Thinking

Drowning in ideas.
Drought of art.
Thinking with my hands.

Collections

I decided to continue doing similar "collections" to the first one I did while in Seattle. Every place I've gone while in Europe, I have been collecting random objects around the city and photographing them together. The objects are usually insignificant and often broken, but my hope is that by putting them together- piecing them into the same frame, and photographing them in good light, they can become beautiful and whole again.

The objects are always photographed in or around the place that I stay while in each place. Since these found "things" are essentially my only possessions (other than the clothes and few items I have with me), it seems only fitting that they be in the place closest to my "home".

I select the objects with no particular pre-requisite in mind. Just anything I notice, or that catches my eye. Some collections are much larger than others, and some follow more patterns (things found on the beach, construction tools) which provides an interesting commentary on each city I'm in.

The thing I like most about these collections is that they seem to capture the feelings of being in a new place and trying to digest a myriad of new stimuli. The result is a fragmented and jumbled experience grounded only by a memory of the place you were.

Edinburgh, Scotland

fall flowers, old sea glass, red rock, new shell, yellow rock, spiral shell, tree coral, lost reminder, castle wall, yellow leaf, old shell, early Christmas, blind pirate, naked seagull, would-be sea glass

Florence, Italy

broken piece of old wall, found blue button, shiny shard, metal tube, lost blue note in Italian, metal vertebra, drunken couple, piece of new wall, purple broken sacrifice , tightly packed glass shards, metal hook

Venice, Italy

once glowing red leaves, questionable bottle, tree brains, 'love therapy' gnome


Palermo, Italy

broken mosaic, red flowers, wired glass, half of a postcard, spring, light bulb remnant's, volcanic rock, green gem from trash pile, red leaves, banyon tree seed, tooth/rock, curious metal disk



Syracuse, Italy

ocean floors, strange rock, banyon tree seeds, snail shells found in ruins, old tiles, rock with fossil imprints, bird bone

Starting the Unicorn Hunt

Unicorn
From Biennale, Venice Italy
Image curtousy of by tschnitzlein [soon to be back on Flickr]

-This post was originally written at the end of Sept-



As I currently sit in the Amsterdam airport, it is finally starting to sink in. I have made it to Europe, and shortly I will living in Rome for the next few months. After weeks of people asking “Are you excited?!” and my rehearsed reply “Yes, I am really excited”, but the reality was that it hadn’t really hit me. And how can it? Consumed in the logistics applying for the program, moving back to my home in Portland, packing and getting everything ready to go, you never have a chance to really think about the going part.

But as I sit here sipping a Koffee, brain and body befuddled of the day and time, I felt it. Realizing where I was, where I was going, that I was doing it completely independently my excitement sunk in. Knowing that I am embarking on, undoubtedly, one of the most significant journeys of my life, I felt a mix of curiosity, anticipation and hopeful expectations.

I felt the most appropriate thing to call my time in Rome “the unicorn hunt” because, where could be a better place to find the majestic creature than a place as magical as Roma?

More importantly, this is the first time that I will be able art and only art. It is the first time I will have a studio, and the ability to really take advantage of studio time. The unicorn is a creature that is majestic, pure and true. It is beautiful as something, which both exists and does not exist, paradoxically real and unreal- or finding a home somewhere in between. It is everything I desire my art to become. Alas, this quest is in a foreign land lined with artistic influence and a place where I am doing nothing but breathing aesthetics. My hope is that his romantic new stetting ill be the context most ideal for the capture of this mythical creature and the discovery of all it represents.