Where does aesthetically wonderful and conceptually rich meet? Is there a place?  How does one go about making work that is so visually engaging that the audience feels compelled to spend a considerable amount of time in front of it, but still reaches really important issues or creates good discussion? 

It's been a long week, especially weekend, so I'm just going to throw up some photos and thoughts. The vomit begins
now.

I think I would be considerably less stressed if I worked in the darkroom every single day. Everything is slowed down and feels so simplified when I'm in there, and I love the magic of chemistry. I don't have to battle technology, and I can experiment and move around as much as I like. 

Some people think in color, some people think in grayscale, some images are about color, some images are held back by color. I think I think in one or the other depending on what camera I'm using. If I'm shooting in digital, it's usually color. If I'm shooting with black and white film, I tend to look for black and white images in the world. 

I recently started developing my own roll film, and it is crazy exciting. Nothing absolutely spectacular has come out of my camera yet, but I'm happy to be making work, learning new things, and thinking new thoughts. 

I'm still not entirely sure what my work is about, and that absolutely terrifies me. I'm starting to wonder if everything I thought it was about is wrong, and it's actually just about the quiet, contemplative moments and sights in life that are important in an unarticulatable way. 

There are occasions when I think I'm majoring in photography only because I can't major in book arts. 

It seems that I'm subconsciously trying to complete a major and three minors; I'm taking an art history course for fun next semester and a geology class even though I've completed all of my MIAD science credits. 

I'm really interested in photographing on the bus. Not necessarily people (see Walker Evans), but the scenes outside the window and compositions that are created by objects and graffiti left behind by riders. I expressed my concerns of getting in trouble for photographing the wrong things or people in a public space to Larry, and he gave me his usual words of wisdom. "Shoot first and apologize later, or run like hell."

I want to work with my Polaroid Land camera more.