Regarding your Work...
las hermanas de luz
Lately, I left the (rather presumptuously named) tiny town of Silver City, New Mexico- no work, no money if they wanted my work, that part of the planet is drying up, and my girl and I parted ways- heading to a more photo buying centric spot that is 1) fun, 2) habitable, 3) profitable, 4) respectful.
Respectful? Why Respectful?
In one year and some few months, the only good work/moolah I got close to, was shooting a campaign for the state tourism board. Within hours of signing contracts, post a couple of weeks of firing emails back and forth and a long round trip up to the state capital in Santa Fe, I was nomered a pornographer and the whole deal falls through. I really gotta say it like a New Yawkah: "so, da whole deal falls true". So much for New Mexico True and my stay in the high desert southwest- NEXT!
But I digress...
For the photograph above, I assume, since it was gandered at/ogled by the state of New Mexico's email filters and then presumably judged to be "pornographic" by the state filter's human verification eyeballs, most likely a human bean with more than likely a catholic/hispanic heritage (since they judge me, I get to do the same, right?), I am trown out wid da bath watah.
Some things political just stick in my craw- like Gitmo, for instance. It seems to me our great country, founded on the belief we are all equal and deserve the right to a fair -and timely- trial should the shit hit the fan, has dropped the ball here. There are people who were turned in by their girlfriend's father so they'd leave the girl to the father's marital discretion. Iraquis were paid 10x their annual income to "report terrorists" and to deliver names. For that amount of cash, I'd report YOU as a terrorist, dear reader.
Or how about water boarding, torture and the international laws we patriotically uphold? It is, according to the Geneva Convention, illegal to torture a captive. But W and Dick were able to mince words around and title 'captives' taken in the War of Terror as terrorists, not as enemy combatants and then audaciously claim water boarding was not torture (did Dick try it?). They performed these inquisitions in what we now know are called Black Sites by the CIA.
CIA black site
So I land in this little village, an historic spanish mission, called San Lorenzo, about 30 miles east of Silver City and immediately begin to smell the flavor of the place- I love it. There is indeed a certain je ne sais quoi about New Mexico, in general, southwestern NM, specifically. It gets into your head and soul and lends itself to pushing sensibilities further southwest into impassioned creativity. Yeah yeah, I know... And I start shooting my mind's eye and my portfolio becomes richer ...as I go down the tubes financially.
help is on the way
But it sure is fun! So, I always wonder about extremists, fundamentalism and how can anybody call themselves faithful to peace and love- god, right?- and pull such horrific acts in the name of... allah, god, jesus, buddha? They can't, but they do and that's not very godly to me. It's a great contradiction which would make a great photograph. So in this little mission village there's a time of year (Easter, I think) when the members of the centuries old church of San Lorenzo do their penitence- unlike some other places where this is a VERY MUCH MORE SERIOUS COMMITMENT TO YOUR FAITH, these folk get their mothers to drive their ubiquitous pickups, emergency lights ablaze, behind them as they walk/strain 2 miles to the church. Hey this is not an extreme form of penitence, it's cute. I say hi as they walk past into the village on their and their trip's last legs. Fritos y cerveza, por favor!
I google "penitentes" and find there are a few sects of seriously extreme brothers of the catholic church up around Taos, whom, at least in the '50's, were doing some real penitence stuff- like flagellating each other with saguaro cacti, dancing around bleeding in little hollows up some unnamed canyons, culminating with nailing each other to crosses and hanging on them until they passed out and were taken down- bloody and expired. Book worthy stuff. But way too nasty for las hermanas... so, of course, it begs the questions, leading me into my next photo shoot (see las hermanas de luz, above). I round up some local "faithful" and shoulder my home made cross up Boston Hill, overlooking WNMU and the town of Silver City and the girls start splattering "blood" on each other... Anyone on an evening walk with their dog fled back to whence they came seeing a very strange religious orgy underway. Which was exactly what the brothers up in the north part of the state used to -and maybe still- do.
Some pictures of the "brothers" up around Espanola and Taos
Next thing I know, I meet up with the NM state tourism board who claim they love my work and we begin the process of nailing down licenses and money and bam, I am back up there to the third paragraph.
Okay, so what do you think, folks? I'm going to shoot naked and bleeding girls on crosses for a family ad campaign? Richard Avedon shot Nastassj Kinski naked under the belly of a big (BIG) python. He's gonna go on assignment to shoot Henry Kissinginger and brings the snake along- drop 'em Henri!
Or huh: Nadav Kandar's beautiful portraits of mostly nude prostitutes? He's gonna go to the White House and shoot Obama's new team for Time magazine starkers / sans vetements?
Just because I am moving in 6 directions, like most of us thinking and awake human beans, meansI am bringing nudity and my commentary on black site torture to your little beauty campaign?
Please. If you want a mono-minded dullard, shoot by the numbers high school prom snap shooter that only Mommy could enjoy, keep it simple and go with one. You want a little complexity, a little darkness and dynamism? How bout real? Get a shooter who is complicated and whoa aint afraid to show it. Even if it's for your daughter's bah mitzvah.
As always, have a great week and if you need a little respite from the usual, please feel free to check out my work where a few nude or semi nude people are inter strewn with some more deadpan and serious beauty or editorial portraits: Wick Beavers Photographer
