A friend wished me a happy rest-of-my-weekend the other day and qualified it by remarking “…as if there’s a difference in these amorphous and indeterminate days and weeks of the covid epoch.”  This sums up much of my emotional state since this ‘epoch’ began last February: one same day after the next with the same news feed, everyone seemingly watching the world turn while quarantined inside our homes.  This isn’t completely true but it feels that way.

Last February I was wrapping up a winter-long darkroom silver-gelatin printing project.  It was for a solo show in July. At the same time I was mapping out a 2-3 week bicycle ride through northern and western Greece that would have taken place in May.  Needless to say, neither of these events came to pass.  The show was cancelled and the ride was put off until the autumn (when it did not happen again).  By the end of October I was left with a porfolio that meant little to me and a lot of maps going nowhere.  But that is looking at these past months the wrong way.  So much may not have happened yet so much actually did occur.

On the advice of a friend (to whom I am eternally grateful!) last March or April, I bought a little house.  The papers were finalized in August and a full renovation began, finishing in the first week of November.  The place really needed to be gutted.  Ancient electrical, plumbing, crumbling walls, etc…I documented it online.  I have now rented it to someone who needed a home.  Then I got the wild idea that maybe I should stop paying rent and buy and renovate my own space!  So I did.  In a few weeks (crossed fingers) I will finalize that deal and begin renovations.  I hope by the end of November 2021 I will have moved into my new home.  So to my friend MM who started this process…many thanks and eternal gratitude for shifting my thinking.

                              Prickly Pear #1

Photography…writing…I have come to the conclusion that, for me, social media, as a whole, is a stifling and shallow platform for art or communication of any true depth.  These applications have actually hampered my creative process.  I have produced less photography and written fewer blog entries since I started being more on my phone with a popular social media app.  I let it suck the creative juices from my mind and soul.  So…I would like to make more real photographs in 2021, write more, produce more real work.  The new house will have space for a darkroom and a small digital area–room for a printer, perhaps a computer with a larger monitor than my laptop.  A place to work.  A home studio.

I have rested on what laurels I may have gathered long enough.  I will make a new commitment to my art, to my life.  Wheels are in motion.  Let them stay moving, well-greased and clean running.

–JDCM

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My winter’s work with the Photografiki Omada Parou has been a real joy.  The 20 or so people that signed up in the fall for the 35mm analog project have all been enthusiastic, fun to work with and, without exception, have produced interesting and striking work.  Today I am meeting with one of them to develop their film.  Tomorrow I hand the camera over to another, and Thursday I work in the darkroom printing with a third.    I think I will try to print on Friday too.  This project has kept me busy through the winter but it has been much more.  I have come to know many locals who I had never met, and they I.  During the weekly club meetings (Wednesday, 19:30hrs) I get to hear at least two hours of solid Greek from numerous voices which has helped my Greek language studies which I work on every Friday afternoon with my teacher Stella.  So all around it has been a “win-win” situation.  They do all the work, by the way.  I am just a guide.

My own work?  This week I hope to submit a new portfolio of digital abstract work to the Antiparos International Photography Exhibition for the upcoming summer 2018 show.  This work is finished  so I can talk about the fantasy digital land-sea scapes I have found and photographed.  Very little Photoshopping, as you may guess.  Just a slight curve here or there for contrast and to keep it WYSIWYG.  Cross my fingers…I am also embarking on some alternative work which will open up some new technical and artistic avenues.  I won’t say much more except that if the winter time is for the darkroom, this project will be perfect for the summer and all of our sun.

Oh yes…the anniversary of my 53rd trip around the sun was a few days ago so I celebrated yesterday with some friends at a local taverna–that is was also ‘Katheri Deutera’, or Clean Monday, informed the menu.  The remains of the meal can be seen below.  Lent begins today.  I would like to keep the Lenten diet as much as possible for the next 40 days.  It is a healthy choice here in Greece.  Of course, this ‘diet’ predates any religious function as it was a result of the end of the winter, when the stored foods from the autumn harvest had run low (or out) and the agricultural population waited for the new crops of spring.  So it will be lots of veggies for me, seafood without backbones, no cheese, no meat…thank the gods the Greeks are sensible enough to still allow olives and olive oil…

The collection of my mother’s newspaper articles is all but done.  Last week I submitted the digital files to a printing company in Athens and the book goes to press this week.  Finally!  It has been years since I began this project, a memorial to my mother and a gift to family and friends.  And I like this book company.  They do nice work.  I may put together a book of my own.  A small collection of my photographs.  We’ll see…let’s not talk about it yet.

So thats it for February.  Right now there is a lovely, gentle, soaking rain blanketing the island.  It is supposed to rain all day.  Really great.  I am tired of winter.  I want spring, warmth and green things to see and eat.  I need to swim in the sea and shed some of the layers I have had to wear all winter to stay warm and dry.  The world moves ahead into the light and the alchemy I practice draws its magic from an ancient source.

clams, mussels, bean salad, pickles…

–JDCM

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Here are the bullet points…

— I am going to Naxos this weekend for a mountain bike race, my third on that island.  27km around a mountain and through the town of Sangri, high above the port.  The weather predictions are good–high pressure, 14-18C, sunny, breezy.  Perfect for biking.  We have had some rain which will keep the dust down and reduce the amount of loose, gravely ruts.  I’ll go and have fun.

— I am grateful and happy to have joined up with the Photography Club of Paros.  They are a good bunch of photography-loving folks with excellent eyes who love to take pictures.  I will begin a long-term darkroom project with them tonight.  For most of them, it will be a first in this digital-automatic age.  Each week, a member gets a 35mm camera (Pentax K1000/f.2 50mm lens) and roll of 35mm film (Ilford Pan 400) and shoots the roll.  Then we (me and the group member) go into the darkroom, develop the film, print, etc…all in a week.  So far there are about 10 people signed up, but that number, I predict, will jump to 20 quickly.  The project will go until the end of April and then they will look at the assembled portfolio and hang a small show.  For more reasons than I can count, this is a superb thing/event/group/happening with which to be involved.

— My own work is moving along.  The year-long Canon G-11 project is ticking away.  I am ready to print a new portfolio of abstract pieces.  I have to re-shoot or otherwise re-evaluate a b/w still life idea.  I am unhappy with several of the pieces due to their DoF, i.e. focus.

— My gym membership is paying off.  I have been going 2-4 times a week for either Hip/Abs classes or just to burn off calories on the treadmill.  After only a few weeks I can once again fit into my 34″ green Levis.  I will go this morning and push some more limits.  That, plus the biking, is keeping me fit and sane.

— The world?  Well…we all read the news and while it isn’t all bad, it isn’t great.  Leaks in the dam…death and disease, as Polly Jo would have said.

My life is Greece is expanding and growing every day.  I am eternally thankful to the wise woman who advised me over 5 years ago that if were to stay here on Paros, I would need to build a life around me.  And so I have.  Biking and exercise, photography and fellowship, the arts and humanities, connections in the community.  Thank you Liz!

–JDCM

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This spring I was given the honor of filling in as Silver Darkroom instructor.  This is not a post I assume to be permanent.  All teachers learn that their own skills, craft and knowledge increase when they pass on what they know to others.  This has been my experience as well.  I have learned more about the art and craft of photography in three months than I thought possible.  It was knowledge that I had already accrued so to give it away freely only strengthened my own foundations.   It was not  review or regurgitation.  I found myself solving problems and asking questions of myself from a new point of view.  One important lesson is to be able to say “I don’t know.  Let’s find the answer together.”  What freedom to not suppose, to not be a fake!

There is an ethos to teaching.  It is not enough to greet the student, spend a few hours or days, and then set them free.  That would be tantamount to showing them a map and telling them to drive to California from New York without first discussing the possible roads west.  As the more experienced traveler it is important to guide these eager minds along the way.  Yes, let them take a wrong turn, experience a sudden detour or two and even run out of fuel, but do not abandon them in the badlands of inexperience.  Let them know that you are there, waiting up ahead at the next marker or traveling alongside.  I have practiced this and it has paid off.  I have gained a level of patience and understanding by remaining available.  I have set up appointments and answered their questions to the best of my abilities, abilities which have grown over the course of three months.  To some this may seem a sacrifice of my own personal time, my own independence.  It is quite the opposite.   I have never felt so free, so happy and, at times, so completely baffled.  At that point I turn to someone more knowledgable than myself.  Such is the nature of education, or it should be.

There is a quote from George Bernhard Shaw: “Those who can, do…those who can’t, teach.”  I must admit that I have found this to be very untrue and can only believe that GBS had his head (beard and all) deeply imbedded in his anus when he thought it up.  The quote should be “Those who can, teach.”    Learning is a cycle:  Practice>Teach>Learn>Practice>Teach>Learn>Practice>Teach>Learn…

Ralph Waldo Emerson had a better idea:

“Be an opener of doors for such as come after thee.”

JDCM

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Now there are stone walls climbing and moving across the landscape of the Kyklades.  They have been accompanied by electrical poles, maybe telephone lines, I am not sure…

I have been photographing them for the past few years, mixed in with all the rest.  Driving back from an area here on Paros the other day I was struck by how these all are indications of the hand of man in an otherwise wild landscape.  I have a choice.  I can bemoan the state of affairs regarding these structures or embrace them as something more, strong vertical and horizontal lines, shadows of human needs.  I have thought of lamp posts as bringers of light in the darkness, guidance along dim roads.  The stone walls define our boundaries, of both self and property, for they are often too insignificant to keep any creature at bay.  The poles signify communication over distances.  Guidance, delineation and communication.  I would post some examples, but I feel that everyone has an idea of what I am speaking of without the illustrations.

It is raining here.  Last night the deluge dropped a hail of roaring ice in Paroikia.  It woke me at 4AM.  It also deposited all the red, sandy dust that has been blowing from the south, out of the deserts of North Africa.  This is the scirocco.  The air was clear this morning and as I drove south to visit some friends for coffee I marveled at the archipelago surrounding me: Sifnos, Serifos, Sikonos, Ios, Kimolos, Syros, Tinos, Andiparos…rugged walls ran through green hills, telephone lines stretched thinly into the blue distance and, even though the sun was bright, my heart was gladdened to see the occasional unlit streetlight along my path.  If I came this way on a dark and stormy night I would not become lost in the tempest.

JDCM

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And so my foundation is built of sturdy stuff–strong mortar, supportive materials, able to carry the larger structure that becomes the rooms, halls and stairways of this artistic domicile.  There is more to the photography than that, however.  My skills and craft are broadened by reading Homer, or T.S. Eliot.  I get ideas from looking at the sculpture of Canova and Bernini and the paintings from a diverse world of museums and galleries.  I soak in the experience of waiting at the bus station in Ravenna in the rain.  By writing about these things I synthesize what I know into something else, perhaps not new to the untrained eye, but certainly original, if only in small ways.

The foundation–my foundation–is greater than the sum of its parts, yet contains all that I have seen and heard.  I become my work and in doing so my work defines part of my being, part of my ‘self’ and grants a sense of community.  More about this later…

JDCM

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The food here at the Villa is very good, filling and the kind of food that brings us all joy and comfort when our tired bones rest for dinner after trekking about all day long.  It is not haute cuisine but rather the kind of food one’s grandmother (not mine, by the way…she could barely boil water) might prepare.  The other night some students and I were discussing “Italian food” and I noted that here we are in Italy, eating dinner.  Therefore we were having ‘Italian food”.  As someone who has been in the food business in a professional capacity and still retains most of what he learned, I have to admit that even back then, 12 years ago or so, I had become disenchanted by all the ‘specialness’ and ‘preciousness’ of the so-called cuisines that  popped up every time a new celebrity chef graced the television or newspapers.  What I most desired was simple food, food that I have already written about here and food that exists in the sense memories of many people I know.  We remember a warm house on a cold day, the aroma of fresh cookies wafting over us as we shake the snow from our boots; the primal experience of grilling over an open fire as the sun sets on a summer’s day; the joy of family and friends as we all gather for a holiday feast.  Regardless of season, these memories flood my thinking, driving away the cold efficiency of Nouvelle-this or Pan-American-that…Where was I?

Ah, yes…food. Florence, Pisa and lunch.

Yesterday I found a lovely little spot off the tourist track, yet in the middle of Florence.  Tired with the usual panini routine, I emptied my mind and wandered about.  I turned a couple of corners and happened upon ‘Pizzacheria Antonio Porrati’, in the Piazza Pier di Maggiore.  The area was tiny, with three tables inside, a glass case with myriad foods prepared that day, dried pasta on the shelves and a large cabinet of wine. The fellow behind the counter greeted me with a joyful ‘buongiorno!’  Out of the many choices I ordered some roast chicken and  fresh green beans chock full of garlic and olive oil.  Dee-lish!  I ate my lunch, chatted with the owners and then went to join the rest of the school for our tour of the Uffizi Museum.  Once again, home-cooking has struck again, with its simple, nourishing and friendly tastes.  Today was a similar experience.  Pisa began with a tour of the large Pisan Romanesque church, its famously skewed campanile, and the ornate baptistry, followed by a break.  Lunchtime beckoned and once again I wandered back streets, away from the madding crowd.  What initially drew me to ‘Trattoria della Faggiola’ was the sign tacked to the door that read ‘NO PIZZA’.  What a relief!  The menu included carpaccio di salmone so I sat in the nearly empty place and enjoyed a plate of thinly sliced raw salmon on a bed of baby arrugala and a mixed green salad.  The simplest food filled the most demanding hunger.   A few minutes later I was touring the Camposanto, a structure in a state of almost constant restoration since the bombing of Pisa in the 1940s by the Allies.  There has been a great deal of progress on the enormous frescoes even since last year and they look lovely.  Thank you Deane Keller…

Today we have classes here at the villa.  Lunch will be salads and leftovers from dinner last night.  Simple, nourishing food for hungry, working students and their teachers.  And tomorrow?  On to Venezia!  Andiamo!

JDCM

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I have been reconnecting with my friends here as well and have found the same old crowd more or less exactly the way I left them, which I am relieved about.  In a world that is constantly changing, sometimes too fast for anyone’s good, it is a pleasant and healthy surprise to find that one has anchors of friendship and support in the old haunts as well as the new.

Right now there is a group of turkeys crossing the lawn, bobbing through the hollow on their way to the pond for a morning drink.  I saw some deer last night, some possums too.  The hydrangeas are blooming in enormous white balls of tiny flowers; the air is damp and the weatherman predicts hazy, hot and humid today.  I meet with the editorial board (of which I am one) of PAGE magazine today for the final layout session before we go to press.  This has been a 2-year labor of love, a long time coming and, frankly, I think we are all ready to put it to bed.  With that, Robert Henri has something to say on the matter of work…

“All outward success, when it has value, is but the inevitable result of inward living, full play and enjoyment of one’s faculties.”

“Don’t belong to one school [i.e., of thought, ed.]. Don’t tie up to any technique.”

“It is necessary to work very continuously and valiantly, and never apologetically.  In fact, to be ever on the job so that we may find ourselves there, brush in hand, when the great moment does arrive.”

“Events and upheavals, which seem more profound than they really are, are happening on the surface.”

“On the surface there is the battle of institutions, the illustration of events, the strife between peoples.  On the surface there is propaganda and there is the effort to force opinions.  The deeper current carries no propaganda.  The shock of the surface upheaval does not deflect it from its course.”

“On the surface, disaster is battled with disaster. Things change. But all improvement is due to what of fundamental law rises to the suface, through the search made by this of the undercurrent.”

“There are painters who paint pictures with spiritual titles but whose motives are purely materialistic.”

“The great masters in all the arts have been whole men, not half men.  They have had marvelous fullness in all human directions, have been intensely humane in themselves and in their interests. And if they seem to select, it is because they have so much to select from.”

“A public which likes to hear something worthwhile when you talk would like to understand something worthwhile when it sees pictures.”

“The true character of the student is one of great mental and spiritual activity.  He arrives at conclusions and he searches to express his findings. He goes to the market place, to the exhibition place, wherever he can reach the people, to lay before them his new angle on life.  He creates a disturbance, wins attention from those who have in them his kind of blood–the student blood. These are stirred into activity. Camps are established. Discussion runs high. There is life in the air. The non-student element says it is heresy.  let us have ‘peace!’  Put the disturber in jail.   In this we have two ideas of life, motion and non-motion.  If the art students who enter the schools today believe in the greatness of their profession, if they believe in self-development and courage of vision and expression, and conduct their study accordingly, they will not find the audience wanting when they go to the market place with expressions of their ideas.    They will find a crowd there ready to tear them to pieces; to praise them and ridicule them.”

More to come…

JDCM

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“An art student should read, or talk a great deal with those who have read.  His conversations with his intimate fellows should be more about his life and less of paint.”

“He should be careful of the influence of those with whom he consorts, and he runs a great risk in becoming a member of a large society, for large bodies tend toward the leveling of individuality to a common consent, the forming of adherence to a creed.”

“An artist who does not use his imagination is a mechanic.”

“All things change according to the state we are in.  Nothing is fixed.”

“There is nothing in all the world more beautiful or significant of the laws of the universe than the nude human body. In fact it is not only among the artists but among all people that a greater appreciation and respect for the human body should develop. When we respect the nude we will no longer have any shame about it.”

“The art student of these days is a pioneer. He lives in a decidedly colorless, materialistic age…Sometimes in the past we shot ahead, in certain ways, ahead of where we are now…We have yet as a body to come up to the art of living.”

“If a man has the soul of an artist he needs mastery of all the means of expression so that he may command them, for with his soul in activity he has much to say.”

“It is a splendid thing to live in the environment of great students. To have them about you in person if you can. If not in person, in their works. To live with them. Great students agree and disagree. They stir the waters.”

“If you want to know how to do a thing you must first have a complete desire to do that thing. Then go to kindred spirits–others who have wanted to do that thing–and study their ways and means, learn from their successes and failures and add your quota. Thus you may acquire from the experience of the race. And with this technical knowledge you may go forward, expressing through the play of forms the music that is in you and which is very personal to you.”

“Why do we love the sea? It is because it has some potent power to make us think things we like to think.”

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I made the initial film rinse at 16C, thus dropping the can/reel/ temp to 20C.  Then I can add the 20C soup and it will at least be stable for a couple of minutes before the ambient room temperature raises the can of soup a degree or so.  Now, since I have been under developing my PlusX by N-2 anyway in this darkroom I have to adjust the time again, this time for ambient temperature.  For this round of work I dropped the time to N-5 and the effects are very nice indeed: good separation in the shadows, nice highlights that are not overexposed and a balanced contrast.  Considering that many of the images were made in the height of the Greek sun (10:00-15:00, or 5800K) I am very pleased with the results.

Paros is much the same.  The Watercolor Workshop and the Digital Photography Bootcamp finished and hung a small exhibition last Friday which was lovely.  I was impressed by the photographers and enchanted by the watercolorists.  Some of the photographers had never worked in this kind of digital dynamic before and their work was terrific: all illustrated an excellent use of negative space, lovely light/shadow, texture and elegant composition in the work.  The watercolors were ethereal and splashed with colors, bright and soft.  There were some students who had never worked in this medium as well but that wasn’t apparent.  This is a testament to both their innate skill and that of their instructor.  There are more tourists on the island, but it is not crammed with people.  I am sure this is making some business owners nervous about their futures, but the summer hasn’t really arrived and the July and August crowds will write the book on this piece of marble in the blue sea.

I leave Paros for the USA in about a week.  I would like to think I will have a relaxing time back in New York but my time will be short and I have much to do, many people to see and commitments to keep.  I will be off-island and out of the EU for a month and then return at the very beginning of August.  As the plan goes I have about three weeks here and then I am off to visit a friend in England for a couple of days and then head to Italy, Ravenna and finally Pistoia and the Villa Rospigliosi where I meet up with the rest of the school for the Italian Session.  I have a lot of work to do for the fall.  My portrait project must continue and I need to push that a bit if I am to stay on schedule for the beginning of printing in October.  I am thankful for all the work I have done so far and I am a little ahead of schedule in the darkroom, but I must not rest on my laurels.  My role as student/intern is unwritten but the future looks bright, at least from this vantage point.

JDCM

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