Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 30, 2009

Friday night I made a conscious effort to not think so damn much, have some fun, and just let the photographs happen. It was totally Zen, bro. As a result, throughout the night my inner dialog went something like this: Would that person make for a good subject? Are they interesting enough for you and your little project, you jerk? Well, are you going to take the picture or not? Come on, SNAP THE PHOTO!
And so on and so on and so on.
When I wasn't visiting my own personal crazy town, I was snapping pictures, and below are a few I think worked out pretty well. In the first I was playing with depth of field to frame my subject, and used the other folks in the foreground's shape to frame him in. The woman in the second was holding that pose and expression for at least 10 minutes-she has a really, really great face. The third features a young, sanguine girl in an amazing winter hat.
If you click this you'll be magically transported to the place where the entire set of photos from the project rests.

118, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

115, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

125, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 29, 2009

I feel like I had an off night on Thursday. If I were pitcher I would have given up 8 runs in the first inning and gotten pulled. Alas I am not a pitcher (ho hum) but a mere photographer, so an off night for me is one where I feel like I'm trying to make things happen. I don't mean that I was posing people at the MCA and breaking from my documentarian style of portrait making, but more so that I was too conscious of what I was doing, and forcing the act of making compelling photographs. Nights like this will happen, such is life. What I need to remember is that the patrons attending 'The Wild Duck' are interesting enough as it is, and kind enough to allow me to photograph them, so there's no reason to introduce my photographer-ego into the equation. That said, here's a few that I think work. See the entire set right this way.

112, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

109, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

106, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 28, 2009

Often times when making portraits of people without asking them to formally pose you have to be ready, and hope that the subject you singled out will hold the pose that attracted you in the first place. Or, in other cases you've got to be patient and hope that eventually the subject will do something that you want to capture with your camera. Other times a man will simply decide to balance his cane (at the same angle as the stairway railing in the background no less!) on his head and you'll be lucky enough to be there to engage the shutter.

91, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Sometimes you'll be there to take a photo when a gentleman decides to dangle his second pair of glasses from his ears.

93, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

While other times, most times, actually, you'll catch a person giving a look that could be best described as suspicious.

94, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

As ever, see all the photos from the MCA portrait project by clicking these words that are a different color.

Pleasant Enough All The Same, January 25, 2009

With Sunday's matinee performance, week 2 of the portrait project came to a close. Besides it being the first time I was at the museum photographing daytime attendees of 'The Wild Duck,' it also was the first time where I tried to shoot at least half of my portraits from the hip, not looking through the viewfinder of my camera. This is what nerd photographers like myself would consider "cutting loose," or "getting wild." I know, I know, I should really try and calm down. If you would like to see the multifarious results, click on these here words.

84, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

89, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

81, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Here's how the installation looks, 90 framed-photos-strong.

Wall Installation--Week 2, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 23, 2009

It seems more and more attendees who are coming to 'The Wild Duck' know about my little photo project before they get to the Court Theatre (I think the project may be mentioned in the email that goes out to members), so it's becoming increasingly more difficult to capture people off guard, so to speak. I'm surely not trying to hide while I make my photos, but I also don't want the subjects to be aware that I'm taking the picture, while I'm taking it, if that makes any dang sense at all. Anyhow, here's some that I think turned out well from Friday night. As always, see the entire set here. Also, if you're in the area of the MCA and you'd like to come down and see the installation let me know and I can suggest a good time to come. If you're lucky you can witness, fist hand, Stefano and I arguing over in what order we should hang the pictures.

67, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

74, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

78, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

77, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 22, 2009

Here's some shots from Thursday night at the MCA. The first image actually has four portraits in one (bonus!), while the second is becoming a sort of standard for me, as far as framing a head-shot goes. Whenever I see someone waiting near the stairway I try and get a clear photo of them, mainly because of the lines and angles that present themselves, so when a subject as interesting as the woman in the third shot is standing in that spot I don't even have to think--I just point and shoot and hope that she doesn't point at me and hit me with her purse. View the entire set, thus far, here.

60, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

59, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

57, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 21, 2009

Week two of the portrait project is under way, although I learned last night that the play itself hasn't officially opened yet. I guess when plays are performed the first week is usually considered a preview, with the official opening occurring sometime after that. This was all news to me. So, the Official opening night for 'The Wild Duck' is this Friday, even though performances have been taking place since last week. Thinking along these lines, if I, hypothetically, were to have an Opening for my exhibit it would not be until after the 'Wild Duck's' run was complete, or at the very least on the Closing night of the performance. Is your mind sufficiently blown?

Anyhow, here are some shots from last night.

50, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

51, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

What's becoming more and more interesting for me is the actual placement of the images on the wall. The following two are hung right next to each other, creating a sort of narrative between the two subjects.

44, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

45, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

See all the portraits right over here.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, Production Notes

This is Stefano hanging a portrait one night last week. He's the fella that made this entire MCA project possible, really, and has been with me every step of the way during the process. He is also the guy that makes sure all of the people who are photographed are actually cool with having their picture on the wall, which works out well for me. He also has a great eye for displaying the photographs, which again is beyond helpful. In addition he's teaching me Italian. Curse words, mainly.

Il Padrino, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

This is how the installation looks after the first week. I'm not sure if I mentioned this, or if it has been clear, but all of the images are printed at 4 x 6. When this is all finished I hope to have (at least) 9 rows of 30 framed photos, totaling 270.

Wall Installation-Week One, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All The same, January 18, 2009

The first week of the portrait project is complete--I have mixed feelings about the results. I feel like I'm going to need to try some different things in the coming weeks to take full advantage of this opportunity. There's never going to be a shortage of interesting subjects to shoot, that I'm sure of. I need to figure out what I want this thing to be in the end. I know that I don't want it to be just a random assortment of portraits of people attending a play. Still working it all out...
Anyhow, here's a couple shots from Sunday. The first is of a young girl standing in front of an assemblage of alarm clocks, which I thought made for an interesting juxtaposition (Time is ticking! You won't be young forever, missy!), while the second is the first shot I took where an action (in this case an embrace) serves to represent the subjects. See all the photos thus far right here.

36, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

34, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 17, 2009

The greatest opportunity in doing something over and over again is the chance to try different things to achieve your intended results. This is precisely why I drink a different bottle of wine every night, but I digress. With the MCA portrait project I'm still trying to strike an aesthetic balance between natural, photojournalistic portraits like this:

30, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

And more 'formal,' posed portraits where the subject is aware that I am photographing them, like this:

26, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

And then there are shots that aren't technically great photographs, but attempt to reflect the subjects' character, or my perception of it after interacting with them for a few seconds or so, like these:

28, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

29, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

In other news, the printer problem has been solved, I hope, and the wall is coming together quite nicely. See the complete set here.

Pleasant Enough All the Same, January 16, 2009

Some shots from night two. Still having printer issues, still trying to remain calm. The most important thing, the theatre patrons consistently make for amazing subjects. See the complete set here.

0012, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

0017, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

0020, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Pleasant Enough all the Same, January 15 2008

I can safely say that I'm glad the first night of the MCA project is behind me, and that the opening night kinks have been (hopefully) worked out. There were some technical issues with printers not printing, along with various small details that needed to be ironed out on the fly, but overall, from here on out, things should run a bit smoother. Most importantly there were plenty of folks who braved the brutal cold and came out for opening night of the 'Wild Duck,' and served as wonderful portrait subjects for my project. Below are a few from the first night. To read more about the project, and to see a complete set of the portraits please click here.

8, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

10, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

3, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Tomorrow's the Day...

Tomorrow begins the month-long-portrait-project at the MCA, and I'm pretty fired up about it! This photo, taken last summer at The Printers' Ball, has the sort of quality I hope to achieve with the portraits of 'The Wild Duck' attendees. The title of my installation is 'Pleasant Enough All the Same,' and I'll post some images here, as well as the complete set on Flickr.

Lady in the Crowd, Printer's Ball, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Landstractions

Instead of laboriously calling these types of images "Abstract Landscapes," I shall now, from this day forward, refer to them as 'Landstractions.' I can't not see this word catching on with the masses. I should also mention that I'm delusional, and will likely forget the word myself by the end of the week.

Jalousie, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

ƒƒtt, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

This Winter Has Been Relentless

This morning the news stated we were having a 'Snow Incident,' whatever the dickens that means.

Mountains on the Sidewalk, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

I think I like the background of this image more than the in-focus foreground. I was going for a 'Berry Incident' type of look.

Snow Creek Berry, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Welcome to the Pile

Peregrination # 29, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

Oh, hello. I see you've stumbled upon (or you followed the link that I sent you because I am shameless) my new, fancy photography blog. Well Hell's Bells, welcome! One of the things I appreciate about photography is that the form lends itself to allowing the Creator of Images to remain tacit. That said, I'll do my best to keep things at a wordy minimum and use this space to highlight new work, like these abstract landscapes that I've taken a liking to creating in the past year.

1, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

4, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

~, originally uploaded by Christopher Hiltz.

I'll also be using this space to document the progress of a project I'll be working on at The Museum of Contemporary Art here in Chicago this winter. If you'd like to learn more about that than I invite you to check out the 'Artist Up Close' section of this post . Long story short, I'll be at the Court Theatre every night during the The Wild Duck's scheduled run making clandestine portraits of the theatre patrons, printing them on location, and then hanging them nightly, creating a wall montage that will be on display and grow as the month of performances proceeds.