F-Stop Magazine

The new issue of F-Stop Magazine is now online. They published two of my photos. To see them, click on the link, then on the group exhibit (titled 'Amusements'). My photos are in the bottom row, on the right hand side.
While you're there, take a look at the work by other photographers. There's some good work there.

Good News!

Today I received the following e-mail:

"Just a quick note to let you know, one or more of your images will be
included in the upcoming issue of F-Stop Magazine.
Thanks for contributing!"

F-Stop is a well done online photography magazine. I submitted some nighttime shots of a fair, and apparently they liked them. I'll post again once the issue with my photos goes online.

Happy Anniversary!

Today is the second anniversary of this blog. My first post here was April 30, 2007.

I started this blog mainly to document a sabbatical I took during Fall semester, 2007. My school requires a fairly detailed post-sabbatical report, and I figured that a blog would serve that purpose well (which it did. My post report consisted mainly of a printout of the entire blog, which is why my personnel file in the Human Resources office fills two thick file folders).

After returning to work, I kept the blog running, mainly as a way to show new work as I made it, to share work in progress, and discuss art in general. I've done that, but have posted less frequently in recent months. There's a couple of reasons for that. One, I usually spend much less time in the studio during the school year than I do over the summer. Two, while I have a lot of ideas in my head, I haven't been making too much of them. School lets out soon, and I'm hoping to jump right into the studio (and yard work, riding my bike, cleaning the house, and all the other things that get ignored when I'm teaching).

I've also kind of forgotten about posting work by other artists that I like here. I really want to pick that up again (artists and art lovers: Send me links!).

So there we have it. I like the blog, and plan on keeping it running. If I get ambitious, I'll actually post here more than once a month. While waiting for posts here, you can always check out A Photo A Day, my other blog (which had it's one-year anniversary yesterday). There, you'll find a new photo nearly every day, along with a few comments about it.

One last thing: The image at the top of this post was something I found stapled to a telephone pole in Ann Arbor, MI, sometime in the late '80's. I've always thought it funny. I have no idea why it was there, or what the original source was.

Expiration Notice

I just had a piece published in Expiration Notice, a new photo blog for photographers over the age of 35 who are making good work but aren't famous.

Unfortunately, it looks like the blog will be going away for a while. They are taking the summer off, while looking for some sort of sponsorship. They say they will publish again in the fall. I hope they do, I like the idea a lot. I have nothing against younger artists, but it can be frustrating seeing so many opportunities that limit the age of who is eligible.

New Polaroid Pieces

I returned to teaching this week after a semester break that was shorter than usual (and felt like it). While on break, I kept busy by making some Polaroid lifts and transfers. I tried something different with these. I took clippings from various magazines and comic books, stuck them in a slide mount, and used these as the slides I made my Polaroid prints from. I must admit that’s not my original idea. An independent study student of mine was doing the same thing last year while learning how to do Polaroid processes. I will say, however, that I’ve done a pretty similar thing for years. When I’m between projects, I take old magazines and comics, throw them on a light table, and photograph what I see. Here’s a page from a magazine I shot back in 2005.


While making these manipulated Polaroid prints, I tried doing both lifts and transfers with the same images. Here’s a Polaroid lift:

and here’s the same image done as a Polaroid transfer:


I expected the differences in the surface between the two pieces. What I wasn’t anticipating was the difference in color between them.

Here’s another lift:


and the same image done as a transfer:


Again, there’s a big difference in color between the two.
I think I know why this occurs. Polaroid lifts start with a fully developed Polaroid print. The photographic emulsion is removed from it’s original backing, and placed onto a new surface. Because the print is fully developed, the color is pretty accurate (for a Polaroid, that is. Polaroid prints aren’t known for having good color).

Polaroid transfers, on the other hand, are made from the negative half of a peel apart Polaroid print. The negative is peeled before the print fully develops. Because the color layers of the film transfer one at a time, depending on how long you wait before pulling the negative off, some of the color layers may have transferred to the print surface, and therefore won’t show up in the transfer.

Here’s one more set of prints. The Polaroid lift is first, followed by the transfer.




While this was fun and kept me busy for a few days, I’m a little ambivalent about the results. I like them, but I’m not sure how much I like them. I made about fifteen prints total, and I’m not sure if I’ll be doing any more like this. My favorite is the Polaroid lift you see above of the face with text on it. I’m considering trying a gum bichromate print of that image. If that turns out, I might make more of these (provided I can get Polaroid film, which just stopped being manufactured).

My Top Five

My friend Brady recently posted an interesting challenge to “artists and artist wannabes” on his blog. He asks “If you were to go through your work from the last year, could you identify five that, for one reason or another, you like best?”
I love that question. I personally find that in my studio work, I tend to move from one idea or project to another, without much reflection on what I’ve accomplished. Looking back at what I’ve made over the past year is probably a good exercise for that very reason.

2008 was kind of an odd year for me, art-wise. It started at the tail end of my sabbatical, as I was working feverishly in the studio exploring alternative photographic processes. After my post-sabbatical exhibit opened in the spring, my studio work slowed to a trickle as I concentrated on teaching duties. The summer wasn’t as productive as it should have been. I shot a lot of random photos, but a large, stressful, remodeling project (with long delays-the 2 1/2 week estimate turned out to be an 8 week project) kept me from the basement workspace I used for making prints. The remodeling finally was completed (and I got a new darkroom as part of it), but by then I was back in school, and my attention and energy were focused elsewhere.

So, here are my picks. It was difficult narrowing it down to five, but ranking them was even more difficult. I’m not sure the order would stay the same if I rethought it, but what’s most important is that these are my five favorite pieces made this year.

#5

This past summer, I started making cyanotype bookmarks as a way to use up some scrap paper and keep busy in the studio between projects. I ended up designing and printing over twenty different bookmarks. They were a lot of fun, and some of them came out pretty well. This one’s one of my favorites. It’s a little surreal, but more fun than weird. I’m currently relisting this one and my other bookmarks for sale on my Etsy page. I'm also listing a larger version, approx. 3.5" X 18.25“ in a limited print run.

#4

This cyanotype print is made from a Holga photo shot in San Francisco’s Japantown in October , 2007. The print was made sometime late last winter. I love the composition in this image, and the prominent use of negative space. It didn’t fit well with the other work I made at the same time (much of which was in my post-sabbatical exhibition last spring), and as a result hasn’t been seen publicly aside from this blog.

#3


In my original post for this piece, I wrote that it looks like a still from a Guy Maddin film. It’s a duotone gum bichromate print, and it really should be printed a couple more times (gum bichromate prints are made by printing a series of layers of different colors. The more layers, the more intense the colors become). I stopped here because I really liked the gray and light yellow in the print. I made a second version of this print which I exhibited in my show last spring. That version was made with metallic gold acrylic instead of the standard watercolor paints used to make gum prints. It turned out much darker, and has a slight metallic sheen. I still like the faded look of this one, however. The photo was shot in Chicago’s Chinatown with my Holga camera.

#2

My most recent piece, currently hanging in the gallery at Moraine Valley Community College as part of the faculty exhibit. Scroll down a couple of posts to get the full story. This shot, quickly snapped after pinning the piece up to my studio wall, really does not do the piece justice. It looks much better in person.

#1

This gum bichromate print was actually finished in the afternoon last December 30. Close enough to be considered work I made this year. The photo was taken in Chinatown here in Chicago on the day after Thanksgiving. I like this piece for a number of reasons. The photo itself is interesting, I like the subject matter (knickknacks in a shop window) and the use of short depth of field. The print came out really well. It was the second ‘real’ gum print I made after several weeks of running tests to control exposure and color balance in a notoriously picky printing process. I was really happy with the color I got here, and it encouraged me to go further with gum printing.

Self Portrait as a Drowned Man (After Bayard)

Here’s my latest piece. I finished the last bit of work on it a few days ago. I made this piece specifically for this year’s annual exhibit of faculty work at Moraine Valley Community College, where I teach, although I’ve had the idea for this piece for several years. It was one of those ideas that was too good not to pursue, and with the theme of this year’s faculty exhibit being self portrait and autobiographical work, the time seemed right.

The piece is made of twelve cyanotype prints. The prints are made on copies of rejection letters I’ve received from various galleries. Here's a close-up of the piece so you can see the letters the piece is printed on (click on the photo to see a larger version).


This piece is based on a well known historical photograph by Hippolyte Bayard. Bayard was one of the first inventors of photography, but was given duplicitous advice which allowed Louis Daguerre to receive the French patent for the invention of photography (that’s why you’ve heard of daguerreotypes, but not bayardotypes). Bayard’s response was to pose as a corpse, an apparent suicide due to the injustice and lack of recognition for his invention. Ironically, the image became famous as the first staged photograph, and can be found in nearly every book on photographic history. Here’s the original Bayard photograph I based my piece on:


I originally wanted to print directly onto the actual rejection letters, but that proved to be unworkable. Many papers use bleach in the manufacturing process, and residual bleach in the paper bleached the cyanotype prints. I made several test prints that looked great when first developed, but when dry, had bleached so much that the image was very pale.

I wanted the piece to look as much like it was printed on the actual rejection letters as possible. After trying a few experiments, I arrived at a solution that worked (for the most part). I scanned all the rejection letters, and printed them on a matte surface Epson inkjet paper. I generally like Epson papers, and was very surprised that the ink held up to the cyanotype process. These prints were washed in a tray of water for about 20 minutes, and the ink did not run at all. Epson claims their ultrachrome inks (the type my printer uses) are water resistant, but I never expected that I could expose them to this much water without the ink running. There was one drawback to using the Epson paper, however. The cyanotype solution stained the white areas of the prints yellow, and no amount of washing would remove that color. I decided I could live with it.

This work is obviously a self portrait, but it is autobiographical as well. By printing the piece on rejection letters I’ve received from galleries, I’m not just referencing the rejection Hippolyte Bayard felt when he lost the patent. I’m commenting on my (lack of) success in the world of commercial galleries (in a lighthearted way). I have an ambivalent relationship with commercial galleries. While exhibits in commercial galleries are often considered the primary goal of the working artist, I just do not enjoy the smoozing and ass kissing that often accompanies them. I also know firsthand (I worked briefly in a gallery when I first moved to Chicago) that decisions in these galleries are made based on commerce, not artistic merit. I’ve done really well at academic galleries, non profit spaces, etc., but my work doesn’t have seem to have much commercial appeal. I’m comfortable with that, although I still dutifully leave discs of my work at galleries whenever I finish a new body of work. At least, my efforts have provided me with the letters used to make this piece!

innerview
Autobiographical works and self-portraits by Moraine Valley faculty
Nov. 17-Jan. 8
Reception: Thursday, Dec. 4, 2-4 p.m.

Robert F. DeCaprio Art Gallery
Fine and Performing Arts Center
Moraine Valley Community College
9000 W. College Pkwy.
Palos Hills, IL

The Postcard Project

Recently, I’ve been revising some work I made twenty years ago.
In 1988, I participated in a mail art project. The project involved making 35 original postcards and mailing them (in an envelope) to someone who was collecting all the cards, and sending back 35 cards from different artists. It sounded fun, and I threw myself headfirst into the project of making the postcards. At the time, I was mostly making collages, and I labored over these 35 cards for about three weeks, clipping images and text from 1950’s homemaker’s magazines, old textbooks, and religious books bought at garage sales, and painstakingly assembling collages out if them. I put a lot of time and effort into these postcards, and I sent them off just before the deadline, then anxiously awaited my package of postcards from other artists.

When the package arrived, I was pretty disappointed. I received 35 cards, but most of them were pairs of cards from an artist, instead of cards from 35 different artists. Much worse than that, however, was that many of the people involved obviously put no effort whatsoever into their cards. One person scribbled on a piece of poster board with several differently colored markers, then cut the board into 4 X 6 inch squares. Another glued whole pages of newspaper onto a sheet of poster board, and cut that into squares. I even received two of my own cards back (which I can’t seem to find right now). Receiving two scribbled pieces of board seemed pretty bad after pouring so much effort into the project. While there were a few decent photo cards in the package, many of the 35 cards ended up in the trash.

When I made my collaged postcards, I ran up against the deadline for mailing them and had to send them off before documenting them (this was years before I owned a scanner or a copy stand). Figuring it was better than nothing, I had my sister take them to work and make B&W photocopies of all 35 postcards. These copies have sat in a folder in my file cabinet for 20 years, until now.

With the home remodeling project (which just passed week five of the supposedly three week project-and it’s still not finished) I’ve been without my basement workspace for making alternative process prints. Tired of sitting around waiting to return to the studio, I pulled the 20 year old grainy B&W photocopies out of the filing cabinet, scanned them all, and have been digitally revising and coloring some of them.

Here’s the original photocopy of the revised card seen at the top of this post, for comparison.


Of the 35 cards, probably a third of them really aren’t very good and are best left buried in the file cabinet. I remember running out of steam about 3/4 of the way through making them, but forcing myself to push out a few more. Another third are ok, but nothing much can be done with them. That leaves about a dozen or so postcards that hold up decently well after 20 years, and that might benefit from being reworked and updated. I decided not to try and recreate the cards as they originally looked. After 20 years, I can’t remember how they looked in their original state, and in some cases, it’s hard to recreate anything from a grainy photocopy. Besides, it’s more fun making something new out of them.

Here’s another one, the original first, followed by the revision.




As of this writing, I have four of the cards completed, and two or three more in progress (including one that I’ve done two versions of, and don’t like either one). I enlarged a couple of them and printed them, and they look great. So good, in fact, that I’m thinking of listing them as prints on my Etsy page.

I’ll post more of these postcard revisions in a couple of days.

Animation News

I'm a huge animation fan. Some of my all-time favorite movies and tv shows are animated, and there's always a couple of cartoons on my Tivo's to do list. This weekend saw a couple of animation related events that I'm excited about.

First, here's the trailer for Ponyo On The Cliff, the latest film by Hayao Miyazaki, which opened this weekend in Japan.



I'm a huge fan of Miyazaki's work, his Studio Ghibli is arguably making the best animation in the world right now (OK, maybe it's tied with Pixar). If you haven't seen any of Miyazaki's work, drop everything, run to your nearest video store, and rent a copy of Spirited Away. Ponyo On The Cliff looks like another great film. I haven't heard when it will be released in the USA, but I'm hoping it won't be too long.

As long as I'm on the subject of animation, the final episodes of Avatar: The Last Airbender aired this weekend on the cable channel Nickelodeon. I was out of town, and didn't catch them, but I have them on my Tivo and will finish them soon.

I must admit I'm a total Avatar fanboy. I could go on at length (and have, just ask my friends), but let me just say that it's no hyperbole that Avatar: The Last Airbender is the best animated series in at least a decade, and will likely be considered one of the best animated shows of all time. Trust me, it's that good. I wouldn't have named this blog after it otherwise!

If you haven't seen this show, I can't recommend it highly enough. The animation, writing, and art direction are of a quality rarely attempted in a children's cartoon program. Even the music is exceptional (I'm hoping for a soundtrack cd). Start with the first season, and watch the episodes in order. The story builds over the three seasons, and some of the characters go through significant development as the series progresses.
Avatar wasn't cancelled, by the way. It was planned from the beginning as a three season series with a finite number of episodes.

One more thing: If you haven't yet, go see Wall-E. It's excellent.

Road Trip To Milwaukee

If you read the last post, you'll know that I'm busy with home remodeling this summer. Not so busy that I can't take a couple of weekend trips, however, and one of those weekenders is going to be to Milwaukee. The Milwaukee Art Museum has two exhibits this summer that look really interesting. Gilbert & George are a British art (and life) partnership that make immense, brightly colored photo mosaic/collage pieces with provocative content. Some of their work is really great, and it's all worth seeing.
The Sensory Overload exhibit of Kinetic and Op art looks interesting as well. Both exhibits look infinitely more interesting than the Jeff Koons show at the Museum of Contemporary Art here in Chicago.

Photographer's Rights

I took this photo in front of a church on the southwest side of Chicago last fall. I had gone there to shoot photos of the rides at a parking lot carnival, but a guy walking around with a camera at a place where children congregate was too much for the college-age security team to bear. At one point I spoke with the pastor of the church, and showed him images I had shot with the digital camera so he could see I wasn't interested in photographing children. He gave me permission to shoot at the carnival, but the 'security' still tailed me so closely that I got uncomfortable and left. On my way back to the car, I spotted this chalk drawing a child had done on the sidewalk in front of the church, and snapped a photo of it. It's more interesting than the shots I made at the carnival. I like how it's kind of charming and funny (and maybe a little creepy) at the same time.

I've heard several accounts recently of people getting harassed for taking legal photos in public places (a student of a colleague of mine was stopped by Homeland Security for shooting a photo of an oil refinery). Here's a short article on the legal rights of photographers. Not surprisingly, you have the right to shoot almost anything you want. There's some useful links at the bottom of the article, be sure to check them out.

A Photo A Day

I’ve started a new blog, which I will be running along with this one. It’s called A Photo A Day. The title tells you exactly what it is. I plan on posting a new photo (nearly) every day, and writing a few comments on each photo.

As anyone who works in the photographic medium knows, for every photograph you end up using, there are several that never get used, and exist only as an unprinted negative stuck in a binder or a digital file on a hard drive. I say ‘several’, but really, it could range from just a few unused photos to literally hundreds. The point is, there’s a big drop-off between what is shot and what is used. It’s not an issue of quality. Many of these shots are interesting or good. It’s more an issue of editing.

That’s where this blog comes in. By posting a new photo every day, some of those ‘orphaned’ photos get seen and appreciated. Yes, I know I could just open a Flikr account and post my photos there. I may still do that at some point, but I have several reasons for not doing so now (I won’t bore you with the details). We’ll see how the new blog works out first. I’m considering selling prints of the photos I post in A Photo A Day, but haven’t worked out the details yet. If you see something you’re interested in, let me know.

Lightbender is still, and will remain, the place where I show my more serious work, discuss work in progress, and post about art in general. A Photo A Day will keep me focused on regular posting at times when my studio work is going slowly (like right now).

Comments and suggestions are always welcome. I appreciate hearing from you.

Gallery Talk

I will be giving a talk this Wednesday, April 16, at 12:30 pm, in the DeCaprio Gallery at Moraine Valley Community College, where my show is about to end (this Thursday is when it comes down). I'm mainly talking about the various processes I used to create the work in the exhibit. I'll have slides of work, most of which isn't in the exhibit, and much of which hasn't been seen on this blog. I'll also have demonstration photos showing how various alternative processes work.

Hope to see you there.

Evanston Art Center Biennial

I received notification a few days ago that this cyanotype print, which I made in the summer of 2006, has been accepted into the 19th Evanston Biennial. The exhibit is at the Evanston Art Center in Evanston, IL, and runs from June 1-July 6, 2008.
I was in the Evanston Biennial once before, in 2000. The two pieces I exhibited at that biennial led to a solo exhibition at the Evanston Art Center in 2001.
I'll post a reminder before the show opens, I just wanted to share the news now.

Thanks!

Today was the opening reception for my exhibit. There was a pretty good turnout, despite it being yet another crappy weather day in Chicago. Several colleagues and friends came, and lots of students were there as well. Thanks to everyone who came, and I hope you enjoyed it.

Here’s a few shots of the exhibit.








The exhibit runs through April 17. I’ll be doing a talk in the gallery about alternative process photography on April 16 at 12:30 pm. It’s free and open to the public.

My Show is Open

My exhibit, titled Constructed Realities, is now open in DeCaprio Gallery at Moraine Valley Community College. Tuesday is the official opening day, but it was open on Monday, because we got all the work installed pretty quickly last Thursday.

The show looks pretty good. I'll take some photos in the gallery and post them here soon. I'm showing 38 pieces total, which fills the space nicely. The number of pieces to include was a guess. Because I hung nine prints of photos taken at the Musee Mechanique in San Francisco in a salon-style grouping, and had frames of varying sizes, I really had no idea how many pieces it would take to fill the space. I was thinking that I would have too many, but while laying out the show, I thought I would need to quickly frame a couple more pieces to fill the space. It turns out that I got it just right.

The opening reception is this Thursday, March 27, from 2-4 PM. Good food, live music, rubbing elbows with artists and students, how can you refuse?

Much (although not all) of the work in the show has appeared in this blog over the past few months, so it seems appropriate to post the artist statement I wrote for it. Understand that I hate writing these things, and procrastinated it for as long as I possibly could. It's not a bad statement, all things considered. It does what a good statement should: Explains the underlying ideas without revealing too much.

Constructed Realities
Artist Statement

The work in this exhibit reflects an interest in how information is organized and presented, and how the display of information effects our interactions with and understanding of that information.

From museums to shop windows and even parks and public spaces, displays are created with the aim of guiding our thoughts, feelings and interactions with these created spaces. These displays strip away some aspects of the world while heightening others. In museums, an attempt at education is made by focusing on specific bits of information to heighten or emphasize scientific narratives. In a similar manner, retail window displays are designed to emphasize the psychology of desire.

I photograph these spaces, created to elicit a particular response or to communicate a specific concept, not as a straightforward documentation of how materials are used or displayed or information conveyed. Rather, I examine them in an expressive manner, achieving a subtle subversion of their intended function. The camera and photographic processes I use obfuscate the motivational or instructional intent of these displays, allowing the viewer’s reactions and responses to recontextualize and create content. Through this recontextualization, new realities are constructed which question the authority of informational and commercial display.

Experimenting With Polaroid Transfers, and The End Of Polaroid?

I spent the last couple days of spring break trying some different ideas with Polaroid transfers. I don’t think anything turned out that great, but I do see potential in some of it.

First up, I made a transfer of an image, and then put a Polaroid lift of the same image on top of it.


OK, it’s pretty uninteresting, but at least I tried something different!

Next are a couple of panoramic pieces made by putting three transfers in a row. These are both made from images I shot in the Field Museum.




The same panoramas were also both done as Polaroid lift panoramas last summer, with less success. Here is my post from last summer on the lift panoramas. You can compare both of these panoramas, made from Polaroid transfers, with the ones I made from Polaroid lifts if you click on the link.

These came out ok, but didn’t thrill me that much either. As I wrote about the lift panoramas last summer, I think the geometry and perspective present in the original photos gets lost when treating them in this manner. The transfers don’t suffer from this as much as the lifts do, but the visual noise that the transfer process brings to the panoramas (one of the desired results of the transfer process) is a little distracting here.

One more try. This one, instead of a panoramic image, is more a mosaic made from four separate photos I shot at Fairyland in Oakland, CA last October.


I like this one, even though it’s honestly not that great. It works much better than the panoramic images shot in the Field Museum. I like it because out of everything I tried, this seems to nave the most potential. I’m considering shooting some more mosaic scenes to try a few more of these. Polaroid images are always going to be much lower in quality than other photo processes, but I like the look of this and think some interesting work could be done with it.

Speaking of Polaroid, you may have heard that they are discontinuing the manufacture of most of their films at the end of 2008. That means no more lifts or transfers, unless someone decides to buy the patents from Polaroid and continue manufacturing the film. While Polaroid processes can be a little gimmicky and predictable, there has also been a lot of interesting work made with them. Check out the work of Lucas Samaras to see manipulated SX-70 prints (Time Zero film for SX-70 cameras was discontinued by Polaroid a couple of years ago).

There’s a website, Save Polaroid, for people trying to convince another company to begin producing the film after Polaroid stops producing it. I personally think these processes are worth saving, although I don’t know how effective the campaign to save the film will be. We’ll have to wait and see.

Constructed Realities

Here's the announcement for my upcoming exhibit. Titled Constructed Realities, it will be held at the DeCaprio Gallery at Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, IL. Dates for the exhibition are March 25–April 17, 2008. The opening reception is Thursday, March 27, 2:00–4:00 p.m. There will be good food and live music at the reception, so come if you can.

I'll also be doing a gallery talk on Wednesday, April 16. I plan on talking mainly about alternative photographic processes, and hopefully demonstrating some processes as well.

Hope to see you there!

Back To School

I’ve been sick for the past few days with a horrible sore throat and feeling run down, so I don’t have any new work to show you. I just haven’t felt up to working in a cold, damp basement. I have two gum bichromate prints that just need to have the black layer printed, which I hope to do today or tomorrow, depending on how I feel. I also have four more gum prints in the works. I’ve been making separations and printing negatives, which I can do while sitting at the computer and sipping tea; as soon as I feel better I will start printing them.

The bigger news is that my sabbatical is pretty much over. I have an in-service at my school this Thursday (I hope I’m feeling better by then), and will resume teaching duties with the start of Spring semester on January 14.

Sabbatical was wonderful, this was the longest period of time I’ve had to focus primarily on my creative work since I was in graduate school. I’m very grateful to have been given this opportunity.

The end of sabbatical will not mean the end of this blog, however. I’m still making work using the same alternative processes that I’ve been exploring over the past several months, and I will also be mounting a post-sabbatical exhibition. The exhibition will be at the Robert F. DeCaprio Art Gallery at Moraine Valley Community College, where I teach. The exhibition will run March 25-April 17, 2008. Before that exhibit, I’ll be continuing to make new work, selecting which of the pieces I’ve completed will actually be exhibited, matting and framing work, etc. I’m sure there will be lots of info to post here.

Although I started this blog as a way of documenting my progress during my sabbatical, I’m pretty sure I’ll keeping it active indefinitely. Posting here has helped me reflect and stay focused on my work, and knowing that people are reading it keeps me motivated to make work. I’m also considering expanding the scope of the blog. So far, I’ve kept it pretty much focused on the technical and creative explorations I’ve made as part of my sabbatical. I’m thinking of keeping that, but also occasionally talking about the work of other artists that I’ve seen, maybe recommendations of art and photo books or web sites, etc. Let me know if you have an opinion on that.

Nearly every blog I’ve seen has eventually resorted to begging for comments. I’ve resisted that here, and even so have received comments and requests for info or advice from both people I know and others I don’t. I’ll just say thanks, and keep them coming!

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a fun and safe New Year's Eve.
Here's the second gum bichromate print I've completed. I printed the last layer on the afternoon of Dec. 30. The original photo was taken the day after Thanksgiving in a shop window in Chicago's Chinatown. This gum print came out nicely, I like the colors I got.