i am slowly re-acclimating to my daily life in California. it helped to have two days off from work. in between dealing with the rigmarole of a stolen car (stolen two months ago and then found the day i flew to new york) and the legal and financial headache that results from such an event, i walked around my neighborhood and took pictures.
the light was beautiful this afternoon. warm and yellow. somewhat
hopeful, somewhat sad. i walked down Shattuck Ave and took pictures of
graffiti. i walked to Berkeley and took more pictures. on film no less. it feels romantic and poetic in the best way. it'll be some weeks before i make it to the printers but it's exciting just the same. it's been at least 5 years since i've had film developed. there's just something about looking through that little window at the world. in NY i didn't take many pictures at all. i wanted to be entirely in the moment, each and every second. i didn't want to be a spectator or documentarian, i wanted to be human. i wanted to be alive and full of flaws. i wanted to sweat and cuss and laugh and that's exactly what i did. in fact, i haven't taken many pictures at all for the passed several years other than to document art. i'm not sure where the urge to make photographs went or why it left me. seeing the francesca woodman retrospective at SFMOMA at the beginning of the year woke up an old, hidden urge. it woke up so many ignored desires. it woke up a forgotten courage too.
and i've been writing like crazy. poems are spilling out of me again. little snippets of prose, descriptions of memories, secret desires and the way smiles look in the dark.
something has definitely changed within me. i visited my tiny storage unit for the first time in close to 7 months. everything inside seemed so foreign to me, distant, relics from a past life... the objects of ghosts. and when the wrecking crew came to collect my car this afternoon, i didn't remove the 7 year old art that was rolled up in the back seat. i let it get wrecked along with the rest.
clean slate.
2 comments:
I'm sorry about your car, but glad about your photography. The transition from film to digital was a difficult one for me to make and i still miss the old way. It seems to make the process feel a bit more real, that satisfying "th-thunk" of the shutter opening and closing and the anxious waiting to see what is produced. ahhhh...photography :)
it's pretty fun! although i love both analouge and digital, there really is something about the magic of film. it definitely feels more active, more physical and visceral, i agree. and THE WAITING!!!! the key ingredient of lust! i have 3 rolls of film sitting here waiting to be processed.
yes, my heart is definitely a bit broken about the bumble bug. i had her for 10 years. :(
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