Look, but not too closely

A creative block can be one of the most frustrating things to work through, and I feel that the past few months have not been my best. So... what do I do? I just watched an excellent video of Elizabeth Gilbert speaking about the need to keep going. When I read her book, Eat Pray Love, it completely changed the way I thought about life and the experiences we can have while living it. It has inspired me to plan my ever changing trip to Europe, and think of my future as having less walls and limits. I sometimes feel that I am the only one who doubts myself. This is definitely not true, and the real test is not whether I can create one great piece, it's if I can create many great pieces, while struggling to do so. Thank you Elizabeth.

A few thoughts...

As school has now started, I am finding my classes to be such a creative stimulus for the work I will soon be attempting to make. I've learned about so many great artists and they work they created because they were so passionate about what they were shooting. Today I had the chance to view a short clip about Elizabeth Opalenik (among many other great artists), and was completely inspired by her work! The depth she conveys in her portraits is truly admirable, but the unique attributes that can be associated with her images is what especially spoke to me. By watching her experiment with her work, I am now eager to approach my own with the same enthusiasm, but I want to step out of my dark room/photographic comfort zone and really experiment with my work. That is a goal of mine for the semester. A few other things I'd like to focus on would be to define who I am as an artist at this point in my life. I want my vision to develop as I create more and more experiences for myself, but for now, I'd like to find my starting point. I need to try something new, maybe hand colored photographs, new subject matter (definitely portraiture and people), new cameras, different films/processes, etc. We'll see how it turns out!

Here are a few photographs from Elizabeth Opalenik

Some San Francisco

Well, I'm finally getting around to editing some of my pictures from San Francisco, but since I took so many, it's taking a while, but I though I might as well put some of what I've done up. Love that city!

4th of July!!

So there's just something very nostalgic about going to a carnival during the summer. So I got Todd to go with me and walk around while I took pictures. We spent about a half hour in line for a funnel cake, but it was so worth it!

Art Festival

So I was able to go to the Utah Art Festival today, which was great. There are so many great works out there, and I had to make myself leave before I spent any more money on new art. Also, it seems so strange that Michael Jackson died today, especially because on the train to the festival, I was telling Todd how strange it is when a famous person dies. So as I am listening to the great pop star on iTunes now, here are some pictures I took today to go along with the passing of a great entertainer and the great things I was able to see at the festival. I also played around with Poladroid a bit...great stuff!!!

Ok, so now I think I've figured out how to do this- write a comment, post the picture. Easy enough! Here are some more...

Hmmm..

Pics from the farm, my new house!!!