Homage to Brian Ulrich

For the past five days, Robin and I have been celebrating the holidays at her Mother's house in Urbana, Illinois. This morning we took off back to Chicago, stopping to get some gas before getting onto the highway.
minutes later . . .
When I went into the gas-mart to get some coffee, I came across this monstrosity. Santa rides a horse??? I immediately thought of Brian Ulrich, went back out to the car to grab my camera and returned to the shop to snap this photo.

Christmas Party 2005

This past saturday night, Robin and I had our annual "Two Jews & A Christmas Tree" party. This year we had a good turnout, the eggnog was delish, and those latkes . . . oh those latkes!!!

How Many Artists Does It Take to Fill a Photo Booth?

Five

BLOODBATH

At work this morning, I stumbled upon an old negative that I had misplaced last year. It actually belongs to my friend Luke, I had helped him to photograph a project a few years back in Grant Park. Luke had built a large, foam fountain of blood that we lugged around and photographed with Luke dressed as a metal faced grim reaper. I never quite understood the project but I love the pictures that came out of it.

Not Yo Mama's Bowling!

Tonight the Museum of Contemporary Photography had their annual Christmas Party at the Fireside Bowl, an old standard of the Chicago punk rock scene. There was no punk rock tonight however, just a heck of a lot of top notch bowling. Who knew that artists could be so athletic???

My New Blog

I have just started a new blog specifically for the Garbage Can Project. Please stop by for a visit at http://garbagecanproject.blogspot.com/. I will be uploading a photograph every day showing the status of my garbage cans as well as any other information about the project. All other info about my daily ramblings will continue to be posted here.

The New Project

Today I began working on my next big project. Robin and I live in a first floor apartment on Grand Avenue and at least once a week we have one of our garbage cans stolen. Every month they vanish and I'm left to call the City of Chicago to ask for more. We've had as many as 5 cans disappear in a week and I've even caught a guy stealing one before. Anyhow, my newest project will be a chronicling of my garbage cans filled with surveillance video and garbage can tracking devices. I'm still working out the details but for now, I'm going to take a photo of our cans each morning to track the neighborhood garbage can thieving community. This morning, December 10th 2005, we had two garbage cans in front of our apartment.

Feeling Crotchety

Your Luck Is About to Change

Two weeks ago, I drove to Minneapolis with Brian and Greg for an opening reception at the Minnesota Center for Photography. Brian and I were in the show and Greg came along for emotional support. The show was curated by Joan Rothfuss, curator at The Walker Art Center and we were all very excited when God sent us this message via interstate billboard during our drive through Wisconsin.

WILLIAM BRADLEY

Recently I have embarked upon a new kind of a project, a collaboration with my friend Daniel Johnson. Daniel's a poet here in Chicago and we are constructing a multi media piece using his poems accompanied with a video montage of found footage from the home movies of William Bradley. The home movies were purchased by Daniel's friend at an estate sale and are really quite amazing to watch. When we googled the name William Bradley, we got this ugly mug; however, some of the footage can be viewed by clicking here. Daniel will be reading his poems in conjunction with this footage next Wednesday night at 5:30 at the Hokin Theater, Columbia College (here in Chicago).

Questions, Questions, Questions . . .

For me, it's really hard to be between projects. As my car project comes to an end, I've started to panic that I'll never make anything ever again. These are stupid and whiney thoughts, but there you have it. As I'm starting to look forward, I'm starting to work on a series of conspiracy theories. I've been reading some books about them and getting ideas (for example, the names of suspect people should always be put into parenthesis). So, that's where it stands at 9:33 am, happy daylights savings!

A Special Thanks

Last month our friends Jim and Nat visited us from the UK while on vacation and two days ago we recieved an amazing collection of hand made postcards a-la Nat. We'll have to buy them a pint or two next time we're in London.

THE WHITE SOX WIN!!!!!!!

NUFF Z NUFF

Enough already!During the past week and a half I have started to slip with my non-smoking regime. Quitting smoking has been one of the hardest things for me and so today, after buying a pack -> smoking two and then throwing it away . . . I have decided that enough is enough. I just returned from buying the patch (which this time I will see through until the end) and when urges arise, I'll vent them here. A healthy glass of scotch to my pursuit, here goes . . .

Done With The Slackin'

Oh what a horrible blogger I have been!!!
After recieving some hate mail as a result of my lack of posting, I have decided to right this ship and begin again. Truth be told, life's just been rather busy. Above are some photos of a recent trip down to Havana Illinois where Robin and I went to visit her Aunt Wendy, Uncle Bob, Cousin Jorie and Mike. We did it all: went to an apple orchard, visited a brick factory, cooked hotdogs on a stick and went for a walk through a nature preserve. I love getting out of the city and there's no place I'd rather go than Havana, Illinois.

Fierce Beast Meets Festive Balloon

Fun with Food

Food can be really fun. On Saturday night, Brian and I hung out with some fruit at Sarah Bierman's party. Two days later, Jim and his wife were in town from the UK and we met up for drinks and more food. We had been corresponding for a while but had never met and it really a good time.

Why You Don't Want Me To Photograph Your Wedding:

Last weekend Robin and I went to a wedding in Champaign-Urbana. As happens at weddings, I had one or two beers and before you could say Mazel Tov, I was on the dance floor, drunk, photographing like a maniac.

Guest MC and the place to be . . .

Last night I asked Robin if she would consider sharing her thoughts on this tiny little corner of the web. Here is what she had to say:

Why are you reading this? You're bored, right? You have a boring job with too much time on your hands. Or you're really busy at your job but you hate it and would rather look at funny stuff on the internet until someone catches you. Or you're at home and it's late at night and you have insomnia. Or you are talking on the phone with someone really boring and you're entertaining yourself by surfing the web. Well, I'm here to help you. These are some of my favorite blogs to look at on the internet when I'm bored:

Post Secret
Dave's Blog
Miranda July's Me and You and Everyone We Know blog
Veiled Conceit
Go Fug Yourself

That is all.
Robin

ALEC SOTH (is the man)

Ok, it's official: Alec Soth is THE MAN! Last night I got home from teaching at about 10:30pm, plopped down in my chair and started to poke around for awhile on line as Robin talked to her mom on the couch in my studio. It had been awhile since I'd visited Alec's site and last night it just floored me all over again. Here are some of my favorites:

A Sad Found Object

This afternoon we were walking to lunch when I noticed this small handmade sign. I'm not used to seeing signs for missing elderly people and so it caught me a bit off guard. Here is a larger detail from the sign:


86 Years Old, 5'5, 130 pounds, Gray Hair, Blue Eyes, Wearing Gray Jacket, Clip-on Tie, Brown Pants, Black Cap, Cane.
If You See This Man, Call: (630) 484-5550 or 911

FRIDAY NIGHT ART

Here we have a picture of art slut Eric Wenzel welcoming in this year's art season. Last night was that special night that only comes once a year and that fills both streets and stairways with people looking for the newest art that Chicago has to offer. It's a fun night, a chance to see people and catch up. Here is a picture of Jason Lazarus flexing some muscle at his opening at Bucket Rider Gallery:


Bucket Rider consitently shows great work and Jason's piece: "...And Then Finally, I Remembered" is both beautiful to look at and powerful to experience. Also showing in that neighborhood is friend and artist, Justin Schmitz:


Justin's new work is showing at Garden Fresh and features photographs of teenage wrestlers. The portraits are awkward and vulnerable and powerful. It's the look in the eyes of these kids that provides the photographs with their punch. All in all, there are a lot of great shows to check out. I liked Rashid Johnson's "Stay Black and Die" at Monique Meloche Gallery and Siebren Versteeg's "Determination" at Rhona Hoffman Gallery; however, I need to go back and take another look . . . there were too many shows and too many people to take it all in.

I ALMOST FORGOT!!!

Every time I fly, I love looking at those weird outdated cards that describe what you should do in case of an emergency. On our way to Seattle, I was shocked to see that they had updated the classic drawings with new and ridiculous photographs. Below is a detail of my favorite frame (I think it looks like Christopher Guest but that's just me).

I Like Green

I'm a big fan of the color green, always have been. I just got my film from Seattle back from the shop and was excited to see how my photo shoot of Robin went. Saturday afternoon we went walking along some sand dunes with Eric when everything suddenly turned green. The coast of Washington is so beautiful . . . later we went to Cable and Ruby's for a bbq.

Eric William Macrae

This past weekend, Robin and I flew out to Seattle to attend an opening reception for some of my work at theCenter On Contemporary Art. Two of my best friends from gradeschool, Cable and Eric, live out there and we spent our nights sleeping on an inflatable mattress on Eric's floor. Eric is pretty much a total freak and while we were out there he showed me these jerry-rigged photoshop images that he had taken of himself. Apparently he had grown a beard and wanted to test out how he would look with various facial shavings. Enjoy . . .

A Day At Wrigley Field

Tuesday Afternoon my folks flew into Chicago from New York to hang out for a couple of days. Yesterday afternoon we took in a ballgame at Wrigley Field where the Cubs were playing a daygame against the Dodgers. It was a great game although the Cubbies got killed 7-0. My new ambition in life is to learn how to properly fill out scorecards for the games that I attend. This ambition is slightly nerdy but it helps me to pay better attention to the game (plus it's old-school). Here is the scorecard from yesterday's game, my first complete game.

SEX-E-ONE

Tonight when Robin got home from work, there was a car blocking her out of our driveway. She honked and waved and cursed and eventually they moved out of her way (but not before she caught a glimpse of their license plate). When Robin told me about "Sex E One," I immediately grabbed my camera and ran outside to grab a snap. Being the smooth guy that I am, I started off by pretending to photograph other things such as a bicycle, my doorway etc. When I finally felt ready, I pounced and landed the shot that you see here. If it looks a little blurry, that's because my "smooth guy act"ended up freaking out the driver who began to drive away as soon as I started setting up for my shot. Anyhow, five minutes passed when suddenly there was a knock at our front door. It was the woman from the car and she wanted to know why I had photographed her daughter's license plate. I told her I that I had photographed it because it is hilarious, at which point she breathed a sigh of relief (she thought that I was going to send the photo to the police because they had parked in front of our driveway).

People You Ought To Know

Yeah, this is me and my good friend Brian Ulrich tonight on our way to do a photo shoot. Brian is a great photographer and has an upcoming show at The Art Institute of Chicago (Brian is one of my friends who I know will without a doubt make a name for himself). The Art Institute needs a publicity headshot of Brian for their upcoming catalog and so he asked me if I would photograph him at the Best Buy on North Avenue. We photographed for awhile and it was a good time (no hassles from the employees). After shooting our headshots, Brian and I headed out for a burger and a beer and some good conversation. These are two very romantic shots of us illuminated by a neon sign in the window of the bar . . . it was great to catch up.