I seem to have not quite gotten around to going to bed yet. Anyway figured I’d point out that there are a few new photos up on my Flickr account. They stretch back to the tastes-so-moreish-because-it’s-so-amazingly-good dinner that Geoff cooked for me and New Years Eve, forward to the wedding in Canberra. I had a bit of fun taking photos after stealing Geoff’s camera and remembered how much I miss getting that ‘really good’ photograph – the ones you end up dropping into a folder that is more easily accessible if you ever need to produce the stunners. NB. I have only got this in a very abstract kind of way and haven’t quite had the opportunity to flash the nice ones around – at least not so to earn me enough money to actually buy a replacement camera. Alas, the poor hobby must be put on hold. I must pay rent, food, bills, uni-books, petrol and 21st birthday presents first.
Category: <span>Photography</span>
I’ve been without a camera for a good while now and after borrowing Geoff’s for a few days, I’m pretty desperate to start working my way towards one again. Then there are all these other things in the way… moving out. That is something high on the agenda.
Photography is a hobby and probably will remain only at that level. I’d love to work with it for a bit and then there’s the old dream job that never quite evolved… photo journalism. I think part of me would hate to be constrained through a contract. Taking unique photographs isn’t easy. People today are so thingy about being photographed (People photographs have a lot of scope…) I love details. Macro photography, Portrait type photography.
I haven’t gotten my Communication Design Interview date yet. I’ve been chasing the postbox. I should get a letter regardless of whether my ‘sample folio’ was good enough or not. It was supposedly meant to be here yesterday. My sister’s friend is in the same boat. Same course, same delay.
I fit some photography in during this year. It was the best bit of uni and strictly elective based. The Communication Design course does have some photography built into the structure but there is not quite as much flexibility for taking electives across faculties.
If/When I get an interview there will be a slightly panicked moment or 43 about how non-diverse my work is. My folio (when I pull it all together) consists mainly of photography and digital art (mostly from photographs with a few exceptions). I haven’t drawn anything since I was about 15 and the most recent thing I’ve painted is the picture at the top (last night at the Youth Group Art night).
Oh well, I guess I’ll meet that lion when it comes my way.
Because you haven’t seen a post for OH SO LONG. I’d like to introduce you to a new word, (Well it was new for me and it doesn’t look all that common). I am enough of a word freak to actually subscribe to dictonary.com Word of the Day. Trusty Google Reader (although I’m still considering the ‘trusty’ definition) spat out this one sometime in the last 24 hours.
virtu: love of or taste for fine objects of art; also, productions of art.
Throw an ‘e’ on the end and you know what it means, remove the e and the actuality of the thing can go vastly downhill.
Let me provide an example:
This evening I had the pleasure experience of watching The Piano. The producers/directors/scriptwriters… yes it was a combined effort, successfully managed to extract the ‘e’ off of virtue. The movie is a fine piece of art but not exactly a fine piece of “moral excellence”.
The same could apply to Children of Men (Which I saw yesterday and did very much enjoy). The plot is gloriously intriguing, but some of the visuals far from peaceful and long way from right.
It is NOT a hard and fast rule, beautiful pieces of art do not have to be risque or downright crude. It is a totally exclusive variable, which really makes it not a variable at all.
Movies have ratings for a reason. I do just wonder though if over time the ratings have eased off in some kind of strange adaption to our ever desensitising hearts and minds.
Should we as Christians only take our virtu with an ‘e’? Only fill the eyes of whatever bodily and spiritual part of us with, “..whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable…excellent or praiseworthy…” – Philippians 4:8?
And then how does watching say, World News fit into that?
You cannot pretend that violence, that war, that rape, that crime, that abuse, that injustice doesn’t happen. It does.
And so clearly we cannot ignore that.
I understand that there is quite an extreme surface difference to watching something for entertainment and something that confrontly real, but honestly – how often do those lines blur?
We go mental at a group of school boys that filmed an abuse and sold it for entertainment. Rightly so. Yet don’t we see some watery alternate version of it on a daily basis?
How much of watching the news is because we actually care? How much is simply because we’re interested and intrigued and ‘need to be informed’? For what purpose? Does that make it entertainment?
I don’t have to enjoy a movie for it to be a diversion. Which is really what entertainment is.
I’m not prescribing that we turn off the television, the news, the movie… I don’t know.
Some of it comes back to motive.
Is there any clear or reasonable reason at all to watch a violent or a less than perfectly moral movie? (And that doesn’t leave you with much choice). Art? Yay? Nay? What if you sift the wheat from chaff? Does it even count? Does it even matter?
You cannot isolate yourself away from things, nor should you really intentionally fill your mind with images that you’ll regret (strongly or even passively) later on.
What is it to be in the world but not of it?
Surely it’s a fascinating pattern. How often do we drag that verse out of it’s context? What is it’s context? Offering myself as a living sacrifice? Loving. What is our emphasis?
Why do some Christians respond with more passion to ‘one of us’ swearing more than they do thousands of us hurting?
We are disfunctionally desensitised.
Art. Life. Art a reflection of what is really going on. Is art simply a manipulation? We feel. We are made to feel.
There is nothing wrong with feeling.
If art is manipulation, how can we use it in a positive way? And is that okay anyway?
*Appologies, comments have now been closed as this post is continuously spammed and I’m getting sick of moderating them.
…just this highly disturbing photo of me taken with Geoff‘s new camera – which we had great fun in buying (well I helped make sure he had the hassle of getting a bit of a bargain, he did the buying) and although this was not perhaps one of the clearest shots, it could come close to being one of the most entertaining.
And oh it’s NICE to hold/use a decent camera again.
by the way:
Happy Birthday to the Haigs, she’s the whole ‘Sweet Sixteen and… maybe been kissed’ (you ask her) today. That is… the kissing didn’t happen today that’s… oh, I’m going to bed!
A few links for those mildly design/art interested. And try the second one anyway, whoever you are.
Daily Dose of Imagery by Sam Javanrouh – a photographers blog which I intend to keep an eye on.
A is for Apple – try this one out! I’d bet this is one of the weirdest design/random sites out there. How’s this for postmodern navigation? It’s all rather disturbing. I don’t want to know how long it took to make.