25 PHOTOS FROM 2005

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Powerpoint to DVD

As many of you know, I have had non-stop issues with the powerpoint and have asked for help. After seeking endless advice, I have just bought DVD Studio Pro 4, Aperture and Adobe Photoshop Elements 3.0 to redo the existing slide shows, which should be time consuming but not impossible.

I am ready to bring these motherfuckers home.

South Philly Xmas Eve Day

I have made a vow, no, not to mix southern rock and county like Travis Tritt, but to photograph in South Philly on Christmas eve day. I was in line with most of the others out in our world, waiting to buy bread or rolls or desert and I was bleary having just woken up and driven to Cacia's, but next year, I'm on it with the photos.


I would say about 40% of the people walking around in South Philadelphia have actual pajamas on while out in the world on Christmas eve morning. I am one of those people, wearing actual matching pajamas purchased from Target. I wear sneakers and my coat with this outfit.


The look of South Philly ranges from casual to dressed on Christmas eve morning with a number of outfits that fit into 4 different categories.

1. Pajamas- clothes you have slept in. This could be sweat clothes or actual pajamas.

2. Around the House Clothes- sweatpants (or separate pajama bottoms for women) and a sweat shirt or coat over a tshirt. You could clean the house or just lay around in this outfit.

3. Around the House Clothes II- the exact same outfit but without stains or paint and is more likely to be from Old Navy as opposed to Hanes. You could visit in this outfit and leave the neighborhood.

4. Dressy Sweat Clothes- Sean John, bootleg Juicy Couture or real Juicy Couture, Baby Phat, Phat Farm.

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Note-

Over 60 women- house coats
Over 60 men- at least one item that has been obtained for free, eg, Resorts casino baseball hat.


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Slight Cultural Differences in Christmas Eve Day Footwear-

African-American men are more likely to wear slides and socks. Vietnamese men and women are more likely to wear flipflops with no socks. White women are more likely to rock slippers outside.

Of course, every group wears every possible combination.

You'll Never Walk Alone

You'll Never Walk Alone
(1945) Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II


When you walk through a storm
Hold your head up high
And don't be afraid of the dark
At the end of the storm
Is a golden sky
And the sweet silver song of a lark

Walk on through the wind
Walk on through the rain
Tho' your dreams be tossed and blown
Walk on, walk on
With hope in your heart
And you'll never walk alone
You'll never walk alone


I am fascinated with the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" from Carousel. I don't know the musical Carousel at all, but I'll be renting it sometime soon.

How does a intense connection to a pop music song move about in the world? And how is a song organically reconfigured to fit the needs of the listeners and mean so much to them out of the original context? What resonates so strongly that this song evokes true emotion and representation to unrelated groups in the world?
FOR CHRIST'S SAKE, TELL ME!


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I know the Gerry and the Pacemakers version best. Apparently, the first time Gerry and the Pacemakers played it in Liverpool, the crowd was mesmerized. From that point it became an anthem for the Liverpool Football Club.

This is from a Gerry and the Pacemakers site.

"A Rodgers & Hammerstein song, 'You'll Never Walk Alone', which had enthralled Gerry Marsden since he saw the film Carousel in his youth, was their biggest hit. For three decades it has remained the anthem of the crowds at Liverpool Football Club, played before kick-off every Saturday, inscribed on the club gates and always the most popular concert request."


Go to this site and scroll down to You'll Never Walk Alone to hear a stadium filled with Liverpool supporters singing it.


Among many, many other singers Nina Simone performed You'll Never Walk Alone.



Jerry Lewis sings You'll Never Walk Alone at the end of every MD telephon.

You'll Never Walk Alone.




Gerry and the Pacemakers



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UNRELATED

This brings me to my favorite song placement in a film ever; "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey in Monster.
Second is undoubtedly, "Sister Christian" by Night Ranger in Boogie Nights.

Patriot Act renewal fails in Senate

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of U.S. senators, demanding increased protection of civil liberties, defied President George W. Bush on Friday by blocking renewal of the USA Patriot Act, a centerpiece of his war on terrorism.

ABOUT TIME!

As I have mentioned about 9000 times, I am searching for a studio and I put a bid in on a house at 9th and Snyder today. It's a little farther than I wanted, but it's on a good, solid block, neighbors were friendly and the actual house is perfect. Read, "not a shell." And also, Francis Albert Sinatra montage on a mirror would be included in the house sale and that's not a mistake.


Anyway, in signing the paperwork to put the bid in, I had to sign a new form that is a direct result of the patriot act. It is essentially a form that records my social security number for easy tracking. Fuck you.



Patriot act, goodbye.



Bush Authorized Domestic Spying.
- from the Washington Post.

Philadelphia Accents

I have noticed that my brother suddenly has a pronounced Philadelphia accent. Both of my grandparents had a Philadelphia accent but my mother has a much, much less pronounced accent and my siblings and I have accents similar to my mother's.

So why, WHY, does my brother has a sudden accent? Because it's in all of us and could surface at any time.
Philadelphia accents

As an aside, when my lady was a girl her family went to Niagara Falls and when one of them asked for "water" in a restaurant up there, the waitress brought them butter.

Check Out this article by A.D. Amorosi

A.D. wrote the first article about the 95 project. That's my man.
Thanks for the shout out A.D.!

Dude, I'm getting back to you

OK, these last 2 weeks I have been completely frozen- I have not returned phone calls or emails that I absolutely must return. I am working, but at an extremely sluggish pace and spending quite a bit of time staring. Just staring.

Not to worry, I'm already all doped up on Zoloft so there's no depression issues, it's just a matter of me being completely overwhelmed.

The new studio search is taking a tremendous amount of time and I'm freaking out because I need to be in a spot ASAP to get my work done for 95, ICA and the Whitney. I should have already begun the basic reordering of 2006 I-95 including about 10 new photos from the last 6 months, and that work doesn't even include the stuff I've got to do for Whitney and the ICA.

So, everyone, following Christmas I will be back up to regular speed.
Prepare for my return to normalcy.

Editing

Let me put this out.
I've got a lot going on with the editing process.

Here's how it works-

1. I make the photos.

2. I go through the photos and decide which ones are strong enough to print as 4x6 images or to show online as the first draft of editing.

When I was all 35mm, it was just print them. Now with this digital and all, it's possible for me to color correct and crop the images, which adds a significant amount of time pre printing.

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The photo below is appropriate to show as one of the images I made in the South, but it's extremely unlikely that I will include it in the slide shows, in fact I didn't include it in the "New Gulf Coast Blues" slide show this year. It's even less likely that I will include it in 95. It's a fair representation of that moment and helps to put the other photos into a larger context, but as an image unto itself, it doesn't hold it's own to me. At this point, I haven't printed it and don't think I ever will.

Often I will put photos like this one up on my blog or on the flickr site, photos that I've taken that I don't consider to be a part of my work. They're photos not intended for art.



Sometimes I will post a series of photos with slight cropping and color differences. I am just beginning to think about those images in my editing process.

3. Then I work on where the photos fit into the larger projects. I slate some of the images for I-95 consideration, some for slide show consideration and most as reference.

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I originally had this in the "New Gulf" slide show this year. It's a fair image and has a few layers of meaning but I eventually took it out of the slide show because I couldn't fit it in the right place. I printed this image and made color copies of it, but it's a long, long, longshot to make it into the 95 installation this year.



4. The photos are then color copied so I can get a sense of how they formally fit with the other photos in the larger projects. The slideshows have evolved into something more than their original intent, which was a tool to help me see the ordering of photos for 95 in a different format. At this point, I see some images fitting into the slide shows and not 95. A part of choosing the digital slide show format was to really see the images in succession, which has really helped me to see a little further than if I worked in the same gridded format for setting up the 95 show.

5. At this point, serious editing begins. I decide what goes into the 95 show or the slide show. This process takes months and is intuitive, intellectual and obsessive/compulsive. Thematically and formally, each image has to fit.

6. The complete yearly 95 project and the slideshows are the last drafts in the continuing editing process. The final editing of the photos will be done at the last 95 show, which is 5 years from now. Each year photos get kicked out and new ones come in. Sometimes I'll sit on a photo for 2 or 3 years and decide that it has a place in the larger installation but generally I can go up until a month before the show to put the last of the year's photos in.

All of these steps are happening simultaneously. I make new work throughout the year and start this process with all of the photos I shoot, so I am always at all of these places in the continuum of my work.

It's important to me to allow folks to see the full editing process as integral part of my larger project. I am completely confident in my work and not afraid to show images that I will later reject.

WHITNEY BIENNIAL!

ain't a damn thing changed

Zoe Strauss and Cosmo Baker

Camden, Part III

I'm thinking about these 2. I don't think they'll make it into 95. Right now I think there's something too composed and banal about them, but I might change my mind tomorrow. There's also something to them that makes me keep thinking about them, and, like with a few other photos of mine, it will take a little time to figure out if it's an aspect of the photo that I think is strong or want to avoid.


ADDENDUM-The next day. I think I love these 2 photos.



ADDENDUM ADDENDUM- If I ever say ADDENDUM aloud, I add an extra "D" ie "add-a-den-dum." I have some problem with word pronunciation. Not just a Philadelphia accent, "gas" pronounced "gaz," but some genuine block between reading and verbalizing. For many years I pronounced the "gaz" station "Citgo" as "Sit-i-go," with an extra short "i." I apparently just like to put an extra letter in sometimes.

Camden, Part II

When I was in Nicaragua, one of my Sandinista tour guides was from Camden. He and his family were originally from Managua and he moved back to Nicaragua from Camden in the early 80s to support the Sandinistas. His American culture was frozen in 1983, his style was still early 80s in the mid to late 80s and his #1 jam was still by the Sugarhill Gang, "a pow-wow, just rock it out,
finger poppin to the break of dawn"

He had a homemade tattoo on his forearm, a thick line dagger with "N" on the handle. The "N" stood for North Camden and he would straighten out his arm and yell, "Norte!"

I am not that familiar with North Camden. I mainly know South Camden and the strip of Broadway from downtown to the Walt Whitman bridge. Hopefully, I will get to know North Camden a little better this year.

The Pain of Uniform City

Uniform City
Camden, NJ

This building's exterior sign says, "Uniform City." There is another sign, a vinyl printed sign underneath the word "City" which breaks up the lines and doesn't allow for a good photo with the full text, "Uniform City." It's possible that one day the vinyl sign advertising Dickies and clogs will be down and the photo can be made. I have driven by this building at least 20 times in the last 4 years with hopes that I can get a good shot one day.

Don't Miss Mr. Manny Dominguez's Show at the Bean

Camden Ranked Most Dangerous City in US

"I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best."




















New York Ship Building Corporation, also known as the New York Shipyards, was located in Camden NJ, across the Delaware River from downtown Philadelphia. This south New Jersey facility closed in 1967. The USS Kitty Hawk, launched in 1961, was one of the last major shipbuilding projects at the yard.

Camden City, located in the southwestern section of New Jersey, is the seventh largest City in the state. The nearby Audubon Park community was created for New York Shipyard employees in 1941. Camden was once self-sufficient, a thriving metropolis turning out battleships during World War II from the New York Shipyard that employed thousands in the city. Campbell Soup and RCA Victor were there, too. But the shipyard closed; RCA merged, diversified and eventually sold out; and Campbell has closed the plant where it once made soup. Camden is faced with a dwindling tax base and a dearth of industry and commerce.





"Press close bare-bosomed night - press close magnetic nourishing night! Night of south winds! night of the large few stars! Still nodding night!"
Camden





"I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end"
Camden





"The butcher-boy puts off his killing-clothes, or sharpens his knife
at the stall in the market,
I loiter enjoying his repartee and his shuffle and break-down."
Camden





"Blacksmiths with grimed and hairy chests environ the anvil,
Each has his main-sledge, they are all out, there is a great heat in the fire."
Camden





"The connoisseur peers along the exhibition-gallery with half-shut
eyes bent sideways,
As the deck-hands make fast the steamboat the plank is thrown for
the shore-going passengers,
The young sister holds out the skein while the elder sister winds it
off in a ball, and stops now and then for the knots,
The one-year wife is recovering and happy having a week ago borne
her first child'




The clean-hair'd Yankee girl works with her sewing-machine or in the
factory or mill,
The paving-man leans on his two-handed rammer, the reporter's lead
flies swiftly over the note-book, the sign-painter is lettering
with blue and gold,
The canal boy trots on the tow-path, the book-keeper counts at his
desk, the shoemaker waxes his thread"
Camden





"The bride unrumples her white dress, the minute-hand of the clock
moves slowly,
The opium-eater reclines with rigid head and just-open'd lips,
The prostitute draggles her shawl, her bonnet bobs on her tipsy and
pimpled neck,
The crowd laugh at her blackguard oaths, the men jeer and wink to
each other"
Camden




The Walt Whitman House is located at 328 Mickle Boulevard, between 3rd & 4th Streets, Camden, New Jersey. The House is 2 blocks east of the Camden Waterfront.