Mystic Lake Recon Mission

On Saturday, my friend Mark Lee and I went on a reconnaissance mission up to Mystic Lake in the rain armed with a couple holgas. This was mainly an attempt to see what was happening up there in preparation for my grant this summer. It turns out, as shown in the last image, the trail was washed out by the stream about a mile from the lake. We found this out after trekking 4 miles up the trail, 2 of which was snow pack, in our Chacos. Give it 2 weeks, hopefully most of the snow will be gone by then and I will be able to get to start on my grant work. Till then, I think I can survive a couple more Chaco snow adventures!

Friday Night Special

"Mark Spencer's Pull Out, Portland. 2011"

Because friday nights were made to stay in and go to bed early, I thought this would be appropriate. My side of the bed in the Mark Spencer Hotel in Portland, Oregon for Photolucida. Now off for a night of "staying in," and "going to bed early."

Semester Recap

This post is just a recap on my Spring 2011 semester. All I have to say is, "what a semester!" Portraiture, Alternative process, recent photo history, and TAing for Alexis Pike's color class as well as working 32 hours a week on the night shift almost killed me. But this semester was one of incredible growth and clarity in my blossoming photographic career. It started with a trip to Atlanta for the SPE national conference. This was the first time I was able to really listen to contemporary art photographers talk at length about their work. To hear their influences and thoughts behind their imagery really made me think critically about my own work. Then there was Personal Vision, the juried University photo show put on by MSU. A lot of good work was shown by a lot of great photographers and friends. I was fortunate enough to be chosen for the grand prize with my image "7th and Dickerson", a diptych I made for my portraiture final. My parents were there for the opening, and my friends and I celebrated responsibly afterwards. The most memorable experience by far though has to be the trip to Portland for Photolucida. Collin Avery, Megan Dunbar, Libbie Anderson and myself were chosen by a portfolio submission to volunteer, and the school would pay for everything but food. I can't explain how amazing it was to be surrounded by some of the biggest names in contemporary art photography. Everyone was super nice, friendly, and easy to talk to. It was great to meet people I have only been able to talk to over e-mails, and to make new connections with people who are intelligent, thoughtful image makers. After Photolucida it was an all out assault on final projects that included 2 all nighters and on average less than 4 hours of sleep a night till last week. But everything got finished, and now it is summer.

THE FUTURE!! I applied for, and received, a USP grant from MSU to photograph up by Mystic Lake and document the area that would be flooded by the proposed dam if it were to be built. I will be spending a couple weekends a month camping up there and photographing as much as possible with my Pentax 6x7. (the big camera in the image above) As this body of work grows, I am hoping to promote it to various galleries around town and to environmental groups. I am also planning on donating it to the Bozeman Survey Project in the fall. Other than that, I will just be carrying my Minox (tiny camera in the picture) everywhere I go, and enjoying what might be my last summer in Bozeman for a while.