Humor?
~ In My Photography? ~
Introduction
I remember, back in college days, trying to understand musical humor. I just couldn't get it. I felt like I needed to know more about the history and technical aspects of music before I could grasp the humor others could enjoy in the music they listened which had been intentionally embedded in the music by the composer, or performer.
In my early Studies Projects (1994-2000) I realized that some of the humor I enjoyed in the music of the great jazz composer and pianist Theolonious Monk was influencing my Studies project (which consisted of miniature silver-gelatin prints [snapshot size 3.5"x3.5"] inspired by miniature pieces of music, mostly piano performances. Monk's music is full of quirky twists and unexpected turns, and playful-humorous improvisations on popular old-time melodic standards. I still love his solo piano music. And once I understood this I was so grateful to dedicate a collection of my "Quirky" images to Monk the man and Monk the composer-performer. (See my blog project Monk's Quirky Music, Studies II.)
I am a serious person, always have been, but I do have fun making puns with my brother-in-law and my son. My wife does not appreciate my humor and she get mad at times when she doesn't get the humor I am trying to deliver to her. So I was happy to have discovered Monk's influence and put it into my photographic practice.
My photography in general is most about attempting to give visual form to that which is--to most people-- not perceivable at all; namely divine presence, a subtle feeling of the transcendent realm of being, otherwise referred to as the inner Self, God, Guru, Supreme Consciousness.
So, well, don't get your expectations up about what you are about to see here in this collection of images which are for me in one way or another humorous. You may not get the humor at first via the image, and yet you might enjoy seeing the pictures for any number of other reasons; and to help us both out, I have committed myself to a promise I gave myself when this project idea first came up, I would try to write some commentary on each of the images I chose to include in the collection that may clue you in on the humor I experience, or maybe I could write some that would tickle you enough to open your heart to the image.
I have looked through most of my projects for images I could identify as having something humorous about them. I must say, I was surprised by what I did not come up with. I thought I had more than 36(+) humorous images images to publish in this blog project. So I suggest you check out my early Studies projects, especially Studies I, Monk's Quirky Music, the Garage Series and my "Quirky" 12x12" Inkjet Print Project, though I understand that Quirky and Humor are not the same thing most.
I would also advise you to watch for humor in the juxtaposition of images as the sequence unfolds as you scroll down the blog page. When two images interact with each other, a third Imaginal image can be generated in the mind's eye that could yield a chuckle or two. Who knows?
Note: I do want to encourage you to click on the images once, then a second time, which hopefully will place that image in an alternative dark tonal viewing space. In this alternate viewing space the image will appear much sharper and luminous than what you see in the blog's initial default viewing mode (which puts my text and my images in white space). And after you enter the alternate viewing space, after clicking twice on the image, you can adjust your image magnification plus or minus and make the image darker of lighter. Note: if you want additional technical information about what I just wrote about, please visit my blog page Regarding Viewing my Online Blog Project Images
The Photographs
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Humor #1 12x12" PROJECT "Walkabout" (Inversed image)
"A Man ascending or descending a ladder suspended in black space
Regarding Titles: Never trust what an artist says about his or her work. This includes titles.
Artists are often the last to know how their images mean. However, a clever use of words
can impact how a viewer sees or experiences an image. Most of my titles in this project
attempt to convince you that the image is somehow funny to me, which might give
permission to try out that point of view to see if it works for you. ~ My
commentary on this image relates to the idea that there is something
absurd about a suspended ladder, and then, seeing a man in such an
odd situation could be compelling especially if one cannot tell
if the man is going up or down the ladder. In a dualistic
world we are constantly presented with paradoxes.
Old ladder, suspended by a thin line in black space
Suspension of things in black space came into my work via a musical influence: American
Composer Morton Feldman suspended notes in a musical (silent) space and then
allowed the struck, resonating note (s) to decay . . . dissolve . . . depart into
silence. Listen to Feldman's solo piano work "Triadic Memories"
I love to make Thing photographs; and the spatial context in which a thing
is encountered can tell a viewer a lot about the thing itself. However if
a thing is suspended in black space (silence) it has no context in
which to provide meaning, other than memories related to
darkness, or silence or perhaps the thing photographed.
My title, Old Ladder, suspended in black space
provides some sense of how the image
means, but then there is the Thin Line
which provides a conceptual context which might invite you to come up with
your own unique understanding of the image. ~ A ladder is of no use
if it is suspended in space. And a thin line offers little sense of
safety. Humor is often based in feelings of fear or aggression.
On the other hand, ladders have been used as metaphors
for spiritual pursuit and a lot spiritual work occurs in
silence, darkness, aloneness.
Humor #3 12x12" inkjet PROJECT : Things Suspended In Space
A Man--standing in a red-lined gray box, looking at a mirror or through a suspended ring of fire
When I present people in black space they other appear, as in this image, to serve a
cartoon-like narrative. This guy, turned luminous after death, has gotten up
out of his casket and taken a good look at his past life, wondering what
he could have done differently, or better.
The red line comes from the great movie Scrooge, the musical, staring Albert Finny.
When Scrooge falls into his grave he ends up landing in a grave like hole in Hell.
When he tries to climb out of the grave, everything he touches
is RED HOT! Then he discovers his punishment in Hell
will be a replica of his office, COLD AS HELL.
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Humor #4 Two old garages after an argument 18x18"
Visit my Silent Dialogues project. These garage images are from my Garage Series, which
was made in 1999-2000 with gelatin-silver black and white prints 3.5" square. In 2006
I scanned the negatives and made18x18" inkjet prints, in which the garages were
were small and suspended in vast spaces of black. I thought of the garages as
musical sounds decaying into silence, and, as character portraits of their
owners, or, as in the image below, a portrait of a frog.
Humor #5 "Frog garage" 18x18" digital print
I turned eighty years old in September, 2025. And I just had to have
a toot pulled, and in 2023 I experienced tears in each of my retinas
after having the cataracts removed from each eye. The tear in one
of m eyes could not be repaired perfectly creating a condition that
is called disparity of vision which makes me feel very tired most
of the time . . . like this garage I photographed in 1999.
Humor #7A 12x12" Quirky Inkjet Print PROJECT Upside-down stairs
(From the early 1994-2000 Studies Project)
This image reminds me of M.C. Echer's lithographs. I'm not sure if this image
is humorous, but a smile comes across my face when I see the image, which
looks simultaneously correct and upside down, like an Escher image in which
you find yourself going either up or down, in circles or all ways at the same time.
M C Escher, Homage #1
M C Escher Homage #2
Humor #8 Monk's Truck
12x12 "Inkjet Print" version of an Early Studies 1994-2000 gelatin print
This image has Monk's kind of musical humor, it seems to me.
A "shadow of a truck" with steel rimed tires!
Humor #9 Monk riding a wild horse in an urban landscape
12x12 "Inkjet Print" of an Early Studies 1994-2000 miniature gelatin print
Thelonious Monk was not a wild guy, but his music could
take you on a wild ride, especially in his quintet settings.
I love his solo piano works. They are so personal, so
loving, so intimate, and so much fun at times playing
around with popular tunes of his generation with
changes and transformations that you could
never have imagined. A real inspiration
for me while I was working on the
Studies Project 1994-2000
A Painted stone under a wire shelf, looking up at the pot just above its head
Humor almost necessarily has to be narrative in the sense that it usually
tells a story that involves a human ego-based dilemma. We are at
our best (on one level at least) when we can laugh at ourselves.
Too many of us are waiting for the "other foot to drop"
or . . . for the pot to fall on our heads . . . Yes?
Humor #11 Plastic flowers in a black square box sitting on a white bowl and a horizon line
Also visit my 12x12" inkjet PROJECT : "Still Life"
Morandi often played visual tricks with ambiguous spatial relationships in many of his Still Life
paintings, and this image with two (or perhaps three) horizon lines is, to my great surprise,
a construction in which I intentionally raise the question: "Is the black box really sitting
on the white bowl? Or, is the bowl in front of the black box? If so the black box
sitting on the back edge of a table, i.e., the back horizon line of a table?
(Note: Morandi often painted plastic flowers; I digitally
added the dark horizon line on the bottom edge of the image.)
I smile when I see this image, for my love of Morandi and his paintings is sooo great.
Humor #12 12x12 "Inkjet Print ("Quirky" Photo)
A goat getting lost as it eats its fill of hay in a safe, clean, comfortable & well illuminated barn.
I took this photograph at the Farm Sanctuary located in Watkins Glen, NY. I love that place,
and the pictures they publish on their websites and in the mailings they send out, which are
mostly intimate portraits of the abused farm animals they have rescued and cared for
with great love and respect. ~ My image is quite different from theirs,
but the humor is not aggressive; I am happily enjoying seeing this
once abused animal fully enjoying its newfound safe haven,
surrounded by only good things, other contented animals, and
very caring nurturing human beings.
Humor #13 Leaning lamp & shadow
This photo is a simple, straight forward depiction of an object--perhaps overlooked for years--
and yet still doing its job when called upon. It is leaning from its base, but I am
honoring its dignity without over dramatizing this sweet object that
has a life of its own. The two clips that hold up the lamp shade
are like eyes; the white electric cord is like a mouth; all the
horizontal and vertical lines are running parallel to the
edges of the photograph except the lamp's wood
mid-section and its shadow. This is an elegant,
easily made photograph made in a
a gentle sympathetic light.
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Humor #14 (12x12 inkjet print) (Also 18x18")
Two Metallic Buckets, water dripping from the ceiling, two tables and a chair
Is this an accurate description of what the picture is showing us? Or
is the "dripping water" actually the corner of the room in which all
these things were being stored? Do you really trust photography's
popular myth that it simply presents the world as it appears?
One of my teachers, Aaron Siskind, who early in his career was a documentary photographer
then later transitioned into making "abstract photographs," always taught:
Photographers are "picture makers."
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Humor #15 (12x12 inkjet print) (Also 18x18")
"Abstract photograph (shadows, light & netting)" or
"Portrait of a constantly talking liar"
Do we all see the same thing when we look at the same photograph . . . or any object?
We tend, I believe, to project what is inside of us rather than see what is before our very eyes.
Perhaps there is no thing in front of our eyes? Perhaps perception is more mysterious
and complex than we could ever have imagined.
Visit my blog essay Seeing the Grand Canyon
Portrait of a Broad Brook Stone with moist red lips
I have photographed many rocks and stones, but this is the first and so far only image of a stone
with red wet lips. Broad Brook is a magical lively stream that flows down through southern
Vermont past the house in which my brother-and-sister-in-law live. This image is an
unusual example of the kind of photographs I have published in my series of
includes blog links to all of my Broad Brook projects.
Humor #17 "Portrait of a Burning Bush"
18x18" Inkjet print Symmetrical Photograph
This Four-Fold Symmetrical Photograph presents the burning bush as a harmless
non-threatening caricature, or perhaps some kind of slightly threatening insect.
I never know how my four-fold symmetrical construction process will
transform the source image I begin with into the finished image, though
many of them have anthropomorphic details, such as the "two eyes" that
appear and look out at me in the center of the image. I enjoy making the
effort and then allowing the grace of my Creative Process to do the rest.
I also enjoy this fascinating humorous character with wings that appears
unexpectedly in the upper most center of this nearly circular image.
(Reminder: Click-on the image once, twice-to enlarge it)
Humor #18 12x12" inkjet PROJECT: Thing-centered Photographs (Things in their Place)
A stone & its shadow sliding to a standstill in a sandy soil
This image has a playful, joyful energy in the way that the stone appears
to be sliding to a standstill, and then becomes locked into a position of
stillness in its close connection with its own skid marks & deep shadow.
Visit my blog link: Collection of Stone Photographs
Humor #19 Chewed gum on a round white dish 12x12" Quirky Photos PROJECT
There can be humor in the way images become juxtaposed to each other when they are
presented next to each other in a horizontal format, or in a vertical sequence of
images which my blog requires. Thus I enjoy the play of moving down from
the sliding stone image to this photograph of a little clump of chewed
chewing gum on a white round saucer. When little things are
photographed above, and from a distance, so that the larger
spatial context plays dramatically into the humorous
nature of the subject matter at the center of the
drama, there this in a certain way an
amplification of the subject's
presence and meaning.
I also enjoy the repeating circular forms (4x)
that surrounds--on three sides--the little
tooth-shaped clump of chewed gum.
Humor #20 Four empty plastic coat hangers dissolving into the background of a coat rack
I took this picture in a medical waiting room while waiting for my wife to get
an x-ray made. I did not see the hangers dissolving into the background
until I started preparing the image for printing, then with photoshop
tools I was able to make the dissolution more visually complete.
Humor #21 South Meadow Pond, iced over, with a finger pointing
toward a patch of soft ice with tree-shaped cracks
(from my project Forgotten Wisdom)
Nature has a way of protecting itself and us, if we pay attention
and make an effort to be open to grace.
This image reminds me of an advertisement I may have seen in the early 1950's.
The directive is well intended and comes with a bit of a smile on its face.
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Humor #22 River, my grandson, walking through a meadow puddle
with his frog boots and his smiling playmate
River was splashing in a meadow puddle with his favorite boots fascinated with
the change in color of the puddle he could make happen.
To my wonder and happy surprise--he created what (for me) is an image
of one of River's fantasy animal "playmates" (which is looking at me with a smile)
as if it wanted to say: "Isn't it Fun!
Humor #23 Bus Window, with blue dots rising up ~ like thoughts ~ over a passenger's head
I would depict human thought as a row of blue dot's if given a chance, but I did not
think this image up; I saw it and quickly made the image and was grateful
to see it after returning from a trip to Albany to protest
hydrofracking in New York State.
It's an interesting picture if you look carefully at all the colors.
But then, most any picture becomes more interesting it you look at it carefully.
I like commenting on photographs because it makes me look more carefully.
I also like contemplating photographs which allows me to look deeper and deeper
into an image and into myself at the same time.
Three Zoo Photographs
(Dog looking at an upside-down floating question mark)
Visit my Silent Dialogues project.
My title comes from a short mysterious piece of music, entitled The Unanswered Question, by
the great American composer, Charles Ives. My commentary will be included under
the next picture, below.
Humor #25 The dog, again, this time ignoring a Sea Lion swimming by on its back
I took both of these pictures, above, in an underground viewing area of a zoo
swimming pool dedicated for their sea lions. When I first arrived on scene
not much was happening . . . until the upside-down "question mark" floated
by the window. When I took the picture I had not noticed the dog in the
lower-left corner of picture, watching the question mark float by, too.
But wait; I remembered that I had seen a sign that said dogs were not allowed in this viewing area;
so I looked at a few other pictures I had taken at that time and was able to better see that the
"dog" was actually a little boy who was wearing a baseball cap with a long bill.
Humor #26 "Yellow Bucket floating by a headless boy (reflected in the viewing window glass"
Yes, I did have a good day in the zoo's Sea Lion underground pool viewing area.
Three fascinating & humorous images all made in less than ten minutes.
I enjoyed looking through the viewing window and watching all those
things floating by. It was a bit like looking at my photographs.
I also take pleasure in seeing others view my photographs.
I especially enjoy watching someone smile while looking at one of my photographs.
The three images make a nice set; I like the way the first image lacks a horizon line, and how the
next two images provide interesting variations in regards to their horizon lines. My 1981-82
photography project The Lake Series was in part an ongoing exploration of the placement
of the horizon line in each of the square formatted photographs. Part II of the
Lake Series consists of photo collages in which each collage has multiple horizon lines.
The idea for the collages was inspired--once again--by the music of Charles Ives. I
provide a further explanation about this in my project's introductory comments.
Humor #27 Adam and Eve looking at a Fallen Tree
from the Images of Eden project
If this picture were not part of my project Images of Eden, it might not be such
an interesting photograph. Again, the titles lay out the scenario in which
a viewer must come to terms with the image.
The body language of Adam & Eve in this photo suggests little interest in each other and in
what they are seeing in terms of The Fallen Tree. That becomes humorous to me
in relation to popular religious idea of The Fall.
But--though I pause before writing this next comment--the fact that the fallen tree
tree is WHITE invokes my long standing concern about the racial issues
which have plagued our country for so many years, harkening back
to the Birth of Our Nation.
And then, of course there is the current 2025 rebirth of White Supremacy we are seeing
right in our very own White House and perhaps we could even say the nation.
(Not humorous at all)
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Humor #28 Quirky 18x18 Inkjet Print
Crowd of people shielding their eyes during a 1964 atomic bomb blast
I took this in photo in 1964, I think. This is an inkjet print version of the original silver
gelatin print which I had solarized for an RIT photo project in my Freshman year.
The luminous image became even more illuminated by the transformative mystery of solarization
--a fusion of light, silver, and photo chemicals. I had been very worried by the
the cold war talk about Atomic Bombs, and the solarization process, the
way it changed my images, awakened those fears in me when.
The humor here, if any, is ironic in the way that the crowd of people are shielding their eyes
from a technological phenomenon that fascinated them but which their gesture
could never have protected them.
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Humor #29 18x18 Inkjet Print
A constellation of stars in a night sky :
(A Worker's Knee on the lid of a bucket)
More Images,
with eyes;
Images that are
"Looking At Me"
With two poems serving as a prelude:
Golden Lines
“Astonishing! Everything is intelligent!”
Pythagoras Free thinker! Do you think you are the only thinker
on this earth in which life blazes inside all things?
Your liberty does what it wishes with the powers it controls,
but when you gather to plan, the universe is not there.
Look carefully in an animal at a spirit alive;
every flower is a soul opening out into nature;
a mystery touching love is asleep inside metal.
“Everything is intelligent!” And everything moves you.
In that blind wall, look out for the eyes that pierce you:
the substance of creation cannot be separated from a word...
Do not force it to labor in some low phrase!
Often a Holy Thing is living hidden in a dark creature;
and like an eye which is born covered by its lids,
a pure spirit is growing strong under the bark of stones!
Gerald De Nerval / 1854
trans. R Bly
* *
Archaic Torso Of Apollo
We have no idea what his fantastic head was
We have no idea what his fantastic head was
like, where the eyeballs were slowly swelling. But
his body now is glowing like a lamp
whose inner eyes, only turned down a little,
hold their flame, shine. If there weren’t light, the curve
of the breast wouldn’t blind you, and in the swerve
of the thighs a smile wouldn’t keep on going
toward the place where the seeds are.
If there weren’t light, this stone would look cut off
where it drops so clearly from the shoulders,
its skin wouldn’t gleam like the fur of a wild animal,
his body now is glowing like a lamp
whose inner eyes, only turned down a little,
hold their flame, shine. If there weren’t light, the curve
of the breast wouldn’t blind you, and in the swerve
of the thighs a smile wouldn’t keep on going
toward the place where the seeds are.
If there weren’t light, this stone would look cut off
where it drops so clearly from the shoulders,
its skin wouldn’t gleam like the fur of a wild animal,
and the body wouldn’t send out the light from every edge
as a star does . . . for there is no place at all
as a star does . . . for there is no place at all
that isn’t looking at you. You must change your life.
Rainer Maria Rilke / 1908
trans R Bly
Note: the two poems above are from my blog project
News of the Universe is a book of poetry selected and translated by Robert Bly
Humor #30 Meadow Snow & Plant "Portrait"
I have had many moments, while photographing, when I felt I was being looked at by what
I was photographing. Sometimes the images, in printed form, have that quality--
of something present and alive.
In this collection each of eight images, which bring the project to a close,
have "eyes" . . . eyes which appear to be looking out at me from
within the image. There is something humorous about this,
but I can't tell you what that is. Or, maybe, its about the
mystery of seeing.
(Visit my blog essay Seeing the Grand Canyon)
This Snow photograph may be a Self-portrait, and, in poetic or philosophical
terms all artistic products could certainly be thought of in that way, though the word
Self is a complicated issue, and should not to be confused with the notion of an ego-personality.
Humor #31 A Four-fold Symmetrical Photograph
Portrait-Transformation
My Four-Fold Symmetrical Photographs are created by duplicating one source image four times
and conjoining them to each other so that each image is mirroring itself above & below and
left & right. The source image I used here is a child's drawing on crumpled paper.
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Humor #32 Quirky 18x18 Inkjet Print
Turtle and three air bubbles floating in a home made pond
When I took this photograph I did not see the relationship between the metal grates
on the bottom of the pond and how they resemble the turtle's shell design.
The grate was a much darker tone than the surface of the water, but over
several printings, I gradually made the image much lighter, such that the
the pond tones on the bottom were almost the same as the
surface tones of the water. Now the tons of the turtle's
head and the dark rings around the bubble grab
my attention first, and then the lite grays,
and then the turtle who is looking at me.
Humor #33 Ping pong paddle with two eye balls . . .
. . . eyes which are looking at me
Humor #34 ~ Terrifying Angel ~
This symmetrical image--and the last two, below--are from my project
I think angels see things differently that humans do. They may not have eyes.
All of my Symmetrical photographs have eyes.
Terrifying angels should have eyes . . . to remind us that they know
their image is nothing but a reflection of the other one who is seeing.
Humor #35 "Polite, shy Angel with red lips, green sun glasses & blue gems"
(A symmetrical Photograph, from The Angels: Faces of Light)
My Angels project began as a homage to the great painter Paul Klee. He made
many humorous drawings of angels that reflect less than angelic human characteristics.
Humor #36 Smiling Spider Garage, with a Full Moon & a Midnight Sun over its head
Here we are again, back to where I started the project, with figures, things and garages
suspended in black space. This "Garage Angle" with its moon and Red Sun,
though at first glance seems funny--like a spider trying to look scary but
is not quite convincing--the image has a mystical presence too.
A Red Sun, according to the mystic and scholar Henry Corbin,
can reference the "Suns of the Heart" which announces the
presence of the Angel-Logos, one of the Angelic Intelligences.
"Angelophany is associated with the symbol of the
"midnight sun," of luminous Night, because the
first Intelligence, the Angel-Logos, is the
initial and primordial theophany
of the Deus absconditus
[the hidden God.]
Henry Corbin' from his book: The Man of Light
*
This Inkjet Print Project
was published and announced on my blog's Welcome Page
December 4, 2025
Related Project Links
Welcome Page to The Departing Landscape blog-website which includes the complete hyperlinked listing of my online photography projects dating back to the 1960's, my resume, contact information, and more.
