Sunday 31 May 2009

swan version


alternate -- rougher, damaged -- version of something from before.

"the subject's gaze is always-already inscribed into the perceived object itself, in the guise of its 'blind spot,' that which is 'in the object more than object itself', the point from which the object itself returns the gaze. Sure the picture is in my eye, but I am also in the picture."
From Matt Lau's review of 'The Parallax View' by Slavoj Zizek.

Thursday 28 May 2009

Fe


“A photographer who doesn’t photograph women is no photographer, or only a third-rate one. Meeting a woman anywhere teaches you more about the world than reading Balzac. Whether it be a wife, a woman encountered by happenstance, or a prostitute, she will teach you about the world. In fact I build my life on meeting women and I have hardly read a book since primary school.” Nobuyoshi Araki

Wednesday 27 May 2009

tarkovsky, etc



"Generally people's memories are coloured by poetry. The most beautiful memories are those of childhood. Of course, memory has to be worked upon before it can become the basis of an artistic reconstruction of the past; and here it is important not to lose the particular emotional atmosphere without which a memory evoked in every detail merely gives rise to a bitter feeling of disappointment. There's an enormous difference, after all, between the way you remember the house in which you were born and which you haven't seen for years, and the actual sight of the house after a prolonged absence. Usually the poetry of the memory is destroyed by confrontation with its origin" Tarkovsky (discussing 'Ivan's Childhood')

Tuesday 26 May 2009

Monday 25 May 2009

separation


A sua ausencia me atraverso
como um fio atraves de uma agulha
todu o que eu faço està imbuido com a sua côr
w.s. merwin

Saturday 23 May 2009

Wednesday 20 May 2009

still life


been thinking about what esme said....'photos as objects, separate from what they depict'... so this is another attempt at creating that distance. (a flower painting in a dublin bed and breakfast presumably meant to brighten up the place but somehow making it more depressing?)

Tuesday 19 May 2009

don't talk to me about quality, okay?




"Quality doesn't mean deep blacks and whatever tonal range. That's not quality, that's a kind of quality. The pictures of Robert Frank might strike someone as being sloppy - the tone range isn't right and things like that - but they're far superior to the pictures of Ansel Adams with regard to quality, because the quality of Ansel Adams, if I may say so, is essentially the quality of a postcard. But the quality of Robert Frank is a quality that has something to do with what he's doing, what his mind is. It's not balancing out the sky to the sand and so forth. It's got to do with intention." (Elliott Erwitt)

Monday 18 May 2009

parallax


"today we start
to pay the piper with each breath, yet love
knows not of death nor calculus above
the simple sum of heart plus heart."
from 'Love is a Parallax' (Sylvia Plath)

parallax: An apparent change in the direction of an object, caused by a change in observational position that provides a new line of sight.

Friday 15 May 2009

Tuesday 12 May 2009

desire



cathexis (n.) — the investment of emotional significance in an activity, object, or idea

Saturday 9 May 2009

missing you


how to analyse and define love and longing? the way it creeps in and inhabits us. the strange, gnawing activity our ribs can barely contain. the palpable void, a suffocating emptiness, a strange impossible contradiction of desolation and jubilation, paralysis and excitement.

Friday 8 May 2009

fracture


This comment from Polish artist, Gosia, made me think...
"When I was observing Your work I had an impression You could be a doctor. Your pictures remind me analize of doctor's work. Is that child on the photo your family? That boy is very beautyful."

Tuesday 5 May 2009

Eva's drawing



People often send me work that has been inspired by something I've done which is always very flattering and wonderful for me to see. This drawing, by Belgian artist, Eva Han, really amazed me. You can see more of her brilliant work here.

Sunday 3 May 2009

i am worn out with dreams


"In representational films ... the image serves as a vehicle to a photo-recorded event. Traditional and established avant garde film teaches film to be an image, a representing. But film is a real thing and as a real thing it is not imitation. It does not reflect on life, it embodies the life of the mind." ‹Ernie Gehr, January 1971

Friday 1 May 2009

one credo after another


"I am a photographer, and can’t help noticing how potent the search for significance is. The absurd task of imposing a rectangle on the flow of the world, and calling that rectangle important, seems to have no end and no zenith." Tim Davis, ‘One Credo After Another’, 2009 (via kirstenbecken)