week seven: September 20th

Started the new week with a full day of portraits and interviews. Connected with two subjects later in the week. I also continue to photograph at the camps, everyday paused. The first batch of film returned to studio and I am pleased with the tight shoots. The detail and intimacy are what I was looking for and what I question in the everyday experiences of living where repetition robs us of passion, intimacy and awareness. I continue to read Solnit, Lefehvre and de Carteau. David Deitcher added a reading from Rosalind Deutsche's Evictions: Art and Spatial Politics (the chapter
on gentrification and the East Village). This concerns displacement which is a subtheme in my reading of connecting to place. David directed me to consider affect and look again at Lefebvre's encyclopedia entry on the "Everyday and Everydayness" keying in on the two forms of repetition. My research is focusing on affect as a concern for place and the minute connections [subjective emotions] people carry as links to a place where their ideals and experiences touched. Perhaps I am also reading too much reference to Jane Austen, he he. I am absorbing questions of affect, resistance to imposed repetition, place, process and practise, meta-langauge, lack of communication and the art of the question itself. The exploration along these themes have been interesting, but now it is time to focus my thesis and outline the term's paper. 

September 13th, week six

I am busy, good busy, getting my ducks in a row and reaching for next step in my projects. I mailed off the first writing package to David today. He replied to my horror scolding my grammar in the email text. I had sent the file in the wrong format. 

This weekend Meagan Gould visited my studio. The time flow by reviewing the past six months North MaineWoods portraits and the everyday work from the camps. Our conversation and exchange brought up questions that have pocked at me for years. I need to choose one camera for a project and simplify the technical and open myself to the visual side of exploration and dialog. I shoot prolifically but the images are all over the place: in color and black and white and I jump between formats reflecting what amused me that day not necessarily the best choice. I am forcing a framework of discipline in that it will be one format. I will be just shooting with the 8/10 for the portraits and square for the camps although I am considering the 4/5 at the camps. I shoot some Velvia last month and it is beautiful. The detail studies of the tools I use from walkways to door knobs resonated the value of these ordinary elements and moments of pause in my day. I felt incomplete in my responses to Meg's questions of why I shoot black and white and why I use so many cameras. Part was exhaustion and part was it is a practice I have followed since NESOP. Once you get comfortable in a practice even if it is not practical you may continue. I am eager to simplify and see the results. My back and sense of time will appreciate the freedom. I do love black and white but it lacks the presence of visual dialog I want at this time. It is nostalgic and I do not want that burden. I am discontinuing the circle images at this time. Meg commented that the peep hole reference was hard to overcome. I am still laughing. I love the idea of the camera and it came from Michael Silver, which makes the camera a ritual of nostalgia not a constructive tool.

We hiked Hedgehog mountain on Wednesday to celebrate Avis' second birthday. The varied niches in the boreal forest were marvelous. Many squares shoot. I thought of De Certeau and Lefebvre chipping away the facade of diversity in my life. Our walking activity brought their references to humanism and the consumption equation to mind as I considered the relationships within eco-tourism and the logging of the North Maine Woods. Tree are the product to extract and sell or to visit and tour. The experience of being in the woods does not separate me from the questions of everyday and everydayness, it only brings new questions within the context. A burning question persists; am I being present, too reflective, too oriented, or can there be a happy balance? My husband did express frustration with my camera and the constant stopping which disrupted the pace, but I had a thirty pound kid on my back, so I was good to stop regularly. 

I admired many large trees, the product of the North Maine Woods, and discussed with Eric how they survived the waves of cutting expeditions that harvested this landscape in the last hundred plus years. Trees are an excellent marker of history and human presence in the landscape. I think of my great grandfather Weir cutting trees on both the east and west shores of Moosehead Lake. Timber has always meant money. 

I shoot portraits this week with the 8/10. Shooting with Provia which means color, beautiful color. The face and the hands taking the whole frame have my eye. I continue to ask folks to hold something that connects them to experiencing the North Maine Woods.

September 6: week 5

Joyously exhale. I finished A Field Guide to Getting Lost yesterday. This was made possible on the most beautiful fall day because Avis played quietly listening to me read and enjoyed a long nap. I love Rebecca Solnit. Like letters from a friend I am glued wanting to share more. Her melting of personal experience in a historical context stands boldly with poetic grace and stamina. Exquisite!

The Zoning is Sexy book and commentaries are being lay out today. The silliness and play with the word Sexy erupted some controversy, but nothing unexpected. It was slang for appealing in a topic, zoning, that appeals to few and effect all so profoundly. Even the Sumerians had zoning: garden plots, house plots and community space plots.

sexy - definition of sexy by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus ...

Arousing or tending to arouse sexual desire or interest. 2. Slang Highly appealing or interesting; attractive: "The recruiting brochures are getting sexier" ...
www.thefreedictionary.com/sexy

It was a fun project. The mannequins, the assemblage, the installation, the taxidermy,...it was all fun.

week 4: August 30th on

Meg sent a preliminary critique of my studio plan suggesting clear outline of final results. I tweaked the plan and sent it all to my mentors and faculty. I continue to read "Everyday and Everydayness" and experiencing Roni Horn's portfolio books. Her work is experiential and it effects me different each viewing. This morning was sad and reflective thinking of a lost friend. Last week was playful and almost silly staring into the back of these dead birds and noting how my mind traveled from page left to right.

I ordered a wide angle wearable camera/video. I do not like carrying about the camcorder. I feel like a tourist. I took it to the Obama Great Outdoors listening sessions in Bangor and recorded some bits to experiment and explore. The rabbit leg atop the box is too funny. I want to pat it. It does break the ice.

Cleaned my studio as a nesting exercise of clearing my thoughts and getting comfortable. I am organizing the book, Zoning is Sexy today. Hurricane Earl arrived last evening, but the humidity persists. I am a northern girl and heat seeps all motivation out of me. Snow would be lovely; It is September!

Week Three: 23 August on

Sampling the texts of my bibliography to engage the new ideas and perspectives and set my pen to write the studio plan. I am reading Roni Horn published by Phaidon and reviewing her portfolio books: Bird, A Kind of You, and Library of Water. I continue reading in A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit and her Wanderlust: A History of Walking. Both books envelop you in walking as an action and a muse. Her writing is marvelous. She takes on the depths of contemporary thought and history in a fun engaging prose. Reviewing the portraits and audio interviews. There is plenty of material there and I hope to add ten community members. I need to get the plan to Meg by Friday. Always the procrastinator this is a good motivator, and it gives me the weekend for editing before the final emailed text on Monday. This is a time to order my projects. Quantifying and qualifying each provides needed structure and limits.

Big excitement this week, I purchased the Garmin Oregon, and I set it to track me. Indian Hill is thanking me because it was pricey. I have wanted one for years admiring my uncle's trails from exploring the north country. Tracking my daily sallies about the camps chasing Avis. After a walk or lunch at the kitchen I admire the mark marking. Sunday 30th I went to Chesuncook village. It traced me there and back. I did glance at it once to confirm my turn. There are few signs on the Golden road. Generally, I set it and ignore it, do my activities, and admire the marks. I want to use the tracks as marks tracings my daily life.