My mind seems to ramble lately about place..I continue to question what that means to me. I began to think about my childhood homes but that no longer feels like my place rather more of someplace I visit. So then what becomes my place? Is it where I currently live just because it's my address? Is that ok that my sense is more than one place especially since I grew up knowing more than one place as my home? What is it then I'm trying to say is it about home or place are they interchangeable? How then can I further push my sense of place visually, an idea I had this weekend was to put portraits with places? is that really getting at my own sense of place. I need to further investigate the self-portraits.
I met with my mentor Jesseca Ferguson for the first time last Thursday. It was a good first meeting she gave me some other artist's and books to look at. I have been photographing myself in my surroundings and objects within my apartment and outside and in my neighborhood. Jesseca suggested pushing beyond just straight photography spreading out my ideas on the wall of my studio and make different parts of my home. We discussed some images I had put into two grids on my studio wall. I challenged myself to photograph one roll of film inside my apartment and another one outside in one afternoon. I am currently pushing that further by shooting one roll a day for an entire week. Today I did not get all the way through my 36 exp roll but my plan is to finish it tomorrow. The challenge for me is the light, I photographed this evening a little with flash. This should be an interesting experiment.
This weekend I spent some time outdoors but also watched Edward Burtynsky Manufactured Landscapes, it was a beautiful documentary. I really loved what he said at the end of the film that while his work is making a political statement, he wants the work to be more about the conclusion the viewer makes rather than pushing his work as a political statement.

Finally feeling like a human again after being sick this past week, thank god for a few more days off from work. Went to the studio yesterday to organize some work and go through some ideas I definitely need to just keep pushing through my ideas. Not really sure where my ideas are taking me right now but I goal for the semester is to be uncomfortable and I am feeling that.
Went to the DeCordova to see the new photography show which was just what I needed. See some other work for inspiration it was a big show with a mix photographers work. I enjoyed the landscape photographs of Elke Morris she photographs in Maine and then creates a sense of place in photoshop. There was a mixed media piece by Peter Sullivan that created a sense of layers and information.
I am still thinking about ideas of place and how can I visually push those ideas. I tried some drawings of maps of home from my mind I'm not really happen with the sketches. I did photograph maps again so I'm planning to work with them in photoshop.

Ugh I'm sick, and home from work. Everything finally caught up to me. I have a lot of printing I want to get done, last week I did a bunch of shooting that I was happy with. Lots of self-portraits and some studies of my interior and exterior space which I had printed and I'm looking at in a grid. Lot's of ideas still flowing I'm trying to keep working through the weirdness. I have been reading and watching Art 21 season 3. While resting I'm trying to work on some more reading today.

Getting back into it...well it's finally happening I am able to balance everything a little better. The first two weeks back at work were rough to say the least. I have been shooting a lot and just finished my residency summary so I have a lot of information floating around in my brain. After writing my paper some of my bigger questions are why am I photographing place? What does place mean to me? I've been thinking a lot about the landscape I photograph, I started doing some self portraits and more interior shots I am interested to see how those will look together with outside landscapes. Yesterday I thought about photographing myself but in my different places, such as my parents house, my apartment, etc and creating a sequence from that. Perhaps photographing in different rooms and making connections. My work feels like it is in an awkward place and I know I need to take a risk so I am just shooting and hoping to both work through it and find that jump I need to make in my work.
On Friday I went to First Friday on Harrison ave, despite the rain it as fun to look around. I enjoyed Lissa Rivera's work of private schools and Greek life. Especially her work of private schools it is interesting to see the spaces empty something she perhaps planned yet on a normal say that wouldn't be the case. I thought about that in connection to my own lonely landscapes, images of the city that seem empty. I have also been looking into lectures and upcoming shows I want to see. I have been in touch with my mentor Jesseca and we will hopefully be meeting next week. I am really looking forward to getting started with that. Now I'm off to more shooting and reading!