In photography, you learn to view the world in a different way than the average human. Your eyes are trained to observe moments in the scene before you that generally go un-noticed by the masses. A key part of this element is lighting. Different lighting can show everything there is to see in one eighth of a second, or tease you with only certain areas of an image lit well enough to see at first glance. It's these images I love the most. You look and see one thing, but with careful observation, you notice something else. The next time you look at the very same image, another piece of the scene becomes a part of your awareness. A well lit ( and I don't mean brightly, I mean well lit as in creatively with darkness and light) piece can tease you with it's image at first glance and keep you looking for the hidden objects that are just barely visible in the darkness or the peripheral edges of the work.
I walked into a place in Memphis and was blown away by the lighting in a very popular night spot. Bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling on, what appeared to be the original early 1900's light fixture. One would think this would make for a hard scrabble existence in the night club world. Not so for this place. The owner was a friend to the man I was there to interview and photograph. Consequentially, I met the owner and we had a great discussion on the history of the building, it's previous owners, the current incarnation, and the ghosts that claim the building as home to date.
The bare light bulbs gave the club the depth and character that suited it's historical place in Memphis music history. My first visit was an experience I'll never forget and I'll have a full story on that in the book. (We are in the home stretch with the writing by the way). I serendipitously met a man who was a significant player in the change of history in the South with civil rights, along side Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. He took me there, introduced me to the staff and owners, showed me around, and gave me a great history of his part in the 60's, 70's.
The club has paint peeling off the walls, the lathing is showing in spots where the plaster has fallen away. Small club tables, that you'd swear were original to the building when it was a cool place to hang out in the 1920's, ashtrays, coke iceboxes, and claw foot bathtubs still in place from when it was a overnight porter rooming house during prohibition. The lighting is a key element in the character of this building and is the subject of a recent canvas I had printed to auction at the Diabetes Fundraiser at Hotel Arts in Calgary on June 15th. Tickets are $75 and it's called A Creative Affair. Please come out, it's for a great cause. I won't be there but the canvas will be! ( The canvas by the way, is a 14 x 26 Fine Art Canvas print of the upstairs hallway in this joint. and Yes I can safely call it a joint) The owner gave me a picture of Elvis and BB King standing together in the very same hallway. For those of you that don't know, Tupelo, Mississippi is a short drive away and some would say this club's original musical line up would have been some of Elvis's most influential experiences.
The canvas is titled 'Last Exit' and the description talks a little about what I've written above. The impact the image had on me when I first saw this upper hallway was indeed, the last exit. A hallway with an exit sign, a window up to heaven, or a partially visible stairwell leading below, with a guiding light (the bare bulb over the stairwell and window above.) For those of you like myself that were raised with serious religion in the family, the image clearly has hidden meaning about the pathway to either, the choices you can make with doors on one side and windows on the other. You have to see it to really read this description and understand the image. The lighting plays a key roll in what's visible and barely visible.
This is my favorite kind of photography, where there is a vision that emerges more and more with the study of it. Something that is not staged but already exists as it is. Someone, like myself, comes along and sees, not the bare bulbs and decaying building that it is, but an image of our history, whether personal or practical and photographs the scene with a whole new perspective.
If you all have a mind to see it, Get a ticket for "A Creative Affair" at Hotel Arts on June 15th, 2012. It's up for silent auction. For whomever buys the piece, it's signed and numbered as 1/1. There will never be another one printed on this medium. All future prints will be limited to 50 and not on canvas, or that large. The full story of the meeting, interview, and photography of this event will be in the book so it will have a history of it's own that the new owner of the print can refer to for their own enjoyment.
Don't forget to check your Compass!
Cole
PS Update for National Geographic post... there are some people coming to Calgary this June for some NG business, not sure what their connection to NG is but I think I may have a meeting arranged... I'll keep you all updated! Keeping my finger's crossed...
I walked into a place in Memphis and was blown away by the lighting in a very popular night spot. Bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling on, what appeared to be the original early 1900's light fixture. One would think this would make for a hard scrabble existence in the night club world. Not so for this place. The owner was a friend to the man I was there to interview and photograph. Consequentially, I met the owner and we had a great discussion on the history of the building, it's previous owners, the current incarnation, and the ghosts that claim the building as home to date.
The bare light bulbs gave the club the depth and character that suited it's historical place in Memphis music history. My first visit was an experience I'll never forget and I'll have a full story on that in the book. (We are in the home stretch with the writing by the way). I serendipitously met a man who was a significant player in the change of history in the South with civil rights, along side Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. He took me there, introduced me to the staff and owners, showed me around, and gave me a great history of his part in the 60's, 70's.
The club has paint peeling off the walls, the lathing is showing in spots where the plaster has fallen away. Small club tables, that you'd swear were original to the building when it was a cool place to hang out in the 1920's, ashtrays, coke iceboxes, and claw foot bathtubs still in place from when it was a overnight porter rooming house during prohibition. The lighting is a key element in the character of this building and is the subject of a recent canvas I had printed to auction at the Diabetes Fundraiser at Hotel Arts in Calgary on June 15th. Tickets are $75 and it's called A Creative Affair. Please come out, it's for a great cause. I won't be there but the canvas will be! ( The canvas by the way, is a 14 x 26 Fine Art Canvas print of the upstairs hallway in this joint. and Yes I can safely call it a joint) The owner gave me a picture of Elvis and BB King standing together in the very same hallway. For those of you that don't know, Tupelo, Mississippi is a short drive away and some would say this club's original musical line up would have been some of Elvis's most influential experiences.
The canvas is titled 'Last Exit' and the description talks a little about what I've written above. The impact the image had on me when I first saw this upper hallway was indeed, the last exit. A hallway with an exit sign, a window up to heaven, or a partially visible stairwell leading below, with a guiding light (the bare bulb over the stairwell and window above.) For those of you like myself that were raised with serious religion in the family, the image clearly has hidden meaning about the pathway to either, the choices you can make with doors on one side and windows on the other. You have to see it to really read this description and understand the image. The lighting plays a key roll in what's visible and barely visible.
This is my favorite kind of photography, where there is a vision that emerges more and more with the study of it. Something that is not staged but already exists as it is. Someone, like myself, comes along and sees, not the bare bulbs and decaying building that it is, but an image of our history, whether personal or practical and photographs the scene with a whole new perspective.
If you all have a mind to see it, Get a ticket for "A Creative Affair" at Hotel Arts on June 15th, 2012. It's up for silent auction. For whomever buys the piece, it's signed and numbered as 1/1. There will never be another one printed on this medium. All future prints will be limited to 50 and not on canvas, or that large. The full story of the meeting, interview, and photography of this event will be in the book so it will have a history of it's own that the new owner of the print can refer to for their own enjoyment.
Don't forget to check your Compass!
Cole
PS Update for National Geographic post... there are some people coming to Calgary this June for some NG business, not sure what their connection to NG is but I think I may have a meeting arranged... I'll keep you all updated! Keeping my finger's crossed...
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