Volunteering

All for a good cause.  But it is funny that historically artists have had a hard time paying their bills, and yet everywhere I turn someone has a project they need my help with.  Good will and good art both come from the same place inside of me.  Ideally, I would never ask for money for my work because it is something I love to do.  I love the challenge of a new project, I love all types of problem solving.  But technically isn't this the definition of a great job?  Getting paid for doing something you love?  All food for thought, for this is not a small issue in my life right now.


PHR Emergency Department
I created this model of Matthew's workplace.  The emergency department of Palmetto Health Richland continually welcomes medical students, nursing students, and rotating residents, all of which require a basic orientation of the facility.  Matthew orients all of these groups and hopefully this model will make his job easier.

  

  

Gills Creek Watershed Association

The GCWA is a group of committed citizens that are tirelessly trying to educate our community about the interrelated issues of water quality and pollution and how they effect our environment.  Explaining the beauty and importance of a watershed is not easy, especially in an urban context.  Their brochure needed an update and I gave it a critical eye.  8/5"x11" tri-fold design, the back portion is detachable to become a member or give a donation to the group.  I also plan on populating the watershed map with more data once I get some feedback from the group.

 (outside)

(inside)

Framing

My brother-in-law recently moved into a new place with his fiancee, and they are in bad need of art work for their walls.  So when my mother-in-law came into town we went to Hobby-Lobby and bought several of their discount frames and mattes and put together some of my photography for Justin.  It was a good project, and I was surprised by how fast cutting the mattes and assembling the pieces went with two people working together.  Great practice with the matte cutter I invested in earlier in the year - I'm not so scared of it now.  These were my only prints of most of these negatives... I guess I'll have to try to sneak back into the dark room at USC once school starts to have a copy for my records.  

 

Finishing

I recently bought a matte cutter.  How daring you say, to attempt to cut your own mattes!  Every time I pick up that instrument I could feel the weight of the risk I was taking.  So I spent a little time practicing.  My black and white photography, a simple white matte, and a cheap frame I bought at Hobby Lobby's 50% off sale.  Not terrible results :)


These two pieces have been entered in the photo exhibition/competition at my church.  

Art 261: Portfolio

Our final project in photography was to print negatives we were proud of but weren't able to print for previous assignments.  Basically, to make art we wanted to make.  So from me you get foliage, landscape, and architecture.  Go figure.

 

Iris foliage

Ocracoke Island, Outer Banks

Louisiana Iris

Huntington Island State Park, Maritime Forest

Huntington Island Lighthouse

Huntington Island Lighthouse

sabal palmetto 

Old Sheldon Church, outside of Beaufort SC

Art 261: Narrative

Tell a story with your photos.  There is only one story I could think of telling... the cycle that dominated April.  

Night Shift

These photos were spotted and mounted.  (My first attempt at spotting - it was tough!)  When I presented this collection photos in class I laid them out in a circular fashion, so that there was no beginning or end. 

All of the tools and accessories needed to go to the hospital.  I like the light in this photograph and how all the objects are arranged... it gives the sense of solidarity with the profession, and how Matthew is alone in his responsibilities and medical decisions.

In this shot I was trying to say several things.  Not only is Matthew sleeping during the day, but he is sleeping alone.  I framed the shot intentionally to include the clock and the time.

Coffee.  I shot several versions of this with the time included in the frame.  But the light was best here.

Contrasting our home in night and day.  At night Matthew's car is not there, and I am alone.  In the next few shots I was trying to photograph the absence of something.  

Alone at night in the house, stimulated by two different types of technology.  And I am without my companion.

Coming home!  I love alot of things about this shot: the morning light, the symmetry of the path and the two trees, scrubs!, Matthew's car, and his expression.  The unfortunate thing is that light pole coming out of the top of his head!  But the shot said too much to exclude it.

How does Matthew unwind in the morning before bed?  A screwdriver.

During the critique one of my classmates said "This is sad."  Another left a really sympathetic note on my wall on facebook offering to hang out if I was lonely...  I guess that wasn't quite the reaction I was going for.  The story was trying to tell that of routine and a lifestyle, and one of sacrifice and hard work. 

Art 261: Photojournalism

This is me making the art I want to make. 

Telling the story of life and death at Congaree National Park.  Photographed on two different visits:  early March and early April, before spring and in the height of spring.

Exposed roots.

 Boardwalk, March 2010

 Boardwalk, April 2010

 New growth on the forest floor.  April 2010.

Cypress knees.

The king of the forest:  Beech.  April 2010.

Art 261: Filters and Art for Toby

I've been avoiding photography posts. Inevitably it means exploring this shadow... one I have been avoiding because I still don't know what it means. Something I'm still trying to understand. 

Early March my photography professor, Toby, was the victim of a hit and run motorcycle accident. Recovery was looking good when a blood clot ended his life as he was leaving the hospital. Toby was a great guy, by all accounts the heart of the photography department at USC. A philosopher and vegetarian, he often said his thoughts were best expressed as images. He was compassionate and open in a way that disarms people, and then instantly charms them. He believed in simplicity of form and composition. I think we saw beauty in the same way. He believed in hugs. I feel cheated because I never got one of his famous hugs. I know we were going to be great friends. I suppose this is a very narrow view of how his death just effected me. But that is what it is, and thats where it ends. 

Toby said "Make art you want to make." It is so true - everyone can tell when you are faking it, when you don't believe in what you have produced. I've been thinking about that alot lately. 

So the semester has kind of dissolved in the wake of what has happened. We took a few weeks to get back in the swing of things. The last project Toby assigned was and exploration in filters: colored camera filters and the employment of filters in the darkroom when processing images. 

Camera Filters

 daffodils, yellow filter

daffodils, no filter

daffodils, blue filter

So, which negative is best?  Most people prefer the yellow.  The general rule with filters is that the filter will lighten the same color and darken the opposite color.  Here the daffodils were photographed on a deck with blueish hues.  The daffodils are yellow.  So with the Yellow filter the deck is darkened (because blue is almost the opposite of yellow).  

Good experimentation, but I can't make a decision about which print I like most.  What do you think (Burt Tietje)?

Art for Toby

I made the daffodil prints before Toby's accident.  The rest of the prints required for this assignment was to make art for Toby.  Inspired by Toby's spirit of sharing your art with others (they could only find 2 prints of his own work to display at school because he was always tried to give away his work) I decided to make a set of prints of the dancers that I photographed for the motion assignment to share with the dance department.  Here are some of the additional prints I made to share.

March

(SPRING!)
I can't resist sharing all the new life that has brought me joy this month.

Mainly, daffodils (Grandma Tietje Louisiana daffodils, bulbs mom dug up from the old farm house and brought me when we first moved to SC)...

 

... and now introducing Lola Hannah Barden (born March 6, 2010).  The Bardens are dear friends of ours and we celebrate their growing family.

We also took a little vacation over spring break (an early celebration of our fourth eWe went to Ocracoke, North Carolina, a small beach community on the Outer Banks.  I really tried not to go overboard with the photos... here is a preview.