Marcoclicks - images, words

First lesson

I'm working with the assumption that the implicit question posed in my post from earlier today is "what am I supposed to learn?" So here I am, same day, with the lesson thus far.

I took a long slow walk around Jamaica Pond mid-morning. The day is bright with startling colors and enough wind to remind you that you live in the world not some astonishingly vivid painting. The work of the rain is over and the leaves, the plants are thriving. The water level in the Pond, not surprisingly, is about as high as I've ever seen it. Trees with water tickling their roots. Gratitude for abundance.

I walked with a sense of exploration, more so than usual lately, since I'd not walked in a while and not walked with the intention of shooting. I enjoyed the people, the air, the energy. I walked up to the ruined Hancock mansion, a short side-trip to a site I've shot several times. Much to look at; little to shoot.

I found myself revisiting old sites of images that have grown to be among my favorites. And then I found something new. It is a reflection - in the water but also in my mind where it reflects some shots I took in Ely Minnesota about five years ago. So there I was, revisiting images as well as places. For a moment, I wondered which is real, my shots or the places I was shooting? It occurs to me now that both are, or neither.

Oh, the lesson? After all this, I'm not sure. It has to do with why I make art, who exactly it is for. Part of the message today is that this is the fabric of my life. Maybe the art-making for me is like the tree falling in the forest. I hear it. Does it matter if anyone else does?

Marco

Why bother?

It's been a while. I feel the need to write but at the moment, I'm not sure I have much to say. Usually, I start these with an image or a sense of what I want to address. This time, sorry, no go.

It's a moment of reflect, reevaluation. Obvious reason: I've not shot anything worthy of putting up here. Less obvious reason: just finished my show at the Arts Center with Open Studios hot on its heels. Nothing sold. I'm confused. And annoyed.

Oh, lordy, this is such irony. I started back into photography in 1999 feeling the freedom of not earning my living from the work. I had spent 17 years in the studio, supporting my family with my work and art. Now, this work was different. Or so I thought.

Here I am working at well-paying and (mostly) interesting work so I didn't need my image-making to earn money. And in some sense, it's not about the money. But that is how our culture defines value. I heard lots of appreciative words, yet few sales. And I don't know what to do with this experience. I want to say something uplifting, something that reflects and honors the difficulty of focusing on personal vision and the risk inherent in sharing that.

But at this particular moment, with the sun bright and the air clear, I think I'll simply take a walk around the Pond.

Cheers,

Marco

Rain and moving inward

It's been raining in Boston for it seems like forever. Certainly the past day and night have been filled with the sounds of rain. I find it comforting, being indoors and watching the water; it's also comforting to be out in the rain and realize: it's only water. My heavy cotton overshirt absorbs the rain and it's only when I'm indoors and take it off that I can notice exactly how wet I've gotten. And by then, of course, I can dry off. That's my reverie on this rainy day, rainy weekend, rainy week.

I came upon this piano as I left a reception for a local artist at the Arts Center. It was crowded and bustling, filled with people talking and eating and drinking. Oh me, what a scene. I stayed a brief time since my show was still up and to support the artists. And then I walked the streets with my camera. And found a piano. This one has been outside for quite some time, the veneer gone, the keys' action exposed. It used to make music. What does it do now?

Which brought me to this: what is it that we do when we can't do what we have done? How do we weather the changes brought about by time, much less neglect? Seeing the uselessness of the keyboard was almost embarrassing for me. Yet, I had no way of knowing what lives this instrument had lived, what possibly luminous music making it had participated in, how it had transformed lives or at least created small pleasures. Too easy to judge by what sits in front of me now.

Which brought me back to me: what is it that will highlight these years? what are the moments of insight or laughter or passion that I will recall a year, a decade hence. Now is the time, as always, to set that stage. And if I end up outside somewhere in the rain, unable to move to where it's dry...it's only water.

Marco

Order

Order has been hard to find lately. There's been so much going on in so many different spheres of my llife. And lots of traveling on top of that. Indeed, this shot from Dallas was taken from my hotel room window before I spent a whirlwind two days traveling to and from Oregon later the same week. With so much time spent in airports and hotels, it's not surprising that any sense of sequence and order would be lost - at least it's not surprising to me.

One of the central themes in my life is "balance." How to get it, how to keep it - and actually before all that, how to recognize it. When I was living in New Hampshire, I thought it was easy because the physical world around me was filled with obviously beautiful things. I was less adept at seeing the discomfort and pain in that world, in my life. Somehow that didn't register clearly.

Now, when I spent most of my time in cities, it is easier to see discord and confusion and dirt in the world around me. What I've come to appreciate are the ways in which beauty manages to manifest, order emerges. It's an acquired taste, for sure. But it's acquisition has coincided with a greater sense of connection to considerably deeper parts of myself.

There's a lesson here. It isn't completely clear but has to do with the ways in which the internal and external worlds feed off one another, often in ways that cause me to look more deeply at what I have ignored in the past.

Marco

Processing

It's difficult for me to put into words how much is floating around in my life right now. Now, when it's so important for me to stay fixed and focused, I feel my attention drawn in many different directions. Can I be skillful in putting my emotional and intellectual energies to bear on the issues and feelings and visions that matter? Honestly, I don't know.

The pull of seeing is strong, as is the pull of speaking from the heart on matters that are grounded in the head. Sorry to be oblique, it's just that I'm not sure I have the words to describe this more fluently. But even though I may not be able to describe the tensions and balances that clearly, I do know what synthesis might look like.

It might look something like this image - lots going on that draws your attention in lots of different directions. But there's something - and I'm not sure what - that holds it together, that makes me want to sing with the amazing rhythm and ultimate balance of it. There's a way in which the pushes and pulls combine to establish something that goes beyond what might otherwise be chaotic.

I don't know how to do it, but I know it when I see it!

Marco