Photography by John Holliger
  • Home
  • Commercial
  • Nature Photography Store
  • Events
  • Bio and Contact
  • Blog

A new exhibit December 1st:  The Many Paths of our Lives"

11/28/2018

1 Comment

 
The Many Paths of Life
A Fine Art Exhibit
Imprints on Cotton, Created by John Holliger
“There is no path that goes all the way.”  没有一条路可以走。(Méiyǒu yītiáo lù kěyǐ zǒu.)
Han Shan, a Zen monk (627-649), uttered this simple thought many times in his short life.
David Whyte, from Wales, now living on Bainbridge Island near Seattle carries us along:
                                                                   No Path
“There is no path that goes all the way.
Not that it stops us looking for the full continuation. 
The one line in the poem we can start and follow straight to the end.
The fixed belief we can hold facing a stranger
that saves us the trouble of a real conversation…
But still, there is no path that goes all the way,
one conversation leads to another,
One breath to the next until there’s no breath at all…
And then wouldn’t your life have to start all over again
for you to know even a little of who you had been?”
 
Antonio Machado (1875 – 1939) probably never met Han or David,
but here is one of his best-known poems:
                                                        Traveler, your footprints
“Caminante, no hay camino,    “Traveler, there is no road;
se hace camino al andar.         you make your own path as you walk.
Al andar se hace el camino,    As you walk, you make your own road,
y al volver la vista atrás          and when you look back
se ve la senda que nunca       you see the path
se ha de volver a pisar.          you will never travel again.
Caminante, no hay camino   Traveler, there is no road;
sino estelas en la mar.”         only a ship's wake on the sea.”




Most Recently, Parker Palmer, a Philadelphia Quaker (born 1939) looking back many decades noticed how confused and lost he was in his 20’s.  In his 30’s one mentor came into his life for a while, then moved on once. Parker had learned what his mentor had to give him. 
Another mentor appeared and ask him different questions but so right in that moment.  Again this mentor deepened Parker’s sense of who he was becoming.  With this new clarity the mentor invited Parker into a new direction, a new path.  One after another they arrived and left.  And then there were no more.  He realized his leading was to become a mentor for other young men who were as lost and confused as he had been.
David Whyte gives us the pivotal question.   Where do I start?
“Start with
The ground you know,
The pale ground
Beneath your feet…
Start with the first
Thing
Close in
The step
You don’t want to take.
Don’t take the second step
Or the third,
Start with the first thing
Close in,
The step you don’t want to take”
 
Our paths, like mentors, can guide us so far, and then disappear.
Santiago by David Whyte
 “The road seen,
then not seen,
the hillside hiding
then revealing
the way you should take…”
 
You will be drawn to one work of art in this exhibit.
What path or memory is evoked as you contemplate this work?
1 Comment

Fascinations

11/5/2018

0 Comments

 
Picture
 
  
 Fascinations
­
How they do change over a lifetime
and yet so deep within
our fascinations are us.
My fascinations with the tiny
Have led me into new worlds of beauty and wonder.
And languages I did not know;
Palmer Amarantha, Nutledge, Basidiolichen,
 
             
  My First Fascination

A child’s bare feet walking on the wet sand
 
I scan through this clear water for a Lucky Stone,
Floating and rolling along at my feet,
Ancient, ageless remnants of the ear bone of the white fish,
A stone of remembrance of another life of Erie,
Inscribed with a large “L.”
Reaching over to catch this floating wonder
I become connected to the ancient life that lived and lives
Here
My home.
 
   
 Returning,
I enter a body of life
Far larger and other than me
To which, I belong.
 
Finding two lucky stones in one morning
Brought me such joy and contentment,
I do belong
To the enduring life of this Great Lake.
 
Looking north across the Lake
her horizon disappears
Dropping out of sight as the Earth curves round
Gifting me with wonder.
 

 
Oh, the unseen beauty and mysteries of
This Great Lake,
“Erie,”
An extinct word for Iroquoian peoples
Who lived and walked the wet sands
Centuries before.
 
My beginning to a life of fascination,
And all I did was stand still
In the wet sand where moving waters
Were giving up their strength on the sand
Then falling back
Returning to their home,
Erie.
 
All I did was stand still
Gazing at the far side of home,
Then turning back
To the here of this wet sand.
 
Do you long to stand still
at home
on this Earth?
 
Do you yearn for the wandering,
Floating freedom
                                 0f the Lucky  Stone?                                                                                                           
                                                 

©2018 John Holliger
0 Comments

My Spiritual Companion, Edward Weston

11/1/2018

0 Comments

 
Picture
My Spiritual Companion, Edward Weston
 
I can almost feel the breath of Edward Weston,
 as if we are both leaning over his wet print in the final tray of fixer. 
We are in his darkroom.  Then he turns over the wet print and
we both gasp. 
The contrast between the black soil and the white tomato plants across that expansive rising hill is dramatic,
crisp,
clear. 
No wonder our breath exclaims surprise and delight.
In the early 20th century prints are made directly from the negative. 
They are the same size as the negative; 6 x 12, 8 x 14. 
So many negatives are awful, littering the floor for years.
 10,000 I like to say.
Until something changes inside Weston,
and he wakes up one of the finest fine art photographers.
 
I thought I was “somethun,’” when I was ordained.  All that seminary training.
But no. 
It didn’t “stick,” it didn’t matter until after 10 years. 
That was when something moved a mile in my sleep.
I woke up, a priest.
 
On the far side of 10,000 clicks of the shutter
and 10,000 deletes,
one morning along a stream at dawn,
I am the stream. 
Together, we flow to the sea.
 
Everyone in that small Weston gallery is 12 inches from the prints of Edward Weston, so close we are not aware of anyone else in the room.    
We are leaning with Weston over the wet trays of prints in the darkroom.
Photography is
 intimate,
intrusive,
disarming,
so close and personal
our breath can seem like one breath. 
 
Weston’s presence is there,
in each creation, and
we can only gaze by coming close, 12 inches away. 
Weston’s negatives could be 6 by 12 inches, and so were his prints.  The negative is not a technical achievement of perfection after all those duds are tossed. 
 
He is now on the far side of technique.
The print is not created from a cookbook of recipes,
water temperatures or chemical formulas.
but there is also that other day.
He is now well beyond what any cookbook could teach him. 
Walking out,
he knows what he is searching for…
his own
hidden
interior stream,
his own voice.
 
What he learns in that moment is what he felt, seconds before the book goes flying.
Those seconds hold a hard truth; one word:  stop.
 You are no longer expressing your own voice
Walk out.  Walk until you find again,
your own
hidden stream,
your own voice.
Follow wherever it leads. 
Do not look back. 
All you’ll see is an ocean wake,
a receding wave.
 
Wall art?  Forget it. 
Weston’s work is held in our lap,
then we raise the tomato hill
 up close,
12 inches close,
And we marvel at the beauty of the Earth.
We see something more we had missed in all those other times we gazed on his work. 
No, this is nothing like documentary photography. 
Edward Weston (b. 1886) is one of the first fine art photographers
who intuitively experiences the intimacy,
two people leaning so close,
his breath and your breath are one.
 

0 Comments

    John Holliger

    Welcome to Photography by John Holliger.
    To subscribe to this Blog, click here.

    Categories

    All
    Photography Ideas
    Trees

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    August 2020
    June 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    December 2017
    October 2017
    July 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    November 2016
    October 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    June 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    December 2014
    October 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    July 2012

    Notes from the Field
Phone: 740-360-0741                                                           Site Map
Email: johnholliger@columbus.rr.com

Member of the Ohio Moss and Lichen Association