A Concrete Modern Gem in Whittier

It has been a magical day, I won’t lie about it. However, here is a lesson everyone should learn: DO NOT eat protein salad from Kowalski’s deli before going to bed. You will sleep for about 2 hours and then… POOF! Awake! Here I am at 2:00 AM sitting around writing blog posts and reflecting on my day.

Asahi Shimbun

I managed to score some pretty amazing items today from a garage sale in North MPLS. My most prized find: an unused 70′s Swedish mountain-scape mural. You know… those paste-on wall paper things that had terrible color balance… chances are one of your grandparents had one in their dining room. Or, if you were lucky like I was, your 8th grad science teacher had one in the lab. I think ours was of the surface of the moon.

More Furniture... We're All Becoming Nomads These Days

Speaking of the surface of the moon, the milky light that settled over Minneapolis today was like being on another planet. I wandered around town with Curtis today. Whittier has finally started to hit it’s tipping point with object saturation… all of the things that are going to be covered by the first snowfall are being pushed to the streets in anticipation. Treasures waiting to be made treasures.

My life is exceptionally simple. I think most people that are saddled with a lack of creativity and enormous student loans have similar arrangements with the world around them? While other people go to movies, go shopping, party, or enjoy being part of the social sphere, I wander.

During my wanderings I find amazing things. Tidbits of life that may or may not prove that other human beings exist, do things, ruin other people’s lives and so and and so forth… It is refreshing.

When I saw this on the ground it was just too good to pass up. I do not know what could possibly indicate that this young man, who cannot control his nearly forked tongue could be responsible for all those things scrawled in Crayola marker around his likeness.

Wow. That is an incredibly pompous way of saying I decided to go for a crazy long walk with Curtis yesterday to look at various buildings in the public sphere. We took off on foot… and proceeded to become tourists in our own city. If you have the means (feet) and the time (2hrs +) to do this… I can’t encourage it enough. I feel refreshed and interested… again.

This little adventure is starting to spark some actual art-based experimentation… finally.I find myself going to movies, sitting in the theatre and, at times wishing I could make photographs that are (simply) cinematic. I don’t mean to say that the images I’d like to make are loaded with meaning or symbolic filters. I am much more interested in the… hidden neutral moments that occur when watching a film. There are always those times when you are presented with a beautiful, glowing image on a giant screen… but it is an image that is not really that consequential to the movie.

Back in grad school, I was fascinated by films such as “Our Daily Bread”, “The Passenger” and also certain parts of “Y Tú Mama Tambien” which employ the long shot shaped by static/neutral camera movements. These little bits sparked my interest in the relationship of moving images to my photographs. There is a certain cinematic quality in the empty spaces that I am always drawn to… and… may or may not be able to capture in the perfectly encapsulated form of the photographic print.

Any way… this is somehow work related also… as I have been testing out a JVC HD camcorder for my job. I have to say it is a pretty mean little tool for people who are interested in using video as part of their work/research but don’t want to invest in a professional level camera. This occasion seemed like the perfect chance to try out the camera and also to try to capture more of the presence of certain spaces throughout the city I live in.