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A Dreamscape

Beyond Technical Perfection

Shining Moss Falls n the Hocking Hills
Shining Moss

Tad Z. Danielewski – “Everything you need to know you will know, when you need to know it if you choose to simply be present at the time you first experience it.”

My enduring dreamscape in the journey to now…….

A contemplation stirred deep within my subconscious and slowly churned a lucid dream that sparked this consideration from the shadows.

I began to ponder that I had become technically excellent, but desolate of beauty.

This realization began a pilgrimage/odyssey that continues unabated in my quest to unleash personal authenticity.

To purge the desolation and achieve beauty I ultimately realized that I must perceive within myself the totality of the experience, both the external understanding and its expression surrounding me that delves into and emotes from my soul inner impressions, reinforced by the absolute solace of being consumed in personal dynamic pursuits. This entire involvement, in its most exhilarating essence, resonates forth as a genesis of inspiration. I eminently respect this wellspring, as a fundamental inspirational element; yet I often speculate “what does it mean to be present?”

The Journey…….

Glade Creek Grist Mill at Babcock State Park in West Virginia
Soul impression…

I began to hypothesize what revelations about myself must get externalized to allow this sense of authenticity/passion to break through?

Ralph Waldo Emerson – “Of Nature itself upon the soul; the sunrise, the haze of autumn, the winter starlight seem interlocutors; the prevailing sense is that of an exposition in poetry; a high discourse, the voice of the speaker seems to breathe as much from the landscape as from his own breast; it is Nature communing with the seer.”

Thus I undertake a sincere reflection inwards to develop a keener sense of my prevailing artistic passions. Initially this entailed distinguishing and resolving the entwined synaptic percepts of externalities that have crept in over time which included my past emulation of other masters which had been insightful to my early progress. Yet now is the time to understand these for what they are and ultimately resolve who I really am; an eternal struggle to define my art today.

Momentous reflections on perceptions of truth and how I wish to convey what embodies who I am began to gather considerable gravity of consciousness. Understanding that all past was a progression, yet today, now, this clarity of internal passions is what belies my need.

This innate lucidity continues to coalesce and begins to reframe my underlying expressive needs. I establish the realization that it is necessary to actuate “my” experiences and observations of these expressions as initial steps towards “my seeing” these in a manner that matures a personal sense of beauty in such experiences and observations.

Igbo saying – “Where something stands, there is something else standing next to it.”

I strive towards developing subjective visual opinions and interpretations that can be set free as I distinguish a fluency of my internal visions and clarity of emotions.

Receptiveness to an intuitive sense and personal observations while alleviating associated internally accumulated stress from preceding minutiae allows me a receptiveness for entering an emotional sense state that accommodates the existent experience. This act of revelation initiates a state of presence and recognition. This often develops an intended impression of the emotional and spiritual message that also conveys a sense of myself.

Slowly, slowly I began this new journey. The cobbled path from realization towards achievement is wandering and, at times, circuitous yet my continued focus and the multitude of minute and often subtle achievements towards a never-reached goal begins to develop my inner sense of place. This reward alone is wondrous.

Emergence……..

A view from a tunnel at Old Mans Cave in near darkness and rain
Tunnel View

Being materialists, we grasp the universe as a physical presence, yet as intuitive, aware, and mindful mortals, we cannot refute that unchartered aspects of reality persist in our field of vision. One major key to the development of my personal expression is to transcend this unchartered countenance to some degree.

With the resolve of considerable introspection and investigation, a new awareness of my personal observations commences. I begin an induced recognition of visual literacy within discovered scenes that are expressive of an intimate sense of beauty. I now often behold an awakening consciousness within each observed intended scene for the beauty of its innate subjectivity, compositional opportunities, visual interpretations, intended message, monochromatic possibilities, and so much more.

As a multitude of possibilities evolve, my need to distinguish key elements within each contemplated scene slowly emerges from my subconscious. This assemblage of potential representations present themselves along with considerable creative latitude within each element and their expressive prospects. This often requires extensive ruminations on my part, generally in a compressed space of time dependent on the subject, and all the while working towards my conclusion of consideration for the optimal expression.

With these new observations I also became more intimate with how the light impulses I capture are applied to my optic nerves and the quite amazing process that occurs, near instantaneously, at my prefrontal lobe after percept construction along the way.

This understanding of characteristics within my frame and how they are interpreted based on the peculiarities of luminance, contrast, hue and resolution assist me immeasurably. Further, the essential awareness of the grasp of what elements control eye movement both during the scene capture and the differences these make afterwards during the viewing of this capture are fundamental. Yet I find that how I determine the lightness/brightness of a surface within my frame is still a mystery.

I find I must be deferential to the luminance within each capture. This luminance of reflectance vs. the “web of light” (the relationship of light on a form) is a critical key element towards creating an authentic masterpiece and achieving “presence”. Thus, integrating authenticity (passion) and articulation into my work.

An additional sober realization is the ability to resolve the same luminance and attributes as they are absorbed on my camera’s sensor and get electronically processed and converted. The often startling differences compared to the human vision system requires clarity that evolved eventually. As I embody and ultimately exploit these differences they mature my visual sensitivity at each locale.

These diverse accumulations across many disciplines advance my awareness along many avenues and has decidedly evolved my art.

I now find that each new endeavor searches for visual elements of integrity. From these I capture and articulate genuine impressions regarding personal elemental truths that each web of light breathes towards me.

This new awareness endeavors the generation of an elegant breach from my accustomed traditional universe and hurls me into an internal ethereal desolation.

Soon,

Dusty