Lauren Fleishman

"We have lived in Brighton Beach for 11 years. Before that we lived on Ocean Parkway and Kings Highway for 4 years. We walk on the boardwalk 3 miles each day. At 2 o'clock we watch the news. I like to read books and he reads the newspaper. What is the secret to love? A secret is a secret and I don't reveal my secrets!"

I met with photographer Lauren Fleishman this week, this was the first photographer meeting I've scheduled since starting at The Wall Street Journal. I was happy to see her "Love Ever After" project in person. I really enjoy this series- and it made me a little weepy. This work is showing at the Brooklyn public library now. I also love her project "you would have loved him too", which is very personal narrative. Lauren is a relentless hunter of the intimate in her work..
Address of show:

The Brooklyn Public Library
Central Branch
10 Grand Army Plaza
Brooklyn, New York 11225

Opening is Wednesday the 9th from 6-8PM

iPhone photo of slip and ink double

This is a terrible photo of one of last week's set-ups--I shot in on a friend's iphone so I could post it here..But I think you can get the idea of what I'm after here.

Walking Shoe

I've been shooting a lot, but not able to scan any of it to post. The above was made with a digital camera I rented for the weekend. I'm just posting it to show that I've been working--it is only a sketch. This shoot came out of last weekend's photo of a black slip and it's twin as an ink drawing. Really interested in these inky blacks right now, and stark contrasts. Tomorrow I'm going to buy some more seamless for two new shots I'm hoping to finalize. Giving my rope pictures a rest--still not sure what needs to happen with those, so I'm giving that some time.

Working at the Wall Street Journal has been at lot to get used to at once. I've never worked at a newspaper before, and even though I work only on the weekend edition, there is a lot going on, and all of happening really fast. It is hard to get used to seeing the photos in newsprint. There is something simultaneously disappointing and exhilarating about seeing your efforts reproduced in such a disposable medium. It is also exciting to be working at a publication with a print run of two million.

Rinko Kawauchi

Photo by Rinko Kawauchi

A link to Rinko Kawauchi's work was sent to me by a photographer friend Andres Gonzalez. The above is one of my favorites.
Andres made an insightful comment about my own work back in December, pointing out that I was interested in problem solving in my art work. Of course I've thought about this before, but it was good to have it pointed out. Took exactly one picture today. Tomorrow I plan to get up early and shoot more before Ollie comes home. I'm working on a few things I'm excited about, so that is a good feeling.

I've really been missing the writing and thinking that was going into my old blog, Visual Science...I discovered yesterday that NASA's Chandra blog linked to my post about artist Kevin Sudeith, and re-posted the photo. That made me a happy blogger!

Hedcuts

I had my photo taken this past week at The Wall Street Journal photo studio, to be the basis of one of those famous WSJ woodcut/prints, called hedcuts by those working on the pages. Which is partly why I was caught unprepared for the photo shoot.. Also my own head was spinning around all week from trying to learn the new systems and just finding my way around the building. The purpose of the hedcut is for when I start doing some blogging for the Journal. Which I hope will be soon. My blogging fingers have been itching since I left Visual Science.

At any rate, pretty exciting. However, I had forgotten how soul-crushing midtown is. Actually, I didn't forget. I just forgot what that crushed soul really feels like. The Wall Street Journal shares the building with Fox News, so there is the additional tension of feeling like you are rubbing elbows daily with the enemy. Fox News plays in the elevators, so at any point you can be subject to a crazed right winger, foaming at the mouth and denouncing science.

The photo below was made with paper, held at varying distance from the lens. Another one from my landscape period. I have been shooting new work, but I won't be able to post it until I can sort out a new scanner.

The New Year

I'm starting a new job tomorrow as photo editor for the Wall Street Journal. I'm really looking forward to it. Doing the science beat for Discover has been great, but I'm ready to go back to mainstream media. I won't miss the press announcements about new measurements of earth's magnetism or the latest exoplanet, and worrying about how to art these discoveries. I look forward to never, ever doing another astronomy story. I'm still negotiating about the future of my blog for Discover, Visual Science. Not sure if I'll be able to continue that work.

This is an older photo of mine. It is one of my favorites from my abstract-landscape phase. I really worked hard during that time. My mom has this one on her wall. This Christmas, one of the kids in the house asked if it was a shark fin, and that was cool.

When I made this photo I was thinking about that landscape genre of collapsed barns in prairies. Those barns somehow that became a ship, and also about a re-ocurring dream I had about a shark swimming under me and running its fin along my spine while I floated in the water above. I often awoke from this dream with my back locked in an arch.