NEW YORK NEW YORK – This is officially a recovery day from the tooth crisis. Walking down Lexington Avenue I tripped on a bit of construction on the sidewalk and fell flat on my face. Still unsteady from having the tooth from hell dug out of my jaw. My Leica M ended up with a minor ding but there appears to be no damage. This is the first day out in several days. Inspiration is thin on the ground but at leas here’s picture of the Frick Museum, three frames stitched with my Leica Monochrom. I’m hopeful that we’ll begin to see some ok photographs. This is not much of an image but at least I’m out of the house shooting.
The Frick
WASHINGTON DC – I’m leaving out the ironic references to “Our Nation’s Capital”. It’s sad to see this disfunctional sprawl close up. But this is a lovely time of year here with the magnolias and cherries in blossom so let’s enjoy the chance to photograph. I spent this afternoon at the Smithsonian American Art Museum guided by the Museum’s director, Betsy Broun. The courtyard, pictured below, is one of my favorite spots for a casual lunch in Washington, but this was my introduction to the collection, which is splendid. It shares the former Patent Office building the the Smithsonian Portrait Gallery. Anyway, the courtyard:
Courtyard
On this day last year: Birch madness. I think that almost everyone who has a camera ranks birches as nearly as irresistible as dogs and babies. I have posted no fewer than 11 pictures with “birches” in the title since a started this project. None of them is much good. Repeat after me: “I won’t shoot birches. I won’t shoot birches. I won’t shoot birches . . .”
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I promise that I’m going to quit this. I mean the wide angle thing. Quit it real soon now. Maybe it’s becoming a crutch. Or worse. My name’s Woody and I’m a wide angle junkie. But later. Maybe. For now I had my Leica and my super wide lens in hand as I walked by the Guggenheim earlier today. If you’ve been following these pages closely you’ll know that the Guggenheim is the one icon that I’ve been struggling with. Well today with Mr. wide I caught it – the first image of the museum that I’m really happy with. Here it is (this is another one of those shot straight up images that could be oriented any of four ways, but I prefer this orientation):
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A tough day for photographs: meetings all morning followed by a large lunch in a dark restaurant. Ugly, gray light outside. Late in the day I found myself uptown near Frank Lloyd Wright’s Gugenheim Museum. I have an ongoing project shooting iconic buildings as if one happens upon them at random – the objective is to try to capture the surprise of seeing them for the first time. The Gugeneheim is iconic but it’s hard to “happen upon” it – it’s cut off from Central Park across Fifth Avenue by a wall, and it’s hemmed in on the other three sides by larger buildings and the Manhattan grid. I ended up shooting details, and got this as it was getting dark. Not my best work.
