It's September 2001. The twin towers lay ruined and smoldering in New York City. At the Pentagon there are nightly vigils and there are flowers for the dead. In the small towns of eastern Pennsylvania the only topic of discussion is the plane that fell from the sky. The nation…
(This is part of series looking back at posts I wrote a decade ago.) Originally published on November 2, 2011 as Chuck Close eyes the money, Steve Jobs envisions art’s importance Chuck Close wants his money. At least from works sold in California. In 1977 California passed the first and…
Every night when we got to the hotel the outrage-of-the-day was waiting for us. Sometimes it was one of the up-and-comers, maybe Jesse Watters, his goofy frat-boy smirk his natural facial expression at rest. Watters came to national attention on Fox by going to college campuses—a stand-in for liberal hot-spots—and…
I crossed America by car in the summer of 2017, looking for Trump. I looked for him in truck stops and restrooms, parking lots and malls. I looked for Trump in roadside signs and unplanted fields, in thrift stores and magazine racks. And I found him, though I had to…
Christmas is over, the new year begun, and it's time to put the ornaments away, time to take away the tree. But before I do I wanted to share a few things I found under the tree on Christmas morning. A Middle Earth Traveler (John Howe)Lord of the Rings Sketchbook…
(This post is part of a guided tour of my book, Computational Photography, on sale now for $49.95 with free shipping.) If you peel back the dust cover of Computational Photography you can see the actual hardcover of the hardcover book. This is the case cover, in book-speak, and is…
She calls in, hoping to hear advice that will change her life. She wants out of the crushing debt that is defining her, shaping her marriage, constraining their opportunities. She tells Dave Ramsey, the radio show host, the numbers. She and her husband are in debt, way in debt. Ramsey…
(This post is a part of a pair of posts on Christmas lights.) Christmas is over but the Christmas lights are still up and a walk around my neighborhood still offers up delightful photographs. For me, the attraction of these isn't the lights so much as the character of Montara…
(This post is a part of a pair of posts on Christmas lights.) I do a poor job here of differentiating between photographs I take which are snapshots, just like everyone else's, and serious photographs, art photographs. Most every photograph on this blog is a snapshot. Once in a while…
Brodovitch's issue of Exakta Magazine in 1952 has only about a third as many photographs as the subsequent one, and I know none of the photographers. Thus, Google. A first glance you might think the cover is a high-contrast reversal of one of Brodovitch's own photographs of the ballet, his…