17 Hours

This is another Matt from back home. My real good friend David and Matt both come up to visit me last weekend. They drove 17 hours straight, through the night just to see me. Boy, I should do miss home and my friends. Who drives 17 hours just to see a friend??? REALLY REALLY amazing friends, that’s who.

We also went to the Rocky Mountain National Park, with my friend Phoebe who lives on my floor. I love this photo of Matt. The lines of his hands are perfect. The color of the sky is amazing. I can't wait to go home and see them all again!

Have I Told You Today..

This is my roommate Jamie and she’s kind of ridiculous. Although I normally don’t get along with girls very well, she and I act like we have known each other for years. We love most of the same foods, like pickles, we listen to the same types of music and we even have the same obsession with the FoodNetwork. I can’t believe how lucky I got with her as my roommate. She tells me every day how much she loves me and how lucky she is to have me as a roommate!

Two Evans

This is Matt, my friend from home. He got overly excited when I told him that there was a street on campus called Evans. Which just happens to be his last name, so of course he had to take a picture with it. He also had to take a picture of the first Chipotle and Tokyo Joe's (since we don't Tokyo Joe's at home).

Sally Mann

Mann, Sally, a converse American photographer, best known for photographs of her three children, often naked in poses that suggest their sexuality. Her widely recognized body of work, At Twelve (1988), similarly portrayed just-pubescent girls. Her later work explored landscapes of the American South, especially the Blue Ridge Mountains in south-western Virginia where she was born, grew up, and currently lives.

            Mann's black-and-white photographs are made with a large-format view camera, thoughtfully and skillfully printed. She has also worked in platinum, Polaroid, and Cibachrome. Her images are generally large and, issued in extremely limited editions, have enjoyed great success both critically and commercially.

            In the late 1980s, the widely exhibited family photographs eventually published in Immediate Family (1992) and Still Time (1994) were attacked as perverse and manipulative, or praised as innocent and beautiful, depending on the political stance of the viewer. In my opinion art is art and it will always be converse.  
            Mann's landscape work is strongly influenced by pictorialism. Appearing less controlled and more flawed than the images of her children, the prints are purposely made with damaged lenses to exaggerate irregularities of focus and evoke historical photography. All her work has a fictional character, and embodies wistfulness for innocence lost or under threat. She has also participated in group commission projects that reflect her values and interests, producing untitled images of windows made from the perspective of the dying for Hospice: A Photographic Inquiry (1996).

Mixing Old With The New

This is Matt, one of my closest guy friend from back home. He came to visit me Halloween weekend. We decided to go up to the Rocky Mountain National Park. There was tons of snow on the mountains around the park. We got some really great shots from the top of the mountain. It was so funny to see Matt's face with all the snow. Born and raised in Texas, he had never been to Colorado. It was a blast showing him around my new home.

Counting Down The Days

This is my count down. I never thought I would miss home this much. I don't miss Houston at all. I miss my family, my crazy best friend, my cat, and I ever miss my little brother just a little. I can't believe this first quarter has just flown by. It's crazy to think I will be home for 6 weeks, then have to come back for 6 months with one week break in between. Hopefully I will be able to go home that week. Some of my friends that went out of Texas for college are coming home next semester because they couldn't handle the stress. I hope that doesn't happen to me.

27 DAYS TILL I'M HOME :)

Has The Leaves Change

It amazing to actually be in a place that has all four seasons. Houston has one sometimes two if were are lucky, summer and winter. And the winter there is nothing like the winter here. In Houston, wearing jeans and a light weight, long sleeve T-shirt is considered our winter clothes. Denver is a totally different story. You need boots, gloves, heavy jacket/coats, scarves and hats. And if you talking about going skiing or snowboarding you need many layers.

Being able to watch the leaves change colors and fall is breathtaking. I'm looking forward to seeing it happen many times, over many years, hoping it will never get old.

"Set the stage, we turned the page
All these years have gone
I guess we haven't changed after all"

-Hello Hollywood

Home Sweet Home

Say hello to David and Matt (left to right). If you asked them how they are related they would say that they are brothers. They may look nothing alike but they sure do have a lot in common and they do basically everything together. I was lucky to be able to go home last weekend for Matt and Matt's birthdays, who are two of my closest guy friend back home. Being home made me realize that no matter how far I go away from "home" my friends always there for me. People always told me most of the friends you make in high school, don't stay with you through college and a lot of my friends at Denver are experiencing that. But I guess I'm one of the lucky few that can always depend on my friends back home.

"College is the best time of your life. When else are your parents going to spend several thousand dollars a year just for you to go to a strange town and get drunk every night?”

-David Wood

Moonrise, Hernandez

 

Ansel Adams

            Isn’t it just breathtaking? After a tiring and frustrating day of trying, precisely arranging the background and the other objects, to capture the perfect image that Ansel Adams saw in his mind, he was unable to render a pleasing image of his interpretation on a negative. While driving home along the highway near Espanola, Adams happened to glimpse sideways out of the car window and saw that famous scene called, Moonrise, Hernandez. Intending to take a duplicate negative as he appreciated the uniqueness of the scene Adams attempted to set up again, but it was too late. Just as he was getting ready with a second negative plate, the sunlight passed and the precise lighting effect of the scene was lost. 

In Moonrise, Ansel Adams has stimulated our eye by offering three layers, each with a different tone: the black sky, the white clouds, and the gray landscape. Under the last light of day we see the village of Hernandez, nestled among the tree-lined. Sage covers the ground. Burning wood drifts its warm, fragrance from chimneys. Even the snowcapped mountains only punctuate the meeting of the sky and earth. A broad stroke of white clouds spans the horizon, while just above the waxing moon beams down. The night is pitch-black and yet, somehow we can see. Each object appears to be lit from within: village, graveyard, and church. Whoever says photography isn’t art, hasn’t seen this photography or any of Adams works.

            Known as an American photographer who shot photographs of the American West in black-and-white, Ansel Adams was given his first camera, Kodak No. 1 Box Brownie, at the young age of 14. In 1919, he joined the Sierra Club which was vital to Adams's early success as a photographer. He was the photographer when the group went on outings; Adams began to realize that he could earn enough to survive. His photographs became works of art. By 1935 he was recognized as one of the best photographers in America.

"My photographs have now reached a stage when they are worthy

 of the world's critical examination. I have suddenly come upon a new style

which I believe will place my work equal to anything of its kind."

-Ansel Adams

Annie Leibovitz

            Born in 1949 in, Annie Leibovitz enrolled in the San Francisco Art Institute intent on studying painting. It was not until she traveled to Japan with her mother the summer after her sophomore year that she discovered her interest in taking photographs. After returning home, she began taking night classes in photography.

            In 1970 Leibovitz approached Jann Wenner, founding editor of Rolling Stone. Impressed with her portfolio, Wenner gave Leibovitz her first assignment: shoot John Lennon. Leibovitz’s black-and-white portrait of the shaggy-looking Beatle graced the cover of the January 1971 issue. Two years later she was named Rolling Stone chief photographer.

            When the magazine began printing in color in 1974, Leibovitz followed suit. Among her subjects from that period are Bob Dylan, Bob Marley, and Patti Smith. Leibovitz also served as the official photographer for the Rolling Stones’ 1975 world tour.

            In 1983, Leibovitz joined Vanity Fair and was made the magazine’s first contributing photographer. At Vanity Fair she became known for her wildly lit, staged, and provocative portraits of celebrities. Most famous among them are Whoopi Goldberg submerged in a bath of milk and Demi Moore naked and holding her pregnant belly. Since then Leibovitz has photographed celebrities ranging from Brad Pitt to Mikhail Baryshnikov. She’s shot Ellen DeGeneres, the George W. Bush cabinet, Michael Moore, Madeleine Albright, and Bill Clinton. She’s shot Scarlett Johannson and Keira Knightley nude, with Tom Ford in a suit; Nicole Kidman in ball gown and spotlights; and, recently, the world’s long-awaited first glimpse of Suri Cruise, along with parents Tom and Katie. Her portraits have appeared in Vogue, The New York Times Magazine, and The New Yorker, and in ad campaigns for American Express, the Gap, and the Milk Board.

            Leibovitz met Susan Sontag in 1989 while photographing the writer for her book AIDS and its Metaphors. Sontag told her, “You’re good, but you could be better.” Though the two kept separate apartments, their relationship lasted until Sontag’s death in late 2004. Sontag’s influence on Leibovitz was profound.

My Life and Photography

          “Be creative, own it, and most importantly, have fun!” Those inspiring words of wisdom were given by my 12th grade English teacher before sending my class off to work on our senior project. Our project was to create a scrapbook based on our growth/change throughout our four years of high school. My freshman year was filled with excitement when new friends were made and anxiety seemed to take over when it came to a new school. Sophomore year I knew who my friends were and I somewhat had an idea about who I thought I was. During my junior year, I had the pleasure of knowing how it felt to love someone but also the horrible feeling of what heartbreak felt like. My senior year was by far my favorite year. I have never laughed, loved, or danced so much in my entire life. But I would have never realized how much I had change through those four years if I wasn’t assigned this project. Just like how Sontag says, photography “means putting oneself into a certain relation to the world that feels like knowledge—and, therefore, like power”, is how exactly I feel when I look back through my scrapbook filled with “stereotypical” prom pictures, crazy weekend adventure shots, and awkward first day of freshman year photos. 
         I agree with Sontag’s analogy between society’s view of photography and the prisoners’ perception of the shadows In Plato’s Cave. In today’s society our “photographing eye” is altered to see what we feel is worth looking at and what we have a right to observe, identical to the prisoners, which view shadows of statues that are projected onto the wall of a cave. When the prisoners see the actual object which the shadow is a product of, they feel enlightened, kind of like how we feel when “photographs alter and enlarge our notions” of reality.
         Reality is what it is, nothing more and nothing less. We are living beings who visually perceive unthinkingly and in doing so we make our visual reality. And photographs are a huge part of that visual. We are lost in our own thoughts and our own ideas of the world, and we so rarely see reality. The camera sees something, and then records it by taking a photo. And through the photograph, one single image, you get a taste of what happened/what is happening/what will happen.
     Sontag’s theory that “photography is an elegiac art” couldn’t be more precise. I believe that the people, who say photography isn’t art, are closed minded. I always have seen photography as another way to express myself. Just like dancers who dance to music that fits their mood/emotion, everyone has their special way to express themselves, regardless if a person is a dancer, a musician, or an artist.
        However some people don’t just use photography as self-expression. Some use it as a way to “prove” something that “we hear about, but doubt”, to others it’s a way to keep a record of where they have been or who they have met, and in other words a life story and everyone’s is different. 
       Photography is also used in media form such as TV, newspapers, or something as simple as a family slide show about their trip to Italy. Photos “fill in blanks in our” memories that we so how seem to forget. It could be anything from the smallest thing, like what you wore, to the biggest thing, like where you went.
      As the months and the years pass by, I continue to add on my college years to my high school scrapbook; merging the old friends with the new friends, combining old inside jokes with the new inside jokes and most importantly, collaborating the old memories with the new memories. The more I look through my scrapbook, I recognize more and more where I have been and where I have come from, and those are two things I could never forget.

The View From Inside

This is a photo of the Capital building taken from inside the Denver Art Museum, in one of many unique windows that covers the building's outside walls. Inside was filled with amazing photographs and paintings from artist around the world and from many different centuries. The works of art were breath taking and wonderful. Thanks for taking us Roddy!

Border

This is where I crossed the Texas/Colorado border to start the chapter in my life: Collge. I cant wait to meet new people, make new friends, and learn more than my brain can handle. Already busy with picking classes, orgaizing my dorm, and getting involved I know Denver I where I was born to be for college. I can just smell it in the air. This is my time to shine. And I'm going to live it up!

"If you want something you never had before, you've got to do something you have never done before."

 - Drina Reed



Small World

Cheyenne, my roommate Jamie and I attended the Rockies game against Arizona and they actually won! Even the score was only 2-1 it was still a good game. The guy in front of us kept yelling different cheers, it was pretty entertaining. While on the way back to campus on the light rail, we met two guys on the hockey team. It turns out they were the ones who wrote all over our white eraser board on our dorm room door, along with trying and failing horribly at trying to steal our suite mates party rug that was underneath their door.

On the Road

After 17 hours in the car with my mother, Im very happy to say we arrived safely in Denver. We left Friday afternoon with my best friend Kaitlyn and most of my belongings in tow. We drove 7 hours to Norman, Oklahoma to be reunited my other best friend Katie, who is going to college at OU. She showed us around campus and introduced us to Classic's where they combine candy and soda, like Dr.Pepper and Hot Tamales. Its not as wierd as it sounds I promise. The next morning I had to say goodbye to my best friends, definitely one of the worst things I have ever had to do. After the tears cleared up, my mom and I drove 10 more hours through Oklahoma and Colorado. Along the way we got turned arounded a few times, saw a camel, and were amazed by the huge windmills. There were between 20 and 30 windmills on one farm we passed, they are incredible.

Typical Night

One of my last nights in Houston was filled with more laughter than I have heard in along time. it was jam-packed with singing country music as loud as we could, dancing in a local Steak-n-Shake drive thru, going to a midget gone wild party, trying to feed a dog mustard, and most importantly, spending quality time with friends that matter most. On top of all that, we watched this movie called Shrooms. I have never used the word trippy, or any other word for that fact, that many times within an hour and a half. As oddly as it sounds, these events might sound really random and out of the normal for most people, but last night was pretty much a typical night in h-town for my friends and I.

Obsessed

Rubber ducks, stuffed ducks, duck socks, and even an alarm clock that quacks. You name it I pretty much got it, minus a pet duck. Im not really sure where my obsession started. My best friend Kaitlyn (yes same name) would say it all started because of her. Back in third or fourth grade, she wore a bright red poncho that her grandmother had made for her. And whenever the teacher left the room she would run around the classroom, stand on top of the tables and chairs, flapping her arms underneath her poncho, quacking like a duck. Its probably another reason why we have been best friends for ten years and counting. I sure am going to miss her.

 "Cure for an obsession: get another one." - Mason Cooley

A Little Confused

Hi this is Patches and he loves to play in my boxs while I pack for college. This look was given by both my cat and I when my parents told us once I leave for DU in four days, they were going to give him away. I have been looking for a home for him but no luck so far. Most of my friends are allergic or have other animals. And I dont want to just give him to some random family or animal shelter. But I have a few days to try and change my parents mind, wish me luck!