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The Glue That Holds Us Together Salt Lake City, Utah 2014

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Vertical Music Salt Lake City, Utah 2014

Something seemed really familiar about this pattern of grids on the windows of a building in Salt Lake City. It took me a while to associate them with musical staffs and measure bars. The only thing missing is actual notes notes and a clef. Perhaps I should have called it the unwritten symphony. I didn’t realize it at the time I was photographing it, but this building is a federal courthouse. As such, I suppose I was closely watched while photographing it and wouldn’t be too surprised to receive another visit from my friends at the FBI. (Six years or so ago, in an act of superbly bad timing, I photographed an oil refinery in Billings, MT in shortly after it had received an anonymous bomb threat. That generated a phone call from the sheriff and later a visit to our house from three FBI agents complete with the black Suburban, black suits, guns and badges, and poor senses of humor.)]]>

Pointless Reprieve Bozeman, Montana 2014

The big winter storm they were warning us about fizzled, at least in this area. They got more snow in their storm in the southeast U.S. than we did here. (We got none to a trace.) So the leaves got a bit of a reprieve from decomposing under a blanket of snow all winter. Not that it matters much for this leaf which is doing a good job of decaying away without the help of the snow.]]>

Point-Counterpoint #2 Bozeman, Montana 2014

In some ten years of posting POTDs it’s not surprising that I occasionally end up using the same name I’ve used before without realizing it. Obviously when the subjects are related I will do a series of photos with the same name and use sequence numbers to distinguish them. But, as in the case of this photo, I didn’t realize I’d used the name Point-Counterpoint before until I typed it in as the title and my software basically alerted me to that fact (by automatically adding a sequence number to the URL for the blog post). When this happens it’s interesting, to me anyway, to go back and see in what context I’d used the same name previously. In this case it was a photo from four years ago here. At first glance, I didn’t see any real relationship between the two images; but then realized there is in fact a similarity. See if you can pick it out.]]>

Ready for Winter Bozeman, Montana 2014

With 5-10″ of snow predicted for tomorrow night in this area, it’s a good time for the locals to make sure they’re settled into a nice soft bed for the winter. I haven’t picked my spot yet, as I’m too busy scrambling around trying to get a few outdoor projects at a good stopping point for the winter. The dump from this storm may not last and there may be a few more outdoor days with the ground clear, but this time of year you never know around here.]]>

They Only Come Out at Night Salt Lake City, Utah 2014

Happy Halloween–don’t forget to lock your doors and windows!]]>

One for the Record Books Arbon Valley Road, Idaho 2014

Nothing special about this particular photo or this particular spot on the map, but it commemorates for me what must be a personal record of sorts. Last Saturday, while driving some 219 miles on two-lane roads in the middle of the day from I-80 just west of Wendover, Nevada to I-86 just west of Pocatello, Idado, we passed or were passed by another car going in the same direction as we were exactly zero times. I didn’t count the number of cars that passed us going the other direction, but it was not very many. Now that’s an empty highway. As much as I like driving deserted highways, I don’t routinely keep track of how far I go without passing or being passed by another vehicle, but that has to be a record. It doesn’t take much to make my day sometimes.]]>

non-art exhibit needs a good artist statement. (Or should I say non-artist statement.) Here’s a good one for an exhibit I’m considering titled Contemporary Non-Photography*:

Contemporary Non-Photography is a meditation on the fragmentary nature of presence and the collision between external reality and the internal space of memory, daydreams, and the subconscious. The mundane, rote engagement, daily landscapes and moments of seemingly little import provide a vacancy and spaciousness allowing for psychological drifts into a presence of greater resonance. This body of work illuminates and in turn embraces these interstitial moments that make up the majority of ones life.

Contemporary Non-Photography considers how to describe this obfuscated reality. The images serve as keepsakes of a desire for presence within the poignant normalcy of life’s in-betweens.

*Except for the exhibit title I made up, this is a real artist statement I found in the book  Crusade For Your Art: Best Practices For Fine Art Photographers, by Jennifer Schwartz, Crusade Press. Kindle Edition. (It might be important to point out that it was presented in the book as an example of a bad artist statement. But that’s probably only because Ms. Schwartz was thinking outside the realm of the genre of non-art.)]]>

Makoshika #25 Makoshika State Park, Montana 2014

One last shot of Makoshika before moving on to other subjects.]]>