Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Self Portrait 3

"Thinking"

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Ellipsis

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Escoria otoñal

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Self Portrait 2

"Knowledge"

1

2

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: "Autumn Lines"

Gifts from God this Day

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Self Portrait 1

"Lip Reading"

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: "Northern Shore: the Orient"

Eden is a Place: TreePhotoBlog2: Populus tremuloides

Took these pictures in the fall near Causey Reservoir, Utah. Originals in color. A different look at quakies whether it be in black and white (like Ansel Adams but I still think different, right?) or in tinting a B&W photo the shade of yellow that many a quaking leaf turn before they get pushed to take flight.

I really don't mind the slight blur (I have a very basic digital camera.), the quaking aspens that my camera caught here were, well, quaking.

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: "Inanimate Summer"

Photos taken last summer in Eden, at my parents house, right before we made the big move east. There are several things that could be taken from these photos but I will not comment on any of them. I will mention, however, that because I took these pictures during a melancholic moment in my life, the tear of vines which appears in the lower of the two photos was a nice, serendipitous touch.

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: "Through the Looking Glass" series

I'm always interested in how light is refracted, bent, dimmed, enhanced, etc. Light is probably the crux of my photographic interests and the main subject of my lens. I usually try, however, not to slip into complete abstraction. I do this by capturing only quotidian observations. That is, I keep my eyes open to the wonders of 'nature' wherever I am - whether it be out in what modernity calls wilderness or whether I be sitting at the breakfast table staring out the window through a vase at a wild, urban landscape, like I was when I took the photographs below.

I'm obviously not a professional photographer by any stretch and so you could say that this "series" of photographs below is ongoing (meaning that it is going nowhere), but it and other "series" of photographs that I develop keep me alive and help me defamiliarize myself ontologically and epistemologically. Basically, photography crosses and uncrosses my eyes. Like pure poiesis, or like a true and sincere prayer, it gives me back those moments that come before thought, before I've given in to ideology or the written word (if I'm not completely wrong, Julia Kristeva calls this moment the chora in her book Desire in Language).

Photographic series: "Through the Looking Glass"

1. Still Life / Landscape #1

2. Still Life / Landscape #2

3. Still Life / Landscape #3

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Personal Space

Modern Triptych: "Object of Gaze: Cartoons and Spilled Milk"

(Now you know what our TV sees on rainy days.)

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: July Patriot

Metaphors for Patriotism (perhaps):

Eden is a Place: TreePhotoBlog 1: Chorisia speciosa

NAME:

"Palo borracho" (Drunken Stick) or: toborochi, yuchán, algodonero, palo botella, palo barrigudo, samohú, samuhú, zamahú, ñandubay, o painero.*

*Gary Larson might call it a "Kid proof tree"

Eden is a Place: Caption Petition 3

Caption please (John in background with headphones, Sam in foreground (sleeping, not dead)):

Winner by default but it doesn't matter because it's a good one [thanks Pablo]:

Caption: "Forget it, Sam. It's Chinatown."

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Río Blanco

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Spring

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Pascua

Sam helping John say 'Doh!'

In the Spotlight [Priscila took this picture]

Easter Still Life

Eden is a Place: Photoblog: Ethereal Hearts

"February Has Gone"

Más y más

The other day our congregation put on a sort of talent show with the perhaps

exaggerated title: "Entertainment Extravaganza."  Normally I would sarcastically spin

this title but since Priscila was in charge I am too informed and involved to be

unbiased (I told her she should have named it something like "The Same ol' Song and

Dance" or "Righteous Roundup of Raucousness" or, to get as many people there as

possible, "Flashdance on Ice").  The show had its ups and downs and asides but I

think most agreed that it was a success.  Priscila wasn't in total control because she's

not the Jefa (Boss) but the things over which she did have control were those that

received the most acclaim from the audience.  

Just to give you an idea about what was on the playbill for the evening: three piano

pieces (quite good each of them); three show tunes (everyone stayed on tune  (two

were professional singers); three dance routines (this group of kids was not

associated with the church but it did a fair job); an act from a play (great job by a

church member who is studying acting); a duet and piano piece (girl sang and played

piano and boy sang (great job both of them)); and, without further ado, a musical saw

piece (would have been a great comedy routine but it was dramatically not funny).

After the show there were refreshments (church members whose talent is cooking

made the sweets) and a sort of visual arts show.

The Visual Arts Show consisted of some fine watercolors, a very impressive display of

one church member's accomplishments as a professional dancer for the most important

African American dance company (the name escapes me at the moment), several examples

of another member's work in animation projected from his computer on to a movie

screen (this was the most popular (at least as far as the kids were concerned)), some

other assorted crafts and paintings, and last, and certainly least, some of my own

photographs (not pictures of me but pictures that I have taken (which are not of me)).

I'd like to show those pictures here but they are not digital and I don't think that I'll be

scanning them anytime soon.  As I was looking for a couple of potential candidates

from my digital repertoire to display I came across a couple of photos that I really like

but that I didn't end up displaying because I'm not comfortable with printing digitals yet

(I really don't know where the best (and cheapest) place is to print them the way I

want them to be):

1 [Córdoba, Córdoba, Argentina]

2. [Río Blanco, Salta, Argentina]

3. [Bear River, Box Elder, Utah]

4. [Spiral Jetty, Great Salt Lake, Box Elder, Utah]

5. [Near Spiral Jetty]

6. [Spiral Jetty]

[7. Río Blanco]

8. [Agua Escondida, Cerro Colorado, Córdoba]

9. [Cachi, Salta]

Eden is a Place: Caption Petition 2

This is another "Caption Petition:"

If you insist on using cliches, please be creative with them 

(i.e. instead of "what are you looking at?" use "what are you smelling (at)?").

*Though I received quite a few really good captions (see comments (me likes Chris Lewis's the

most)), I have made an executive decision to put my own caption: 

"Woof"

Thanks for playing.

Sam - UNCLE SAM

A picture of Sam revving up his crawling machine:

Pics of our trip to DC 1month pre-inauguration.
Overall theme: Phantoms:
1st stop: Smithsonian Museums (only got to see two):



Curvilinear facade to new
National Museum of the American Indian:




Circle in heaven lights the museum:

Uncle Sam from the entrance/exit to/from American Indian Museum: Phantoms on the Hill:

Memories now:

Space for future/past phantoms: The National Mall: