Robert Adams

While we were in Denver we went  to see an exhibition of Robert Adams work, which by chance was on during our stop there.
I only fairly recently got to know/appreciate Adams work.....I guess in the past I'd been fairly dismissive of anything that smelled too much of landscape ...how stupid I have been...
Anyway, a few months before leaving the UK I bought Adam's Summer Nights Walking, it's a beautiful small book.
So I was happy to find this exhibition on. As always it's a pleasure to be near the prints, and as I discover, to be near to where Adams lived and worked...I begin to understand more beyond the images on the page....
Adams, to me, is a bit of a spiritual man, and some of the small sentences he writes feel so pure in their origin...

"often there doesn't seem to be anything there, I feel foolish to have stopped, but small things can become important, a Lark or a Mailbox, or Sunflowers.
and if I wait I may see architecture - the road, the fields, the sky." RA
this one I also liked
"on the Prairies there is sometimes a quiet so absolute that it allows me to begin again, to love the future"
You can see more of Adams work and listen to him speak here , here, and here

installation Denver

all images © to Robert Adams

The Car

©Andrew Bush

Many of the secondhand bookshops we have been in have very good photography sections.
We recently picked up Andrew Bush 's book Drive.  Shot between 1989 and 1997 around LA. Andrew created a rig which would allow him to shoot while driving at speed of between 50 to 70 MPH.
Here is an interview explaining his methods.

©Andrew Bush

©Andrew Bush

While trying to figure out how to photograph the street, one of the methods I have been employing is photographing people in their cars. It's one of the few methods I've found of creating portraits of people in the landscape . The light at this time of the year is perfect for this.

Ogden, Utah

Denver

Spokane, Washington

MoMA interviews and NYC

MoMA have audio interviews from all the photographers in the New Photography show up on their website. Tomorrow there is a second opening of the exhibition alongside 2 other photography exhibitions showing in the other galleries. So a 3 day break from the road trip and back to NYC.
It feels like a different country. After the open landscape of the West, the empty streets, the suburbs and almost exclusively white population, it is great to be in the grime, the noise, the busy streets and the many different shades of people. I have to admit I've missed the unpredictability a big city gives you.

NYC

Veterans day

Listening to National Public Radio in the car yesterday, there was a discussion and phone-in about war veterans. A lot of vets were calling in about their situation since leaving the army. Whatever we might think about the rights and wrongs of all the wars the US and it's European allies have been involved in, their stories were incredibly sad and tragic. What really got me, was the high level of homelessness and unemployment . About 1/3 or 110,000 of the male adult homeless population are veterans, and more than 1/2 of these are African American or Hispanic. On top of all this you have post-traumatic stress disorder, mental illness, alcohol and/or substance abuse, marriage and family breakups
I find it hard to understand politicians that are happy to send young men and women to war but are not willing to take responsibility of these same people once they leave the army. 
More info on unemployment of young vets here at Bloomberg.
Also on the NPR website are portraits of Veterans by Suzanne Opton
Through The Lens: Seeing Veterans Up Close

©Suzannes Opton

Colorado

Colorado

Levittown: First American Suburb

Came across this article on the BBC website the other day about the first US Suburb, Levittown in Pennsylvania

They have all moved to the Mall.

While we were in New York, we made a visit to Aperture and came across the newly released book by Brian Ulrich,  Is this great or what.

The book is a 10 year work looking at shopping malls,  thrift shops and shops that have closed down.
It's a really well realised project and well worth buying a copy.
Here is an Interview with Joerg Colberg on Conscientious Extended.

© Brian Ulrich

I only mention Brians work now, because by coincidence  Vanessa received an email from Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa who edits the interesting website The Great Leap Sideways. 
Stanley:   
 "I noticed George had mentioned the absence of people on the streets and downtown, and mention it only because I just interviewed Brian Ulrich about his Copia work for the forthcoming book and he said that he saw that work in a way as taking street photography indoors, because that was where the people had moved to. It casts his pictures in an interesting light I think, when you look at them in that fashion."
I couldn't agree more, the street in small towns and cities has difinately moved to the strip malls.
It's a fairly depressing sight to see. From town to town you see the same companies dominating. In a land that's supposed to promote competition, I think I have never seen such a narrow amount of choice. 
Downtowns have been designated historical centres, with a few independent shops, bars and galleries. But even these begin to take on a repetition. Thankfully the landscape that surrounds these towns is truly stunning, beautiful and keeps surprising us.

Utah

Installation photographs from Hereford

Just received some installation photos from the Hereford photography festival.

Georgia  "Seeds carried by the Wind"

Georgia  "Seeds carried by the Wind

Shadow of the Bear

Shadow of the Bear