The Take Away
Carr Leon Hagerman
Artist. Performer. Author. Tinker.
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Carr Hagerman
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A Starbucks in Toyko. Now this is the kind of design I’d like to see more of on this side of the globe.
I’ve been a long time observer of street performers. Musicians make up the bulk of performers in any city, most of them dropping a hat or case and playing for a few hours to pick up to change.
For me, there is something elegant and lovely about the musicians who play in such a quiet way. They’re not out to gain an audience necessarily, and they don’t take pains to gather a crowd or engage. Mostly they come to these busy places to practice and hone their skills, and to perhaps pick up a little green in the process.
They provide a textural backdrop to the busy noise of the city, a softening of the din, a seductive counterpoint to distraction, and quite often they’re just good musicians learning and growing in full resolution.
It’s snowing this evening and I’m just heading out to take some late evening shots of the snowfall, the plows, and the foreign landscape of fresh white snow (for this year at least). I should be in bed, I have damn cold.
The car is running already, and here I am taking a quick glance through my photo files because I wanted to post something, because I wanted to say something. The car is running.
I’ve never called myself a mentor before, and though I’ve talked about it and known about it conceptually, it’s not something I’ve tried or been comfortable doing. In my past, I guess I’ve mentored others, many of them, but it wasn’t formal and it wasn’t prolonged. But now, it means something, now it’s something that I’m thinking about. I’m mentoring a young and talented photographer who, among many things, is also a roommate and friend. That’s a lot of relationship to manage. The car is running.
It’s been a year since we met after she came home from an extended leave of absence from family and local friends. When we first talked she said she wanted to be a photographer, to take pictures in the difficult corners of the world, to go far beyond the horizons of comfort or the ordinary to shoot pictures. Already an experienced underwater diver and shooter, she possessed a crop of photographs that demonstrated a talent and a predisposition for narrative composition.
When I agreed to mentor her, to take up her interest and make it my cause, I imagined it would be an apprenticeship, teacher and student, and I would bestow upon her all of my useless knowledge on creative things, on looking at the world, on drive, being relevant, driven and successful. But that’s not what has happened. My car is running…
Life and teaching, mentoring and learning aren’t predictable paths. Organic mentoring is as much about learning for the teacher as it is about the student. It’s a love it and fuck it free for all, a pushing and shoving, pleading and fighting, tipping over and pulling back, laughing so hard you can’t breath, and crying at broken moments. At the core of all of this, for me, has been a kind of beautiful unfolding, a birth. Nothing of worth is born casually, and nothing worth loving comes without undoing something. Creativity, learning, friendship, fighting, challenging the lines and growing are all just love in different scenes. Love of the path, love of what’s possible.
I’ve got to get outside, it’s snowing and the car is running.
After a few tense words this evening, before I started the car, I came and found this photograph she took at a local zoo just a few months ago. When I see this, when I think about her eye and this moment, and our first conversation just a year ago, I’m reminded of why I’m here and what I’m doing. It’s no secret I guess, you’ve already figured it out I suppose, but as you can tell, my mentor has so much to teach me.
The car is running, guess I’ll turn it off and go to bed.
(©Robin Brigham)
This park and fountain is located across the street from the MOMA in San Francisco. On such a lovely day, I would assume it would be populated by tourists and locals sunning themselves, or sitting by the calming sounds of the fountain. Instead, a homeless man, asleep atop a pile of newspapers, is the only one here. Not a bad place to sleep for anyone, let alone someone who has no where else to go.
The homeless situation in San Francisco seems remarkably bad. Areas of town wreak of urine, and the sidewalks are littered with people sleeping, some in their own filth. I guess freedom means everyone can do as they desire, but so many of these people were obviously suffering from emotional or mental problems.
This picture captures a homeless man, sitting in a waterless sculptural fountain, oddly blending with the massive structure. The juxtaposition of images and meaning struck me.
As I post this, I wonder if Keen is really onto something, though I don’t know if there is anything I can do about it!
I love photographic simplicity, the unregarded moments that pass quickly, that usually don’t fall open to our attention. The morning sun passing through a messy glass door, capturing a candid moment. Simple. Lovely.
Minnesota
As I have grown older, particularly in the past couple of years, I’ve become more curious about craftsmanship, not just in the things I purchase or browse, but the nature of craftsmanship in my own works and those for whom I am close. It wasn’t until I began working with photography, and eventually video and audio, that I began to have a sense of my own level of craftsmanship, which I see now as a complex conversation between myself, ideas, the materials I have to work with, and the way and manner they interact with life.
I have observed how easy it is to be seduced into activities that diminish my thinking, that pull me into the undertow of distraction and a kind of meandering uselessness. The drone of nonstop texting, information overload, gadget masturbation and a nearly myopic hedonism (read alcohol) can sever the creative mind from the delicate nature of quiet craftsmanship and creative reflection.
To pursue an expression of an idea into some form, whether it be writing, photography, music or performance, requires presence and practice. It’s requires our best thinking, quiet, and the application of discipline and experimentation. Experimentation is useless without reflection and thoughtfulness.
I could go on.
I wish our institutional school system could be re-invented. In it’s place I’d build neighborhood studios, lofts, labs, theaters, learning playgrounds full of the best technology old and new. I’d also return to some form of apprenticeships. Learning is organic, and the more we approach learning and education as a dynamic choice, rather than a linear necessity, a demand and command structure, the more likely it seems to me, we will turn out enlightened, curious, engaged and delighted human beings who want to build beautiful things, including a new world.
A lovely little film about a barbershop in North Carolina, where pickers come from all over to play music in the “back room”. It’s really a film about community, and it’s worth the time to watch it…even if you hate bluegrass.
The Good Life
I’ve got a plate full to accomplish, and as life plays out day-to-day, I find myself drawn more to quiet and solitude, then noise, distraction or drama. It’s an odd position for me, in some ways, because I’ve always been in the midst of the hoopla and seem to operate at my best when there are three rings and a circus surrounding me.
As a creative, it’s too damn easy to be spun into the tangled google of unnecessary details and uselessness. My success of late is a result of focus and reward, but also of working more on quiet and reflection, acknowledging that I cannot nor won’t get it all done, that I don’t need more attention, and that I get a lot wrong. Creating creative works at any age requires, it seems to me, a sense of groundedness, a connection to compelling ideas that run subcutaneously, that we can’t easily eject, and surrounding ourselves with friends who love us. Then, it’s looking at the work we create with pride, with an itch to get it better and clearer, and a sense of accomplishment when we make something that strikes a chord inside us, and hopefully others.
So, stay focused on the projects, but spend time reflecting and writing. Have some ideas, for crying out loud, and defend them. Stand up for yourself against the utterly predictable inner critic inside. Engage with those that are grounded, willing, smarter than you, and who aren’t mentally unstable, caustic and dramatic busy bodies. Most of all, love those others, listen with them, hang out with them and give them the best of yourself and try not to let people down.
Well, I have my work cut out for me today, but it’s sunny, my projects are coming along and I’m creating and isn’t that the good life?
Yulia Brodskaya’s work with strips of paper. This work is made up of strips of paper glued to a background creating a fantastic depth and texture. Huh…not much social life if you do many of these!
There are so many pieces of historical pop culture that would be best forgotten, but looking at this cover for an old vinyl workout album, one knows there isn’t any ambiguity about roles, as silly as they were back then. If you were to create an album cover for a workout plan for married couples today, what would it look like on a cover like this?
Debbie Drake was kinda hot though, don’t you think?
