Even CVS Looks Better in LA
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All Posts Filed in ‘Documentary Photography’
All Things New
I spent 16 hours yesterday putting together work to finally make a WEBSITE, which is LONG overdue. Tell me how it’s shapin’ up if you’d like to take a look. In the next few days I’ll be posting two or three picture collages that I made–you should be forewarned that some of the photos (er…maybe a lot) have already been published here (wow, lucky you ;P), but I think they’re so much stronger in context of other photos. Today I’ll start with these: seasons in Ann Arbor
At Costco
Where To Put Baby?
Ann Arbor Falling Asleep
Isn’t it romantic?
P.S. I love you all.
It’s Fall in Ann Arbor
Or at least it’s supposed to be. Actually a weird pseudo-fall where the streets are littered with leaves and everything smells like pumpkin pie yet we’re all bogged down and stenched with a heavy heat of 80+ forecasts to come (roughly 27 celsius, Jonatan;)). But I wanted to update since it’s been awhile, and felt in the mood for fall. These are some photos I took in random places of Ann Arbor featuring (but not in order): downtown streets and scenes, Jacob and his cat, my mom and electronic menus, bored server in elevator of a steak house (yes I AM obsessed with Robert Frank so sorry for the poorly done imitation), DD with the Beatles bob pounding on his drum pad, Keaton and smoke, my parent’s house, and a trying-to-be-epic-not-so-epic college party. Circa last year/late 2011. All taken with my 50mm Canon film camera courtesy of DD Gao, all unedited (for which maybe I should apologize but hope you enjoy nonetheless)
Self-Portraits, Self-Obsessed?
Sup everyone, I’m taking a class and our first assignment was to take 30 self-portraits…Have a looksie, would ya? Tell me what you think. These were some of my thoughts that I wrote up for the accompanying journal entry for class:
The thing that is always so elusive to me is how to make photos that can accurately and succinctly tell someone about a time, a place, a person, a society, a culture, or a feeling. What is much harder for me than picking up on these things in someone else’s photograph is knowing when or if I’m successfully doing so. I find it difficult to abstract myself from the experience itself and thus I feel I lose the ability to see the image as a snapshot in isolation from the living moment. Therefore it’s often hard for me to assess how objectively strong or interesting my photographs are—whether I’m too quick to defend them or too desensitized to appreciate them.
As I was brainstorming about how to approach this assignment, I was thinking of photographs that portray everyday people in interesting ways. I came to realize that it’s important to make the subject relatable…or unrelatable i.e. something that is stimulating either because you can relate to it, or because you immediately know that you can’t relate to it. I’ve also been increasingly more interested in assigning greater weight to the context within a photograph (i.e. everything besides the subject such as furniture, walls, space, background in general), rather than having the overwhelming focus be the subject itself. This assignment was a productive exercise in negotiating what I think strikes the appropriate balance between the subject and context, and moreover how to even represent context in an intelligible way.
What I’m most excited about is to hear your comments on my photos so that I can grasp a greater sense of what you as strangers are able to pick up from my photos, and see how that compares to my intentions and own self-evaluation.
Detroit Airport, USA
I’ve Been Away….
On a fantasy expedition to Sweden to visit the nicest places and people this earth’s good for. But I’m flying back on my less-than-glamorous day and a half flight from Stockholm with 2 layovers, including an overnight stay in Amsterdam in a hotel room that’s surprisingly less depressing than you would’ve expected. Sorry I’ve been away for so long without any updates… Here’s a teaser.
And for the photographer, Joni: thank you for the pic but MOST importantly I MISS YOU! XP
The Grown Up Kids 