same....but this trip was to photograph  the people who endure this city....looking for work, looking for salvation....

11 yr old mary akinya said " i am reading a story about a cheetah, elephant, zebra, and lion..they are fighting over who is  strongest..but the  zebra is the smartest and he  wins"

the reverend christopher mwenama earns his living as house servant..."i was called to the ministry in a dream" he says......

all of the 800,000 people who live in kibera  have a story.....i only know two of them....

portrait of zaida

i never do not have a camera with me.....at the dentist , my camera bag sits in the corner....i do not always shoot every breakfast , lunch and dinner in my life....but i do have coverage of a lot of them...the picture below i shot at lunch the other day....light was terrible , i was bored, and then i saw my course assistants  zaida (read her story under "road trips") and cristina hanging by the doorway of the restaurant....from boredom to the temporary insanity of being  "in the zone"...maybe 30 seconds of shooting time...made my whole day.......6 frames.....2 nice.....here is one of them..

 

how to publish a book

well, there is one little problem with this title....even though i actually teach a class in book publishing, the first thing i must admit to my students is that i have no idea "how to publish a book".....martin parr is the only photographer i know who actually seems to know how...the man has 35 books!!! or is it 36??  who can keep up? 

the rest of us suffer....each book undertaking is a whole new experience.....the wannabe new author has new "work"....there is oftentimes a new pubisher.... we are mostly working with new editors....but here is the most formidable/fundamental problem:  we photographers  are asking a publisher to take on our projects, spend THEIR money on production and distribution and yet WE want the book to be done OUR way!!

you have heard me before stress authorship, authorship and authorship.....let me please tell you why this is so important....i have published six books.....i will not even tell you the titles of three of them....why? because they are not books i am proud of...and there is nothing worse than having a "bad book" sitting on your mother's coffee table....

a magazine piece that does not live up to your expectations can be explained away....."well, they just did not run the right pictures.....i had a much better picture than THIS...what were they thinking?"

with a book you have no such excuse or , at least, you should not have...you are standing there absolutely naked when you publish a book....who wants to be the "emperor without clothes" ??

this afternoon i will look at a preliminary dummy for my yet untitled hip hop work to be published by "powerhouse" for publication this fall....between now and the fall season, i will be living in some sort of  artistic anguish......so many things have to go right.....i am going to take you through this as an educational experience....but, as i said, whatever this experience will be is a "brand new" experience for me and for my publishers.....there is a  "ballet" between the photographer and publisher that requires diplomacy and honor and integrity and sometimes raw courage.....and, sleepless nights...

there are TWO truly wonderful moments in book publishing:

(1) the day you realize you actually have the material for a book, the concept is there.....at this point you can "high five" anyone in sight.

(2) the day the book actually comes out and arrives on time at the exhibition you have been working for weeks on...you can "high five" anyone in sight on this day also.

BUT IN-BETWEEN!!!  well, that is the world that is hard to describe in a sentence or two, so i will just take you along on this process....but, i will say this now.....the "in-between" is "creative" in almost the same way that painting the whole outside and inside of your house is....it is nice to have it done!!!