CAMPERCRAFT was a six month investigative project exploring the dichotomy between the lived and idealized life associated with the "adventurous" nomadic lifestyle lived within a handcrafted teardrop camper. Through candid photographic and literary documentation, the mobile live-space questions a common belief in the promising power of an object's ability to create inward change, beneficial routines, and influential relationships as well as the expectations associated with sharing lifestyles through contemporary media.
CAMPERCRAFT SELECTIONS:
THE RULE OF THIRDS // 4.11.16
The rule of thirds is a suggestion for the composition of design. A no brainer in my mind, I balance my photographic frame without thought, purely intuition and feeling. I don't know if it's out of habit or just an instinctual human nature, but a part of me physically aches a little bit over intro students' poorly constructed layouts, a total composition snob. Balance is essential.
But despite my snobby eye, my life doesn't quite follow the rules. I can only focus on one project project at a time, which would usually leave me to do my university art projects until the absolute end of the deadline when I had everything else out of the way and could put my heart into what I cared about most. My relationships can be like that of a movie romance, but caught at the wrong time and they can turn more into a "Blue Valentine." For the life of me, I cannot keep a succulent alive, overwatering it with love or forgetting its existence. I like to be hiking a a mountain crest, straining my body to the extreme, or relaxing in a hammock with a book and a pen. I tend to give my life to others or selfishly run away from it all. So we can easily say, that balance outside of a lens isn't quite my strong suit.
A couple years ago, I got a tattoo on my forearm of the rule of thirds. A solid daily reminder to get my shit together. I know that balance is a struggle for everyone, but to live a content life, I should probably reign in the horses a little bit. These travels of mine are definitely about finding a balance within that once again. I think it's easier to ease the care of others and work into life when you are content with yourself and your priorities. Through absorbing myself in nature, living simply and poorly, reading lots, and making art, and really slowing down to see things, I am getting the base of my priorities straight. Life suddenly doesn't only seem about advancing in the work force or where I will be in five years. Instead, I don't know what day of the week is or what I will do this afternoon, my clock has no hands, and it feels pretty good.
One time, a very cute young man came into the coffee shop that I worked at for years. He was a regular, always getting a standard small black coffee. This day though, I decided to make a rare show of some small talk. He informed me that he was a med student and was studying for something or another as he drank his coffee every day. But what made this guy stand out from most, is that instead of asking me what I do for work (although he already knew part of it was grindin’ beans and slangin’ joe), he asked "what gives you energy?" Such a simple and delightful question. These are the things that I am reconnecting with on my travels, the things that give me energy. The love of friends and family, independence and nature, art and curiosity, learning to swallow them in healthy doses.
I am really fascinated with the Chinese philosophy of the yin yang. No, I wouldn't get this tattooed too. But the sentiment of this solid body made of two extremely contrasting forces, with a little bit of each integrated aesthetically pleasingly within the other, taps into that anally intuitive crave for compositional balance. Yin and yang are not to be expressed as two separate forces, like I just worded them, because they are interdependent, unable to function without the other. A simple and pretty obvious ideal, that most of us can probably be reminded of more often.
The Idaho landscape reminds me much of this balance. The lava rocks of Hell's Half Acre just outside Idaho Falls was the cold, harsh, and mysterious yin, while the sand dunes of St. Anthony were the smooth, malleable and forgiving, bright yang. Although the lava rocks were rough and volatile, there were hints of life sprouting up in the form of lichen, sage, and juniper. And although the sand dunes seem ever so gentle and calm, given some wind or a little sun, they sure know how to sting. Through sitting and contemplating in each landscape, I discovered a lovely balance that Idaho can bring.
FREEDOM BETWEEN THE EARS // 4.14.16
As I’m driving out of Salt Lake City, I hit patches of rain. Pouring rain. I am as giddy as a wee kid as I have always loved driving in heavy rains. Despite the fact that in the back of my mind I am praying that the camper will NOT take on water this time.
I think of these showers as a cleansing thing. Maybe it’s the hippy dippy teenager in me that once believed in a medicine man and still burns sage every time she breaks up with a boy, but there’s something rejuvenating about a shower, physical or metaphorical. Either way, this is the start of a different chapter in my travel journal. I am now on my own. No longer traveling to meet a friend or family. Just going to go, and going to go slow.
Bryce Canyon’s my first stop. But it was just POURING RAIN. So everything here is absolutely sloppy. Despite this, the rocks are rich, and I am fascinated by the layers. I once described how I see the world to a boyfriend of mine. How everything is just shapes and layers. Colors and blocks. I break things down into their simple forms in my mind. I think it’s why I make the art that I do. The people and the rocks and more rocks and more rocks and some different colored rocks and some canyon rocks and some clouds and sky. So much depth to flatten in my mind it keeps me occupied for so long. Eventually I get a little over stimulated and decide to go for a drive. What amazes me, maybe because it gives me a little familiar mental break from all the rocks, is the forest. As you look towards the canyon, the forest is tapping you on the shoulder, hoping for a little attention. Like the middle child, not rebellious or perfect enough to get any notice. But I think it's absolutely gorgeous! What greens! Such nice shapes! So I sit between the ovals for awhile and think about this place. Over in Cleveland, my friend David texts me telling me that I am one of the few people that appreciates not doing but just sitting as much as he does. And then I remember. Oh yeah! I do! So I sit. I sit and think and absorb and be. And this has been the first time that I just sat in a long time.
"Freedom begins between the ears." -Edward Abbey
BASECAMP // 3.21.16
After setting up a camp that I plan on staying at for 3 nights, I can feel like this place will become a home. Ponderosa Grove is its name and I am one of a few campers at this BLM site. Only $5 a night, this place is almost too nice. Conveniently situated south of Bryce, east of Zion, and west of the Coyote Buttes, it is a prime location, without the crazy crowds.
My first morning, I barely want to get out of bed. My mind is as bright as the freshly risen sun but my body and the frost on the windows is telling me that it’s tooooo cold to get up yet. I decide to put on my next comfiest pair of pants, after my pajamas, and set off on the hunt for The Wave. As I am 10 miles out of Kanab, UT, I read on the website for the hike that you have to receive a permit before hiking it. Permits are only dispersed online MONTHS before or at 8:30-9 each morning (for a hike the next day in Kanab. I only have two more mornings to hike and it’s 8:20! I turn my car around and hunt down the visitor center. Turns out there is an everlasting reason that I hate gambling. I may be lucky in life, but not in the lottery. No Wave for me either day.
So instead, I decide to do some housework. I clean up the car, sew some patches on my pack, write some letters, make the bed, take some pics, make some lunch, and the next thing you know, the day is gone. No exploring or going, just semi productively catching up on things, as if I were doing chores around the houseThis was just what I needed to feel like I was living here or anywhere really, rather than just passing through.
The next day, I decide to do my backup backup plan. Some place called Zion that I hear is maybe as good as the Wave or something…. !!!!!!
I’ve been feeling a little funky these days. Not eating much, fatigued, nauseous, not sleeping well. One trouble that feeds another really. So when I get to the visitor center at Zion, at the base of the canyon. I am not sure of what I should even do. Feeling like I may pass out any minute, really just wanting a nap but somewhere deep down where I can’t feel it but it still tickles my toe a bit my mind is too excited to rest. I assure my parents that due to this altitude sickness I wont push my limits.
I start with an easy hike.. that was nice and all but over in 10 minutes. Maybe I can pull off a moderate climb… I am feelin’ pretty good, and they always overstate the difficulty of these to scare people off anyways. Next thing I know I am holding onto a chain bolted into the wall of a cliff thousands of feet in the air praying to my Merrels that they get a grip today because they’re the only thing keeping me from that certain death drop that a handful of people have died from in the past 5 years.. Not that my Merrels could give me wings or anything if I passed out with altitude sickness...
But here I am, safe and sound. Zion was beautiful. It's hard to describe really. A true wonder. I wish I could do some backcountry rock hopping to really get to know her better. Being there just kept making me think of my time in Canyonlands last spring. How I was scared out of my pants hiking the Syncline Trail but once we were done, dominated and exhausted, we felt that we had something special there. Whether it was with the land or the friends we hiked with. It was something else. So Zion made me dream of the potential for such feelings again. And dream even more about who I would want to share them with.
A DATE WITH THE DEVIL // 3.24.16
If this was a trip were five course meal and you the Mojave was your dessert, it would kind of be like when rice krispie treats don’t have enough butter or something. Hard and dry, they still look soooooo good but they don’t care one bit about your teeth.
My two days here were have definitely taken me out of my element. I entered the dessert in a sort of Hills Have Eyes situation, following the map to Cima road to find my way to the Kelso Dunes at the Mojave National Preserve. But of course the road says its off limits to thru traffic, and after going a little further more signs say “flooded” or “keep out” Flooded in the dessert?I see nooooo water. But I pretend it’s a sign and backTrack until I get to the interstate and find another way into the the DEVILS PLAYGROUND. As if I didn’t have enough reason to think that at any moment some deformed humans with no care for humanity would stall my car and jump on me as I am wandering around in the sun drenched sand bed, never to be seen again…
I pull up to my campsite about an hour after getting off the interstate. Kelso Sand Dunes roadside camping. Turns out those deformed humans watching over me are just something called children screeching with joy at the distant base of the mountainous sand dunes. I catch the sun setting just right as I set up camp. I CANT EXPLAIN HOW GOOD it felt to stand outside with just a sweater on, no frozen toes or fingers.
Over the next couple days here, I have gradually become one with the land , the families left, the sun rose, I pooped in a hole, made friends with some bees and have learned a couple things.
There is a reason why Stanley Yelnats found peaches in the desert, and that’s because peaches are really fucking good in the desert.
YOU WILL ADMIT DEFEAT and drink water.
Humans aren’t meant to live in the desert.
If humans are meant to live in the desert, they are meant to run around naked.
It feels really right to be naked in the desert.
The desert will play tricks on you by whispering some wind your way that due to heat exhaustion you may think is a car so you rush to put your clothes back on again.. But it’s probably not a car. Because you’re alone. In the desert.
WAKING UP IN WONDER VALLEY // 5.18.16
You know that feeling you get once in a while? That fleeting, but absolute best feeling? . Maybe a few seconds or a few minutes, you feel high. Like you're soaring and nothing matters, not even yourself? I have been thinking a lot about self actualization. I first heard the term while listening to a TED Radio Hour podcast titled "Maslow's Human Needs." I remember being fascinated by Maslow's Hierarchy as soon as I heard about it years ago, but didn't take the time to delve into the philosophy until much later. In my past life I may have been a psychologist. Listening to people, watching them, finding out what makes them tick. I think that relates to how I photograph. Filling fictitious case studies with strangers and for a matter of seconds, or maybe minutes, I study and record.
I was listening to this particular podcast episode as I worked on cataloging the Colorama project at the George Eastman Museum one summer. I fended off the mind-numbing sensation of computer work that summer with hundreds of hours of podcasts. Whether they kept me sane or a little crazy, I would vomit my newly found facts about the current trends of nihilism or African tribes practicing a religion based on American military practices to my coworkers as I heated up my kale and sweet potatoes in the break room microwave.
But Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs is a food pyramid for humanity's well being. A fairly common sense set of suggestIons. But like many self help things, whether it's a personality quiz or tarot deck, just hearing the simple things about why you may be the way you are, or how you can approve can give a much needed nudge of introspective. The pyramid's base is all physiological. Food, shelter, water, the basics. The next tier is safety. Whether it's protection from the growing amount of tornadoes in Minnesota or marrying a sugaR daddy for some money, we all seek a little protection. After those first two categories are fulfilled, we all need to belong. Love, companionship, and community are the next level of the pyramid. Introvert or ex, we all do better when we feel we are part of a community. Sexual, romantic, or platonic, humans are social creatures that typical thrive when they feel like they belong to part of a bigger pack. Not only do you have to belong though. You also have to feel respected, which is the next tier on the pyramid. One needs to understand and appreciate themselves, which will in turn let others show their respect as well. Maslow separated esteem into "higher" and "lower" saying that higher (those who have more self respect compared to those who seek respect from others - lower) takes precedence.
Although Maslow put these in a pyramid format, it seems to me that they are more like a web. Because unlike the food pyramid, just because something is on the top doesn't mean esteem will rot your teeth if you have too much of it. Although each tier is separate and requires a balance, they are incredibly interrelated.
So the next time you're grouchy with your boyfriend you can think about how your physiological needs aren't doin' so hot because you've been eating ramen noodles for the last few days... or maybe that's just me.
These things are basic. Simple. Not surprising, right? But it's nice to think about them here and there and get in check a bit.
What may be surprising however, is "self actualization". To me, the lower tiers of the pyramid describe how to live, but self actualization, the crown of the pyramid, explains why. It is described as the motive for realizing one's potential. Expressing creativity, a quest for spiritual enlightenment, pursuit of knowledge, and desire to give to society are examples of this. So I am listening to this TED podcast and they get to the part about self actualization. They describe it like when a pianist is playing, he has practiced and practiced and he as at a point when he can just play. The notes flow out of him as though they are a part of him. His concentration isn't strained, but instead it's simply a stream. He is in this zone so much so that he doesn't pay attention to his body, mind, or anything else about himself. His identity disappears from his consciousness and he becomes this flowing act, a "peak experience," as Maslow would say. It sounds like heaven right?! All those worries disappearing, losing yourself and becoming this art. BUT it won't last. It never will. Never can. Maslow said something along the lines of "Man can't be perfect but for five minutes. You must give up the notion of a permanent heaven, because after five minutes, you have to come back to earth again.
Maslow believed that we must focus on ourselves, our bodies, and all these practical aspects of life just so that we can get to this peak experience that is entirely focused on losing sight of all those practicalities.
This is why I make art. But it is also why I hike mountains or listen to podcasts about self actualization. Something about the flow of the act, it's numbing yet blissful in just the right way. I don't worry about myself, how many people are reading a silly blog, if I have groceries to make dinner, or if I broke up with the wrong boy. None of it matters, and it feels so good to not matter sometime. Like being in the wilderness, surrounded by beasts and trees older than old and you, you feel so small, insignificant, and so good about being humbled.
But...This is why art is so damn hard. Math is easy. Well not for me, but if you have the education and can retain it, you will find the answers. Because they are usually there to be found. Of course mathematicians have flow too! But even if they aren't in the mood that day, it is likely possible they can still find the answer.
But art... My dad always jokes to his photo students... "Think art is going to be easy? No way. If you want something with answers or you want to copy someone's homework, go get an engineering degree."
Because art, the art that feels good to make, requires living in heaven. You can reach that five minutes of flow and hope that you take a step towards a masterpiece, but unlike a math equation, the answers aren't right in front of you. And what a contradiction. To commit to living a life around a work that is so personally intertwined with your health, your security, and emotional well-being to be successful, yet doesn't reward its host with the financial or logistical benefits that so many other career paths offer.
But this is why I am living like this. Why living in a camper, sleeping in a deafening desert alone, complementing my ramen noodles with discounted fruit, avoiding cities and shopping malls for fear of impulse buying, and sweating over pizza dough to make money to drive my car to my next destination is so worth it. Because simplifying my needs makes them more easily satisfied, and the more easily satisfied they can be, the more I can forget about them. And the more I forget, the more space I have to think, create, and maybe live in heaven for a few minutes.
Photographing in Wonder Valley is a peak experience. I drove through this area on my way to Indio to work Coachella and saw these abandoned shacks. Confused and intrigued, I went back a couple weeks later with my friend Victor. He chatted up a guy at a gas station in Twenty-Nine Palms and found out it was an area that was land granted out to people decades ago. And they just couldn't make it. I mean, it is the desert. You can't just plop down in the middle of it and expect to somehow make money off of the couple acres of land that your house is on. So they couldn't build up their own lives, which meant they couldn't build a community, and to my photographic delight, Wonder Valley is full of the most endearing humble abandoned homes.
The wind was blowing like a heartbroken wail. My lungs were already full of dust from a week of pizza vending at Coachella. I'd just showered so the sand was sticking in my hair rather than flowing through it, and my stomach so full from masaman curry that I splurged on five minutes earlier. Groggy and exhausted from 18 hour shifts of standing on cement, my legs were tired and my mind was foggy, but Wonder Valley woke me up.
The cold damp breeze raced under my feet, the camera in my hand, Victor at my side, I just started racing from house to house. Literally sprinting with excitement and some solemn but refreshing spirit in the air. And Victor sprinted after me. I don't know if it was the comfort of my camper, the poke bowls and jasmine ice cream I traded for at Coachella that filled me with a sustenance that had been lacking for some time, the community of the job I was working, the love I had in the back of my mind, or simply the wind, the friendship, or moment, but this was a moment. A peak experience. One that can't be explained even in a too-long blog post. It wasn't about the images I was taking, or what I was seeing, but it was at the same time. It was nothing, but everything. And the shape it takes is this contagious flow of running and looking and smiling and shooting. And when coming out of that Wonder Valley 5 minute experience, after losing the sunlight and legs feeling numb from the cold wind, nothing exists but the place and person I've gone to heaven with.