From the Archives of 2007—1
February 7, 2021
In 2007 I spent time in Florida and Missouri. Here are some abstract photographs I took in those locations.
1 The alleys in Sarasota are some of my favorite places to photograph.
2 In Kansas City I found some interesting things in a yard just off an alley.
3 I wouldn’t have the slightest idea how to find this yard again.
4 I’d love to go back.
5 I wonder what this plastic was used for.
6 Rolled up and stood vertically, the plastic was unwinding.
7 Some walls in Sarasota display clues to their history. The sign that I presume was once attached to this wall couldn’t have been as interesting as the remnants of mastic that held it there.
8 Installed on the grounds of Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is Walter De Maria’s One Sun/34 Moons. In this photograph you can see part of the sun and one of the moons.
Romancing Reality 
In the first picture, I could almost have taken the horizontal tape (if tape it be) for a charred beam of wood.
The lower left quadrant in #4 resembles the result obtained from zooming or otherwise moving the camera during a longish exposure, even though that’s not what you did.
Did you inadvertently repeat #5 as #6?
The squiggly curves in #8 seem organic, as if strands of seaweed.
That’s a colorful abstraction you closed with.
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February 7, 2021 at 7:00 PM
No, I did not mean to repeat #s 5 and 6. I hit Publish, then left the computer (and my mind, apparently) to eat dinner. Everything’s fixed now. So your #8 is now #7. I agree that the duct tape looks like charred wood, though I hadn’t thought of that. I see what you mean in #4 and #7 (the former #8), too. The installation shown in the new #8 must look cool at night, but maybe not as colorful.
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February 7, 2021 at 8:13 PM
Once again these are beautiful because of their deteriorated quality that demands my attention.
You have a great eye for what to capture and how to do that.
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February 8, 2021 at 9:36 AM
Thank you, Clare. I’m pleased that you like these. As I look through the photos I took in 2007, I find some that I still like a lot. I find many many more that I liked back then but that no longer would make the cut.
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February 8, 2021 at 2:01 PM
Good stuff >>> esp like 4, 5 and 6! 🙂
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February 9, 2021 at 4:54 AM
Thanks, Adrian. I’ll bet that today I would have taken at least 10 more photographs of that roll of orange plastic. What a gift.
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February 9, 2021 at 9:42 AM
The last photo made me smile – I like De Maria’s work. It would be nice to see some in person – someday! I love the plastic knots, just love them. Also the orange plastic – #5 & #6 – #6 begins to get into a grand scale. #7 shows off not only your eye for those walk-by details no one else sees but also your eye for exceptional compositions. Let’s not forget the nice window with duck tape.
I’d like to hear about how you connect these to what you’re doing now, 14 years later. I’d also like to hear about when you began noticing and photographing things like the plastic knots and the wall in #7.
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February 9, 2021 at 6:04 PM
The photos of the plastic knots are two of my all-time personal favorites, so I’m glad you love them. All these are photos I would take today. I may have added to the subjects I consider worth my attention (such as dumpsters) over the years, but I don’t think I’ve eliminated any subject matter. Thinking back to the first roll of film I took with my first adjustable camera (a Zeiss Ikon rangefinder) in 1970, I remember two photos. One was of louvered slats in a door with a 45-degree-angled shadow cast across the slats. It was a similar look to #19 on this post: https://lindagrashoff.wordpress.com/2020/11/15/walking-around-downtown-oberlin/. The other photo I remember from that roll was of a garden hose. Here’s a more recent one: https://lindagrashoff.wordpress.com/tag/hose/page/3/. I think plastic knots and the wall in #7 are in the same category. I think all my photos praise the material world; that’s how I connect them. Many people—not only photographers—to some degree praise landscapes and other pretty or sublime things. Although I photograph the landscape, I have aesthetic reactions to things much more mundane. I know I’m not alone in finding beauty in the commonplace, but I may be one of the few to praise the sheer corporeality of the world. More about this is at the top of the page under Matter Matters. Tell me, Lynn, if I haven’t answered your question. I’ll give it another go.
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February 9, 2021 at 9:15 PM
Some interesting effects, there. The twisted plastic is particularly fascinating in the range of colours it reflects.
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February 10, 2021 at 1:30 PM
I agree. The blue is probably sky, but I can no longer remember what else was reflected. Thank you for writing, Karine.
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February 10, 2021 at 7:38 PM
These are super, Linda. I especially like the yellow painted mastic and those colorful twisted plastic compositions are so intriguing.
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February 12, 2021 at 5:19 AM
Thanks, Steve. This isn’t the first photograph I’ve taken of painted mastic, but it’s the one I like best. Would love to find more twisted plastic to photograph.
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February 12, 2021 at 8:36 AM
love the textures and lines Linda…😎 cool work ~ smiles hedy☺️
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February 13, 2021 at 9:14 AM
Thanks, Hedy. While I love to spend time in nature and to photograph it, I think I can do my most original work with subjects like these.
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February 13, 2021 at 11:40 AM