Early Morning: A Photo Series

When you grow up in a city of 10 million, in a country that is rapidly developing, preparing itself and its citizens to enter the global arena, you find yourself constantly seeking quietude, some time away from the fast-paced-ness of events, eventually leading you to begin to romanticize solitude.

My father had always been a storyteller. He had a penchant for adding narrative to everything mundane. As a child, when I often found myself being overwhelmed by how much was simultaneously happening all at once, around me, he would tell me to put my shoes on and then take me on a long walk around our neighborhood. These walks weren’t interventions of any sort; there were no questions asked. Instead, while we strolled through parks and past houses, he would point at the simplest of things, like perhaps the lone red rose in a neighbor’s garden, and create a little story around it. Walking with him, I would carefully observe one thing after the other; the same things that I previously didn’t care enough about to even notice, suddenly turned into objects of immense interest.

These walks would launch me into a fantastical journey and I would never want that little journey to come to an end. When we would come back home and I would tell my father how I felt a lot better, he would respond by saying, “Always remember, nothing gives one more clarity than taking a walk”. Ever since, I have lived by his words.

The generation of today does not stop and think. As technology advances, we are rapidly, if not already, endangering our sense and patience for observation. 

The art of visually stimulating one’s senses has become obsolete. McLuhan too recognized this growing ignorance towards one’s immediate environment. He says, “At the high speeds of electric communication, purely visual means of apprehending the world are no longer possible” (McLuhan 63).

For the “Something is Happening” photo project, I decided to venture out, in the wee hours of this Wednesday morning, on the streets of Appleton. With three layers of clothing and a camera hanging around my neck, I wanted to be disturbed by nothing but the icy wind, as I attempted to capture subtleties in our environment that we pass by in absolute oblivion - create my own private little narratives.

The wind was icy, the roads empty and the small businesses all shut.

To a lone wanderer, in subzero temperatures, downtown Appleton felt serene.

Up Is The Wrong Way, a photograph by Zain Ali

I would walk, pause, think and click. Different vantage points allowed for interesting narrative. I found humor trapped in nooks and corners, I found spring locked inside a gardening shop. I realized there was still so much outside to see, instead of just piles of white snow. There were fascinating compositions. 

I hope after viewing my photo series, “Early Morning”, you too decide to venture out, take your own little private walk. Not with your head down, texting away on your iPhone 5, but with your chin up, and your eyes not shut.

Lauren Semivan: A Photographer Who Creates While She Captures

On Monday morning, as I rushed triumphantly into the Hurvis Center (I use triumphant because that’s the feeling I feel, each time I complete a trek through these icy winds in order to successfully arrive at my destination), I was introduced to Lauren and her husband Lorne by Johnie as we all made our way down the stairs.

Just one look and L&L instantly reminded me of a young J&J. If you don’t agree yet, just look below.

Top: Lauren Semivan & Lorne Carroll
Bottom: Julie Lindemann & John Shimon

This is how I was immediately certain I was going to enjoy getting to know more about their lives, and I knew it was for more than just the vintage glasses.

One is a photographer, the other - a public health nurse. The two are as unique as individuals as they are as a duo. Lorne Carroll, a public health nurse with a passion for farming, has spent the past few years of his life in a remote part of Alaska. Whereas, Lauren Semivan, the artist wife, doesn’t just capture photos, she creates them – not in Photoshop CS6, but on the negative of an early 20th century 8x10”view camera.

Using charcoal drawings, found objects and her own body, Semivan creates dreamlike images, composed in a way that transcends the viewer into an almost unreal narrative space. When asked, in an interview, about the kind of photography that inspires her work, it almost seems like she describes her own images by saying, “the best photographs draw the viewer in and then don’t necessarily release them from an emotional/psychological space”. Her photographs leave the viewer with a haunting feeling of wanting to know more, wanting to reach in, just a little deeper.

If I were to pick a favorite, this one would be it. Within this image, the myth of Ariadne unfolds.  

Lauren Semivan as Ariadne, 2010

Semivan writes, “[about Ariadne] Hand-drawn charcoal lines mimic routes across the Atlantic. The layers of tulle on the dress become an expanse of water. The process of photographing myself within a staged environment begins as a private act, a contradiction that interests me as the work reaches an audience and becomes performative.”

Lorne is not just supportive, he admires his wife’s work. In fact, he was quick to express his newfound respect for art and artists in general, after having watched Lauren put “so much thought” into each of her individual yet emotionally connected pieces.

It was not just refreshing to meet a young reputed artist who’s work has been displayed in galleries all the way from New York to Paris, but one whose early artistic journey evolved quite similarly to mine, training in photography under J&J during her time as an undergrad at Lawrence.

Immerse yourself in Semivan's dreamlike world

Smoking Causes Film Ideas - A Short Experiment on Film

We're living in a global world. We're living... No, we are stuck. We're stuck in a sort of hyperreality, where we can't keep up, yet we can't let go. 

This is the 21st century. 

McLuhan aptly characterizes this era, this brand new-world, where "electric circuity profoundly involves men with one another. Information pours upon us, instantaneously and simultaneously" and there is no permanent escape (McLuhan, 63). 

In the short experimental film, Smoking Causes Film Ideas, A.Garcia and I set out to explore the space and time when smokers are able to create what each of us truly desire and require, a peaceful silence, a sort of white emptiness in this dark place, a disconnection from the incessant buzz of the 21st century. 

We have, through this film, attempted to cease time and vanish space. We capture a private luxury, a state of nothingness, a brief instant of tranquility that not only the four smokers in the film enjoy, but perhaps thousands around the world are indulging in, this very second. 

Sandra L. Dyas: Home Is Where The Heart Is

As Sandra Dyas walked into the Digital Processes lab on the icy Wednesday morning of January the 15^th, she not only brought in an air of comfort, warmth and humility with her, but also a unique life story. Dyas’ life has been anything but conventional. A portrait photographer who started out photographing weddings in the small town of Bellevue, Iowa, Sandy got married at the age of 20, returned to school at the age of 30 and now teaches photography to young rising artists at Cornell College.

“Photos lie”, she says.

There is always more to a photograph than meets the eye.

There is always a story.

Ballerina Girl with Apple, near Iowa City, Iowa

Brought up on a farm in Jackson County, Iowa, Sandy believes that an artist is primarily influenced by the place that they belong from, the place they consider their home. As I look back at some of my previous works, I realize how each of them have, in some way or another, been molded by aspects of my life in India. Thus, it is indeed true - nothing influences an artist more than the place they come from, and it makes perfect sense. Our minds are constantly being affected by what is happening in our immediate surroundings.

            Furthermore Sandy adds, that, in order to realize how much one’s landscape informs and shapes who they become, an artist must leave a place and come back. Indeed, true appreciation can only arise from absence. Each time I have the opportunity to go home, I see the same things, but just more intently every time. I realize things I have lived my whole life in absolute ignorance of.  And I pay attention. I appreciate.

This brings me back to one of my favorite quotes.

Charles M. Schulz once said, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder”.

I know Sandy would agree.

Go ahead, Take a look at her work, It's worth it.

An Artist by Accident

There are two kinds of people in this world. Those that are artists and those that are yet to be discovered.

Now, allow me to tell you a story to validate this claim.

This was around the time when I was a young girl of 8 or 9, with big brown eyes, a mushroom cut and a toothless smile.

On weekends, my parents would often drive me to these regional art competitions held on big open grounds, under flimsy tents, in and around my hometown, New Delhi. I was no child prodigy, in fact I don’t ever recall managing to even land a consolation prize, but my parents refused to lose hope.

This competition was no different. I remember it was summer. I was sitting under perhaps what felt like my 100^th flimsy tent, amidst at least a thousand other little kids, trying hard to keep my drawing paper from flying off, from the air of the big noisy portable fans placed all around to relieve us of the scorching Delhi heat, as we drew.

As kids uncomfortably got down on all fours and drew one of the generic topics that were assigned (draw a house or draw a landscape) inside the tent, the parents waited on fancy round tables placed out on the lawn and enjoyed snacks, while boasting away about their child’s artistic talents.

As I sat down with my pencils and watercolors, I remember being very uncomfortable sitting on the floor and consequently, very distracted. So, I began to look outside to find where my parents were seated.  Whilst looking, a waiter carrying a big hot bowl of steaming soup caught my eye. Next, I noticed a small bump approaching on the carpeted path he was walking on with his chin held high up.

Naturally, my imagination ran wild.

I envisioned the waiter tripping on the bump and dropping the hot bowl of soup he was so proudly carrying, everywhere. The more the fiasco played out in my head, the more curious I became to see what would actually happen. So I stood there, waiting in the shadows for the big moment.

The waiter stumbled, but regained his balance and continued to walk on. He was embarrassed, but no one seemed to have cared or even notice his minor stumble, and life moved on. That is, no one, except for me. 

I immediately ditched the landscape, forgot all about it and decided to draw the waiter tripping and the soup falling instead.

After the time limit was up, my parents came by to check on my drawing. Upon seeing what I had drawn, my mother was furious. She believed my drawing would immediately be disqualified since I didn’t stick to the assigned topics. My father, however, was more forgiving, and encouraged me to submit it regardless.

A month passed. The results were out. My mother didn’t care to check them, of course.

That afternoon, our telephone rang.  It was one of the judges from the competition and they immediately asked my mother to bring me down to their office.

The whole ride there, my mother was angry. She kept scolding me, telling me they were just calling me in to return my disqualified drawing in person. 

So when we reached, I went into the office hiding behind my mother, frightened by the idea of a formal rejection.

However, when I came out, life was different. This time, it was my mother who was tailing behind me, proudly holding the giant storybook collection, which was in fact the 1st prize for the drawing competition.

They said I deserved it, for thinking “outside the tent”. And the ride home, was surprisingly pleasant.

Art Competition Fiasco, a painting by Zain Ali

Pablo Picasso, one of the greatest artists of all times once said, “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artists once he grows up.”  

Truer words have never been spoken. We are all born artists, each with our own idiosyncrasies. However, to gain confidence in how one sees the world, or what we call an “artist’s vision”, requires a moment of realization. And that moment of realization must come before one subdues their deeper inner voice in order to conform to society.

I’m Zain Ali and that was my moment of discovery, of self-realization, and of gaining confidence in my own decisions, however unconventional they may be. However, as I grew up in the confines of a very rigid educational system, the artist inside me went into a state of limbo. I came to college in the United States of America to study Mathematics and Economics, and just that, until I took an analog photography class with John Shimon and Julie Lindemann. That changed everything. The artist inside me was resurrected. And I began to take more and more art classes, using art as an excuse to “keep me sane” from the insanities of imaginary numbers and Keynesian theories. Last week I decided to drop my Mathematics major and I am now, no longer just an art enthusiast but a proud Studio Art and Economics double major instead.

When it comes to my art, be it instantaneous sketching in my sketchbook or developing a photograph in the dark room, I’m driven by deep private emotion. I use my personal sketchbook as a visually diary, recording memories from my childhood. When I decide to make an art piece, I find inspiration deep within, often times reflecting on my cultural upbringing and life in India. “The Golden Peacock”, a life-size peacock made simply by wooden sticks and a hot glue gun stemmed out of spending my childhood memorizing “the peacock is the national bird of India” in my early school days.

I don’t have a set type of art I want to pursue for the rest of my life. I simply want my art to serve a purpose. The form of art that has come closest to giving me such internal satisfaction is photography. My black and white photographic series titled, “Secrets”, serves as an outlet for 10 different subjects to anonymously disclose their deepest darkest secret and relieve themselves of the burden they have been carrying around for the entirety of their lives.

I want to use this blog to showcase my work in the coming months. How my art grows and evolves around the core concept of private emotion, and attempts to serve a greater purpose. As an artist, I can only hope and pray that perhaps someday my words can inspire one of the many undiscovered artists still out there in the world, unaware of their potential.