New Orleans

The city of New Orleans is a rich mix of the modern and the old, of wealth and poverty, of music, historic buildings, a new flourishing arts district, and all the good and the bad of the culture of the Deep South. In areas like the French Quarter the excitement — and sometimes drunkenness — of the tourists floats like a thin sheen over the hardships…

The Mall at University Town Center

A new enclosed shopping mall has been built here in Sarasota. All over the country malls are struggling, being re-purposed or abandoned. But here a new one just opened. It is big. It is new. It is filled with things from other places. They call it “University Town Center”. It is near University Parkway, and in the center of a very large parking lot,…

Palm Avenue Perspectives

Palm Avenue is one of the more attractive streets in downtown Sarasota. It is lined with art galleries, boutiques and restaurants, palm trees (many of which will soon be removed), historic buildings (some of which will be removed to make way for another high rise for the affluent), and even a large verdant grassy patch (soon to be dug up and covered over with…

Sunrise at Celery Fields

Veterans Day, 2013

It was Veterans Day, and in the park where the speeches were given, stood the Salvation Army truck — symbol of the only real help many veterans will receive. The parades and other patriotic events offer little for many who they supposedly honor. Instead, the parades seem to glorify wars past, promote the jingoism of war, and praise the children destined to become the…

Artfully Urban

The urban environment can be noisy, dirty, artless and unfriendly. But these images from Seattle suggest that there can also be whimsy and artfulness if you look for it. Sometimes these qualities happen by accident and are fully in the eye of the beholder, as with the “Building Blocks” and “Waterfront Whimsy” below. In other cases creative people add whimsy on purpose, such as…

Industrial Counterpoint

Thousands of people travel to Southeast Alaska every year to experience the grandeur and wildness of its natural wonders. But getting to those wild places is itself a business of industrial scale — an industrial counterpoint to the experience of nature that is the goal of so much travel. There is tension between the experience of nature and the means to achieve it. It…

Sometimes the Light Is Everything

I’ll admit it, the doorway to the old Sarasota High School doesn’t always look like this. But maybe it did just for moment as the afternoon light glanced off the stones — even though the doors are locked, the students elsewhere and the old building sits empty awaiting its destiny. That flash of light invites the question of how it looked to the generations…

Sometimes the Little Things

People often do not have any larger message in mind when they do some of the “little things” we see each day — just as nature is not trying to make a point as the sun sets over the ocean. Yet most of us claim a right to attach meaning to the setting sun. So should it be different for the simple actions by…

Seedpod

Two images, both inspired by natural forms. But more important, after a short hiatus to tend to other matters, perhaps the seeds for the next chapter. Stay tuned!