Skip to main content

A mundane image as inspiration



Today I added a new collection to the my website.

The lead image, in a grouping titled "evolve," is shown here and centers around a tree and a luminous field.



  •  The tree itself was photographed in the San Luis Valley of south central Colorado.  It is neither an exceptional tree or a remarkable photograph. 

 

But I repeatedly return to this image as a base for other ideas.

 

The first time I used it was in a clumsy mystification of a beautiful flight of wood steps in Pindaya, Burma.  While the resulting image was not a success, I began to recognize in that tree something of myself.  And it became an artifact for creative conversation about myself and my relationship with the changing world.

I'm sure other image makers experience a similar recurring attraction to a thematic image. You can see this image used again in other efforts; although it's original structure seems to change, the centrality of the image is a constant.  It's valuable to understand how creativity can be sparked by the mundane and as artists, it's important not to ignore the attraction of things which do not have the 'bling' associated with commercial images.

 Here the image was at the center of a idea in which it represented the land tying together sky, the ocean and the subterranean aspects of our environment.


This was a mixed media presentation celebrating autumn.  You can probably see how this image led to the one at the top.

There have been many permutations of the Valley Tree.  I'm sure you'll see it again.  In the end, whatever can drive our creativity is a good thing.

 

 




Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Composition after the camera work

  What influences the shape of a photographic composition? From behind the lens of most cameras, your view of the world falls typically within a rectangular form, either vertical or horizontal.   Cameras may artificially allow you to adjust the field of view so as to more easily visualize a square or panoramic canvas, but in any event, the camera itself influences how you visually perceive the world.   In the end, it will often dictate the two-dimensional shape of your final work.   If you consider how you actually see, it is obvious that there no straight lines whatsoever at the edge of your vision.   We are wonderfully adept at defocusing and perceiving a cone of light, emphasizing the horizontal, in an arc of about 120 degrees.   And we instantly focus on detail, drawing our perceptual attention like a telephoto lens to movement, color and forms that have alerted us.     Are there other influences which give shape to...
Post a Comment
Read more

Gerhard Richter and the lack of style

“I like everything that has no style: dictionaries, photographs, nature, myself and my paintings,” he says. “Because style is violent, and I am not violent."  A quote from Gerhard Richter. Richter painted powerful photo-realistic images for years before turning more intensively to abstraction.  I watched a movie several years ago which showed Gerhard preparing large abstractions for an upcoming exhibit.  I believe the movie was titled "Gerhard Richter Painting" and is available through Amazon.  I watched in fascination as he pulled entire lines of color across an existing field of colors, allowing the underlying areas to show through in some places, obscuring it in others.  I was excited by what I saw because it closely resembled work I was doing in Photoshop, generally with images from nature. I returned to my work and began interpreting Richter's approach in Photoshop; selecting a swath of the image notable for its colors or form, copying, then pasting, then...
Post a Comment
Read more

Looking back at summer

 Winter is closing in and I can't resist looking at garden photos taken when the richness of plant life and sunlight washed over us daily.  I was suffering the absence of family and friends, the horror of the pandemic, and endless ignorance from leadership; but was lucky to have an abundance of beauty nearby.   At 7,000 feet summer temperatures vacillate between forty and ninety degrees, often in the same 24 hour period.  During the peak of the day, leaf temperatures breech 150 degrees and no amount of water, which is scarce here, can heal the torment of the plants.  Shade from other plants, healthy layering of the landscape and ultimately, some shade cloth for the most delicate species is a requirement.  But looking back, it was worth it. Today, swirls of thin snow accumulate outside the door and Salida has assumed its late fall wardrobe colors of brown and pale straw.   I will return to garden images again this winter.  ... a good time...
Post a Comment
Read more