third nature

Not dead yet

You would be forgiven for thinking, based upon my recent output on this blog, that I’ve packed it in. In fact, I’ve simply packed up all of my belongings and moved down the block, which took much more time and effort than I anticipated. It continues to do so, in fact, since I sit here surrounded by boxes I haven’t even cracked open yet. All of this work has been taking up most of my creative energy at the moment, and leaving me with little time for anything else.

A move down the block doesn’t sound like much, but this transition has definitely shifted my worldview a bit. Maybe it’s just a matter of priorities; moving out of a cramped apartment into a house we own is a big change, and it’s taking some time to adjust. I haven’t had a back yard in more than twelve years, for example, and there are days when all I want to do is stare at this:

It’s not much, yet, but it’s ours. There’s a fig tree back there that’s just getting ripe, with one tempting branch hanging over our fence. Guess what I had for breakfast? And yes, the house came with its very own cast-iron sink birdbath.

And then there’s the work! Nobody told me how much work was involved in keeping a 100-year-old house from collapsing into a pile of bricks. Lets just say that a lot of creative thinking has gone into keeping this place standing over the years, and my wife and I are having a wonderful time unraveling all of it.

In the midst of this packing and unpacking, I have had some time to think about photography and where it is taking me. I started running this summer, mostly through the waterfront neighborhoods of Gowanus and Red Hook, and I’ve started to become interested in photographing the neighborhood again. I’ve photographed around here before (I put a good amount of time into urban landscape photography last summer, for example) but I think I’m seeing things a little differently now and have some new ideas.

One artist I’ve been particularly inspired by over the last month or so is Rackstraw Downes. Downes is a plein-air landscape painter who has done a lot of urban work, including several paintings in my neighborhood. He’s not the easiest artist to follow; his work is quite scattered online, and I don’t hear about much in the way of exhibitions. Interest does seem to be picking up steam, though, and he had a few exhibitions this summer and a new catalog of his work that is at the top of my wishlist.

I came across two articles on Downes last month, one in the Wall Street Journal and one in the New York Times. The images accompanying the Times article are particularly good. I also came across this interview with Downes from 2004, which includes a painting from the park in Red Hook where I run most days. In fact, the grain terminal in that painting was the subject of my very first large format photograph!