by jad

Art Thoughts

Being around artists and in artmaking spaces makes me think about the impulses behind my desires to make, do, and express things in general. I have language to explain it and different vocabularies to define it with, like the stars and their imprint on the soul, or God, the Creator of co-creatives, or class distinction and its many corollary affordances. But all these are just words to make sense (♒︎) of a nagging feeling I don’t actually understand (♋︎). It’s the gnawing dissatisfaction I felt while flipping through craft books as a kid, desiring to make things without knowing why; … Continue reading “Art Thoughts” →

by jad

Cornish BFA 2023

I haven’t been to a Cornish BFA exhibit since “Expo 2019,” which wasn’t long after I first moved to Seattle. Back then, I took any opportunity to push myself to write, so I wrote about what I found there, and I still follow the artists whose art I wrote about. Now I write all the time, but I’m still here sharing what I’ve seen; except now I’m pushing myself to take photos any chance I get instead. x x x x

by jad

Photo-Elicitation

Taking photos with someone else is an interesting way of looking at things differently. You’ll probably notice the same things, but you may not; you’ll pause to listen in one spot while the other is talking and vice versa; you’ll use these stops to compose or capture, or you may just peer through the viewfinder, too engrossed in the conversation. You’ll probably start off talking about what you’re seeing, but it’s more than likely that you’ll end up somewhere else entirely. Looking back at these, I’m struck by how most are imprinted with a memory of something said or remembered, … Continue reading “Photo-Elicitation” →

by jad

What is Artifice?

I’ve been thinking about “AI” and “art” and “photography” and the slippages people makes when discussing where these concepts coincide and where they do not. It frustrates me to see the conversation around the place of technology in art-making being swept up in outmoded generalizations around what “is” or “isn’t” art when the ethical anxieties that AI brings up are better addressed at a more granular level: what is or isn’t an artifice? At what point does the maker end and the mechanism begin? I took these photos in 2008 on what we’re now calling a “digicam” of some kind. … Continue reading “What is Artifice?” →

by jad

Mother’s Day

“Je ne te quitte pasJe ne reviendrai jamaisJe ne te quitte pasJe ne reviendrai jamaisJe ne te quitte pasJe ne reviendrai jamaisJe ne te quitte pas.” We’ve all seen the posts about words that can’t be translated into English that inevitably include “saudade” in the list – saudade, that Portuguese feeling of “profound nostalgic longing for a beloved yet absent something or someone.” This longing is “often associated with a repressed understanding that one might never encounter the recipient of longing ever again.” But what’s a word for the melancholy that comes with irrepressible presence? Does anyone else ever feel … Continue reading “Mother’s Day” →

by jad

Is Christianity Worth Saving & Other Frustrating Questions

I spent the day yesterday at a conference asking: “is Christianity worth saving?” All I knew about it was that it featured Brian McLaren, a post-evangelical theologian I’ve admired, & that it would have 3 sessions answering that question in 3 ways: “no,” “yes,” “what now?” I was surprised to find a very non-traditional format for the event. Instead of a panel with a series of talks and Q&As, there was a circle of thinkers & doers from around the city taking turns to ask Brian questions that began with: “I’d be curious to know.” This was a full circle, … Continue reading “Is Christianity Worth Saving & Other Frustrating Questions” →

by jad

Luigi Ghirri

“I’ve always approached the ‘scene I was looking to represent’ directly, standing squarely in front of my subject to avoid any kind of slants or vanishing points, cuts or leaks.” (Luigi Ghirri: The Complete Essays, 1973-1991) That’s the thing about Luigi Ghirri’s work that struck me instantly when I saw someone sharing his work a few weeks ago; that, followed immediately by an eerie sense of familiarity: ‘I could have taken this very shot.’ This spooky feeling of déjà vu made me want to read what this man had to say, after having started this journey with Sontag, Benjamin, and … Continue reading “Luigi Ghirri” →

by jad

Fragment Fragments

“If the fragment is truly broken (frangere), it cannot, it seems, be thought of in terms of a part (portio), for the part, as part of a whole, would deny that which is broken its broken nature, its different status, by relating it always to the former (whole). The fragment…must be thought of apart from a part, and therefore as wholly distinct from the whole (of which the part is a part) as well.” (Dan Mellamphy, ‘Fragmentality,’ 1998) x “Contemporary poets use all three modes of fragment, sometimes all at once. First, the fragment can illicit a response or echo … Continue reading “Fragment Fragments” →

by jad

Green Lent, Red Pisces

It’s funny “haha” and funny “hmm” to me how often I’ve swung between dogged determination and complete surrender. I am the original member of @baumwerkj’s Order of the Dung Beetle before it had a name, back when @heure_bleue__ initiated me as such. I am also constantly broken open and made a vessel of things I did not choose but became available for. Pisces season seems to come around every year to mark some new striving after a vision; sometimes it turns out to be a mirage, other times it is transfigured into a brighter image of the truth. I used to be embarrassed … Continue reading “Green Lent, Red Pisces” →