The Spaces Don’t Lie

Orb Yard Night, San Francisco, 2025

"The greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and to tell what it saw in a plain way."
— John Ruskin, Modern Painters III (1856)

There's a category of building we rarely get to know. Not because it's hidden — it's usually right there, at the edge of the freeway, at the end of the off-ramp, along the road you take to get somewhere else. They’re made of corrugated metal, concrete, or something equally nondescript. There’s usually a loading dock, security cameras, and a chain-link perimeter, with no signage other than “no trespassing.”  

These are the buildings that manufacture, store, process, repair, and distribute the goods and services that power our modern economy. They are the load-bearing buildings on the edge of town. They’re essential, nearly invisible, and indifferent to our presence. 

I've been photographing them for years, sometimes as an abstract texture, or as a distressed backdrop in an environmental portrait. As I pivoted to documentary work last summer, I began a deeper exploration of San Francisco's Bayshore corridor in the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood. It’s a historic area that once hummed with heavy industry and now features light industry cohabitating with residential neighborhoods. The more time I spent in industrial areas in San Francisco and beyond, the more I learned about how and why we marginalize them and why they seem so anonymous.

John Ruskin — the Victorian critic and author who believed that a building is never just a building — argued that the architecture of a place is a record of its social and moral condition at a particular moment in time. In his era, industrialization was still nascent but already polluting the environment. When Ruskin wrote that the greatest human act is simply to see something and report it plainly, he was talking about painting, but he could have been speaking of documentary-style photography. 

These industrial zones aren't unfriendly, ugly, or simply innocuous by accident. They reflect — with brutal honesty — what a society actually values. In effect, we ghettoized them. Industrial areas such as the Bayview, Bayshore, Oakland, and Phoenix’s Valley of the Sun (also featured in this series) were built to efficiently process, move, and contain goods and services. When those functions become unprofitable, the buildings fall into disrepair. Today’s logistics demand ever greater scale and automation — and older industrial parks must struggle to compete and reinvent themselves. 

The photographs in this series are an attempt to illuminate these issues, among others. They also celebrate the unexpected beauty and sly humanity of these mostly unseen areas. We can handle the truth about them. These industrial spaces don't lie. They just don't speak unless we look at them. 

Mixing Things Up

Dislocation-7 in “A Measure of Uncertainty” at SF’s Harvey Milk Photo Center, February 2026

There’s nothing like a political campaign to exacerbate our existential concerns. In the fall of 2024, I began work on Dislocated, a collection of 16 diptychs pairing environmental portraits with distressed urban settings. The project inspired me to try something new — rendering the diptychs in mixed media. I opted to print the portraits on plexiglass and display the backgrounds on metal (my preferred surface). The only question was how best to connect these disparate layers while accentuating the collage's effect. 

As I prepared the images for my photo group’s exhibition, called A Measure of Uncertainty, at San Francisco’s Harvey Milk Photo Center through Feb. 21st, I explored various ways to present the layers. I tried magnets, but they didn’t separate the layers well. I tried edge standoffs to connect the layers, which worked, but they lacked the stability to withstand the rigors of a gallery show.

After evaluating these methods, I asked an expert framer (Orion in S.F.) to create a window box to securely hold and separate the layers. They made it possible to slide the plexiglass in the frame, which is fun, but, as I’ve learned, the plexi is sensitive to fingerprints.

Meanwhile, I want to congratulate my 21 amazing colleagues in the Bay Area Photography Collective (BAPC), who also have images in the show, which was superbly curated by Heather Snider. I also want to give a shoutout to Melissa Castro Keesor, the talented director of the Harvey Milk Photo Center. I hope you’ll check it out when you have time.

There's nothing to see here, folks

What is the mission of anonymous-looking urban buildings?

Stealth-mode buildings discourage interaction. And most businesses seek just the opposite, choosing to build brand awareness and customer engagement. Yet, San Francisco’s Bayshore, an industrial enclave within the larger Bayview neighborhood, is thick with gray, unnamed structures that aspire to anonymity. Razor-wire fences, metal-barred windows, and glaring motion-activated lights are the most memorable features of these mini-fortresses. 

We’re meant to conclude that there’s “nothing to see here.” But it’s probably just the opposite. These days we assume this bunker mentality is mandated by their lawyers or insurers. Even small businesses take maximal security measures, regardless of their actual risk or potential liabilities. Are hostile looking buildings simply physical shelters or the expression of a company’s dark view about everyone lurking beyond their gates? In my view, this safety posture vibe sows distrust and alienation. 

I’m at work on a documentary project that explores urban industrial areas, but I’m not intending to celebrate their often hostile vibe. On the contrary, I’m aiming to expose and explain it, and reveal the weirdness and humor I find in these strangely compelling spaces. I’m sharing some of this new work on Instagram, and there’s much more yet to come. Let me know if you have any thoughts or ideas you’d like me to consider.

If you're not feeling anxious ...

Dislocated-1, London, 2025

Before naming my new series, dislocated, I considered other ideas. When I submitted several new portraits to LensCulture (a popular online photography site) they asked for a series title. I chose a phrase that was top-of-mind for me: “If you’re not feeling anxious, you’re not paying attention.”

As titles go, I’ll concede that one is not only long, it also runs hot. A photo group colleague quipped that I should just call my new portrait series, “2025.” She had a point. 

How hot is too hot? As the Jack White song puts it, with the amplifiers set to 11: “That’s how I’m feeling right now.” A great song, but it could be the title of every art series, ever. 

These portraits, shot mainly at night in the San Francisco Bay Area and London, express existential concerns for myself and countless others. The feeling of dislocation expressed in this series may be a fleeting or prolonged experience. Sometimes it’s simply a nagging concern for others near or far away. 

In some cases, I’ll present portraits, but in others, such as in this new series, those same people are paired with environmental textures and backgrounds. The dislocated images present a diptych variation that comment on the uncertainty of our times and the opaqueness of truth in portraiture. 

One of my new portraits, Staircase, shot with Fay Xiong (@yifayfay_) on a crisp February afternoon near London’s Trafalgar Square, will appear in a group portrait show at Praxis Gallery in Minneapolis. The same image is also featured in Dislocated-1. The “Portrait” exhibition, which runs June 21 - July 12, 2025, was juried by Sandrine Hermand-Grisel, a fine art photographer and founder of All About Photo.  

I want to thank the terrific people who collaborated with me on this project in the Bay Area and London. As I run their images on social channels I will share their handles.

Please let me know what you think of the new series and tell me how you’re feeling right now. 

Fear and Loathing in Eagle Pass, Texas

The Big Beautiful, Unfinished Wall in Eagle Pass, Texas

A year ago, I rolled into Eagle Pass, a town on the Rio Grande, full of apprehension about Texas and the immigration crisis. My friend David, another ex-journo, invited me to accompany him to this tiny town that’s become a flashpoint in the militarized effort to prevent immigrants from crossing our southern border. 

A year ago, the political rhetoric was toxic. “I have already declared an invasion,” declared Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who militarized the area for his “Operation Lone Star.” One of his first actions was to shut down Shelby Park, a public space across the river from the Mexican city of Piedras Negras. 

We found the riverside park fortified by shipping containers, ensnared in concertina wire, patrolled by a handful of National Guard troops and state police, along with a smattering of helicopters, tents, Humvees, SUVs, and pickup trucks. Later, Abbott or his advisers dubbed this otherwise drab park Camp Eagle. Abbott boasted of his action, “The only thing we are not doing is we’re not shooting people who come across the border because, of course, the Biden administration would charge us with murder.”  

Nearby, of course, was the famously unfinished border wall, a project initiated to curb illegal immigration during the first Trump administration. Trump termed it a “big, beautiful wall,” but its design and construction have been marred by controversy and criticism, with many arguing that it is an ineffective and costly solution to the immigration issue. The rusty steel and cement wall remains a potent symbol of the immigration debate, and we were eager to gauge its impact. 

David’s focus was on the human stories behind the crisis. He met and photographed immigrants with word tattoos—often a visually and emotionally powerful experience. He wrote a terrific article about this quest for the Atlantic called “The Words People Write on Their Skin.”

My journey to Eagle Pass was fueled by a desire to deepen my understanding and document a situation that had become hyper-politicized. As David’s wingman, I was also there to support his mission. Our time in Piedras Negras, a place with a far mellower atmosphere, provided another perspective on the National Guard’s intense yet makeshift efforts. 

I cannot abide hostility toward immigrants, no matter their legal status. Trump’s assertion that “Illegal immigration is poisoning the blood of our nation” is racist bile meant to stir up hostility toward people who are desperate for a better life. More to come? Perhaps. 

Here are a selection of the images. One of them, “Big Beautiful Wall,” a diptych, was published last year in a photo book called The Double City. 

A view of Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, from across the Rio Grande in Piedras Negras, Mexico, in April 2024.

A patrol boat watches for immigrants on the Rio Grande between Eagle Pass, Texas and Piedras Negras, Mexico, in April 2024.

A National Guard soldier allows a truck to enter recently militarized Shelby Park one night in April, 2024.

A close-up of a National Guard Humvee inside Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, Texas in April, 2024.

Metaphors of Recent Times at S.F. City Hall

Three “Of the Mission” portraits in PhotoAlliance’s “Metaphors of Recent Times” on view at S.F. City Hall January-June, 2025.

Step inside the Beaux-Arts masterpiece known as San Francisco City Hall and you’ll see newlyweds smiling and waiving for photographers on its dramatic grand staircase. Just steps away from the procession of brides and grooms, another type of photographic exhibition is underway. The San Francisco Arts Commission and PhotoAlliance are presenting Metaphors of Recent Times: A Dialogue of the Personal, the Political and the Cultural. 

This group photography exhibition features “incisive visual perspectives from artists of diverse identities and background, each responding to the issues of our times.” Each artist contributes a triptych—three images that highlight one of many impactful socio-political themes. 

I am thrilled to be one of the 24 artists selected for this group photography show. The curators, Lewis Watts, Beth Davila Waldman, and Linda Connor selected three images from my recent “Of the Mission | de la Misión” series: Maria, Febe and Rose. My images, featuring a selection of people who live or work in San Francisco’s Mission District, depict life in ways that words alone cannot express. 

The show features work by Pablo Tapay Bautista, Renee Billingslea, Barbara Boissevain, Kennedi Carter, Mima Cataldo, Yu-Chen Chiu, Katie Cofer, Mark Coggins, Izzy Cosentino, Kelly Fogel, David Gardner, Stuart Goldstein, Christine Huhn, Judi Iranyi, Anni Lopponen, Darcy Padilla, Eric Robertson, Lance Shields, Nina Sidneva, William Mark Sommer, Liz Steketee, myself, and Harry Williams. I enjoyed meeting a many of these talented artists at the opening reception on January 16th. 

Metaphors is on view at City Hall’s Ground Floor and North Light Court until August 1st, 2025.

de la Misión at the Mission Bowling Club

Karla, SF Mission District, 2023, is one of dozens of environmental portraits of people depicted in real or imagined neighborhood settings.

Are you ready to celebrate some of the amazing people who live or work in San Francisco’s Mission District? Nearly 60 people I met on the streets and at the Mission Farmer’s Market allowed me to take their portrait last year and then feature them in an art project. The resulting series, called Of the Mission or de la Misión, depicts these adults in real or imagined settings to showcase how this neighborhood’s distinctive culture, vivid colors, textures and stories, permeates our lives.

Selections of these environmental-style portraits will be exhibited locally in a solo show opening November 14th, 2024 at the Mission Bowling Club, a participant in ArtSpan’s Art-in-Neighborhoods program. I am deeply grateful not only to the kind people who agreed to be photographed (for which each received a digital portrait), but also to ArtSpan, the Mission Bowling Club, and to Foodwise, a nonprofit that hosts the seasonal market and allowed me to run a “portrait pop-up” over the course of several weeks last fall. 

Some information about the exhibition: 

• The opening reception is November 14th, from 6 to 8 p.m. The show runs through April 7th, 2025.

• What’s on view? There are eight selections from my series Of the Mission, plus artworks from a group show called “Landscapes: Real & Imagined Pt. 2.”

• Mission Bowling Club is located 3176 17th St, San Francisco, Ca. Entry is free. Here are the hours. Be advised that one, it’s a great place to bowl, and two, as a disclaimer, I suck at bowling.

• The artwork will be available for purchase after November 11th on site or on the ArtSpan website.

Opening Up to Open Studios

A “gaggle” of artists participating in S.F. Open Studios at Upside Artspace in the SF Mission District. It was fun!

Wrapped up my first Open Studios this past weekend. I met a range of art fans, including buyers, and even folks who weren’t sure how they found us. Thanks to the team at Upside Artspace along with the participating artists (pictured above) plus the S.F. Artspan crew who organize the 50-year-old, city-wide event.

Rather than focus on my latest work, a series of urban portraits called Of the Mission, I exhibited images going back to when I began this adventure in 2015. Although the work represented a mix of styles, it’s all foundational to my work today.

Check out these artists (at least on Instagram):
@jamiesmithart
@chasindoodles
@anideasmith
@sanaz_safanassab
@priyatam.art
@travelerscamera
@waverlyliu
@davidperea_travelart

What's Clicking Now?

Lisa, from Of the Mission

If you live in San Francisco the odds are you’re sick of hearing the oft-repeated but fictitious quip about the coldest winter Mark Twain ever spent. As I look out my window in the Mission District, in August, the sky is 95% white, a mix of haze and stratus clouds with a hint of blue. There’s just enough cloud cover to qualify as a good day for a photo walk.

That said, I’ll write this post instead, because it’s way overdue, and I have a bit of news to share. (I’ll update this post as other things happen this year.)

• On November 23rd, “Stand In,” a diptych from my series Night Work, appears in my photo group’s exhibition, called Night Vision, at Oakland’s Transmission Gallery. The images feature the highly engaging Christine Lee, a circus performer, during a burlesque show at San Francisco’s DNA Lounge
  

• On November 21st, Human Presence: Faces, Figures, Crowds, opens at the Belvedere-Tiburon Library in Marin. My portrait, Karla, from Of the Mission, is one of more than 70 images on view. The group show runs until Jan. 8th, 2025.

• On November 14th, my first solo show de la Misión opened at the Mission Bowling Club on 17th Street in San Francisco. It was a wonderful experience and I’m really grateful to everyone who came to the party, including some of the portrait participants, the ArtSpan team, and the MBC crew. The show which includes eight Of the Mission portraits runs until April 7th, 2025. Let’s arrange to meet there.

• In October, “Big Beautiful Wall,” a diptych I shot in April in Eagle Pass, Texas, will be exhibited at Porto Vecchio during Trieste Photo Days, in Trieste, Italy. The image, also selected for a book called The Double City, depicts an unfinished border wall along the Rio Grande in Texas.
  

• In late September, I participated in my first San Francisco Open Studios. It happened on September 28th and 29th at Upside Art in the Mission District. It was be a fun scene with art, food and drink. I had numerous pieces on display, both framed and unframed. There was lots of dynamic work by contemporary artists and I enjoyed making lots of new friends there!
  

• In August, the image Lisa from my series Of the Mission was juried into a group show called “21st Century Portraits” by L.A. Photo Curator. The image from my Mission portrait series received an Honorable Mention by the jurors, Michael Rababy of Hive Gallery in Los Angeles, and James Payne, a photographer. My thanks to the jurors.

• In July, the image Ingrid from my series Of the Mission was juried into a group show called The Photo Review International Photography Competition. The portrait of a Mission resident was selected by the juror Joel Smith, the Richard L. Menschel Curator and Department Head in Photography at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York. It marks the third image of mine selected by the Photo Review - the first ran in 2018. (Joel’s are cool.)

• In April, several images from my Unnatural World series — Valley/Burn and Hills/Graffiti — were selected for an Artspan show called “Landscapes: Real and Imagined.” The exhibition at the Mission Bowling Club (yes, a real bowling alley) included a fun reception on June 25th — ending just after Labor Day.

Nothing is Lost in Translation

Rock/Vehicle, from Unnatural World, will appear in BAPC & Samurai Foto’s new Memento Mori, Memento Vivere exhibition at the Marin Art and Garden Center.

Do you remember the scene from Sofia Coppola’s 2003 movie Lost in Translation when Bill Murray’s character Bob is filming a TV commercial for Suntory whiskey in Japan?
“[after a long speech in Japanese by the director]
Ms. Kawasaki: He want you to turn and look in camera. Okay?
Bob (played by Bill Murray): Is that all he said?”

I thought about that moment this week as members of my photography group, the Bay Area Photographers Collective (BAPC), were preparing to host a joint exhibition in March with Samurai Foto of Yokohama, Japan. Would we need to minimize cultural or language barriers? Unworldly me conjured thoughts of food, whiskey and music — not unlike the movie.  

How did our photo groups hook up? No, it wasn’t on social media. Various members of each group met at Photolucida in Portland, Oregon, in 2017, and the idea of joint exhibitions quickly gained steam. Samurai Foto invited us to participate in a Yokohama exhibition called Beautiful Bridge in 2018, shortly before I joined BAPC. We’re thrilled to reciprocate. 

The natural bridge between our photography groups, of course, is thematic and primarily nonverbal. Kudos to our curator, Trisha Lagaso Goldberg, for suggesting a thought-provoking theme called Memento Mori, Memento Vivere (remember you must die, remember you must live) featuring the work of 22 BAPC and 10 Samurai Foto artists. 

Our new show opens March 9th at the lovely Marin Art and Garden Center in Ross, CA. Please join me at the opening reception on Sunday, March 10th, from 1-3:30p. My mother-in-law, in particular, will be thrilled to see our planned Ikebana demonstration. 

The exhibition runs through April 21st. I’m participating in a Meet the Artist event there on Sunday, March 24, 1-4 pm along with my BAPC colleagues Cindy Stokes, Chris Stevens-Yu, Ari Salomon, Ingo Bork, Mitch Nelles and John Martin.

I’ll have two images in the show: Rock/Vehicle and Valley/Building from my recent series Unnatural World, exploring the disharmony between nature/man. I’ve seen much of the work that will be on display and urge you not to miss it. Nothing will be lost in translation.

A Personal Mission

Loved photographing my neighbors at the S.F. Mission Farmers Market. These portraits are part of an art project that will debut in 2024. A shout out to my friends at Foodwise. Image courtesy of Rosi Lopez.

A former diary keeper, I still jot down ideas, particularly for future photographic projects. One idea from early 2019 entailed setting up a table and a tent at San Francisco’s 24th Street BART station to snap portraits of my fellow Mission District residents. A pesky pandemic prolonged matters.

Flash forward to late summer 2023. At my wife’s urging and with support from the gracious Foodwise team, I opened a “portrait pop-up” at the vibrant Mission Farmers Market. Aided by Rosi Lopez, a bilingual assistant, and Rami Levinson, I’ve shot portraits for 57 people (and counting). Each participant signed a model release and received a free digital picture. 

The pop-up offered an excellent opportunity to meet my fellow residents. The volunteers included one fellow waiting for his bar exam results (he learned he passed 20 minutes later), a young man who had just picked up the keys to his new Mission apartment not an hour earlier, and a woman whose family had been here for three generations. Couples appeared and laid their bags of fruits and veggies on our card table. A poet wanted a photo for the back jacket of his new book. There were mothers and daughters and sons of all ages. One woman requested a new LinkedIn profile pic. I met teachers, nurses, tech workers, artists, filmmakers, photographers, florists, retailers, unemployed workers, and much more.

I shot pics of them all, often knowing they wouldn’t appear in this project. I asked most participants how they felt about the Mission, and despite daunting challenges in this city and elsewhere, nearly everyone said they love living here. The lawyer, Ram, said he loves the diversity of the Mission, which “makes me feel comfortable and safe.”

These shots and others will form the foundation of a new series of fine-art environmental portraits celebrating the engaging people, places and (world-famous) street art that signify Mission life. My environmental portraiture tells a story and features a mix of Mission-based textures and backgrounds. Unlike a documentary project that records a specific place and time, in this project, participants may find themselves transported to a real or imagined outdoor setting to demonstrate how we are all “of the Mission.”

I intend to publicly share a selection of these Mission portraits in (or near) the Mission in 2024. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or suggestions. Participants can track the project’s progress on this site, in my Instagram feed, or via newsletter. 

Community is the Message

Checking out #429, Valley/Burn, at the de Young Open 2023, an exhibition featuring Bay Area artists.

We think of art as a solitary exercise, but with group shows, everyone, including the participants, may feel a sense of community. 

The de Young Open amplifies that feeling to the Nth degree. Walking into the museum’s vast exhibition spaces, you’re immediately gob-smacked by the quality of this enormous exhibition featuring (primarily) painting, mixed media and photography by 800+ San Francisco Bay Area artists. 

The curators opted for a salon-style presentation, placing work in multiple rows that run higher and lower than eye level. I met several local artists — painters, photographers, and mixed media artists — who shared my joy at participating in this large-scale community event.   

I also felt a strong sense of community with another exhibition — one that I helped produce on behalf of my photography group, the Bay Area Photographers Collective (BAPC). Curated by Emmanuelle Namont, Uncanny Beauty opened mid-September and runs through October 21st at San Francisco’s Harvey Milk Photo Center—a hub of the San Francisco photography community and a great gallery venue.  

It’s gratifying to know that the art you conceive of as an individual can also assume an engaging group or community persona. As my favorite hoops coach is fond of saying, there’s strength in numbers. 

What's Clicking in 2023?

Viva Cinco de Mayo! It’s tiempo de fiesta in San Francisco’s Mission District, especially on a Friday. The fireworks commence at dusk. [Note, this post is updated over the course of the year.]

Here we’ll light a virtual sparkler to celebrate the inclusion of various images from my latest series The Unnatural World in exhibitions highlighting the environment. The series, which debuted earlier this year, explores the clash of scenic beauty and the human expressions that impede, deface, degrade, and obscure our environment. 

Who doesn’t feel a sense of frustration about how man undermines the environment? This work is my way of drawing attention to this destructive behavior. Here’s where to see these images in the wild (so to speak):

• In mid-December, my image Valley/Burn will appear in the online gallery of the 2023 International Juried Competition by the Center for Photographic Arts in Carmel, CA. I am a member of the CfPA and send hearty thanks to the juror, Shana Lopes, Assistant Curator of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Center’s Executive Director, Ann Jastrab.

• In mid-November, my image Island/Tunnel, also from the Unnatural World series, will be displayed at Galerie XII in the Bergamot Station Arts Center in Santa Monica, CA. The image was named a finalist in FOCUS Photo l.a.’s Summer 2023 exhibition. I was previously a finalist in 2020. Thanks to the jurors, Valérie-Anne Giscard d’Estaing (owner of Galerie XII); Eve Schillo, Associate Curator, Wallis Annenberg Photography Department, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)

• In late September, my image Valley/Burn will appear in The de Young Open 2023 in San Francisco’s de Young Museum. This is a salon-style exhibition featuring work from artists across nine Bay Area counties. Kudos to the museum for promoting local art, and a giant thank you to the curators who selected my image. The exhibition runs from Sept. 30th to Jan. 7th. Pics to follow.

• In mid-September, my photo group, the Bay Area Photographers Collective, held our 23rd annual group exhibition. Uncanny Beauty, curated by Emmanuelle Namont, from Sept. 14th to Oct. 21st at San Francisco’s Harvey Milk Photo Center. Two images from my Unnatural World series, Valley/Burn and Lake/Window, shot in the Sierras last October, will be on display. Hope to see you at the Opening Reception on Sept. 14th, 5- 8 p.m., or on one of our Meet the Artist Saturdays.

• In August, the image Blaze from the series Re-envisioning, will appear in a group show called The Photo Review: Best of Show 2023 at the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia. The urban portrait was awarded a fourth-place prize by the juror Deborah Willis, Ph.D., University Professor and Chair of the Department of Photography & Imaging at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. The exhibition will present the work of the 15 prizewinners of the 2023 International Photography Competition organized by the Photo Review. It is my second image to run in the Photo Review - the first ran in 2018. Blaze will appear in a fall edition of the magazine.

• In July, the image Valley/Building shot just outside of Death Valley, will appear in a show called, aptly, Environment at the Glasgow Gallery of Photography in Scotland. Death Valley is otherworldly, of course, and every time I see a sci-fi set in space, I assume it was filmed there. 

• In June, Valley/Burn will appear in a show called Landscape Perspectives at Gallery 1137 in Art Works Downtown in San Rafael, California. The group show was juried by gallerist Kim Eagles-Smith. Please join me at the opening on June 9th, 5-8 p.m.

• In May, Valley/Burn was juried into an online show called In Sight at the O’Hanlon Center for the Arts in Mill Valley, CA. The exhibition was curated by Shana Lopes, Assistant Curator of Photography at the S.F. Museum of Modern Art.

• This year kicked off with my Yosemite Valley image called Valley/Burn, juried by Aline Smithson into The Artist Intervenes in Praxis Gallery in Minneapolis. The main image was shot last fall during an epic hike to a scenic overlook. Little known fact: Cameras provide a great excuse to catch your breath.

• Last fall, an image (now-called) Hills/Graffiti was juried by Elizabeth Cheng Grist into “(Un)Natural Cycles: Air, Water, Land,” at the Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado. The main image was shot in Iceland last summer.  

Valley/Building, shot outside of Death Valley, from my series The Unnatural World, will appear in an exhibition about the Environment in Glasgow, Scotland in June.

What's in a Name?

Each fine art photo series I produce has its own distinctive vibe. I craft a naming convention for each set of images that differs from those preceding it. 

Just before launching my new series, Unnatural World, I met with a handful of distinguished fine art photography curators and sought their advice about my work. Unprompted, several of them politely suggested that the working image titles could use a rethink. 

Hey, but what about those clever titles? One curator referred to the “poetics” of naming conventions and said I should refresh my approach. He said I needed to stop trying to frame a viewer's interpretation of the image and go with something more neutral and prosaic. 

A shot that I’d called Overlooked, depicting Yosemite Valley and the aftereffects of fire, would now become Valley/Burn. The backslash separating the words signifies the juxtaposition of the environment and how man has impaired it. 

You may well ask, why not name every image Untitled 1, 2 or 3, etc? That’s a little too non-descriptive for me. This series shows what man is doing to the environment both literally and figuratively. Undoubtedly the next series will be completely different. Let me know what you think at rusty at rustyweston.com or on Instagram as @rusty.weston.

Mountain/Window, from Unnatural World, explores the human expressions that obscure our environment in real and imagined ways.

Curating the New World Exhibition

October marks the start of my fine art photography group’s (nearly) annual exhibition. This year we’re installing it at the Minnesota Street Project galleries—a cool space for art and photography in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood. That area has become the center of gravity for contemporary art in S.F.

We’re honored that Sandra Phillips, Curator Emerita of Photography, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, curated our exhibition. That’s no easy task given that we have 21 photographers representing nearly the entire spectrum of photographic styles. Sandra thoughtfully chose a broad yet timely theme - The New World - how artists are seeing life now that COVID-19 is becoming more manageable. “How has this recent history, our new fear of this disease, affected our lives and our perceptions?” she wrote in our show statement.

How, indeed? For me, it dialed up the anxiety but has also provided time for creative exploration. Sandra selected four of my Re-envisioning images: The Mission, Blaze, With Intent, and Overnight. Altogether there are 54 artworks in the exhibition. She’s giving a talk at our opening reception on Oct. 22nd, and I urge you to attend (it’s 1-4p, and she’s speaking at 2p). I’ll talk about my urban portraits on another Saturday in November and will post more information about that here and on my Instagram and Facebook pages. Here’s a link to our exhibition page. See you there!

Blaze, featuring @ouuthatsjuju, from my Re-envisioning series

What's Clicking in 2022?

Happy World Camera Day. Apparently, that’s a thing.

An image from a series in progress called The Unnatural World was juried into an exciting new show called “(Un)Natural Cycles: Air, Water, Land,” Elizabeth Cheng Grist, the curator of the Center for Fine Art Photography’s exhibition, selected my image, The Road to Utopia, which aligns with the show’s exploration of the environment. The exhibition, which you can view online, will be live until January 15th. My new series will debut in 2023, and I’m previewing some of it on Instagram.

One of my urban portraits, Forethought, from the series Re-envisioning, received an Honorable Mention in NYC4PA’s 10th Anniversary exhibition juried by Elizabeth Avedon. The portrait of a masked woman was shot a year before the pandemic. It appears in an online component of a very engaging exhibition.

Two of my images were selected for the East Bay Photo Collective’s exhibition called “The Night is Young.” I had the pleasure of attending the show opening at the Oakland Photo Workshop, a terrific space in downtown Oakland, Ca. One of the images, called Intake, was shot at a San Francisco dispensary for a series called Night Work. The other, Take Out, is from my Cerrado series shot in the Mission two years ago in the darker days of the pandemic. The show will be live until the end of September.

See the next post for details about the recent solo exhibition of my Re-envisioning images in Rome.

One of the year’s highlights for me was the Bay Area Photo Collective’s New World exhibition, featuring four of my urban portraits (Re-envisioning) plus the wonderful work of my BAPC colleagues. I loved the gallery show at the Minnesota Street Project in San Francisco.

In November, the Santa Cruz Art League’s People and Places — Photography Reconnected exhibition featured Overnight from my Re-envisioning series of portraits. Thanks to the curator Joe Ramos and kudos to the art league on a terrific show in a wonderfully spacious gallery.

Finally, I received word in mid-December that my Re-envisioning series had received an Honorable Mention from the Tokyo International Foto Awards (TIFA). The work was cited in the professional category called Fine-Art Collage. Can’t wait to see what 2023 will bring.

Forethought, from my series Re-envisioning, features young adults at night in San Francisco. In the frame: Kisa Hues.

The Mission in Rome

Rome is an amazing place. I’m grateful to the jurors at Roma Fotografia who selected my image “The Mission” for a group show about people at the Bresciani Visual Art Gallery in early June. The jurors awarded the image 1st prize and held a solo exhibition of ten of my urban portraits in mid-August projected at Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere.

The judges said of The Mission: “It is innovative, it recalls the web, the graphic dynamics of youth, red and then that lost but not anxious look of those who surf in the dark but with courage.”

The Mission is from my new series Re-envisioning. The work features portraits of young adults at night in San Francisco. Inspired by the principles of circular design, the composites remix my photographic work in areas such as street, textures, abstracts, and portraits, to express my cumulative and evolving perspective on the urban experience. Evolving is everything, although what I’d really like is a Jerusalem artichoke and a plate of pasta in Trastevere.

“The Mission'“ from my new series Re-envisioning

The Completion Backward Principle

Musicians call it a remix. They reimagine a song, often layering it with different drum tracks or orchestration or harmonies. In digital photography, we can remix images to our hearts' delight because the changes are non-destructive. 

I spent the holidays at home recently and decided to see what would happen if I could combine some of my recent street work, both documentary and abstract. And that quickly evolved into reexamining a little older work with gamers and models. And then I opened the digital floodgates and started pulling in textures I’d shot six or seven years ago in the U.S. and Europe. And then all hell broke loose but in a good way. 

So, what is this all about? Not sure I can explain this better than my beloved S.F. band The Tubes. This quasi-punk band once released an album and a jokey video called the Completion Backward Principle — “the imagination creates reality” — which still rings untrue today. Until now, I didn’t know what I was missing.

As I write this in late January, I’m developing a series of urban portraits, with other projects underway.

A reimagined urban portrait featuring Eilyn Escalante from the series Re-envisioning.

A window seat into volatility

Disruptions have become the new normal during the pandemic. Many shops and restaurants have closed; some permanently. Outdoor dining spaces called parklets have sprouted for those who prefer to dine outside. At night, street light moves through parklet “windows” in volatile ways creating unique abstractions that change shape in a matter of moments.

That’s the effect that inspired my new series called Night Glass. I’m still shooting the series on chilly San Francisco nights. Let me know what you think.

Untitled 63 from the series Night Glass shot through San Francisco restaurant parklet windows

Through a looking glass

Untitled 3, shot this year in San Francisco, from my upcoming series Night Glass

What can an abstract image tell us about a changing man-made environment? This image called Untitled 3 is from my latest project, still in development, called Night Glass.

After spending a year documenting my city in turmoil and transition, I’ve embraced abstraction to explore how I’ve changed—and am now seeing things differently.  The photos express what I’d rather not parse into words— a glassy layer removed from what’s actually happening on these streets and behind these windows.

Let me know what you think—I’m previewing a range of them on my Instagram page. Stay safe.