This Project was first posted on my blog's Welcome Page
May 16, 2019. I published this revised version
of the project in August, 2022
~ Window Pictures : P a r t II ~
Symmetrical, Square
Symmetrical, Square
& Various Other formatted
Window Pictures
Selected Photographs from Previously Published Projects
Introduction
This second collection of window photographs was selected from several of my previously published blog projects. Under each photograph I have provided the title of the project, and then I have offered a brief description of how the window theme is operative within the image. Before presenting the 48 window pictures I want to offer a few of my thoughts and personal experiences regarding the relationships between the window, the photograph and the picture-window.
*
When I look out of a window I expect to see the world in its most beautiful splendor. In the yogic tradition that I practice, the outer world is understood to be a form of the divine; every created thing is an embodiment of Chiti Shakti the creative power of the Universe, the creative power of God, the inner Self. When I look into the pictorial space of a photographic image, I hope to experience a revelation of the Heart, the inner Self, That which the yogic saints and sages tell us dwells in every human heart. I am always longing to make and to experience images which will unveil the sacred reality that exists within the things of the outer world, that exists beyond the surface description of appearances, that exists within my own Heart.
Images which succeed in accomplishing this for me, images which transcend the dialectics of inside and outside, I identify as "True, living symbols." Symbols are visual revelations of the Oneness of Being, images alive and overflowing with interior radiance, or grace, with Chiti Shakti. It is grace which re-unites the corresponding interior and exterior images of the divided dual world into an image of wholeness, an image of the inner Self.
The pane of glass in the windows in our house create a fascinating point of interface between an interior space and the outer world. Either (or both) of its two surfaces, however can become the site of magical visual events, as I have described and illustrated in the first part of my Window Pictures project. There is no end to the play of complementary opposites in this world, however the symbol is empowered to still and silent the play, and align contemplators with a greater Truth that exists within the contemplator, the image being contemplated, and the thing(s) photographed.
*
The pane of glass in the windows in our house create a fascinating point of interface between an interior space and the outer world. Either (or both) of its two surfaces, however can become the site of magical visual events, as I have described and illustrated in the first part of my Window Pictures project. There is no end to the play of complementary opposites in this world, however the symbol is empowered to still and silent the play, and align contemplators with a greater Truth that exists within the contemplator, the image being contemplated, and the thing(s) photographed.
Gaston Bachelard writes about an "Intimate Immensity" in his excellent book The Poetics of Space, and in the last chapter of his book, entitled "The Dialectics of Outside and Inside" he warns:
In the unfolding evolution of the photographic medium, the black & white photograph represented a dialectic within itself; and then the dialectic of the black & white photograph vs. the color photograph followed. Historically, the color photograph has also undergone major dialectical shifts: it first was used to represent fantasy, romance and surrealism; and then later the color photograph became the visual metaphor for a new Realism, particularly in the genre of journalism and most strikingly in war photography.
There is also a photographic image that exists between the black & white and the color photograph, and you will be encountering this kind of image in my collection of photographs below. At first blush such an image may appear to be black&white, but after a more careful scrutiny a subtle color presence may begin to emerge into one's awareness that my shift the viewer's experience of the image. (See my project The Space Between Color and Black&White)
Outside and Inside form a dialectic of division,
the obvious geometry of which blinds us
as soon as we bring it into play
in metaphorical domains.
In the unfolding evolution of the photographic medium, the black & white photograph represented a dialectic within itself; and then the dialectic of the black & white photograph vs. the color photograph followed. Historically, the color photograph has also undergone major dialectical shifts: it first was used to represent fantasy, romance and surrealism; and then later the color photograph became the visual metaphor for a new Realism, particularly in the genre of journalism and most strikingly in war photography.
There is also a photographic image that exists between the black & white and the color photograph, and you will be encountering this kind of image in my collection of photographs below. At first blush such an image may appear to be black&white, but after a more careful scrutiny a subtle color presence may begin to emerge into one's awareness that my shift the viewer's experience of the image. (See my project The Space Between Color and Black&White)
The digital color photograph has been the dominate media in my Creative Process since 2008, when my wife Gloria and I moved from Milwaukee to Canandaigua, NY. The window, however, has been a constant presence in my photography from its earliest beginnings. And since 2008 window imagery has become extraordinarily pronounced in my work, in part because our house has a picture-window that overlooks our back yard, a beautiful meadow with two ponds, and a tapering woods that interfaces the meadow on its western border.
The title of my three part project Window Pictures is, in a way, a play of words on Picture Window. In the early history of photography there was such an astonished fascination with a photograph's veracity that people believed that what they were seeing was the world itself. Photographs were sometimes referred to as "windows on the world." Looking back to my photographs made between 1965 through the late 1980's one would find only black & white images . . . and you would find lots of window images. In a book project I completed in 1965-66 (click here) at least a third of its 31 images are (in varying ways) "window pictures."
Book Project, 1965-66 click on image to enlarge
________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________
A Personal Story
City Places project, 1985
Our house in Canandaigua is the only house I have ever lived in with a picture-window. However one of the most poignant moments in my life involved a picture-window.
In the summer of 1955, when I was nearly ten years old, my dad became very sick and had to be hospitalized. I spent many days and nights that summer with my cousin Bobby and my Aunt Lilly and Uncle Bob who were caring for me while my mom was caring for my dad in the hospital. Early one morning as I lay in bed listening to the song of a morning dove coming through the open window of my cousin's attic bedroom, I heard my Aunt coming up the stairs. She quietly asked if we could go downstairs so we could talk; she had something important to tell me. As we sat together on the living room couch, as she was telling me that my dad had passed away in the hospital during the night, I was staring out of their picture-window at a telephone pole with cross bars and lines running through them. That image has haunted my Creative Process throughout my life. See for example the image above from my 1985 project City Places.
The day before my dad died I became ill with a fever; during the night I experienced--in a delirious dream-like state--what I believe to have been my dad's last heartbeats. I have published a written, detailed account of that experience: see stories #5 & #6 in my essay Death, Art, Writing.
In the summer of 1955, when I was nearly ten years old, my dad became very sick and had to be hospitalized. I spent many days and nights that summer with my cousin Bobby and my Aunt Lilly and Uncle Bob who were caring for me while my mom was caring for my dad in the hospital. Early one morning as I lay in bed listening to the song of a morning dove coming through the open window of my cousin's attic bedroom, I heard my Aunt coming up the stairs. She quietly asked if we could go downstairs so we could talk; she had something important to tell me. As we sat together on the living room couch, as she was telling me that my dad had passed away in the hospital during the night, I was staring out of their picture-window at a telephone pole with cross bars and lines running through them. That image has haunted my Creative Process throughout my life. See for example the image above from my 1985 project City Places.
The day before my dad died I became ill with a fever; during the night I experienced--in a delirious dream-like state--what I believe to have been my dad's last heartbeats. I have published a written, detailed account of that experience: see stories #5 & #6 in my essay Death, Art, Writing.
*
I have included five symmetrical photographs in this collection, each of which has been constructed with window "source" images. The symmetrical photograph is for me the most obvious visual embodiment of a Unitary Reality, the Oneness of Being. Symmetrical images emerge spontaneously from deep within my Creative Process and, for me they represent and have the numinous character of the ineffable realm of the Heart. Each symmetrical photograph has a center-point--whether it's visible in the image or not--which is both the Heart of the image and its Origin.
*
Thank you for visiting this second part of the Window Pictures project. Following the presentation of the 38 photographs, I have added a brief Afterword. I also invite you to see the third and last part of the Window Pictures project. I have provided a link to the project at the bottom of this page.
(Note: Though I have identified the second set of images as "Square Window Pictures" there are admittedly a few images which are rectangular in format. As blog images, I find it useless to disclose image sizes. If these images were to exist in print form, that would be determined by many technical and other factors not useful to discus here.)
Symmetrical
Window Pictures
from Previously Published Projects
from Previously Published Projects
1. Photography & Yoga, The Discipline of Seeing project Window view suspended strings of lights
2. The Photograph as Icon, pt. 1, Window onto the Invisible Car Garage Window covered with Vines
3. Babysitting Photographs, Part 3 Ice Crystals on a textured glass front door window
4. The Photograph as Icon, pt. 4, The Unstruck Sound Angeled Wood piece in front of a frosted window
5. Homage to Robert Ryman, III project Meadow photograph through a window with interior reflections of lights
Square
Window Pictures
from Previously Published Projects
from Previously Published Projects
6. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 5
Metal pan with reflections of light from our picture-window
7. Morandi inspired Still Life, Chapter 2
Bird deflector on the exterior surface of our picture-window, and bird droppings
8. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 3
Wooden blue bird hanging from the floor lamp and two lamp reflections in the picture-window
9. The Space Between Color and Black&White
Wood bird hanging on the floor lamp with drawn shades over our picture-window
10. Homage to Robert Ryman, Part One
Interior reflection in our picture-window of Gloria reading with the floor lamp
11. Homage to Robert Ryman, Part Two
Laundry room Oval Window and hanging towel
12. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 5
13. Angel Photographs, Part VI
Reflection of our couch lamp in the glass covering a framed photograph
14. Angel Photographs, Part VI
Light rays on the wall behind the cloths dryer window
Picture frame with reflections in its glass of our front door window
Small oval hallway mirror reflecting the oval window in the laundry room
17. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 3
Orchid plant, arching wire, morning mist on deck door window
18. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 3
House Plant, sunlit window and curtains
19. Morandi inspired Still Life photographs, Chapter 3, image #6
Hanging garlic bulbs in front of curtained garage door window 
A house in Salem, with one boarded window, next to a haunted graveyard
21. Angel Photographs, Part V!
Lamp reflections in a window at the Abbe Museum in Acadia National Park
22. Angel Photographs Part VI
View through a motel window, near Acadia National Park
Blue-edged glass table top top under a basement window
24. Zoo Photographs
Split view above and below the water line through a pool window
25. The Space Between Color and Black&White
Rubber band on a stainless steel table top in the reflected light of a storefront window
Points of light on a wall from the venetian blinds covered window
27. Morandi inspired photographs, Chapter 10
Airport escalator, two figures, windows, reflections
27A. Morandi inspired photographs, Chapter 10
Airport windows
Airplane window view of the plane's shadow on clouds inside rainbow colored circles
29. Angel Photographs, Part VI
Papers taped to a plastic covered door window
30. Still Life: Morandi inspired photographs, Chapter 10
31. Still Life: Morandi inspired photographs, Chapter 10
Door windows viewed from inside a medical waiting room
Bus View through window and reflections of hills in Turkey
33. Still Life: Morandi inspired photographs, Chapter 10
View through a skylight window
34. Monk's Quirky Music
Frozen and melted water forms on both surfaces of a window with venetian blinds
35. Monk's Quirky Music
Soaring Paper Bird taped onto the interior surface of a storefront window
36. Dream Portraits, Photo Collage
view from a child's changing table of a curtained window, bells and a reproduction
37. Giacometti, Epilogue
Walking Man Ascending on the exterior surface of our picture window
Walking Man Ascending on the exterior surface of our picture window
38. Portraits, Faces & Figures for the Departing Landscape
Waving Goodbye through an airport window
______________________________________________
Window Pictures Part II
Around 2017 I became interested in searching for, discovering and contemplating recurring themes that have unfolded within my Creative Process over the past 60 years. (I paid little attention to such things when I was younger, I just needed to keep working. I looked forward to what might become for me a next new project.) I have listed many of the recurring themes and the projects related to them on my Welcome Page, in the section that follows my Introductory texts. That section is entitled Collections of Theme-Related Pictures and Projects.
Surely, this recent interest in "looking back" and discovering recurring patterns in the prolific unfolding of my Creative Process over the years is a relevant and perhaps important aspect of my Creative Process associated with aging. Perhaps it is a way of preparing for death.
I have found that looking more closely, more carefully at the overarching themes in my work has helped me become more conscious of the interior journey that has belied the various outward manifestations of my life and my photographic practice. It has also helped me to have a more intimate, heartfelt appreciation of, and gratitude for, the grace which has provided my life with unwavering guidance, direction, and unbroken enthusiasm for going further and deeper into my Creative Process in photographic picture-making which, according to the yoga I practice, is essentially a practice of exploring my own inner Self. I hope you will view my Welcome Page and the section "Collections of Theme-Related Pictures and Projects." I have listed over two dozen thematic categories, and many of the themes are represented my many different photography projects. Here are a few examples of the themes listed: Music Inspired Projects, Sacred Art Photography Projects, Death-themed Projects and Water Photographs.
I also want to invite you to visit the the third and last part of my Window Pictures project. See the link below.
This Project was first posted on my blog's Welcome Page
May 16, 2019. I published this revised version
of the project in August, 2022
The Window Pictures project has three parts:
OTHER RELATED PROJECTS:
The Meadow An on-going project
Thing & Meadow Photographs September 2022
On my blog's Welcome Page, following the "Gratitude" section of my Introduction, there is a section entitled Collections of Theme-Related Pictures and Projects. It consists of a listing of hyperlinked thematic titles, each of which contains links to projects related to particular theme. Here are a few examples of themes especially dear to me: Music Inspired Projects, Sacred Art Photography Projects, Death-themed Projects and Water Photographs.
Welcome Page to my The Departing Landscape website/blog includes the complete listing of my online photography projects dating back to the 1960's, my resume, contact information, and more.
.
