Over the past 11 years, I’ve created thousands of images that combine motion and emotion within the music industry. However, I also have a collection of photos that were taken while chasing the last bit of light or chasing the elusive commodity of human connection, while existing on the road or in the in-between.
This series is entitled: Blurry and Significant.
You can see the whole collection here.
The first piece is this collection is called: and I wouldn’t mind remembering this.
You can read its story here and purchase it here. I hope it makes you feel something.
While planning this collection, I also revisited pieces I wrote on the days that I took the images. One such photograph was taken on a November evening that began with a melted chocolate chip cookie and my third cup of coffee and ended with running through downtown and into two friends and running together through parking garages and side streetsuntil we ran out of light. (That’s the only sort of running I like.) Later that night I wrote these words:
“On my drive home tonight I turned the heat on to keep my fingers from growing too numb to grip the wheel and rolled down the windows and put the Bleachers album on. I could feel a giant smirky derpy grin creep across my face, the sort that isn't particularly attractive or winsome, but the kind you get when you're swinging or you spot an old friend in a new city or you magically get your mug of coffee for free. Genuine unhindered happiness. My gas light came on--is on--is probably empty. But I feel so full. It's strange and wonderful how I feel fullest when I hold my days and my life with open hands. This is today, tonight, all blurry and significant.”
In the five years since, I have not been able to shake that phrase and how the best parts of life feel like that. It’s the weighty, momentary in-between.
It’s the exit you didn’t plan on taking with the friend you didn’t plan on meeting that leads to the small town gas-station-turned-thrift-store where you find a tiny mug from Wales and wonder how it arrived there. It’s running through the rain in Indiana when you’re 15 and 14 years later still remembering how it felt. It’s finding out your best friend is in love with you and knowing you have everything to lose no matter what your reply. It’s walking off the plane in New York and wearing the same clothes for three days because you only brought a backpack. It’s that same day and dancing behind the sound booth with her, screaming lyrics about sleeping in clothes and lavender lips. It’s laying on the cement floor in the back of a crowded arena so the phone lights look like stars. It’s seeing a man across the room and then walking into his cafe in a different city the next day. It’s Monday nights laughing on your best friend’s rug with that third glass of wine, watching the show you all like even though you hate it. And it’s spending all night awake in Chicago after locking yourself out of the apartment, but it’s the sunrise on the beach that made the rest of the tired day worth it. It’s writing these words while sitting under a garland of lights on a neighborhood patio, hearing the murmur of strangers’ voices again and feeling hopeful at the white noise of possibility. It’s not always a clear memory, but it’s a vivid feeling.
Those moments, the most important moments when you look back, they aren’t the crispest ones: they feel blurry and significant.
Each of these images represents a day that felt blurry and significant. My hope is that my words and images connect you to parallel feelings you’ve experienced in your own life. You may not have run into the ocean with your clothes on after watching Toy Story and drinking champagne on the beach with a friend you met on Twitter (or maybe you have), but I hope to connect with you from a place where you felt that same way. Though we all hold varying experiences, we also all hold synonymous emotions. Beyond just connecting with your emotions, I hope my words and my work make you feel seen. Less alone. More alive, if only in this small way.
Each image is titled with a word, phrase, or portion of poetry that was written during the same period of time or represents that time in my life.
Because this collection is a reflection on meaning and nostalgia, it’s appropriate that all of the images are from prior years and that their release dates and pricing are connected to those years. For example, the first image and words were taken and written across 2016 and 2017. So I intended to release it on the 16th (more on that on the post about the piece itself—see the link at the top of this page). There will be only 3 copies of each piece. I believe in pricing my work according to its value, but also creating spaces for friends to purchase it, so each copy is priced differently. One of the images will be priced at 1.6ETH—which reflects my piece’s value—one will be at 0.16, and one will be at 0.016. Even with the two pieces at initially lower price points, the exclusivity in only have 3 editions allows for the retention of value. Additionally 16% of the profits of this series will reinvested back into small businesses and the art community.
As I want this to be a fully immersive nostalgic experience, I have a small additional gift for each collector. Many of these photos were taken as I traveled across the continental United States. Instead of collecting physical souvenirs from the cities I visited, I began stopping at local coffee shops and bringing home pounds of coffee. With each purchase, I will be sending you a bag of coffee from the shop I associate with the memory of the photo. This gift only available to the first collectors of each copy.