Here’s another one from the new series of still life images created using objects from the large group of boxes of things I have picked up over the years. They sit in a corner of my studio and I am grabbing from them without much thought except for a very loose association. Nothing is glued in place, it’s all about a balancing act with certain bits poked in here and there.
It’s May in Las Vegas and it’s hot……really hot outside. Las Vegas culture is inside air-conditioned hotel/casinos full of expensive impulse buys from high end manufacturers. Outside it’s 105 degrees and oppressive. The only people you see on the streets are locals that absolutely have to get somewhere on foot, a few cars and assorted service workers. I only ventured out once during the mid day sun to try to capture the garish light of that time of day. Most of the imagery I did was shot early morning, pre-dawn and at sunset dusk. The people you encounter at those times of day are a world unto themselves……drunks trying to find the next score or just trying to get back to their hotel, some of the strangest looking homeless people I’ve ever seen……….sort of dried up and high-rollers still looking to throw money around and everywhere scattered about are cards for hookers and escort services. There are also armies of cleaning crews that literally scrub Vegas clean with soap and water every dawn and dusk. If you stay in one of the large hotel/casinos like I did you really don’t ever have to venture out into the desert heat, everything you would ever need is provided in these complexes that spread for huge distances. Las Vegas is definitely one of the most surreal places I have ever photographed.
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Shooting this was completely spontaneous. I had heard about this on Saturday the 19th but was busy today and forgot about the event. It wasn’t until my son and his girlfriend ran out the back door of our house and began commenting that I put it back together. These images were shot from our back yard across our neighbors fence and into the sky with dense moving clouds. I missed getting the full “ring of fire” because of those clouds but I really like how the images turned out anyway.
New from the still life series
Here is another random set of iPhone images from my iPhone, taken over a three-week period……..still looking for a pattern.
iPhone Fun 2
Clifford’s Tower – York Hilton
I was in England last year and one of the citys I visited was York. My hotel was the Hilton and it was positioned right next to a famous landmark built by William the Conquerer in 1068 called Clifford’s Tower. I thought it was the strangest thing to be sitting in the lobby of this very modern hotel, air-conditioned and fitted out with everything a modern person could want, and be able to look out of the lobby windows and see a piece of English history, 944 years old, rising right in front of me. This shot was taken looking through those lobby windows.
These nudes by Mogensen are just a bit surreal and almost too perfect….very erotic and just a little creepy……….but beautiful.
We’ve all seen these inflatable bounce houses popping up all over to help happy children celebrate birthdays but nothing is more surreal when one rises up in your neighbors’ backyard. It complete changed the familiar backyard view and transformed it into a strange, surreal fantasy.
