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Check out this great clip of Todd Hido working. I love what he says near the end about short artist statements.

The Southern Appalachian Film Festival is going on in Johnson City, TN at East Tennessee State Univ. now and continues through the 23rd of Nov. at PTSCC and The Knoxville Museum of Art. This year’s theme is the environment and includes everything from shorts to documentaries to horror to kid’s films. It should be an interesting festival.

An interesting documentary, Arid Lands, was to be shown but somehow disappeared from the schedule as far as I can tell. But check out their website where you can view the trailer and order the film.

Arid Lands is a documentary feature about the land and people of the Columbia River Basin in southeastern Washington state. Sixty years ago, the Hanford nuclear site produced plutonium for the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, and today the area is the focus of the largest environmental cleanup in history. It is a landscape of incredible contradictions. Coyotes roam among decommissioned nuclear reactors, salmon spawn in the middle of golf courses, wine grapes grow in the sagebrush, and federal cleanup dollars spur rapid urban expansion.

Arid Lands takes us into a world of sports fishermen, tattoo artists, housing developers, ecologists, and radiation scientists living and working in the area. It tells the story of how people changed the landscape over time, and how the landscape affected their lives.

The photo below just really speaks to me. It was taken last weekend at the Studio Stroll down in the River Arts District. I found this spot I liked and waited for a few moments as strollers came and went. There were several variations on this, but this guy just made the shot.

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

There was some great moody lighting the other day with some overcast, dark, rainy skies. The clouds and mist are one of my favorite conditions to photograph in. Everything just looks good and at any time of day. I’ve had in mind a few subjects that needed these conditions and the last few days I’ve been able to find what I wanted. There’s one shot here of a lone cow and the fence around his field is electric, which I found out the hard way. It bumped my arm like three times and each time I just said “Ouch” or the abbreviated “Ow”, which just doesn’t look right somehow when I write it.

Then I almost went driving over this rickety bridge to explore an idyllic pasture, but I stopped short thankfully and upon inspecting the bridge realized walking would be the only sensible means of crossing. One must really check these things out because there are some suspect bridges out there.

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

Last weekend was filled with activities including the Asheville Film Festival as well as the River Stroll down in the River Arts District. As I am now writing about these events after they happened, I apologize for not mentioning them before so those interested could attend, but hopefully you already knew about them. The Studio Stroll was well attended and in the four years I’ve been attending I haven’t seen so many people. The weather was great and I’m glad it was such a success.

The photos below have nothing to do with either the Asheville Film Festival or the Studio Stroll. None whatsoever. They are in fact just photos of people out doing things in the apparently last of our nice autumn weather. But I did think they made good photos and can each explain their own story. Except maybe for the building, which I found so compelling because of the colors, light and interesting composition. I enjoy very much urban landscapes, the New Topographics movement lauded and so well executed by the likes of Robert Adams and Stephen Shore. I did in fact get one photo that I really liked from the Studio Stroll, but I will save that for some later time.

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

Riverside Cemetery is located in Montford, near downtown Asheville, NC. It is an historic cemetery with many notable remains interred in its hills including former NC governor and local hero Zebulon Baird Vance. Wow, that’s really a mouthful. What could any child have done to deserve that name?

I was driving in the neighborhood last week and the lighting and color was really inspiring so I took a turn to see the haps in the old resting grounds. The variety of headstones, statues and tombs is quite diverse. Everything from simple headstones of soldiers in rows, to grandiose monuments can be found. I want a statue with lasers or really elaborate lighting at least for my tomb. Eyes that glow would be cool too. Something to scare all the teenagers who come to hang out and get high. I know, a robot statue!

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

As the last of the fall weather and leaves are fading away, I spent some time making these lovely portraits with my Boxer, Sadie. She loves being outside and as you can see, thinks rather highly of herself (she often has her nose up in the air like that).

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

Going right along with the previous post about William Eggleston, comes his neighbor and contemporary William Christenberry with an exhibit opening Friday, November 7th at 5PM. This is a one of a number of high profile photography exhibits the Asheville Art Museum has gotten of late. Last year, the works of Abbot and Atget were shown. The curator has

From the museum’s website:

The Asheville Art Museum is delighted to present William Christenberry: Site/Possession. Christenberry has explored the regional identity of the American South, focusing on his hometown area around Hale County, Alabama. Beginning in November 2008, visitors to the Asheville Art Museum will have the unique opportunity to see the drawings that Christenberry calls the basis and inspiration of all his other work. Christenberry is frequently the subject of national acclaim for his photographs of rural Alabama, but this exhibition offers the chance to experience a more complete representation of his life and work.

This exhibition reveals the complexity of the artist’s very personal investigation of the both the American South and his own family heritage. Christenberry’s theme is the narrative of place. He photographs ramshackle buildings, weathered commercial signs, lonely back roads, white-washed churches and decorated graves. Dutifully returning to the same locations annually, the green barn and the Bar-B-Q Inn, among others, Christenberry fulfills a personal ritual and documents the physical changes brought on by the passing of time. In addition to 50 drawings, the exhibition also features paintings, photographs, constructions and the Klan Room Tableau. The work included shows the many sides of rural Alabama, both positive and negative, and includes many drawings from the artist’s collection that have not been previously exhibited.

William Christenberry’s Kodak Brownie photographs are touring under the auspices of Aperture. A major exhibition featuring these photographs recently closed at the Smithsonian Institution American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. Christenberry has been a member of the art faculty at the Corcoran College of Art and Design since 1968 and lives and works in Washington, D.C.

This exhibition is organized by the University of Virginia Art Museum. This exhibition is sponsored in part by the Chaddick Foundation.

William Eggleston will be having a retrospective exhibit at the Whitney. The exhibit is entitled “William Eggleston: Democratic Camera” opens this Friday. The exhibit will then travel to Munich and Washington.

From the Whitney:

One of the most influential photographers of the last half-century, William Eggleston has defined the history of color photography. This exhibition is the artist’s first retrospective in the United States and includes both his color and black-and-white photographs as well as Stranded in Canton, the artist’s video work from the early 1970s. The exhibition will travel throughout the United States as well as to the Haus der Kunst in Munich following its New York presentation.

Copyright William Eggleston

A recent project I’ve been working on etitled 18 Miles to Graggy Gardens has been published on my website. Check it out here. Its a nice little body of landscape photos. I’ve got a little statement about it that I will add later.

The November issue of Our State Magazine features my photos in an article about the Womansong group here in WNC. They had a performance a short while back at UNCA.

Copyright Our State Magazine

As I’ve culled some more photos, there seems to be another entries worth here. Again, I’ve looked at a lot of the crowd during the rallies.  The responses to the politicians are the interesting phenomenon, moerso often than the politician. Although there is some intrigue into just why they are so popular, especially in Sarah Palin’s case.  Both sides express their vitriol and their passion, is there a middle ground?

Then there’s the personal message from Sarah to her mother. Rather a nice gesture. I like her use of the heart for the letter “O” in mom and also the dot of the “i”. You know what would be really cool is if she were to become VP and then even Prez, if she would send letters to heads of state and dot the “i”s with hearts.

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener

With the election about a week away, the campaigns are in the final stages of visits to the swing states. Here in NC, we’ve had visits from the candidates since the spring when the Democratic nominee was still undecided. Yesterday, Sarah Palin made an appearance. While documenting the event I was struck with just how popular she is among her supporters.  I’m sure she gets larger crowds than McCain.  On these campaigns, there is almost the auro of rock star status, and Palin is McCain’s answer to Obama’s celebrity. It will be interesting to see if McCain loses the election what becomes of Palin. With her popularity, she will probably run in 2012. Populism can really only take you so far, as John Edward’s campaign illustrated.

I unfortunately missed Obama’s rally a couple weeks back when I was ill, but really would have loved to attend. I did make it to Hillary’s event a few months back. Hillary’s rally was also held in the civic center, like Sarah’s but in a different hall.  The dichotomy between these women became even more so apparent to me yesterday. During Hillary’s rally she was dressed in her typical pants suit and looked the part. But Sarah, however was in a casual outfit, the first time I’ve seen her in such. She was wearing jeans and looked very different than her usual dresses. Maybe in light of the $150,000 shopping spree she’s going casual. That or she thinks NC is where the “folks” live and to play that angle.

Its interesting to see the different crowds that attend each party’s appearences and the strong belief each hold that their candidate and party is the “right” and sensible one. At yesterday’s event, it also became apparent to me how many children were there and really into the whole thing. Many of them had buttons and hats and even signs saying who they support, as if they could vote. Well they’ll be voting in a few years anyway.

It was also Sarah Palin’s mothers birthday. So she called her on the phone and had the crowd sing her happy birthday. Sarah seemed to be taking it all in too. From just a couple months ago when she was an unknown to now where she’s receiving crowds of thousands chanting her name and traveling the whole country must feel surreal at times.

Copyright Scott Lessing Hubener