Photos of The Day

I took these photos at the Central Park Conservatory this weekend. I can't tell you how hard I worked to get these just perfect. I've been shooting in manual mode on my Nikon more often and I love it. Manual is literally just shooting the way you would with a regular film camera if you can remember what that was like. There was no auto focus, no little red light or beeping alert telling you what to do. It gives you control over focus, light metering and depth of field. Fortunately, my Nikon give me the option to go back to a somewhat analog style of shooting. I don't have a macro lens on my camera but I thought I would play around in manual to get this somewhat macro close effect. It came out so much better than I imagined.

Can we talk about how absolutely miraculous the structure of flowers are? I was just in awe looking at these forms of life up close. There is so much going on in the world of plants that we don't know about. As insignificant as it may seem to us, our survival is dependent in many ways upon their ability to function in a balanced eco system. I now begin to understand why Stevie Wonder was moved to make a double album about them for the soundtrack of a small documentary of the same name. There really is a secret life there.

Saturday in Central Park

I got up early this Saturday morning, ran some errands on Union Square and then took the green line to 86th and walked to Central Park. It was a gorgeous day and being broke lately, I just wanted to remind myself that money is not the only path to happiness. I am totally content walking through the park, snapping hundreds of pictures and just enjoying nature. This is what I wish I could do every day! When I'm here I can't believe I have to put on a costume and go to work the next day.

I walked across the park to 59th Columbus Circle which ended up being quite a work out. I had to meet a friend there though so in the end I was kind of in a hurry. I hate hurrying through the park. There was just so much to see and hear and smell and touch. I have to go on one of those boats rides before the summer is over. We should all go! So get ready! And don't let me forget!

Also I'm realizing finally that taking a picture of something and experiencing it are two completely separate events. I mean there are so many technical things that divide the subject from the viewer aesthetically, eg., colors, light and shadow are never reflected in a picture the way they are seen with the human eye. A photograph is a total recreation or rendition of real life in a square or rectangle box. We may understand this intellectually but for me, taking as many pictures as I do every week, it really does start to feel like living in two different worlds simultaneously: behind the camera and not behind the camera. This suits me just fine. I get bored very easily and duality is my favorite drug. I thrive on multiplicity. There's really just no other way for me.

When I look at the sunlight streaming through the leaves of a tree, what I'm seeing is a combination of things, both material and spiritual, projected through a collection of things that make up whoever I am at the moment. A photograph is a way of trying to capture that moment as a reminder of those things, of the feeling that is evoked in that moment, but it is not that moment. The moment itself cannot be captured. So a picture is like the shadow of a memory. Memories, which live inside us change as we change. Pictures remain the same.

But what I love about pictures, which is what I love about art in general, is that every person sees something different in every picture. No single person sees a picture in exactly the same way that another person does. Because they are viewing the picture with the collective perception of their own personal experiences, regardless of whatever perceived objectivity they believe is within their means,the resulting experience is always unique in some way depending on whomever is viewing it.

Images have the power to inform our own personal stories in different ways and so we tend to ascribe autonomous influences to some photos or pieces of art more than others. But the most affecting influence is always the one we carry around inside ourselves. And I believe that art is just a wonderful way of manifesting material evidence of that. But above all, it is a way of sharing each others thoughts and memories in hopes of feeling less isolated, staying connected and striving to create something evermore transforming and informative about the nature of existence.