Winter 2011

It is amazing to see my son learning to read and write. He can now form and write sentences all by himself. His drawings are also so super. Above is one I really like from this winter. The past few weeks have been especially hard to get into the studio as I have a major renovation going on in the garden rental apartment below us at my house. Ollie's dad is doing a lot of the renovating, so I've been keeping Ollie busy all weekend. Hopefully this construction will be wrapping up soon and I'll be able to get back to my studio.

One Step at a Time

This shot is from a few weeks back-- I need to buy some new seamless so I can execute this the way I want it. I didn't have enough space here, but I liked the greenish cast of this test shot. Got a few hours in the studio on Saturday while Ollie was at a friend's house. It was the first time in a few weeks I'd been able to get any studio time and it was so great. It is usually hard and scary to get going again after a break, but things were flowing, ideas were happening, and I was working them out. Bliss.

michel szulc krzyzanowski

I have followed Michel Szulc Krzyzanowski's work for a few years- one of my first blog posts was about his show in NY at Robert Mann in 2008. Just looking at his work today while running though ideas for an upcoming shoot at the WSJ, and was reminded just how interesting and flexible he is as an artist. Above is one I particularly like.

Happy Valentine's Day

In honor of valentine's day, I'm posting this photo of my Grandfather Phil and Grandmother Doris, on their wedding day. They knew each other a very short time before getting married, and then my Grandpa was off to the Navy to fly planes in WWII. Their marriage produced four sons, and ended only with my Grandmother's death, when I was thirteen. The dress my Grandma is wearing in this photo is hanging in my mother's closet in Santa Barbara, it is dark blue velvet with cream colored lace details. I remember being allowed to try it on when I was a girl, and I didn't want to take it off.

Kinky DYI in Los Angeles

A short visit to Los Angeles over last weekend came with a round of gallery viewings. One of the best things I saw was at the Nicodim Gallery on Cienega Blvd, by the Romanian artist Alex Mirutziu. I love the weirdness of this sculpture that seems to be a DIY fetish mask and ball gag. And the mundane pull strings on the head covering in the other shot.

And now for something completely different

Last weekend instead of shooting in my studio I went to a big hotel with a friend who was modeling in a fashion shoot, and took some behind the scenes shots for her. It was so much fun, it was ridiculous.

German Herrera

Today I had a few moments to breathe at work and started in on clearing my desk and building up my bookmarks of photographers. I came across the above image of German Herrera's that I hadn't seen before. I love German's work-- it is maddeningly subtle and suggestive. It kind of makes me crazy that I only half-know what I'm looking at, I'm often left with scraps of my own fancies to complete my understanding. I met German at the Center for Photography at Woodstock some years ago, and had a chance to see his work in person in his solo show there. The prints are lovely and smallish, and I found myself peering into them like portholes...

Several limited edition, hand made artist books of Herrera's work are available for purchase, and a monograph is currently in preparation and will be published by the Antonio Saura Foundation in 2011.