Winter Front/Back Doors

As a Texan, winters in Montreal make me feel so alive and excited sometimes. The briskness of the cold and the shortness of the days feed an energy of quick movements that both keep me warm and get as much as possible accomplished during the few hours of daylight. However, the dominant feeling of winter is a time of hibernation, when the snow piles up all around you like a soft blanket, muffling sounds and assuaging the guilt of the lazy. These photos hopefully capture that feeling, the mercy of being able to sit at home and rest with friends and lovers. Good for warm-weather homes that feel too much excited windy energy flowing through, the low point of view helps reinforce an earthy, grounded feeling.

I like them best side by side. I think a white matte around and between them would work great, though a milk chocolate or sky blue on a bright yellow wall would also be nice.

New Camera! Pentax Optio W10

Bought this camera at B & H last week in prep for a trip to Brazil. Waterproof, dustproof, and wide angle. (Though here I'm actually shooting into the blind spot mirror on a cargo van, while waiting at the border to get back into Canada :)

China: Goat Stowage

This is from the flight from Chicago to Shanghai. I spent a lot of time standing around in the back, annoying the flight attendants and pouring myself more orange juice. After awhile I noticed someone had tampered with this sign. Jake, was that you?

Path around the bend
Tiger Leaping Gorge, Yunnan Province, China, 2007

I've just started looking through my photos from hectic trip I made to China this May. This photo is from a two-day hike through the deepest gorge on the planet. We spent day one on the high road, passing through small villages with farm fields terraced into the mountain side and stopping to eat and sleep at guesthouses that directed travelers via messages painted onto rocks extolling the plentitude of their vegetable gardens, the coldness of their beer, and the warmness of their showers.

On the other side of the gorge the mountain is practically uninhabitated. There is, however, a high road cutting across that seems to mimic the one we traveled. You can see it in the photo above, the thin line to the bottom left. Where does it go? Who takes it? As far as we saw, nowhere and no one.

What makes this gorge measure so tall is the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain whose peaks are hiding behind clouds in this photo. All day the peaks were hidden by clouds, except for about a 20 minute window during which we happened to be at the highest point of our trek. A remarkable coincidence that we made the most of by resting and taking endless amounts of photos. As we sat and watched, we noticed that the mountain seemed to make its own clouds, that white mist rising out of the snow-covered rock puffed up and sat atop the peaks. By the time we started walking again, the mountain tops had again disappeared.

China: Coming Soon

Jack
Originally uploaded by chloeandliah

I just got back from a trip to China - Shanghai, Yangshuo, Kunming, Lijiang, Tiger Leaping Gorge, and many places in between - and I'll be posting photos from it soon. I shot many many photos, 17 rolls of 36 exp., so I have to check my funds before taking them in. But here's a little taste of the trip, this photo was taken by Liah at the summit of our hike on Tiger Leaping Gorge.

Austin City 1

I'm Austin on a layover to Shanghai right now. I spent the day visiting an urban farm, walking around the hike and bike trail, and doing some last minute errands via borrowed bicycle. I love this city. Its green and warm, people are friendly, and there's an excitement over the newness of everything that's tempered by a proper amount of skepticism. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos, but there are some nice scenes I witnessed that I'll have to come back to sometime.

BOGGY CREEK FARM - an all-organic farm a 15-minute bike ride from downtown. They have hens, pick-your-own strawberries, tons of greens and vegetables, as well as a healthy does of politics over food transport. Standing in line today I heard Carol Ann, the owner, talking about the way Chinese garlic has ruined local production. Her garlic seems 'expensive' by comparison, but it actually juices when you cut it. We bought potatoes, cilantro and eggs laid that morning to make breakfast tacos and salsa, plus some beets for dinner. Lots of kids and older folks walking around, being friendly Texans.

HIKE AND BIKE TRAIL - a big wide sidewalk that follows nearly every creek running through the city. In San Antonio they paved over all their creeks. In Austin they turned them into linear parks for people to walk or bike along. They link to one another via other parks or the part of the Little Colorado River that runs through town and is officially called Town Lake.

We hiked down the Shoal Creek trail to the river. There were all kinds of new condos going up all along, like most everywhere in Austin. We also saw a bridges being repaired, with huge scaffolding erected in the middle of a dry part of the creek. We saw about fifteen turtles ome sun-bathing, some swimming slow, some scared and haulin' ass. There were also fish, and we wondered where all the fish go when the creek dries up mid-summer. At one point along the creek there was this long black flexible plastic tubing snaked around the base of a tree at one end, and around the side of a bridge at the other. At the bridge end, the snake was spewing out some orange mesh. Near Town Lake we saw where this big wall had fallen down and taken a huge tree with it. There were some people surveying the land at this spot, some on land and some on a canoe in the water near the fallen wall.

Well, gotta run for now, gotta catch a flight in the morning. In 5 hours actually. Post more later: river and joggers and the park-and-run, spiral ped risings for bikes, not wheelchairs., also LIVE OAKS.

D.C. Metro

DC Metro #3 (Outside Escalator Looking Down)

DC Metro #4 (Outside Escalator Looking Up)

DC Metro #7 (Lone Man Against Wall)

DC Metro #8

DC Metro #9 (Empty Platform)

DC Metro #10 (Girl Looking Back)

DC Metro #13 (Three Going Down)

DC Metro #15 (Watching From Above)

DC Metro #16 (System Map)

DC Metro #19 (Escalator Feet)

DC Metro #20 (Arriving Train Series 1)

DC Metro #21 (Arriving Train Series 2)

DC Metro #22 (Arriving Train Series 3)

DC Metro #23 (Arriving Train Series 4)

DC Metro #25 (Subway Doorway)

DC Metro #26 (Down The Aisle)

DC Metro #30 (Rosslyn Station)

DC Metro #32 (Entering/Leaving Rosslyn Station)

DC Metro #36 (Turnstyles)

I received many positive responses to the three photos from the DC Metro that were in my recent show (see previous post). The colors here are what attracted people the most. Thanks to a roll of Kodak Ultra Color 400 I found at a high-end photo store near the mall, and to my surprisingly steady hand considering I was a nervous man with a beard photographing public infrastructure post 9/11, the darkness of the DC metro system contrasts well with vivid color from what little lighting there was.

Not all these photos worked for the Dance Of Life : Daily Movement show, but I think they work together as a series all their own. Those above are my favorite photos from the roll. They are numbered based on the order they were taken. I shot them all in under an hour, just in time to get to Rosslyn Station where the bus would take me back to Dulles Aiport so I could finally catch my transfer flight to Burlington.

This was part of an unexpected trip to DC after I was forced into a 16-hour stopover at Dulles Airport. Soon I'll post the photos I made while staying overnight in the airport and also the shots from the DC Mall the next day, before I entered the metro.