China Re-Collections

Gushi

Huang Shan

Urban vs. Rural China

Xi'an

Tibet

Huangpu River

 

Terracotta Army

Da Cien Si

Shanghai

I went traveling in China during the summer of 2006. I wasn't touring as I was going from friend to friend or their relatives and acquaintances avoiding touristy places trying to experience China instead of tour buses. I instead used trains, domestic airlines and buses.

The photographs I took were originally in color and the travelogue texts in the piece are actually from my observation or interpretation of what could be from generic travel books. I kept and collected almost everything and anything so I would have clues to my experiences. Several months later while reviewing my photos I saw some rural farmhouses with scrolls over their mantelpieces (a place of honor in the home with ashes of ancestors or house gods) that depicted values or places of pilgrimage that they wished to go to once in their lifetime. In the cities the billboards and buildings with windows that had video advertisements were the graphic art selling everything and anything (taxicabs advertised breast enhancement surgery or facial reconstruction around the eyes for females).

The scroll format adapted to one of my favorite artists, Joseph Cornell, gave me the idea of presenting my scrolls in shadowboxes as re-collections of the China I experienced. Being that the Re-collections are things that I collected in China they are one-of-a-kind collections / assemblages and are priced in an escalating range as pieces sell. Originally there were 44 pieces so as availability decreases the price increases as the pieces are not reproducible.

Rez'-A-Vision

Title frame

Caucus Race

 

Cookies / Diabetes

 

The Small Door

The Mad Hatter

 

The Looking Glass

Humpty Dumpty

 

Pool of Tears

Tweedle Dee

The Chessboard

 

Hookah-Smoking Caterpillar

 

Knave of Hearts

 

Tweedle Dum

Queen of Hearts

The Castle

Dream Catcher

The Way Home

Entering The Rabbit Hole

The Rez'-A-Vision Profect is a video presentation of still "manipulated" images utilizing associations from "Alice In Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" by Lewis Carroll while taking a journey through the Osage Indian Reservation. Lewis Carroll was writing about what is reality and living on an Indian reservation begs those same questions. The federal government recognizes the reservation as established by the tribe's purchase of the land and treaties whereas the state says that the reservation has ceased to exist.

I live where my great-grandfather built a cabin before there was a state and then so that they could have a state they officially gave him the land that he lived on. Many Osages were married to non-Osages so that children could be "produced" and spouses murdered so the Osage spouse's oil headright could be kept for the Indian children by their non-Osage parent. During the period of the murders my great-grandfather escaped to New Mexico. Escaping was nothing new for him, at age 12 he had escaped from Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania and with two other Indian boys walked and hopped rides on railroads across the country back to the reservation, traveling at night to avoid being caught and sent back. He had tried two previous times.

True unemployment among Indians on reservations is typically over 25% and the country is worried that the national unemployment rate is near 10% and up to 16.5% among African-Americans and Hispanics currently. Indian Health Services supposedly has a "model" diabetes program but it doesn't decrease the rate diabetes spreads among Indians with starchy and carbohydrate rich commodity foods. The tribe is publicly trying to eliminate the illegal drug epidemic but we have drive-through liquor stores and tribal casinos that addict us to other destructive behaviors to replace our dreams.

We are down a "rabbit hole" that when others visit they can not see. They see a small rural community with a couple of souvenir shops, a few oil wells and a sign that offers to help those who can't read to learn to read, if they can read the sign. In the grocery store in the produce section however you will find bilingual signs, English and Osage, should you look closely enough. That is the last place that the buffalo hunters have reserved for them.

Photo Totems

Someone else gave this series the title "photo totems" and it has stuck. Its not appropriate, while I hope these portraits are given a sense of spirit by being combined with natural elements I am a Plains Indian instead of a Pacific Northwest Coast Indian.

The computer has become a really useful tool as now it is easier to work with layers of images to evoke dimensionality and sharing of textures like sculptors practice. In the past when I was working with this idea, fifteen years ago, it was via sandwich printing which was much more trial and error, matching up of film densities, hoping to get a desirable print. A lot less successful.

Welcome

It's been a long time coming, a true website to show off my photography.


Contemporary art that uses creative solutions to reach real people.


I sold my first professional photograph in 1991 and haven't looked back. I have been published in magazines, newspapers, organization journals, and commercial catalogs. I began exhibiting artwork in 1995 (first a three-photographer show then group and solo exhibits shortly thereafter). Exhibits have been presented in the United States, Canada and China including being honored at the Oklahoma State Capitol in 2009.

Gives out the annual Matt Jarvis Photography Travel Award at the University of Washington (Seattle) Photography Department to a worthy student from a rural area to travel to do a project internationally.

I use both film and digital cameras and produce work in print, video, slide shows and web formats. Video, slide shows and websites are saved to cd or dvd. Print work is up to 13" x 19" in house (additional time and cost work can be larger) on a standard medium (glossy or matte) or for an additional cost I can print on non-standard medium. I also have a large archive of stock images for websites and social networking backgrounds.

I know images and I will keep an eye out for yours.

If you hire me I will give you my super-secret shoe phone number so that you can contact me at your convenience (let it ring a couple of times as I have to take it off to speak into it).

I can do work as a single freelance job or commission or after a business relationship is established I can be maintained on a monthly retainer (more affordable and guarantees a set amount of hours per month). I can keep overhead down in the countryside, have the coolest music playing in my studio that is situated in the Osage Hills and be comfortable with my two dogs (a mut and a Tennessee Walker Hound).


When exhibiting I show up before the opening starts and leave at the end of the opening, talking one to one with gallery visitors and giving a brief talk about the work. I have a mailing list depending upon location that I will share. If gallery has an event for "elite" patrons I am willing to be present and do a Q & A session. In educational settings I like to give a 30-45 minute lecture that is more academic and suited to art students and professors.