I had no idea I was so far behind in these postings. I shot these months ago at Idapalooza, a queer music festival on a radical queer land project in Tennessee. One of the finest places in the world, complete with caves, waterfalls, and really open hearts.
Some of the photos are moderately NSFW. Some are shot with a DIY pinhole lens, others with a DIY kaleidoscopic macro lens.
Continue reading
Now my photos are just getting wildly out of order as I post them here, my apologies. A month or two ago I was in New Orleans. We went out of the city with a friend to a nature reserve, and on the way back picked up a roadkill alligator which we of course skinned. (I suppose the “we” doesn’t include “me” in the actual skinning.) But I do like to take photos of roadkill skinning and butchering, so be warned that some of the photos below show animals without their skin.
There are also a lot of photos of live animals, and graveyards, and other such things.
A few weeks ago, myself, my travel companions, and some friends from Phoenix took a day trip up to see a big hole in the ground. We hiked down into the canyon to watch the sunset.
I drove down to Chapel Hill and immediately met new friends who wanted to come across the country with me. I then picked up my friend from Spain so she could speak at NC Rising 3, the anarchist conference. I didn’t photograph the conference, but it was pretty exciting. I did a reading from Clock Tower and watched a room full of 30+ anarchists try to decide if they should join a lion in killing gnomish children (someone blocked).
We left for Asheville after that, and I continued my pattern of obsessively photographing my 3-yr-old friend. He’s just so photogenic, and he loves both having his picture taken and taking pictures. A friend of mine light-painted. We also went swimming in the creek.
I had an even better time at the Steampunk World’s Fair than I expected. I got to meet some amazing people, reconnect with old friends, and generally feel like I wasn’t just wasting my time all those years ago when I was editing SteamPunk Magazine. Because steampunk actually has a fairly strong and growing contingent who views the whole thing as more than just an excuse to dress up funny. Plus, we all got to dress up funny.
While I enjoyed What Time Is It Mr. Fox and Frenchie & The Punk (both exampled below), I think the show was really stolen by Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band, not the least because two of my friends are in it. I’ll have videos of them online in the next day or so, with any luck. I’ve never really been able to give a good example of what I think steampunk music should be, (Sorry, Abney Park, I like some of your music but it doesn’t scream steampunk to me.) but now I do. And I should have realized it earlier: crazy marching bands acting like a bunch of punks while playing acoustic instruments, getting enough of them together to really be raucous.
And of course there was a labor rally run by a steampunk Emma Goldman, counter-protested by some rich gentlemen.
There were discussions on intersectionality and steampunk, cultural appropriation, race, gender, class, and all sorts of things that really do need to be taken seriously.
But I was most impressed by the people. I’m too used to being around cynical, grumpy anarchists these days and it was refreshing to meet earnest, engaged, political people who weren’t embarrassed to put skeletal steampunk ravens on their shoulders and talk one day about how to make cheap stuff look cool and then, the next, why we need to fight.
Note that the above is a rather large panorama that really ought to be viewed at least a lil bit larger.
It had been a year and a half since I’d last visited Ithaca, NY, and I had some friends what needed visiting, so I drive out that way for four or five days or something and went camping in the Finger Lakes National Forest. Now, let me tell you, they may call it a National Forest, but where we camped, we had to listen to someone mow his lawn across the street. And, at the risk of west-coast snobbery, the forest was awfully new-growth and plain. But nature is nature and it will grow up and be awesome one day if we don’t fuck it up like we always do.
There was a good lake though.
And some anti-hydrofrack graffiti in town.
Continue reading
My sister and I are both obsessed with history. My tastes run more towards the late 19th century and/or large-scale anarchist uprisings, and hers are more towards the 1920s and 1930s and/or local history to the area we’re from. But it’s something we have in common and can bond over. She works for the Montgomery County Historical Society of Maryland and I went to go visit her and her museum. She showed me wondrous things, like this antique harmonium.
After the cut, a few shots of the house, portraits of some of the owners, an antique camera, two mandolins, and an autoharp. Oh, and apparently, back in the day, people used to make lacework out of human hair. So there’s a photo of some framed human-hair-art.
I’m behind in posting photos again. On my blog, I’m still posting photos from Asheville, which was like two weeks and two cities ago.
One of the last days I was in town in Asheville, I went out with my friend to see the Blue Ridge Parkway, a scenic drive atop, well, a ridge. We hiked to some falls, climbed a fire watch tower, played with a pinhole lens (those are the blurry photos, you see) and learned the word “enchancement.”
I feel like I’ve been in Asheville forever (in a good way, I promise!) but it’s only been two weeks. This small mountain town is filled with strange people of all stripes and spots, and is home to one of the best anarchist-run cafes in the country, Firestorm.
These photos are of a punk family I’m friends with, lots of photos of their kid who is ridiculously cute (and whom I’ve been photographing about once a year now). Also some funny macro photos of ants crawling on peony buds, plus nighttime shots of the riverside district, plus the abandoned ice house.
A week ago I attended an anti-police demonstration in Asheville, a small banner-holding thing. But it’s interesting to see people with such provocative messaging doing a roadside banner-holding demo, and more interesting still to hear people supporting the radical message.
A few more photos:
