Distraction

Here's a portrait I made a month or so ago of myself and a guy who is capable of driving me to distraction. I also took some photos of him while he was sleeping, but they didn't come out quite the way I wanted.

This week my brother is getting married and I turn forty years old, and I'm going out of the country over this coming holiday weekend.

Haruki Murakami on Writing

The problem with talent, though, is that in most cases the person involved can't control its amount or quality. You might find the amount isn't enough and you want to increase it, or you might try to be frugal to make it last longer, but in neither case do things work out that easily. Talent has a mind of its own and wells up when it wants to, and once it dries up, that's it.

From What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami

How Great is This Kid?

Answer: REALLY, REALLY GREAT. A few weeks ago Oliver was helping me out in the studio-- for the first time ever I had him actually helping me with a shoot. I was struggling for space and places to put things as per usual, and probably swearing in a mostly child-approved way. Oliver then suggested that I take his room for my studio, and give him my studio for his bedroom.

I was blown away by his generosity. This suggestion of his was totally unprompted or hinted at. In fact I was reluctant to consider it at first. As it turns out, this weekend I primed and painted my studio to make it a nice clean space for Ollie's new bedroom. I'm going to have a much, much bigger studio now, with more light, in Ollie's old bedroom. And he's going to get a new bunk bed in the bargain, which seems only fair.

Photograph of Oliver Beck-Horne at his grandparents house in Winston-Salem, NC taken by his sister and talented SVA photo student Chloe Beck.