New work from today.
I’m starting to feel like I need more time. Maybe I need to stay in Boston.
This is a song I recorded recently. I hope you like it.
Today I went to McDonalds to meet up with Billy but instead found Mike sitting by himself. We talked for a while about this and that but eventually we grew silent. I started to think “What’s the point of this? Is it possible for me to even help these people? Would anyone really care about them if they saw the pictures? Are the images doing them justice.”
It all really got to me. I started to feel really small. I still do. “Why take pictures of others misfortune?” It’s a question I can answer just yet.
The story is moving so slowly. I’m not sure I even have time to tell it the way it needs to be told. I just hope the the kids let me in soon.
Here’s a loose edit from today. I didn’t get much but I was introduced to Mike, who is a part of the homeless community here in Brighton. He agreed to introduce me to the rest of the community soon.
Some of you have asked for details on what they do during the day so I thought I’d elaborate. Geni and Billy are usually together by the time Matthew (8 year old) returns from school and Michael (20 year old) gets off work. Usually they’re busy with trips to the hospital to get things figured out with Billy’s lost medical insurance card and getting him his medications for his leg and tourettes. When they don’t have any appointments though they spend their time at the McDonalds.
Billy has been accepted by the local homeless community. They like him because he doesn’t beg for money from people (which they don’t tollerate because it attracts the cops). He just minds his business. They take care of Billy by bringing him food and teaching him how to stay out of trouble with the cops (who are good about the homeless people there most of the time) and also help him turn in empty bottles for money.
His shopping cart holds everything he owns. He has a few changes of clothes, some bottles for water, some food, and a bag with legal documents in it.
I went back to meet up with the family from yesterday. This is a very loose edit.
Today a story fell into my lap.
I went out to shoot my neighborhood. I wasn’t looking for anything. I just wanted to meditate with a camera. I had walked around for about an hour and decided to go down a road I had never gone down before (literally not metaphorically). To my left was a woman standing in an empty parking lot with a shopping cart full of what appeared to be trash. Even from a distance it was clear what the situation was. But then from behind her an 8 year old boy ran out throwing a ball in the air.
I decided to go over to them to maybe take their picture. Before I could even lift the camera the woman asked me “What are you taking pictures of?” I told her “Anything.”
We started to talk and before I knew it I was learning about their lives in incredible detail. A strange thing for most people but heaven for a photographer.
Their story is roughly this: Geni and her two kids (ages 8(who has tourettes syndrome) and 20) were kicked out of their apartment in East Boston because they couldn’t pay rent. Because they had nowhere to go they ended up staying with a friend but had to leave because of the friends heroine addiction. They are now living in a motel. Geni’s husband of 22 years (who also has tourettes syndrome) is unable to work because of a leg condition that had him in the hospital until recently. He is also not allowed to stay with his family under some rule that the motel has so he has no choice but to sleep next to the Charles River or behind the motel.
I have no idea why they are so willing to let me follow them around and photograph their life. I really hope this turns into something.
Old woman in her living room.
I finally scanned some black and white film. I’ve only ever done color so this is new to me. I’m putting them up here for you guys to see not because they’re anything special but because in the not too distant future I hope to look back at these and see how far I’ve come. And by that I mean with my developing and scanning process.
My goal for the next few months is to be set up to roll, process, and scann my film at home. I hope it happens the way I’m planning it to. And I hope you all come along for the ride.
"Just read this on www.aPhotoEditor.com. I thought I’d share: “There is a universal truth about creatives: At some point in his or her career, he or she will have an ego that far outweighs the depth of their experience and the quality of their work. It may last for decades or it could shrink the minute that person walks out of art school."
aphotoeditor.com
I enjoy this song.
(a shot from my animal project.)
Sometimes you start a project solely out of instinct. A voice in the back of your head sits there talking to you until you pick up the camera and respond.
For me it was exactly this way. The trouble is my inability to articulate why I’m doing it. Saying that it makes sense in my head is never enough. The reason is there buried under my failed attempts to address it.
So I had to go back to square one. I had to talk with the voice again. Why did I wan’t to even do this? What is the value to me? In asking these questions I made the decision to do some research but also revisit what inspired the voice to speak up initially.
There are three major points that put it all into perspective for me again:
1) Studies have proven that animals in captivity live much shorter than those in the wild. For example a wild elephant lives an average of 56 years but an elephant in captivity only lives about 16.9 years.
2) Zoos today still routinely take animals from the wild. This does not mean animals that were need of being “saved”. On top of this zoos today often supply animals for experimentation and to exotic meat buyers around the world.
3) On average zoo goers spend less than 2 minuets reading the sign for each exhibit. There are also a staggering number of zoos that lack signs in the first place.
So what do these facts mean to me? It tells me that we don’t go to the zoo because we want to educate our kids and ourselves, we don’t go because we care about animal rights and their welfare. We go because we are obsessed with entertainment.
Somewhere along the line we looked a lions home and said “You know, I could make something just as good and it would save us a lot of trouble.”
