Category: Photography

Art

Louisville

Many years ago, Donna went to Louisville, Kentucky, on a business trip. The company she worked for sponsored a workshop and put them all up in the Brown and she raved about it ever since. We finally got to go together last weekend, in company with friends, and my first reaction is—we need another week.

The Brown Hotel is one of those landmarks that has been kept up to snuff and is redolent with the charm of a past that clings here and there and is easy to miss unless you’re looking. We stayed three nights. We will do this again.

The excuse (as if one is needed) was a distillery tour, the Woodford Distillery, which is in Versailles, near Frankfort. I had not realized that bourbon can only be called bourbon if it comes from Kentucky. Like champagne, it is a regional hallmark. We have long since discovered Woodford and have yet to taste anything better. Comparable, sure.

The place has been there since 1812 and the original buildings are still there and in use. Beth, our guide, gave a great lecture while taking us through the facilities. Old stone, the odor of baking bread, a heady wheat and corn aroma, and in some ways the quiet of a church.

It has only been Woodford since 1996, but the continuity has apparently never been broken. (Not sure what they did during Prohibition, but whatever, lots of old distilleries survived somehow.) At the end of the tour we of course spent far too much on the product, bringing home some specialty bottles which we intend to savor carefully.

The grounds as well are beautiful. I could spend a week there photographing. Picturesque is both accurate and a cliché. The two things that hold the imagination of folks there seem to be bourbon and horses.

After the tour, we drove into Frankfort. Frankfort, along with being the state capitol, is also the public art capitol of Kentucky. Lots of murals and street sculpture. We didn’t have the time to really go through it. (One thing, the only Frank Lloyd Wright house in Kentucky is in Frankfort, but it is privately owned and not open for tours. Still, it would have been cool to see it.)

We returned to Louisville and later had dinner at one of the local “famous” watering holes, Jack Fry’s Bar & Grill. Fry was a boxer and opened the restaurant and it is one those “everyone has eaten here” kind of places. The food was excellent, but it was too loud to really carry on  any kind of conversation. (I had lamb chops, Donna has a pork chop.)

We Ubered. I don’t usually, but it was not my choice. Watching Maia navigate the rides prompts me to rethink my attitude.

A lot of upgrading seems to be going on. The confluence of neglect and revitalization is everywhere, and walking down to the river into the museum and bourbon crawl district was a treat.

We toured the Frazier History Museum. Again, a great deal of display space allocated to bourbon, but there’s a lot of early Republic history there. George Rogers Clarke has a statue overlooking the Ohio, and the Frazier had an elaborate Lewis & Clarke section.

On Saturday we walked around a lot, which only made it obvious, despite the pleasure, that we didn’t have enough time. So clearly a return trip is in the future.

We lucked out with the weather. Mid-80s most of the time and very cool evenings. We ended with dinner at a place called Proof (you can interpret that as you will) which turned out to be attached to a 21C Museum Hotel. So after dinner, we toured their current art show.

All in all, as near perfect a long weekend as could be had.  I’ll add a few more photographs below

 

 

 

 

Art

The Past In Black & White

In 2001, Donna and I took a meandering road trip from Oakland to Seattle. It was an amazing trip and I made a lot of photographs. The other day, having some downtime, I fired up the scanner and worked some of those over. What follows are from some side stop in Oregon.

 

 

 

I’ll be doing more of these. I have quite a lot of color from the trip, too. Once again I am amazed at what these negatives can produce through Photoshop. The detail floors me every time. Of course, there are those times when the flaws are magnified, and that’s embarrassing, but in general…

I think I need to get myself an auxiliary hard drive to store these. I have far too many negatives, going back to 1971 or ’72, to just keep on my desktop, and I don’t really want to spend all the money on the Cloud. Anyway, the next thing to take care of.

Thanks for visiting.

Art

Images

The one skill I acquired from my stint at my last lab job was color printing. I’d never been interested before. My few attempts in my own lab had been frustrating and unsatisfying. But I had to do it for the job. I learned. But.

But I will always be fond of black & white. I value good b&w more than color (with certain narrow exceptions).

So I’ve been playing a bit. Here, for your pleasure, are some recent results.

 

blog

Chicago

The first week of April, we boarded a train and headed to Chicago. The train ended up behind a freight train, which slowed us down a bit, so we arrived later than intended. Still, after navigating the construction blocks around Union Station, we summoned a cab and got to our hotel. Famished, we asked what was open this late and were directed to an Italian place three blocks away, which served good pizza.

It was raining when we arrived and continued most of the week to be one degree of wet or another, but it did not deter us.

We met up with friends, ate great good, wandered around the central district around Michigan Avenue, toured some smaller museums, and had a great time.

Chicago is a bit of a joke for us. Not the city but the fact that in 44 years together we have only managed to get there twice. The last time was 24 years ago, for a Worldcon. That one happened 20 years after we met and talked about running up to Chicago. After all, it’s not that far away…

Well, what can I say? Other places, other people got in the way, and we just lacked either the time or the money. Hopefully, that will not be a problem going forward. I’d like to visit once a year at least.

We stayed at a 21C Museum hotel, which was hosting an exhibit which proved to be excellent. Some fine pieces of work, thematically to do with family relations,  both parent-child and siblings.

The restaurant in the hotel, Lure Fishbar, was a marvel. It was the main reason we picked that hotel, as the son of a good friend works there. As one might guess, it specializes in seafood, especially sushi. I’m not myself a big seafood fan, but this was all wonderful. (If you go, ask for Andrew.) And then, the special deal, Donna was able to indulge her love of smoked salmon for breakfast.

The only odd thing was, this is the first hotel room we’ve had since the 1980s that lacked a coffeemaker in the room. Otherwise, comfortable.

And it was almost ideally located for easy access to a lot more of downtown Chicago than we indulged. Did I mention it was wet? One morning is even snowed, but none of it stuck. We went forth, braving the blech weather, and walked quite bit. The highlights include the Museum of Medieval Torture, the American Writers Museum, the Chicago Architecture Center, and the Driehaus mansion, one of those Gilded Age monstrosities that have since been turned into a museum and, in this case, a venue for new art.

And I got to indulge one of my favorite things, which is photography. I count a trip at least partially a success if I get some good images. For instance:

 

 

Chicago is a very photogenic town.

We returned on the train Friday. Neither of us are used to just walking around like that, so we both felt it, but in a good way. Next time we will visit during a bit more temperate weather, something with more sunshine?

Chicago feels like someplace in our backyard, which may be one of the unconscious reasons we haven’t been there more. That has to change. (We did zero shopping, and we were two blocks from Michigan Avenue!) We have friends there, we have no real excuse.

But for now, we had a very good time. Just sharing.

Art

Projecting

I went out yesterday and indulged myself. New clothes. I needed a new belt. Pants. Socks. I haven’t been to a mall in over a year. I used to enjoy them quite a bit. They sprouted like mushrooms for a time, though, and like the gas station wars (which, yes, I remember) they undercut each other until there was an inevitable collapse. The few that have survived, well.

I was amused a couple weeks ago when I had occasion to drive past one of the first in the greater St. Louis area, Crestwood Plaza. In my childhood, we used to run out there. I don’t think they called them strip malls then, but that’s what it was. Then, beginning in the early 70s, it grew and was covered over. The outdoor strip was joined to a roofed-over extension and then later the original strip was enclosed until the whole vast thing was a small town with lots of cool stuff. It was one of the first ones to fall on hard times. Efforts were made to preserve it and for a short while it became an enclave of independent artists. Alas, it wasn’t really close to the wealthier parts of the area to sustain that and it was shut down. Then torn down. Plans for redevelopment followed, many quite grandiose. I hadn’t seen it in a long while. As I drove by I saw that there was a new line of stores…a strip mall. What goes around…

Anyway, I spent too much money on too few things but for a brief moment I felt good. Last week I stopped by an art supply store and bought pencils, pens, and a small sketch pad. I keep intending to start drawing again, maybe even get back into painting (though I was never huge into that). All that stuff is sitting there, waiting. Between my music, photography, and writing, along with the other things I try to keep up on, I honestly don’t know where I’m going fit one more project.

See, it took years to acquire all the skills I have, such as they are. I don’t want to walk away from any of them. But the fact is, I was never really good at most of them, just good enough to show off, as it were, but not good enough to satisfy my own estimates of what that means. And that was fine since for many of those years I hadn’t settled on what I wanted to do. When the writing turned out to be the primary project, all the rest receded and time was reallocated.

You don’t realize how you lose things when you don’t pay due attention to them. It may be that I’m inwardly dreading trying to draw anything anymore, because it’s been so long that I’m sure I’ll suck at it.

And I really can’t stand being bad at the things I like to do.

Now, you might think, reading that, that I had gotten very good at those things at one time. And as far as it goes, I think I was. Drawing and painting, back in my youth, yeah, if I took my time, I was fairly good. But it came “naturally” so I didn’t consider how practice might be necessary. The music? That was….different. And I have over the last several years developed an improvisational method which serves to impress even as it isn’t exactly “good.” I’ve recently set myself to learning actual pieces, but the discipline of practice is a hard one to recover once abandoned. Photography I did for so long that it just seems innate now, and I don’t walk away from it for very long, so while I could certainly be better, I’m not bad,

Writing is the only thing I do with serious intent, and it seems to take up the largest chunk of time.

I don’t seem to be organizing my time very well, especially if I want to start up a new project. I don’t know where I’m going to fit all the things I want to do. That did not used to be an issue. I just did whatever appealed to me that day. It was all so organic.

Subsequently, questions of goals emerge. And I am brought up against a fact about myself that has always been an issue. I do very little just for the sheer pleasure of doing it. Almost nothing. All that I do I have certain intentions, even if only wishes. I started drawing again many years ago when it was pointed out to me that I needed an outlet that had nothing to do with career paths. I pursued it for a while until I found myself looking at the work and thinking, I could sell some of this… At which point it ceased being an outlet and became one more thing with a goal.

I suppose I write these blog posts as outlets. I don’t sell them.  They’re like a shopping trip. Wander through the mall, see what’s new, maybe buy something just for the hell of it.

Anyway, these are some of things occupying my thoughts of late.