NEW YORK NEW YORK – Here’s the dark underside of the photo-a-day experience: sometimes you just don’t feel like it. I found myself walking in the Village today, coming back from a meeting at the James Beard House. I just wasn’t seeing well. Here’s the best of a bad lot – a tree shadow on West 12th Street.
On this day one year ago: an IR image from Indio California.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I spent this evening at the Armory Show, a major annual art show held here in New York. It was held this year on Piers 92 and 94 on the Hudson River. Pier 92 was focused primarily on modern – I spent most of my time there. Why is it called the “Armory Show”? I guess because it used to be held in the Seventh Regiment Armory on Park Avenue, but has clearly outgrown that space. It was a nice chance to catch up with my old friends James Barron, an art dealer based in Rome and Kent Connecticut, and Jeanette Montgomery Barron, a prominent photographer.
There was a lot that was of interest, but nothing new or radical. Here’s my picture for the day, captured with my Panasonic GH2 and a 20mm pancake lens:
On this day one year ago: Cholla, Joshua Tree National Park.
More images from the Armory Show picking up on some of the themes. As I said, nothing really new.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Back in my comfort zone. A clear, cold sunny day in Manhattan with really good light and reflections.
One of the things that I like about this is the way the the building mimics Manhattan’s grid.
On this day one year ago: Barrego badlands.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – A very gray day here. I took my Leica and a few lenses out to capture something moody. Carl Schurz Park lent itself to to these explorations – it has a Victorian feel and is magnificently sited on the East River. For some reason, though I wasn’t in the moment and wasn’t really seeing. Here’s the image that I went out to capture – I liked the curving steps, the barren tree, the background and the very subdued light, but the picture is ruined because of the overlap of the light post and the tree. There juxtaposition creates a real compositional problem, probably solvable by taking a step or two to the right or left. Oh well . . . .
On this day last year: Salton Sea sunset.
This was the first evening of our Salton Sea explorations last year.
WARREN CONNECTICUT – After three inches of new snow overnight we had a bracingly cold and clear day in Connecticut. Have I mentioned that this has been the coldest, most snow-covered winter ever? But at least I feel that I’m back on my daily photo game again after a rough day yesterday. Taken with my Hasselblad H4D-60 and a 35-90 zoom lens. I’m using the Hasselblad rather than the Alpa because the external battery that I bought to power the digital back on the Alpa doesn’t seem to have enough capacity in this very cold weather. A common issue with batteries, but disappointing nonetheless. Basil the Norwich terrier snuck into this one, creating another exception to my “no pets” rule on this blog.
If you compare this images with yesterday’s, you’ll see that we have a lot more snow in Warren than in New Milford, which is less than 20 miles south. This is typical. Warren, and even our hillside in Warren, is at least one USDA zone colder than the surrounding towns.
On this day one year ago: Portrait of Richard Cohen for the jacket of his book Chasing the Sun.
NEW MILFORD, CONNECTICUT – A bad day in the one photo every day world. We drove up to Connecticut on Saturday morning (the weather was terrible on Friday night, our usual drive time). I packed my Hasselblad and Alpa and couple of lenses. On arriving in Connecticut I discovered that I had left the CompactFlash memory card in the computer in New York. I couldn’t shoot the Hasselblad or Alpa because I didn’t have any digital film. I didn’t have another camera with me, not even an iPhone. Warren Connecticut is rural and quite isolated – there’s really no place close by that carries memory cards.
So what to do? I drove south the New Milford Connecticut because there’s a Radio Shack in a shopping center there. The drive took 45 minutes because of road construction (it’s usually 25 minutes). This gave me plenty of time to think about how stupid I am and to plot a route back that avoided the construction. When I arrived at the Radio Shack they didn’t have a CompactFlash card. The salesman tried to sell me a memory stick card saying it’s exactly the same (where does Radio Shack get these people?). I went to the Walmart in the same shopping center and found a single 8 meg CompactFlash card hanging at ankle level on one of those displays that retailers use for the small electronic doodads that are sold in impossible-to-open plastic packages. I bought it and painfully broke a fingernail opening the packaging; installed it in the Hasselblad; formatted it and voilà I was good to go. But irritable and out of sorts. This isn’t how I had planned on spending Saturday.
New Milford is kind of a sad place. I’ve commented on this before. It’s a commercial stretch on Route 202 consisting mainly of strip malls. One of my favorite books on life in England is Crap Towns, a listing of the 100 worst towns in England. New Milford would deserve a place in an American edition. There is a village center with large Congregational and Episcopal churches, a library, a town hall and a World War I era tank – reminders of a time when the town projected greater grandeur. I’ve taken quite a few of my daily pictures in New Milford. If you search for New Milford in the search box to the right you will find them.
I was too distracted to get back into the moment so I shot the first thing that came to hand: St. Johns Episcopal Church. The light wasn’t that interesting. The church building was built starting in 1881 sort of gothic HH Richardson – the congregation is 250 years old. Shot with my Alpa Max, a 47mm Rodenstock lens and my newly-purchased 8 meg CompactFlash card.
On this day one year ago: Snow in Central Park. A nice image.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – A seriously bad weather day. I took the Staten Island Ferry. It’s free and offers remarkable views of New York harbor. I had hoped to get wind and rain swept views, but the weather started to break right after we left South Ferry in Manhattan. There were brief moments when shafts of sunlight broke through the overcast. I captured this during one of those moments. So what if it’s sentimental? This made the trip worthwhile – I’ll be back. Taken with my Hasselblad H4D-60 and an HCD 35-90 lens.
On this day last year: Madison Square at night.
