tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28154988.post6344185698760747771..comments2024-03-26T01:59:52.206-04:00Comments on Just outside: Brian Olewnickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08567239067604835372noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28154988.post-66694286018721170582007-07-16T12:00:00.000-04:002007-07-16T12:00:00.000-04:00Richard, I can certainly (not surprisingly) see af...Richard, I can certainly (not surprisingly) see affinities between your photos and some of my own work.<BR/><BR/>One of the other main "themes" (if you will) of my painting that smoothed the way for my hearing re: eai, was an early interest in the spatial tension between two separated objects. I remember taking two otherwise boring vases in the Vassar art studio and just placing them on a little ledge on a white wall, maybe a foot apart. Something about their relationship (again, against this "blank" wall, which wasn't, serving as spatial intermediary) really fascinated me. For a long time, I did pieces with two objects, rarely overlapping, against more or less monotone backgrounds, really enjoying the push-pull I was seeing between them (of course, extrapolating out from objects--generally everyday things like sticks, stones, candy, what-have-you--to human psychology. That's similar to the way I hear, say, a Rowe/Nakamura event, listening for the tensions between them as much as the sounds created.<BR/><BR/>In some of the last pieces I did, I tended more toward single objects, trying for the same tension between the item and the ground. Hard to describe and, to be sure, most people would look at them and see just a pretty well-rendered stone or mollusk shell...Brian Olewnickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08567239067604835372noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28154988.post-34793207760801314202007-07-16T06:31:00.000-04:002007-07-16T06:31:00.000-04:00Brian that's really great stuff, and I'm a little ...Brian that's really great stuff, and I'm a little scared how closely I can relate to a lot of what you are saying.<BR/><BR/>I had a similar art class experience myself when I was young. Our tutor had set up tables of supposedly interesting still live compositions that small groups of us were to sit around in a semi circle and paint. The composition I and a few others were placed in front of was the usualy tedious collection of plants, vases, skulls, sacking etc...<BR/>As I sat and concentrated i realised pretty quickly that the haphazard pile of coats and bags dumped on the floor by my fellow students behind the table was of much more interest. So as my colleagues painted away at the specified composition my painting was of this heap of randomly fallen colours framed by the table legs in the foreground.<BR/><BR/>The other interesting element that this way of seeing/understanding presents you with is the importance of timing. Perhaps if you came back the next day to finish the painting you had begun things would have changed, something been moved, nature's natural clock casting new shadows. Obviously as field recordings capture a moment so does this kind of painting. I know for sure I had to paint fast in my situation, as anyone could have decided they needed somethign from their bag at any point...<BR/><BR/>This way of seeing beyond the obvious tends to inform a lot of my photography these days. Photography tends to lend itself more easily to grabbing what may at first seem everyday, mundane and highlighting the life within it, the spaces and how it interplays with the spaces around it.<BR/>The tendency (for me at least) is to close in on details though, and present something more abstract by isolating one small part of it. Perhaps it would be nice to just present things as they are, maybe just randomly pointing the camera in an interesting place to see what results.<BR/><BR/>I know for certain I am regularly surprised / interested in those happy accidents that happen when the camera goes off when you didn't mean it to, and you get back home and plug in the USB cable and try and work out where on earth that intriguing image came from.<BR/><BR/>Two recent examples of photos I don't remember taking:<BR/><BR/>http://www.flickr.com/photos/46668551@N00/820427911/<BR/>http://www.flickr.com/photos/46668551@N00/772538918/Richard Pinnellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00168522717135806763noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28154988.post-67112746617903438712007-07-13T14:41:00.000-04:002007-07-13T14:41:00.000-04:00Heh, yeah I guess should mention that none of the ...Heh, yeah I guess should mention that none of the above observations was hallucinogenically inspired, having been "clean" in that regard since 17.<BR/><BR/>Haven't heard of Feld, will check him out, thanks.Brian Olewnickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08567239067604835372noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28154988.post-36871291355331088502007-07-13T14:37:00.000-04:002007-07-13T14:37:00.000-04:00Hi- Great thoughts on what maybe could be called f...Hi- Great thoughts on what maybe could be called field of perception. I only became aware of the kind of attention you refer to during my experiences with hallucinogens. Those days are 20 years gone but the expansive sense of light and air is still accessible. Cats sometimes seem particularly talented at this sort of global perception. The kitten my housemate brought home recently sits and stares at the curtains for long periods of time, whether there's a breeze or not.<BR/><BR/>Have you heard Steve Feld's The Time of Bells series on Vox Lox? (http://www.voxlox.net/). It's called "documentary sound art" but there's much more than that in Feld's field. <BR/><BR/>PBPeter Breslinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15466530226652452872noreply@blogger.com