STL DPB On The Road: Kansas City

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I love Tom Otterness. He's the sculptor of a wonderful cute/terrifying work in Citygarden back home. Well today we're in Kansas City and, after checking into our hotel, paid a visit to the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art. It's not very big as these things go but it has a very good collection and rotating special shows. Otterness' The Crying Giant is the first thing you see when you approach the museum from one direction.

A bit later we crossed the state line into Kansas and joined a bunch of the in-laws for dinner at Taqueria Mexico. It's supposed to be KC's best Mexican restaurant. I'm not qualified to say, but it was pretty good.

Portraits of St. Louis Artists: Amanda Pfister

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Photographer Amanda Pfister finds her subjects in abandoned spaces, the empty husks of what was once human activity. Her images include closed car dealerships; old, empty factories; out-of-business shopping malls and, as above, disused schools. Nobody goes there any more, except her. The pictures are a meditation on transience.

We're driving to Kansas City today. Dinner there tonight with a bunch of the in-laws. On to Hanover, Kansas, (population 653) Saturday morning to see Mrs. C's 91 year old mother (still living at home) and the annual family reunion. I'm hoping to get some good portraits.

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Thursday Arch Series

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Rummaging around in the archives again. I actually planned to take some new Arch shots last Sunday after the studio open house. However, there is limited free parking around the monument and the place I usually go was flooded. The Mississippi is still pretty high. It was miserably hot, I was too lazy to walk further and went home.

This picture will do nicely, though. It is the apex of the triangular structure (here, the south leg) that points inward. There has obviously been post-processing but it shows the structure of an object that, from a distance, looks like solid metal.

There will be another artist's portrait tomorrow and a few next week. This weekend it's off to Kansas for my wife's family's annual get-together. Delightful people and wonderful things to photograph.

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Portraits of St. Louis Artists: Garrett Roberts

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My friend Garrett Roberts is one of the resident artists at Soulard Art Market. I've had work in a couple of shows there. Roberts is a soft-spoken, unassuming guy who creates uncommon images. He often uses a Holga camera, creating photos much different than what the eye sees. You can see some of them in a post about him last year.

I've bought a couple of his pieces. The top picture in this set has a place of honor in my office.

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Portraits of St. Louis Artists: Barry Liebman

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I walked into Barry Liebman's studio on Sunday, saw some of these paintings and thought, "wow, I bet this guy likes Cy Twombly." So I asked if he did. In response, he pulled out a beautifully-made art book about that painter. It told me something about Liebman.

He is an abstract painter who often uses mixed media to enhance the effect. Music is a great influence on his work: he has series inspired by the work of Charlie Parker and the Adagio from the 9th Symphony of Gustav Mahler (my artistic hero!). You can click here to listen - you'll get the point. No Western music is more profound.

Until recently, Liebman was co-owner of St. Louis' beloved Left Bank Books, one of America's finest independent booksellers. He will soon be moving to Whidbey Island, Washington, a jewel in Puget Sound not far from Seattle. Our loss, their gain.

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Portraits of St. Louis Artists: Sandra Marchewa

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I like Sandra Marchewa's work and her personality, too. We met for the first time at last year's studio open house: in the portrait I made her face and art are full of whimsy. She has some new work this year, notably this piece with little portraits of friends affixed to lighters. Some of the people have died. On those lighters, Marchewa has changed the logo BIC to RIP. The objects are encased in resin. I couldn't photograph her next to it - the glare was too severe. So we decided to use the situation to our advantage and place her in the reflection. It worked, or we think so.

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Portraits of St. Louis Artists: David Ottinger

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It's Open Studios Weekend once again, when St. Louis artists open their workspaces or gather in exhibition centers to show what they are making. I went around more slowly yesterday than in the past, spending more time with the artists, learning about them and their work, and of course, asking if I could take their pictures.

I saw some very original stuff, not the least of which was the painting of David Ottinger, professor of art at McKendree University in nearby Lebanon, Illinois. The long painting behind him has four iterations of the same person, apparently wracked in thought. I wish I'd written down the title - it was The Essence of the Decision or something like that. It's quite penetrating.

Yesterday brought portraits of eight or nine artists, many of which will appear here in coming days. Today, the second day of the open house, will feature different artists and spaces.

Arts & Crafts

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A little more from the craft fair next to Soulard Farmers Market last weekend. Mom, dad and daughter were selling costume jewelry. The young lady had a special warmth about her (and I am not saying this because it is supposed to be 100 F/38 C here today). After I took her picture she pointed to these charming, happy little necklaces and exclaimed "I made those!"

This weekend is the fifth annual St. Louis artists' open studio weekend. As I have in the past, I plan to wander from one to another (unless I wilt from the heat), asking artists if I can take candid portraits of them with their work (examples from past years here, here and here). Should give me blog material for days.

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Mac Enough?

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I don't know. That's my collection below. What do you think? I am getting kind of sick of the company's hubris, though.

Actually, the sign was advertising a certain vendor of horrible things to put in your mouth, displayed during a Cardinals baseball game.

Thursday Arch Series

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A hot summer day downtown, looking east on Market Street between 7th and 8th Streets. I like the friendly giant looking out for me.

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It's Hot

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We've had a pretty miserable summer. I know, there are lots of places that are worse but we like to complain about it anyway. In this picture, a produce vendor at Soulard Farmers Market needs towel to soak it up.

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Poke In The Eye

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Is there an ophthalmologist in the house? My favorite piece in Citygarden, Eros Bendato, has a mote in its eye.
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Native

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Soulard Farmers Market has some vendors of things other than food. This man was selling Native American jewelry. Damn, he was a good model. Click the link in the left sidebar to my Flickr page to see a couple of other pictures of him. For some reason we got talking about the Lone Ranger, that racist Western adventure that ruled my childhood. The name Tonto, the LR's Indian companion, means fool or stupid in Spanish. Tonto always addressed the LR as kimo sabe. I thought it was a corruption of the Spanish que mas sabe, or "that knows more" in English. My subject (I didn't get his name - hope he emails me) said it was simply an Apache term for pale face.

This is why I went to that lighting workshop recently. We were in shade inside the market. Sunlight was coming in from the left and I had a flash mounted on the camera with a Lumiquest Pocket Bouncer at TTL -1 2/3. Wish I could hit it this well all the time.

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Potato Juggler

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There have been food vendors at the site of Soulard Farmers Market continuously since 1779. It's a busy, off-beat and inexpensive place to shop food (one vendor sells roasted alligator on a stick). There was a small craft fair at the market yesterday (more about that soon). I took some pictures there and among the vendors' stalls. This young man was playing with the merchandise. I certainly couldn't do it.

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Video Shoot

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My law firm, Crowe & Shanahan, represents individual people, not businesses or government agencies. There is a lot of competition in our specialty and we have to be aware of marketing our services. We are working on a big upgrade of our web site, which should go up in September. Part of the new site will be video of me and my partner, Julie Shanahan, talking about what we do. The taping took place yesterday. Here, Julie gets ready for an interview with our producer, Laura Bogenschutz of FindLaw.
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Hot Rods

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As I mentioned in Wednesday's post, last weekend's Collinsville catsup festival featured a lot of hot rods and custom cars. Nothing stated about fuel economy. I prefer my hot rods from Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen.

Thursday Arch Series

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From deep in the archives. This picture was taken back in 2005, when I started obsessively photographing the Arch. Maybe my approach was more creative then (maybe I've worn out the possibilities) but all I need is an image every week.

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'52 Jeep

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Something else from the catsup festival. There were lots of hot rods and custom cars on display. This one was a restored 1952 Jeep, Korean War vintage. This gentleman knew everything about it but he was a bit shy and I did not get his name.

Sorry no comments yesterday. Running at top speed at work, zoom home, take Mrs. C out to dinner for her birthday, then hit the pillow. No rest for the wicked, as they say.

Happy Bastille Day to our French friends.

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Sure You Can

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There were vendors hawking all sorts of odd things at the Collinsville Catsup Festival last weekend, not the least of which were for sale at this tent. The first and middle pictures are the front and back of a tee shirt. The image is Rosie the Riveter, made famous on a World War II poster. However, Rosie's face has been switched for that of Sarah Palin (the horror! the horror!). The date is our next congressional election. The back of the shirt is, well... But I can't figure out how the law, which is made by the government, is above everyone and you will be punished for breaking it, except when you and your spouse don't agree with it, and you don't have to answer to the government anyway. And damn right that the government can't force anyone to be charitable. If it could, no one would wear this shirt.

Fossil Fuels

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I went over to Collinsville, Illinois, yesterday afternoon for the annual Catsup Festival. This suburban town is home to Brooks Catsup, a local brand considered a delicacy by some back yard grillmasters. The company created the world's largest catsup bottle, disguising the plant's water tower.

I ran into Erika, the proprietress of The World's Largest Collection Of The World's Smallest Versions Of The World's Largest Things. The has a traveling exhibit of what I just said, collecting photos and miniatures along her way. She's from Lucas, Kansas, which is way out there. We've met at the festival before. Her vehicle (Kansas license plate ART CAR) is a celebration of gas-guzzling American life. She's a genuine original.

Citygarden's First Anniversary

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Hooray! Downtown's coolest art installation is a year old. They had a little celebration yesterday afternoon. Not a lot - there was a band playing traditional marches and a flamingo costume contest, which we may see in coming days. Toy flamingos are sort of the park's mascot, as seen below with a group of devoted flamingo fans.

There was a good crowd, as there is on most summer weekends. The kids play in the fountains and pond, adults sip a drink outside of the Terrace View Cafe, and everyone enjoys the art.

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Art Market

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Soulard Art Market, where I've exhibited a couple of times, had a reception last night for social media types interested in the arts. Never thought of it this way, but I guess I am social media. SAM has some new resident artists and I met a couple. This is T. Matthew Pierson, cartoonist, illustrator and fine art painter with attitude. It's worth your time to review his stuff.

Some good shooting in STL this weekend. Citygarden celebrates its first anniversary today with a Flamingo Festival. The place is strewn with toy pink flamingos that kids can pick up and have their way with. Tomorrow brings the World's Largest Catsup Bottle Festival under the world's largest catsup (or do you prefer ketchup? Questions like this only arise in English) bottle in nearby Collinsville, Illinois. Time magazine named this as one of the top 10 quirky local festivals in the U.S. Quirky is too mild a word.

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Caged

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A little more archives archeology. This is from a few weeks ago when the family went to the wacky City Museum. The top floor of this old shoe warehouse had been opened since my last visit. It's where you will find the strange jellyfish sun shades and rooftop Ferris wheel seen here last month. They built this odd dome into the roof with a sphere made of steel bars suspended beneath it. You can climb up into it, as team member ShadowyOne has done here.

Hope to have fresh local pix sometime this weekend.

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Thursday Arch Series

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Digging way back in the archives now. This picture was taken three years ago. It's also the first picture I ever edited with Lightroom. Lots of photographers I know swear by it. I've had it on my laptop for a while but I just didn't get it. Some people in Maine helped me begin to understand the system. Like just about everything, it will take practice and experience.
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Euphemism

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Time to go wandering around the archives.

My language is being emasculated. Not since the days of H. L. Mencken and Dorothy Parker has it been considered insightful to say that nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public or that an actress runs the gamut of emotions from A to B. Now language must be soft and unoffensive. We have health centers, not hospitals; human resources, not personnel (I assume these resources are to be exploited like any other); refuse, not garbage; pre-owned, not used cars. All to soften the edges of life's little unpleasantries.

And justice centers, not jails. These come-hither advertising signs adorn the building that replaced the old St. Louis City Jail. It's annoying. I mean, who is in this place and why? Of course, justice, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. But for heaven's sake, speak plainly.

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For Brattcat, Or, It's Hard To Light Glass

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Found in the same junk/antique store in Maine as last Wednesday's post. Glass is problematic. There is usually glare. Strobes spread light behind the translucent object that you may not light (or it may look really cool). I never did learn how to deal with it but sometimes the outcome was okay.
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Head Shots

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The Fourth of July parade and fireworks in Ridgewood, New Jersey, are not until today, a legal holiday in the US, so no shots of that. I won't have any fresh St. Louis material until the weekend. For a few days, then, we will pull up more Maine images or perhaps dig in the archives.

There was nothing scheduled last Friday afternoon. Three of us spent some time in the studio with our teaching assistant, Jason Esposito, working on lighting head shots. Above, your humble servant, taken by Kelley de Bettancourt. Below, Ted Lieverman, taken by me. At the bottom, Jason instructs Kelley on flash settings.

Home this afternoon.

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Memory of Rockport

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This is the harbor of Rockport, Maine, right behind where my lighting class was held. I'm in New Jersey now seeing my brother and two sisters. I may shoot the traditional Fourth of July parade here in Ridgewood in the morning but it's supposed to be beastly hot in the New York City area - 95 F, 35 C. Might be better to avoid the surface of the planet.

And by the way, happy birthday, America.

Farewell To Camera Camp

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Leaving Rockport, Maine, today and my class in mastering flash with Arlene Collins at the Maine Media Workshops. This is our class photo, engineered by Ms. Collins. She is putting. Our two wonderful teaching assistants, Jason Esposito and Vanessa Tierney, are in front. I'm to the teacher's left.

Thanks are also due to my classmates, Ted Lieverman, Kelley De Bettancourt, Francie Bishop Good and Elizabeth Albritton. Always cheerful and helpful, glad to share their experience and encouraging to their classmates.

Really good week. I learned how to use those &%@*^# flash units. I learned the steps in the speedlighting process (manual mode, expose for the ambient light, vary all the parameters as needed, use light modifiers as needed and check the results on the computer, not your camera. Thanks to Ted for the analysis.) Now I'm ready to go out and screw up these techniques on the streets of St. Louis. Practice and time will help get me there.

These weeks here at camera camp in Maine are as happy as I can get. No pressures from ordinary life. Just creativity and good people. Hope I can come back again.

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Camera Camp, Day Four

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Another long day. I'll need a rest when I get home. (Note to self: ha ha!). For our afternoon shoot, we went to an old school in the larger (meaning, big enough to have a WalMart) neighboring town of Rockland. It been converted into an arts center but still has great signs of wear. Interesting spaces.

I had no idea where to start. There was an auditorium with a black-box proscenium that looked interesting, but what to do with it? Then I found a costume closet above the stage. Okay! It still took me over an hour to work out the lighting with my limited set of equipment. This is what I came up with in the end.

Tonight is the big finale with a Maine lobster dinner and an amazing video show of all this week's classes' work. I'll post our bizarre class picture as soon as I get a copy. Down to New Jersey tomorrow to see all my family at my sister's house.

Camera Camp, Day Three

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I'm writing this late Wednesday night and I'm out of gas. There is precious little free time here. Everyone in our class is supposed to have a project for the week, some theme we will use to try to improve out lighting skills. Mine is definition of shape and space with light. Some of us went to a junk/antique shop in Cooper's Mills, Maine, called Elmer's Barn. That's where I found this.

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