73. That's a Pretty Good Tree

Matt picks up a Cartier-Bresson book at the used bookstore and we read two passages from it — one on prowling the streets, one on primitivism and the hobbyist trap. The quotes pull us into a longer conversation about what it means to make work outside commercial pressure, and whether the thrill of hunting for things to sell has become a structural parallel to street photography: the finding, the deciding, the sharing. We don't fully settle it, but the overlap is hard to ignore.

From there we move through John Ruskin's definition of great art — the greatest number of greatest ideas, received by the highest faculties — and Alex reads a passage from Swann's Way, the moment where music briefly restores Swan's belief that there's something worth devoting a life toward. We've talked around definitions of art on this show before, and this episode probably gets us closest to something we can actually use.

The last third of the episode centers on an Italo Calvino essay called "The Written City: Inscriptions and Graffiti," written in 1980, which frames words on walls — whether graffiti, political signs, or advertising — as a form of aggression imposed on anyone who happens to walk by. We spend some time with the idea and push on it: what it exempts, where we agree, where it gets complicated, and what it says about the visual state of things fifty years later. -Ai

Transcript

Cold Open And Studio Banter

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's been a golden afternoon, and I remember having the familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with someone else.

SPEAKER_02 0:12

My clothing choice. I just got a haircut so it'll look different. For you list for those listening, no idea. They have no no clue. We don't know what you're wearing. We don't know what you people look like. What's going on? Just listen to those soft, buttery voices lulling us to sleep.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

This is the best show. This is better than a lullaby.

SPEAKER_02 0:38

Just don't eat popcorn on the show anymore. Chewing. We should make some that sounds pretty good right now. Could be the move.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Um, all right. So we I have a couple of things. Um quotes. You have a couple of things, quotes. Yeah, I got a quote. Do you want to talk about anything that you've been have you been back to reading in the

Used Bookstore Finds And Photo Masters

SPEAKER_01 1:00

mornings?

SPEAKER_02 1:00

Yeah, I well, I picked up that Cartier Brisson book. Um, so the used bookstore here in Omaha, Alex pointed out because he goes there often. And I was going there somewhat regularly to sell some, like if I found some cool books at um an estate sale, I would just take them in and sell them just to try to like replace gas money for going to the estate sales if I could. But I wasn't really hitting the photography section too hard because I wasn't seeing anything new. And then Alex pointed out that there was a Martin Parr book in the front window display, and then several other sort of adjacent books adjacent to that. There was maybe something on cinema, something painting.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Yeah, there was a Jean-Luc Cadard.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Yeah, a very well-curated selection for our interests. And it was difficult to not buy, I think, four books from that display. The Martin Parr book, while no doubt, you know, is early black and white work, earlier black and white work is fantastic. I am personally drawn to the later color work, and I want to sort of consume him there and then maybe work my way backwards to see sort of where it came from. So to drop 75 bucks on that book, I was like 75 was a lot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:18

I mean, I get it, they're probably just pretty simple to the market, but yeah, eBay eBay comps or whatever. It's a newer book too. It's not like it's uh it's not like it's a yeah, like a early new first edition.

SPEAKER_02 2:28

Right, right. So yeah. So then we decided to look through the photography section, and I saw several books that I hadn't seen before, a couple with um uh Cartier Person, and then uh I guess there's like a William Klein book that um Hayden was telling me about. They have but you have to ask for it, they have it priced like a thousand dollars. It's like a like a early uh early edition or first edition of William Klein's one of his big books. Interesting. Yeah, I was like, oh man, I want to see that. Although I'm not as deeply familiar with Williams' work as I am Brisson and Martin Parr and all that. Excellent, yeah. So they had so they had this Cartier Brisson book. Yes, yeah, they had this Cartier Brisson book and it was only 25. So I uh I actually grabbed it because it had a lot of things. Is that an exaggeration or is it actually a thousand dollars? No, I th Hayden said it's a thousand bucks. I ran into um before I met up with you and Audrey um at the farmer's market, and we chopped it up about because he goes to the photo section all the time too. Yeah. The photography section. So I picked up I I leafed through a couple of Cartier Brisson books that were there and picked this one because it was, you know, there was a lot of writing in there, a lot of, you know, discussion about his background and um everything that led up to him moving from painting into photography. And I've just been, you know, ravenously reading it. I'm like really making myself, I'm like, you know, they kept keep referencing images on a certain page number, and I'm like, just read, read it all, soak it all up, get the whole context, get get that all in your mind and in your emotions, and then go through the photographs. So it's a really uh a really different way for me to go through a photography book because most of them are just the photos, you know, there's not uh uh uh a deep context for the artist or the photographer preceding it. So I'm excited to go through that. And there were just some interesting things in that book about um his uh being drawn to primitivism and uh some quotes uh about what making photographs on the street um you know meant to him or what it why it was so profound for him that I shared with you and that I can read when we get to it. But again, nothing sort of like an earth-shattering revelation of making the work, but just uh a really great way to sort of go, yeah, I feel the exact same way, and that's why I'm I'm pulled into it so deeply. But yeah.

Money Pressure Versus Making Photos

SPEAKER_02 5:14

If uh there was anything else just to just along those lines to talk about, and this I don't want this will not turn into a therapy session for me, but sort of reading reading that book and and sort of going, what pressures, you know, he came from money, his parents were very wealthy, what pressures were placed upon him to earn a living or to seek out primitivism, to avoid the the um the commerce pressures of whether it was you know paying rent, meeting expenses, obligations, all that kind of stuff, um, to reduce that to be able to focus on the work um was interesting, especially in my context, which is you know uh a little bit of um financial scarcity right now. The accountant sent the bill in for getting the corporate taxes done, um, paying back the money that I borrowed for the Leica to our savings account, which I'm halfway, halfway paid back. Um, and then uh you know, having a a ton, you shared that passive that essay that you shared with me, but having a ton of stuff that I've collected to sell that I have to get out to market.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

Actively sell.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

Actively sell. I was just at the store today and I, you know, processed two transactions for $75. You know, so all this commercial stuff going on that is keeping me. I have the M11 with me, it's keeping me from just like being outside and taking photographs. What's funny?

SPEAKER_01 6:50

I was thinking today, I almost think you may have you almost have replaced photography, or at least like the need for it. Because if you think about it, you go out and you hunt, right, and you find things, and then you drop them once a week. Yeah. And you have build an audience and tell the audience, hey, this is the new things. I'm sure when you're like finding something, you're excited about it, and you're like, oh, this is gonna, somebody's gonna want this, or this is gonna that's I mean, obviously there are different like things that come from you know, pursuing photography or pursuing, but you've definitely almost created a parallel to you know the process, like if you were if you had a big audience as like for street photography, yeah. Online, maybe maybe more online than I mean, but even if you know honestly, it's like you have a gallery, yep, and the store's your gallery, yes, and you get this stuff and then you put it out there, and then you put it up the word. I mean, it like there's not a lot of room beyond that. Yeah, like what is photography going to do that that isn't doing emotionally? Yeah, I'm not saying that it there aren't things that it can't do, but I'm saying like for you specifically, I think the thrill is like finding things, yeah, like finding the image happening upon it and taking it and then sharing it. You kind of have that entire thing mimicked, entire process mimicked. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that because I was literally sitting right there, I was reading, so I'm reading um it's actually a really good book. I mean really good, pretty good. I'm not I mean, I'm like halfway through it, so I can't, but it it it's been insightful. And it's Peter Wollen and it's signs and meaning in the cinema, and this is the BFI fifth edition. So uh this is just a collection of different editions, and I think it's a new conclusion. But it's uh originally written like uh first published in 69. So it was written in like 68, 69. Peter Wollen, uh my familiarity with him is he was a co-writer for the film IDS for the film uh The Passenger. But I was reading about I was reading something in that book, and um I'll I'll get it. I've got other things that I want to get into, but um yeah, I was thinking about like oh Matt's kind of created his own version of this process. Yeah. So what do you think about that? Am I am I off or like no?

SPEAKER_02 9:41

I think that they're very similar.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

I mean, it's like pretty one-to-one in a lot of ways. I mean, obviously, well, there are differences. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:50

But well, we read I read that Saul Leiter quote, I think, in the last episode, and I can't remember it verbatim, but it was you know, something the effect of like just you know going out and finding these things um for him, moments that are you know that create an instinctive reaction to take a photograph. And you know, before I started doing all this um, you know, thrifting and and personal collecting, but then curating stuff for the shop and for um e-commerce and all that stuff, that that's that was you know, going out and just on the street and finding things to photograph, whether it was searching and yeah, and you know, that that is still integrated into the process of hunting um for things again for personal collection, the shop, and then e-commerce.

Thrifting As A Creative Parallel

SPEAKER_02 10:45

You know, the camera's always with me. I've been taking portraits and photos of the settings that I'm in when I'm looking for these objects. I just picked up um a pr uh a pretty cool uh vintage band t-shirt from the late 90s, and the woman who sold it to me got really emotional when that we did the deal. She was, you know, trying to choke back tears because it represented such a formative part of her life in the late 90s. She's a year younger than me, so you know, she was in middle of high school at the time, and uh I said, you know, are you all right with me taking the photograph of you, you know, wearing the t-shirt, you know, just to document this? And she yeah, threw it on, took several portraits over um with the M11 and uh that you haven't exported yet, that are stolen. Haven't transferred them. Um yeah, 100%. And then I told her, and this is another part of this is an extension of that feeling of discovering something, because not only was discovering that t-shirt a profound thing for me because of what it means to me, um, all of that, but it's also discovering the possibility of telling a story. And so I asked her, can we find time in the near future to sit down and you can tell me the story of these shirts and what they mean to you? And this goes back to your essay as well that you shared with me. And it all comes together in that, right? You're you're finding the treasure for your personal collection to express yourself, to wear the clothes that fit most aligned with just keep going. Damn it. Um just glad the glass didn't work. Oh, sad Bordeaux. Slurp it off the table, Alex. Get his just for those listening, Alex tipped over a small glass of delicious Bordeaux, and it is starting to inch its way toward the edge of the table where it may spill on the floor. Hurry, you got about eight seconds, McGruber. And we're gonna soak it up with some paper towels here.

SPEAKER_01 13:08

We didn't have anything, uh, yeah. Anything crucial on the table. So maybe it'll give that bick a little bit of color finally. There you go.

SPEAKER_02 13:20

Oh man, that's toasty. Alex, this was Alex's way of getting me to stop talking about this. He's like, this is not where this is not where I wanted this to go.

SPEAKER_05 13:30

Just spill wine.

SPEAKER_02 13:32

I don't care about your Nirvana, your Nirvana t-shirt, you stupid bastard.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

Man, Alex, that's the fifth glass of wine, Alex.

SPEAKER_02 13:41

Hey. Finding stuff and taking pictures. Let's talk about that. We're almost there with the cleanup, everybody. We definitely can't edit this out because this is a very truthful, pure moment here.

SPEAKER_01 13:58

Hey, this is moment to moment, you know.

SPEAKER_02 14:00

That's right. We're just living living in the truth.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

Anything that we're not, we're just out here.

SPEAKER_02 14:05

It's moving pictures of a moment of you know, it's just it always, you know, my kids have spilled stuff. Like it'll be like uh a fucking thimble with like a quarter full of water, and it feels like you just let Niagara fall rip across your kitchen table. I'm like, where did all this liquid come from? That was this that was a quarterful glass. Yeah, a quarterful glass. I feel like we soaked up a gallon of a jug a jug of wine here. Jesus. All right, we're on the I'm just fully saturated here.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

My first thought is oh, this isn't this isn't a big deal. This table is completely built for this. Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_02 14:48

Yeah, you know, it's it's uh it's it's getting close to where it must never happen. You should work for ServePro. Maybe that's your calling. It's really a good Bordeaux. I shouldn't be drinking as much on an empty stomach because things are gonna get really wild here in a bit.

SPEAKER_01 15:06

I hope you're all ready for this. That's what uh that's what everybody wants. Give the people what they want. All right. Everything else you can just add. Oh, this clipper. Great.

SPEAKER_02 15:17

Holding strong. Couldn't couldn't take it out with a spilled cup of wine.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 15:28

Should we just leave this in the bloody mess of napkins?

SPEAKER_05 15:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:40

All right.

Wine Spill And Staying Present

SPEAKER_02 15:43

Idiot whole show Where were we? Uh yes, the the the convergence of of uh uh finding things. So finding a photograph in that moment, finding the t-shirt that is like means a lot to me. And the finding uh an opportunity to tell a story that I care about telling. Um this is the whole thing with photography, right? And I obviously I'm not gonna snap pics of her, not maybe not obviously, but I didn't immediately think to take photographs of this woman as she's getting emotional because she was completely caught off guard by it. She's like, and like never in a million years would I have guessed that selling this t-shirt would have done this to me, but it did. So um yeah, I I I just uh I think it all blends together and to just quickly relate it back to what I was talking about at the current state of things, you know, a little bit of scarcity with uh the bank account with all the bills come and do. My post office box bill came in. It's like $220 to have a post office box.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

I hate it when the like we have all our bills in a space box. And that's just for six months. And yeah, dump I don't know, you can't really dump it.

SPEAKER_02 17:03

Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

I use it for returns on eBay, and it's just the um I hate it when a bill though, like we like I said, we both have all our bills and spreadsheets.

SPEAKER_02 17:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:16

And so I I know it's there. Right. But when something just comes out and you're like 200 fucking dollars.

SPEAKER_02 17:22

Well, it's when they converge, you know. I always know I'm gonna owe obviously the accountant for taxes and all that stuff, but it was like it's just been this perfect storm of like the the guy um requested a return with a Leica, the the X1 that I sold him, because he didn't read the description. So, you know, you gotta get that.

SPEAKER_01 17:40

You said a lot of mean things about this gentleman.

SPEAKER_02 17:42

Yeah, I was not happy about his complete disregard for the description. Disregard for the description. Um anyway, uh, so like all these things converge, right? So you're in a little bit of a scarcity thing, and but then you're having these great moments that you're discovering to take photographs. I take the camera with me every time my wife and I go on a walk at night and we go different routes, and there's just little moments like uh that I've had where I've been taking photos. So I am you know doing it every day. Is it three hours walking the streets and trying to grab stuff? No, I wish it was.

SPEAKER_01 18:20

And to expand on what I was saying, I'm not saying like you've replaced, but you've almost replaced like the like the the magic of what it well not even I wouldn't even say I I'd say the magic is still there, but there is like a like a shoot release to like an audience kind of cycle. Yeah. That I I I think you can get pleasure from and but it's also it can also be a little toxic to the work. Yeah. It is very attractive. Yeah. And you've almost replaced that with something that's less predatory on your actual work. Yeah. Does that make sense? Like you've taken you've taken that danger out of influencing the work in a negative way by replacing it with what you're doing at the shop. Yeah. I don't know if you'd agree with that or if that's just me. What is that? We lost this one. Did it die? That's no good.

SPEAKER_02 19:29

It did. She's down.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Matt said your angle. Matt said, Thank God I can get dinner now. Yeah. No, we'll just go to the wide for the whole episode. F it. Honestly, probably the move.

SPEAKER_02 19:41

Yeah. Who cares? All right. Yeah. I mean, spilling wine, cameras cutting out. What's these coming threes? I haven't done it in a couple weeks.

SPEAKER_01 19:50

It is time to replace these batteries, though. I'm gonna I'm gonna do that. Yes. Um, but yeah, I mean, what do you think? Do you think you've Is there something to that or am I am I reaching?

SPEAKER_02 20:03

I think I'm still just kind of trying to Yeah, maybe. Yeah. You know, honestly, I haven't really thought about it. You're kind of dropping it on me in a good way, um, and have to kind of process it for a second and play some catch up. I th I yeah, yeah, I I I I would agree. I I think just on a like actual you know, the time that I get to spend on it, I think if if you know the thing that I'm right now finding things to sell through e-commerce, to make videos about on my various channels, to put in the shop with a weekly drop on Fridays. Um, the only the only downside to me or the only uh disappointing thing right now is I think about it is just that cutting into more time being dedicated to being out work doing making work. Um I love that doing this stuff creates opportunities to meet people that I can photograph and photograph their home or their space or their sale or whatever they have going on or photograph the guys down in that area, you know, Josh at the shop, Stefan and Trey across the hall, you know, all that. But it's it's still not, you know, being out shooting in the streets or exploring small towns, the landscapes, whatever, and just finding those things, uh, whether it's an interaction between two people or uh how the hell did this stuff get here? Um, or just a beautiful landscape. And I don't like when I'm out hunting and I go to some small town and I'm feeling pressed for time to find cool shit rather than to find cool moments, interesting visuals, you know, whatever, whatever makes me want to take. A photograph. So it's I guess there's maybe a little bit of uh uh an imbalance there that I don't prefer, but I'm certainly feeling fulfilled and having fun, and I'm not um relying on and by the way, if you like the way that this video looks, um using film convert nitrate. If you click the link down in the description, uh you can save 10%. And he's not talking about this, we just use shake cameras, but just talking about you know the different tools I use and and just being being under somebody else's thumb to make yeah the monthly or thinking, you know, again, having a thought of um because because that's the that's what's anathema to the discovery process of street photography or finding things that you want to sell in the shop. I want every video I make to feel like I discovered an idea that I want to share versus bank account's a little low. What can I sell to people? What can I oh, you know, I'll do a video on this camera and I'll put a B and H link on the description. I don't really feel like making a video about this, or I don't really have feel like I have something unique to say, but you know, I'll probably make 800 bucks if I do, and uh let's just get it out there. Whereas I spent an hour in the shop today loading in new vinyl records that I found in interesting places, new cassette tapes, new t-shirts. Two kids, two different groups came in and bought t-shirts that I had found at the thrift store and estate sale, whatever, made money off of it. All of that felt great. But and I know there's negatives to it, but you know, I know that you know they're the pressure they might feel to have a cool shirt and this and that. Yeah, right youth. No, you know, there's it's not just like this pure perfect thing, but um it feels way better than oh, like a hundred people clicked my link on the video I made because I wanted to make some money. Like that's a bummer. Yeah. But the the last weird element of the current thing, you know, sort of just like the um what's going on in my last couple of weeks is releasing this video about um my prediction that Apple's gonna re-release Aperture.

A Viral Aperture Prediction And Dopamine

SPEAKER_02 24:29

A video I really felt strongly. What is Aperture? Oh, Aperture is video uh uh photograp photography, editing, and cataloging software that Apple discontinued in 2015. So it was a a Lightroom contemporary and competitor, and they just out of nowhere discontinued it. Um, it wasn't completely out of nowhere because they had really stopped doing meaningful updates for several years, but um it just stopped. And uh with what's developed with Apple and Creator Studio and the things that are going wrong for Adobe and Lightroom and their subscriptions and getting you know investigated by the Justice Department, all this stuff, I was like, uh Apple's gonna bring this thing back. And I had a very clear idea for a video that I wanted to make. Um, and I did. And you know, there's no like click this link and whatever. And you know, uh I wasn't like a wasn't a sponsored video where a brand was, you know, had an ad read in the middle of it or whatever, but the video is doing really well, it's got like 60,000 views. I've added almost a thousand subscribers to my channel, so I have like all these weird conflicting sort of feelings of not failure, but sort of like success here, and then but I'm like having to work the business bank account to try to get the get the money, get the accountant paid, and you know, like sort of like play the shell game of all that stuff. So it's just this weird and then reading the cardio.

SPEAKER_01 26:03

That's like a great yeah, it's just a really nice demonstration or a really nice example of how much of a facade some of these things are. These digital like oh man, this this thing is ripping. It's at 60,000 views, it feels so good. It's like, okay, did it move the needle in any meaningful way? It's like, well, not really. Meanwhile, yeah, you're like, some kids come in and buy a couple of records or something, yeah. Like, oh, that's cash.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

Well, actually, with the so the the the the thing that's funny about the video doing well is you start feeling pressure, like, okay, well, how do I follow this up?

SPEAKER_01 26:49

I gotta put out a new one and I gotta keep this, I gotta I gotta ride this wave. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:54

Yeah, and I don't feel that. I'm just gonna come up with, you know, I already I think I'd be checking what's what's the app called YouTube Studio? Is that what it's called? YouTube Studio checking one these days. You know, I I I haven't checked it all day, but it was fun. I mean, I went uh and we don't have to spend a lot of time on this, but I went to bed and the video had like 800 views, and then I woke up and had 25,000. Like that's a thrill. There's no doubt about it. It's it's a it's a different kind of thrill, it's a different kind of dopamine hit than like finding a you know a $300 band t-shirt at a thrift store for four bucks. Like it's all they're all thrilling in in similar and different ways. Um but with the t-shirt, I go, it's very simple. I'm either gonna keep it or I'm gonna sell it. Yeah. With the video, it opens up all these different permutations that you look at. Well, do I do this next? Do I do that next? And some of those permutations fall under commerce, some of them fall under maybe not art, but sort of like just what I instinctively feel like I want to do next that has nothing necessarily to do with riding a wave or capitalizing on the momentum or doubling down on an aperture video, you know, all this kind of bullshit that that comes down on you versus I don't know what my next

Camera Repairs, CLAs, And Buying Cycles

SPEAKER_02 28:16

video will be. Like it might be uh I don't know, uh it might be an unboxing of the Nikon S after I got it back from um swingboxed. No, I did it. I filmed it. Yeah, yeah. Is it yeah? Uh oh no, it's good. They they replaced the leatherette on it. It's a different, it's it has you know, they can't replace the exact pattern. So you can see there's a little bit of leatherette that they didn't have to mess with at the across the top. I wish they would have just replaced all of it so it would match. I mean, that's a little bit you know nitpicky. Um they are not able to actually take apart the whole top plate and get into the actual um you know rangefinder part of the camera to you know replace the coat, you know, the area where the coating's foggy or it's not it's it's not foggy, it's just doesn't have like the best contrast anymore. So um I mean I can still clearly uh see focus, but you know, if I'm sure if it was like made to look brand new, it would look a lot better. So would you say the like a revamp was more successful? Yes, because yeah, usin went into the shit. He got in there and rebuilt the camera. Yeah, rebuilt the range, the range render patch looks brand new. Everything is really nice. Um and precision camera down in Austin that did it. I just don't think that they work typically with these older cameras. So they did, you know, do the adjustments, they timed the shutter, they you know took it all apart and cleaned it up and you know lubricated it, did all of that stuff and made sure that the shutter worked correctly. But I don't think that they can actually replace shutter curtains, they can't fix the range finder, and the you know the viewfinder is clear, but you know, they didn't go in and like clean the inside of it and all that stuff. So I'm happy with it, but um, but I'm like deeply satisfied with with what Yu-Gi-Oh did for the 3F.

SPEAKER_01 30:23

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna have to probably do some CLAs here in the next little bit on uh M4. Um M4 is in good shape, mostly. Um, but then yeah, the M9 is probably gonna need some some work. I mean it's fine, it works great, yeah. But you know, it's like a car. Right. You gotta get the oil changed or else it's gonna Yeah. Um the Q2, I told you the thing popped off. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 30:52

So I have to glue that back on that back on versus sending it to Leica and not seeing it for nine months.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

Yeah, so it's gonna have a little super glue. Yep. And I mean if it comes off again, I'll send it to Leica. Yeah. But and then they'll probably be like, well, you try to glue this back on. And it's like, yeah, because you fucking gave me a camera that is falling apart. No, I'm just kidding. It's a great camera. Yeah, it was good. I did wish I had DM9, but it was it was fine. It worked really well. Um But yeah, that's exciting though, to get that Nikon back and yes. And uh you'll shoot with it, or you think you'll just I have to, yeah. I mean it has a shoot with it and sell it or um I think I'll probably hang.

SPEAKER_02 31:36

I see this is what I what I like to do with them is I like to hold on to them until an opportunity arises.

SPEAKER_01 31:43

Whether it's you should you should set aside two cameras for Dottie and Goldie. Like when they get to a certain age, like you get this camera.

SPEAKER_02 31:51

Yeah, I I mean I have you know a few digicams that they could use, and then obviously some film cameras that they could use as well. Um, like just the simple cannon point and shoot that if they dropped it.

SPEAKER_01 32:00

I'm talking something like, hey, this is a proper camera, this thing lasts you for the rest of your life if you care for it.

SPEAKER_02 32:06

No, I think that's a good idea. I've actually been setting aside vintage clothing and stuff for them, like a little little tote that they can open when they're in high school and like go through and and wear all the cool stuff that's 50, 60 years old. Yeah, this is yeah, yeah, yeah. Because it was old when I bought it. Um but yeah, so so you know, the and that was the the whole thing with the M11 is I had this a shitload of cameras that I got for next to nothing, and then I was able to sell a bunch of them to so far pay off half that camera. And the same thing with the S. I really would like to get an S2, so I I'm just basically gonna sit on the S until an opportunity to get one comes up. And it's not like an eBay thing. If I find one at an estate sale or someone local has one, um, you know, then I would look at selling that one to help pay for this one. Um, there was a cool opportunity that came up. My buddy Joel bought um a Mamiya 645 AF from a guy that was selling all his old photography.

SPEAKER_01 33:07

Leaf shutter, correct? I think the 645.

SPEAKER_02 33:10

I don't know if the 645 AF is because this is a 90s Mamiya. So I don't know if they moved from the leaf shutter on that camera, and I don't know enough about it. I watched a couple videos on it because there's not a lot on the AF. There's a lot on the AFD, but not the AF, which was the first the first model in that line that they created, where they made it more of like a DSL, uh an SLR form factor than uh than the that iconic 645 more boxier. Yeah. This of course has removable film bags. The RZ bodies is similar, yeah. And with the 645 AF, you can't put a digital back on it. Um the the um AFD can.

SPEAKER_01 33:55

So there's I forget who it was, but there have you seen like it's like the Hasselblad back that you can put it so cool.

SPEAKER_02 34:02

I know. So my buddy Joel acquired this camera, and you know, obviously, if I just hadn't bought the M11, it might be something that I would figure out how to sell some cameras and just have it. It's not like a camera that's on my like, you know, oh my god, if I find this camera, I have to have it, but it would be cool to work with it for a while. I have the Connie Omega Rapid uh and that is a fine rangefinder medium format camera for what I want to do. But there was something about the autofocus and taking pictures of the kids and you know, more portraiture and stuff like that that really interested me. But for I mean, he's he's gonna want over $2,000, I think, for the camera and the lenses. I'm like, I just can't leave it. Yeah, can't make it work. But he was like, if you want to come, you know, make a video with it, you know, shoot a video and then give it back to me, you know, as long as I have it to be able to list it for sale because he's got to recoup his his investment. So that's what the the S will be. And I am also just gonna hold out for a canon P if it pops up at an estate sale like the S did, I'll just be ready for that. It probably won't be very expensive, but getting it CLA'd and all that stuff will is where the money comes in because the the CLA on the Nikon was like 380 bucks to have it's right go through it all.

SPEAKER_01 35:19

But I the way I look at it is like there's only a couple of things of it, but like there's a couple typewriters I want to get yeah, gone through quote unquote CLA'd. A couple I only own like three typewriters, but yeah, um only own like three.

SPEAKER_02 35:35

I've been slowly selling mine because I was at like 15 for a while. Yeah, I mean I I'm just working them down.

SPEAKER_01 35:40

I didn't need the three, I just yeah, really I only use the the one now, but yep. Um yeah, anyways, it's worth getting it if you if you're gonna use it. Yep. Um I don't like having old stuff, just have old stuff. I like to have old stuff that works. If it doesn't work, there's no point in having it. Yep. But agreed.

SPEAKER_02 36:01

Um so I think that kind of puts a yeah,

Cartier Bresson On Prowling Streets

SPEAKER_02 36:05

puts a pin in it. You know what you can do to put a pin in it? I'll read that bersan quote real quick and then we can move on.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

If we I you sent this to me on Mon no, Saturday.

SPEAKER_02 36:15

Uh I believe so.

SPEAKER_01 36:17

No, Sunday, because you would have we would have bought it because I was with you when you bought it.

SPEAKER_02 36:22

Yeah, on Saturday. Yeah. Uh so this is uh Sunday morning coffee. Try to remember, yeah. I'll try to remember to link this in the Where do you read in the morning? At the kitchen table. Yeah. Do the kids read with you or no, they're usually for a good chunk of it asleep still. Probably about an hour. Yeah. So I'm just, you know, little uh cappuccino, and then you will drip coffee and uh or pour over actually, and then and then they get up and screw everything up. Uh so this is from the Cartier Brisson book. Um, and this is uh just a a brief excerpt. If surrealism aimed to eliminate the distinction between art and life, no one achieved this goal more thoroughly than Cartier Bresson in the early 30s. The tool of his the tools of his art, a few rolls of film, the small camera held in the hand, required no distinction between living and working. There was no studio, no need to separate art from the rest of experience. And despite the high intelligence that lies behind the work, Cartier Brisson is justified in describing it as a purely visceral act. I prowled the streets all day, feeling very strung up and ready to pounce, determined to trap life, to preserve life in the act of in the process of enroll unrolling itself before my eyes. And I just thought that that was um I don't know. Just a I think actually I And there was another one, right? Well, no, here let me let me reread it. I goofed it up because I had an overlay on this one. My apologies. I prowled the streets all day feeling very strung up and ready to pounce, determined to trap life, to preserve life in the act of living. Above all, I crave to seize the whole essence in the confines of a single photograph of some situation that was in the process of enrolling itself before my eyes. And then you sent me another one too. That was like Yeah. Uh was that one earlier?

SPEAKER_01 38:35

Yeah, read that one too. You can just go to our text thread too, it might be easier. Don't tell this old guy how to use a phone, Alex. You definitely know how to use a phone better than me. I don't think there's any.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

Uh I gotta make sure it's the one I sent you. I don't know if I did have in here. Is it this one? Yeah. Yeah. Because you never sent me the one you just read. I don't know how to say this guy's name. Okay. Recently, after rereading Mandiarguez's recollections of their youth together, it's Camus, Cartier Cartier Brisson elaborated, Andre de Mandiargue makes clear our total I took French for six six years and I cannot say that. I I don't know if it's Mandiarguez, Andre Andre de Mandiargue, makes clear our total uninterest in quote pursuing a career. He and I were and still are libertarians in an old tradition that includes uh Elise Ray Clou, Pissarro, and uh Ailee Fower, to name only a few French intellectuals. For us, every human being is potentially an artist, but in our societies of high technical specialization, amateurism is considered a creation of the second order. There is a polarity, the quote, hobby opposed to professionalism. Man is impinged upon by industrialization and a certain professionalism. This is the meaning of my collage of 1931. Technology levels individuals. Amateurs find themselves solitary, unrecognized. Professionals enter into the law of the jungle. One might one might almost say that now only children are still able to express themselves spontaneously. Primitivism incorporates an essential contradiction. Only the non-primitive can admire the primitive. And then it goes on. This contradiction expressed itself in the polarity of Cardio Brasson's life in the early 30s.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

It is funny knowing that he came from money. But the idea is great. Yes. And I agree with the idea. And I also don't know the situation if he inherited the money, but I assume probably. I would imagine at some point.

SPEAKER_02 41:04

No stipends.

SPEAKER_01 41:05

Absolutely agree. And I I think I even replied to you, I was like, it it's even children are are not able to express themselves freely now in today's world, like they were.

SPEAKER_02 41:17

Well, and not 1930s France or not to go down another rabbit hole, but who knows if I guess 1930s France got a little shaky there. If um his intake of his parents and family, you know, if they were very wealthy, you know, who knows if a lot of his feelings come from a reaction to what he saw. Maybe he saw excess, maybe he saw materialism, maybe he saw uh sort of um you know, them caring about things that weren't really important.

SPEAKER_01 41:56

I I mean I think above anything he probably had like a poet sensibility. Like he's probably uh hypersensitive. And and when you associate yourself to the act of creation or you know, something close to that. You're just gonna see it being corrupted. Yeah, it's gonna yeah. I think that's just a natural reaction to seeing something you love be just obviously corrupted.

SPEAKER_02 42:28

Well, and I wonder if it's interesting to read your quote sort of as you comment on him, you know, being sensitive, being pulled towards art the moment, truth, you know, uh going out on the streets and finding finding these moments to photograph, uh, and and really being w uh uh a pioneer of that that art form. I mean, I guess you could say street photography. I know um Cortez in Hungary, which the book mentioned several times, was making work very similar to uh Brisson. There was another quote and I didn't send it to you, but it was it was basically just uh him sort of giving up painting um and his feelings of the camera being the quicker instrument, um, not like in a lazy way or sort of like, well, this is just works, this is just faster. I I think you know, the amount of time it takes to paint a painting, and he was dissatisfied with many of them, destroyed them or painted over them, or whatever he did with them. Um, you know, I imagine, you know, especially as the Leica came out in the 30s, a small compact camera versus the larger format, big tripod, put the shroud over your head and all that stuff. The excitement that that tool must have brought must have just been earth shattering for him. Yeah. Uh and to be able to go out. And make these images that you know, I imagine he looked upon it with greater fondness and sort of like that's you know, what I saw came came to life versus actually making paintings about it, about what he saw or what he imagined. Um But yeah, I it just got me thinking when you were commenting on that uh quote that you read me earlier and sort of the some of the quotes we've we've explored over the course of the podcast about sort of this not that you can, but people trying to sort of d define or at least um map what art is, what it does, what what what makes people love it, and sort of what makes something that someone's made art versus something else, which is goes back to what he said, you know, hobby, you know. Oh, it's a nice little hobby you have, and and uh and his frustration that that's what people are relegated to. The postman has to do his woodworking in the in the in the basement on the weekends or in the garage on the weekends, uh relegated to being a hobby where if those forces weren't raining down.

SPEAKER_01 45:06

Well then the professional woodworker is just trying to make the inventory that's gonna move the quickest for the most profit.

SPEAKER_02 45:13

Right. And then somewhere in between, maybe there is someone who makes something just without either of those things at play. So yeah.

Ruskin’s Test For Great Art

SPEAKER_01 45:24

Well, should we We're at 50.

SPEAKER_02 45:27

Should we read?

SPEAKER_01 45:28

So I have a couple of quotes.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

Um Well, read the one I was referencing first.

SPEAKER_01 45:33

That's John Ruskin.

SPEAKER_02 45:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:37

Got this at Jackson Street, by the way. So John Ruskin.

SPEAKER_02 45:41

Was it on the table or did you have to dig for it?

SPEAKER_01 45:42

Oh no, I had to dig for this one.

SPEAKER_02 45:44

Now were you seeking it out or did you discover it? Okay.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

I don't know if Ruskin is the most in vogue.

SPEAKER_02 45:50

What's more satisfying? Finding the book you've been looking for or finding a book you didn't know you needed looking for.

SPEAKER_01 45:57

Okay. Always. Always. But I'm never really it never happens. It never happens. So I I would agree too. So this is from uh from a criticism that he wrote. It's modern painters, and then it's definition of greatness in art. And if I'm stumbling all over this, it's the wine's fault, it's not mine. He still rattled from spilling delicious beverage. Okay. Um let's see, and I read you a little more than I need to read. So now I want a definition of art wide enough to include all its varieties of aim. I do not say, therefore, that the art is greatest which gives most pleasure, because perhaps there's some art whose end is to teach and not to please. I do not say that the art is greatest which teaches us most, because perhaps there's some art whose end is to please and not to teach. I do not say that the art is greatest which imitates best, because perhaps there's some art whose end is to create and not to imitate. But I say that the art is greatest which conveys to the mind of the spectator by any means whatsoever the greatest number of greatest ideas, and I call an idea great in proportion as it is received by a higher faculty of the mind, and as it is more as it is more fully occupies, and in occupying exercises and exalts the faculty by which it is received. If then if this then, by the definition of great art, that of a great artist naturally follows. If this then be the definition of great art, that of a great artist naturally follows. He is the greatest artist who has embodied in the sum of his works the greatest number of the greatest ideas. And so that was Yeah. I think it was the f the I mean, obviously, art is ideas. Like anything that you consume is ideas, everything is ideas. Um, the first person, I think, when I was in college, I read I think there's a book by David Lynch, and it was called Um Catching the Big Fish. Don't quote me on that. We might have to look that up. I mean um I think that's what it was called, and that was the first time that I'd ever seen or heard. I mean, in this context, he's talking about film and painting, um, but like art broken down, broken down to the atomic level of the idea.

SPEAKER_02 48:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:36

And I really, I mean, ever since I read that, I've thought about it in that regard. And so I really like the the definition. Um, Ruskin's definition. I think. Um, you know, we've talked a little bit about like Tolstoy's definition of like what is art, or we I think we've talked about um Thoreau, or um, maybe it was Emerson, yeah. Um, but kind of that like transcendentalist idea of art. Um and we've talked about, I mean, yeah, we've it's it's a subject we've we've revisited several times, and I think breaking it down to something like as simple as like the greatest number of great ideas. And what is a great idea? It's something that you know embeds itself onto the mind of the person that's receiving it and kind of shifts the way that you're looking at a thing or yeah, you like again, it's one of these things that's a bit hard to describe, but you really kind of know it when you're in the presence of it. Yes. And I think it that almost embodies some of these other, it's like an umbrella for some of these other um definitions of art where I'm like, I find conflict and maybe that's not all encompassing, but it's definitely something. And so yeah, I don't know. I I thought it was interesting. What are your thoughts? That's the second time hearing though.

SPEAKER_02 50:01

You know, it it's a little bit of a uh kind of a sophomoric phrase, but the you know, you think about the different things that you've taken in as far as art goes and which ones blew your mind. I mean, this literally is saying like it it it it works its way into the most spaces of your of your of your brain, your heart.

SPEAKER_01 50:21

I don't I don't take it as working, and I'm not saying you are either, but I'm just like a clear caveat. I don't think it's saying like ideas in in the sense of like an intellectual experience.

SPEAKER_02 50:32

Yeah, no, absolutely. But it's it's when you take in a piece of work and uh it it literally, you know, again, it blows your mind, like you just are like alive with connections, uh brain, heart, the world around you, um, inspiration. Uh you want to, you know, consume it again. And you know, I'm thinking, you know, everything from music to cinema, a painting, a photograph, um sculpture, all of that.

SPEAKER_01 51:08

That reminds me. I I read something, I I'll read this too, but I've just got a bunch of quotes today. That might just be my Yeah, that's the quote episode.

SPEAKER_02 51:15

That's it. You know, it's not terrible to just have an episode where we just read quotes the whole time.

SPEAKER_01 51:19

This is Audrey.

Proust, Music, And Moral Rejuvenation

SPEAKER_01 51:28

So I've never read Proust before. Um, and so I've been over the last couple of weeks, I've been reading Swan's Way. Um, and then I want to work all the way through Remembrance of Things Pass, but um it's really, really fucking good. Um let me see if I can find this because I didn't highlight it. I didn't want to mess up the book. Yeah. But he's talking about the experience with music. Um I mean, anybody who's read this book obviously probably remembers this. Um what's the book again? So this is Swan's Way. Swan's Way. So it's uh Marcel Proust. It's the first, um I guess the first book in so uh Remembrance of Things Past, or I think it's colloquially kind of today, uh you you might have heard of it referred to as like uh um what is it? In search of lost time. Yeah. It's kind of what it gets referred to as. Um okay, and then this is from Swan in Love, which is the second part of the book. Um, please, I hope I can find this. Okay. All right, let's see if I can actually find it. And I'll just it's not a huge section, but I'm not sure what exactly. Talking about things blowing your mind when you get in contact with it. It's like every other page in this in this book, it's the most amazing thing I would say. Oh, it it Bruce lives up to Bruce. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:46

I have to say, um that's how I felt when I read um Updike. I read that first book in the Rabbit series, and I'm like, how is this writing possible?

SPEAKER_01 53:57

Yeah. It's when you come into contact with something that's it's just like um completely incredible. Okay, I'm just gonna read this one little excerpt from it. And so this is um specifically, this is the uh Lydia Davis translation translation, and that's not the most popular translation, probably, but I think this one's better. I've um read like the anything that really kind of piques my attention in this.

SPEAKER_02 54:42

I'll read it in in the um Oh, you'll grab the translation yeah, in the more common translation.

SPEAKER_01 54:48

And again, it's just preference, but I think this is um I I just have kind of resonates with you more. Resonated with this more. Um, I'd love to read it in the original French, but I don't speak French that well. So um okay. So it's talking about him coming into contact with a piece of music that he'd heard before and he can't recognize, um, or he's trying to recognize, and it was kind of a fleeting experience prior, and it's like that beautiful moment of coincidence when you come into contact with something again and you know you thought it was lost forever. Yeah, right. Um, but then just the description is insane, and I would read this whole thing. Like, if you can get your hands on this, just read the book. I mean, I I can't, I mean, it's the best, it's the best 218 pages I've ever read of anything in my entire life. I think it's unbelievable. Okay. Um ringing endorsement. It's just an affiliate link in the description. It's beautiful, it is insane. Um, I can't believe I've waited this long to I mean, obviously you you hear your whole life about Proce, but like we never I I was never like in a class that covered it, and I'm really glad that I didn't you wrote you read it when you needed to. That I yeah, I mean, if well, and I like I I have friends who took like, you know, like oh modernist literature or something, and you know, or they were taking that in college or getting uh you know, like a master's or something, and it's like, yeah, we had five days to read Swan's Way or something. And I'm like, Yeah, I wouldn't have wanted like it's one of those I I almost have to force myself to put it down because it's it's like you want to put it down, and I'm probably reading through it quicker than I need to be, but it is something that like you almost want to get to one of these passages, and then you just want to like live in the passage. But anyways, I'm wasting time. Okay. Um it even seemed for a moment that this love for a phrase of music would have to open in Swan the possibility of a sort of rejuvenation. He had for so long given up directing his life toward an ideal goal and limited it to the pursuit of everyday satisfactions, that he believed, without ever saying so formally to himself, that this would not change as long as he lived, much worse, since his mind no longer entertained any lofty ideas, he had ceased to believe in their reality, though without being able to deny it altogether. Thus, he had acquired the habit of taking refuge in unimportant thoughts that allowed him to ignore the fundamental essence of things. Just as he did just as he did not ask himself if it if it would have been better for him not to go into society, but on the other hand knew quite certainly that if he had accepted an invitation he ought to go, and that if he did not pay a call afterwards, he must at least leave cards, so in his conversation he endeavored never to express with any warmth a personal opinion about things, but to furnish material details that had some sort of value in themselves and allowed him not to show his real capacities. He was extremely precise when it came to the recipe for a dish, the date of a painter's birth or death, the nomenclature of his works. Now and then, despite everything, he went so far as to utter a judgment on a work, on someone's interpretation of life, but he would give his remarks in an ironic tone, as if he did not entirely sit subscribe to what he was saying. Now, like certain confirmed invalids, whom suddenly a country they had arrived in, a different diet, sometimes a spontaneous and mysterious organic development seemed to bring on such a regression of their ailment that they begin to envisage the unhoped-for possibility of belatedly starting a completely different life. Swan found within himself, in the recollection of the phrase he had heard, in certain sonatas he asked people to play for him to see if he would not discover it in them, the presence of one of those invisible realities in which he had ceased to believe and to which, as if the music had had a sort of sympathetic influence on the moral dryness from which he suffered, he felt in himself once again the desire and almost the strength to devote his life. Dang. I mean, like that just floored me. Um, and I mean the whole I would read the whole to get the context. It it definitely does better when you build into it. Sure, of course his experience receiving the music and recapturing the moment that he thought was gone forever. But yeah, yeah, pretty amazing. You're welcome to borrow this when I when I finish it. I would love to. Unbelievable.

SPEAKER_02 59:37

Yes. It's a book that that's that highly recommended, of course.

SPEAKER_01 59:41

Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's very good. Um the last

Graffiti, Advertising, And Visual Aggression

SPEAKER_01 59:45

quote. So I I picked up this at a bookshop in Paris called the I think it's called the Alley bookshop. I don't uh it's really good. It's uh run by a gentleman from a small town um in Canada called Ontario. Um and no, he's uh he was very enjoyable to uh spend a couple of minutes with, and he has a wonderful shop, and it's beautiful. Um if I can find the if I mean yeah, if you're in in Paris or if you're you're a listener and you live there, you probably already know about it. Yeah. Um but it's great. Um, but I picked up this, I picked up three books. I picked up uh a Henry Miller little like uh short, it's not uh even a novella, it's like a letter that he wrote. Um uh a Calvino collection of sand, and then uh book by uh Sabald, which is a collection of essays. I really like collections of essays. Um I tend not to cross so like I'll I'll usually read like a piece of fiction, maybe something that's like a like in this case I'm reading um signs and meaning or like something that's a little more um philosophical. I don't know, like you know, not non-fic, but and then yeah, a piece of poetry and then an essay. So like I'll I tend and then maybe like a play or something like that on the side. Um, but I I try not to cross over it's not like genre, but it is you know, definitely the tone. And so this has been wonderful, and I've been sending that uh probably way more than I need to.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:24

Not too many.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:25

Um, but there's this wonderful essay in here called The Written City Inscriptions and Graffiti, and I had a hard time finding it online. Um if we can find a link, we'll put it in the show notes. Um, it's I mean, it's really, really good, especially for anybody who works in kind of like graphic design or just topography or definitely like just photography and you know, any visual medium. But this is really funny. So it's um what do you call it? The election cycle right now. Uh all the signs and shit are for the midterms? Is it midterm? Yeah, that's what everything like the signs and everything. Yep. Oh, those are primary primaries primaries for the midterms. Thank you. So we are in a state of siege right now. Yeah. When you walk the streets of my neighborhood. And I've been thinking about that a lot, and then I came across this essay. And so there's there's a lot of wonderful stuff in here. It's not just this, but this is a really interesting idea, and I highlighted um quite a bit. And again, that essay is the written city inscriptions in graffiti. Um and so I'm just gonna read this section, and again, forgive my reading. I know it's kind of choppy right now, but now that is precisely the idea I disagree with. Words on walls are words imposed by someone's will. Whether that person is high up or low down, words imposed on the gaze of all others who have no choice but to say them or receive them. See them or receive them. Sorry, I don't know why I pronounce it that way. The city is always a transmission of messages. It is always a discourse, but it is one thing if it is a discourse that you have to interpret yourself and translate into thoughts and words, and quite another if these words are imposed on you without any chance of escape. Whether it is an inscription celebrating authority or a defamatory insult, we are still dealing with words that land on us at a point in time which we have not chosen. And this is a form of aggression, abuse, violence. And then he gives a caveat for advertising, which I think is interesting. Um, and this was written in 1980, so it was about 50 years ago coming up. Um, and he says, of course, the same applies to the writing produced by advertising, but there the message is less intimidating and conditioning. I've never believed much in hidden persuaders, it finds us more prepared and is never and is in any case neutralized by the thousands of equally powerful and competing messages. I disagree with this. I think this is, and maybe this is just you know what you get with 26 years of progression, but I think advertising is aggressive, abusive, and violent. It's I mean, I I would say um I would lump that in with it too. The written word is not an imposition if it comes through you through a book or a newspaper, because in order to be received, it proposes a previous a previous act of consent on your part, an agreement to listen, which was expressed in your buying or just opening that book or paper. But if it comes to you via a wall, which one has no chance of avoiding, then it is a form of tyranny, however you look at it. There are people today who feel the need to assert that their rights have been trampled on by writing about them on walls with a spray gun. The day they have power, they will continue to need walls to justify themselves, using bronze or marble or letters, depending on the customs of the time, or huge propaganda banners or other tools for brainwashing people. This discourse of mind does not apply to graffiti under oppressive regimes, because there it is the absence of free speech that is the dominant element, even in the visual aspect of the city, and the clandestine writer fills this silence entirely at his own risk, even reading it in some sense is a risk and imposes a moral choice on the viewer. Similarly, I would also make exceptions to my rule of thumb for cases where the writing is witty, as we have often seen recently, both in Paris and in Italy, or when it is such as to prompt an illuminating reflection or poetic evocation, or it uses its graphic form to portray something original. So work on the half behalf. Um and then to see the value of this humorous or poetic or aesthetically visual thought involves an operation. That is not passive, an interpretation or decoding, in short, a collaboration on the part of the receiver who appropriates it through some mental effort, however instantaneous. But where the writing is simply a naked affirmation or negation, which requires the receiver merely an act of consent or refusal, the impact of being coerced into reading in this way drowns out any potential advantage that comes from managing to re-establish our internal freedom in the face of verbal aggression. Everything is lost amidst the den of neuroideological bombardment to which our brains are subjected from morning to night.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:35

And even more so 50 years later.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:38

So I read that, and at first I was like, I don't know if I agree with this. And I thought about it for the entire day. I was like, this is great. This is why this is why you buy the book. This is okay. Like the 16 euro paid the cost of admission.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:54

Yep. Well, and then do you when you when you see something that you you feel uh negative feelings about whether it's a political symbol, it's a tribal symbol, you know, like a guy pissing on a Ford logo, you know, uh on the back of a car window, you know. Um but then the ones that align with how you feel, they don't feel that way.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:25

Well, see, I think I think in order, like you can't separate if you're gonna if you're gonna hold this. You can't be like, oh, like I mean, I literally had to think about the cubs hat, and I was like, and I don't know if that necessarily like seeing a C on a blue hat, it's there is a bit of um uh it there's a bit of a of a decoding that has to happen, or like maybe a a bit of a of an agreement with the the viewer. Um but maybe you know I haven't come to I haven't come to a conclusion that I feel strongly about yet. So maybe I just won't wear that hat anymore. We'll see.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:09

Um You certainly wouldn't wear it in the south side of Chicago because uh that would be visual pollution down there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:20

Um no, but yeah, I I I don't I don't know. And obviously, like I don't expect you to go through and be like, oh, can't wear this shirt anymore because this is visual pollution, but the world today though is so overrun with it. I mean everybody wants to express their opinion, everybody and it it really gets lumped under the the idea of free speech, and I'm like, well, I think there's a I think there's a a distinction that should be made between those two things because obviously like I agree in free speech, but is it free speech when I'm walking down the street and you have the dumbest statements on a fucking sign that are literally built for a three-year-old to be able to understand and like regurgitate? Yeah, that's pollution. Like give me something witty for your candidate or your whatever, or something that requires an act of, and I I will give it a pass immediately. And I'll probably look more into I'll be like, oh, that's interesting. Yeah, but yeah, just like person's name retarded statement. Like, and I that goes for sports teams too. Like, I mean, you go you walk up, uh I think these are the same things. I've thought about doing like a photography project on this, but you'll see somebody is like they've got some kind of like you know, social or political or whatever thing in their yard, and then you go to the yard next and they've got a Yankees flag or something, or Nebraska football. Yep, and I'm like, you guys are doing the same thing, yeah. Like it's the exact same human urge.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:54

I think um yes, the the the yeah, where it comes from is very similar, uh if not the same, but its effect on the viewer can be different. Can be different, yeah. Now, someone like I don't know, you see the Boston fan. Someone like my father-in-law, every time he sees anything, Nebraska Huskers, it's it's as if he saw a blue dot in somebody's you know front yard, you know, or maybe uh, you know, uh someone else seeing a don't tread on me flag, you know, or whatever. Um, so you know, they can create a visceral reaction.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:31

I guess and I was I was I've been thinking a lot about about how we do separate things. Yeah. And I thought it'd be a really interesting photography project because you could just put all of that in there.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:40

Right. Yeah. And um well, and I think Yeah, I I think documenting sort of the the difference between them and not and the difference, but just sort of like the placement of these things, the choices that we as people make and the effect that it might have upon the viewer. I think jumpstaposing, uh a sports, you know, uh flag in somebody's yard against it's so funny because I didn't notice it as much in the winter, and now everything is beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:09

I mean, we it is lush and green. Beautiful in our neighbor in that neighborhood right now. Like the trees are green, the flowers are blooming, but there's animals everywhere. Like it's beautiful. Yeah. Everything is filled out, the the grass is grown up. Lush and there's clover. There's yeah, it's it's gorgeous. And so there is a really stark contrast between these ugly designs and graphics, and and I mean, I I felt this is like one of the really um abrasive things uh that I felt when I worked in advertising is that just we are just polluting the world with shit. It's just like we're we're just uh pouring shit onto the world. Nobody asked us to do this, like we're just doing this, and we're just l polluting the world with shit. And most of it's as uncreative and as dumbed down as you could possibly make it because they nobody will understand it. And you're just completely you're everything that you're just pouring shit onto the world, visual pollution at the highest level, everywhere, put it everywhere, make them see it 30 times. You can't watch a TV program in America without just you know, commercial, or you can't watch a YouTube. I mean, you can't if you have YouTube print.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:32

Um but it permeates the videos themselves though, too.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:36

Yeah, yeah. And I yeah, so sorry, I keep and you're you're like offering good critique, and I just I I want to guide it though. Like, I don't want to talk about like the potential of photography project, I more want to talk about the idea of like, yeah. I mean, do you feel like you'll walk down the road and it's just aggression? Or I don't because I when you see an advertisement, does it frustrate you or is it just more of the emotional are you just numb to it?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:01

I think I I don't even think it's numb. I think because of the majority of my life being spent in the arts, especially going back, and I've talked about it numerous times in the podcast, you know, um acting school and the villain doesn't know they're the villain. Don't judge the character you're playing. See it from their point of view, understand their intention, all that stuff. I guess I just sort of and that doesn't mean that like if I'm I'll give an example of something that offends me with a sort of visual pollution. It's it's not it it's it's a it's it's a a much more uh to me violent act than um uh you know a billboard or someone having a lawn ornament that has a political connotation. Um but I kind of just go, it just makes me more interested in understanding why we do these things and creating work that explores it, doesn't teach it, it doesn't answer the question, it just goes maybe it puts this a photo of this visual thing, uh text, an advertisement, graffiti on a wall, whatever, against this, against this, against this, against this. Why why do we do this? Why is this a part of the human experience? And I kind of just look at it. I tend to look at it more objectively and just go you know, like first of all, do I like this? Do I not like it? Um if I do, why? If I don't, why? Why did this person put this here? Why did he put it right there? Why this political thing and this sports thing? Why, you know, then then how far down do I go? Why'd you choose that flower versus this one? Why did you why do you not mow your lawn? Why do you, you know, like you could argue that almost everything about what a person wears, what their car looks like, um uh what their home looks like, everything that has sort of a public facing um thing is a form of communication.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:10

Yeah. Well, and I I definitely thought about that. Like, oh, you could you could say this about a flower garden as well, but a flower garden requires and maybe it is because of the familiarity or just the the the natural element of it, but it I think it does require some interpretation. And I'm not saying like, oh, you can't have a political sign or you don't you shouldn't have an advertisement or whatever. But it uh but like like it it most of most of these are like this person, yeah. Or like really stupid statement. Like the the the one ex ex or exception, exemption, exception, yeah. Yeah, like remember at the at the beginning of the last political cycle, um so I guess it what is it like there's like a district in Omaha that's different, right? Or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:58

Like there's a district it's yeah, for the electoral college, yeah, there the it's a state Nebraska is one of two states that breaks up their electoral votes into three different um areas of the state, and Omaha's its own area. Omaha, um, and I don't know if it's like literally the city of Omaha or if it's you know, there's some parts outside of Omaha, but yeah, it's its own, it has its own electoral vote.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:23

And so there was this sign that started appearing in everybody's yard. Yeah, it was like just a dot that was a blue dot, yeah. And I thought that was interesting. You know, you you whether you're with the political association or you're against it, or what who gives a shit? It was graphically interesting, it required some form of engagement. Nobody was really sure what it was until you engage, and then it got co-opted and you know turns into something. So maybe you could say that like you you constantly have to reiterate in order to fit into that like act of um collaboration uh on behalf of the viewer, act of acceptance or opening the paper, buying the book, etc. But uh like that's interesting though. You know, those appear um and you're just like I don't know what that is, and you have to think about it. And maybe eventually, like once you've thought about it one time, it becomes a form of in in this case, maybe it becomes a form of political or not uh visual pollution, not political. Um but at least it's like a little interesting, at least it's not just like name on sign, yeah, vague belief on sign.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:41

Right, slogan, yeah, yeah, three words on sign. Yep, yeah, catchy slogan that millions of dollars of super PAC money was brand logo on sign.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:51

And I mean, yeah, I mean I this goes for the Coca Colo billboard that's out on the on on Dodge right now that's been there for a year.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:58

And I mean the or the even the license plates now are you know is is a surface area that has been co-opted for some sort of messaging. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:09

Or I don't I don't know. I I I do think I mean personally, I think the world would be a better place if we uh if we cleaned up the visual pollution a little bit, but you know that this is the I mean you you know, talking about being affected by the objects around us, I am too, and there's nothing I hate more than seeing an ugly ass fucking like nature is beautiful, and you know, we already have tried to you know fence nature into these little you know hyper-focused areas and they're groomed and they're manicured and they're really the pure conception of it, especially when you walk around here, there's nothing that's natural, it's all just the conception of humans being like, I want to do this with my art, like you were talking about.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:55

So, you know, if if we're already dealing with that, like don't put your don't put your whopper whopper whopper whopper sign in the well and I think I think what it is is is you know, you set an intention when you go out in the world, you know, I'm gonna go for a walk and I'm gonna listen to the birds and I'm gonna soak up the sun and I'm gonna have a you know you know, you have all these expectations, and then these visual things, whether it's graphical, text-based, an advertisement, graffiti, uh a license plate, whatever it is, they are battling against what your intentions are or your expectations are of an experience. And some of them might be inert, some of them might sort of help, you know, aid the um the achievement of your expectations, and then others may destroy it or corrupt it or uh be an obstacle to that. And uh, you know, I agree, you know, those things can be frustrating.

Free Speech Versus Shared Public Space

SPEAKER_02 1:20:00

Um, I'll give an example of the one that gets me the most, and this is, you know, uh it's not just like you know, a text or an advertisement or whatever, but it's when you're walking around the old market and it's not the signature folks, although they are they are frustrating as well. You actually talked about creating a piece of visual noise, you could argue, that says, I live in Iowa, so that you wouldn't be asked to sign these petitions that these petition people are out. It it's almost it's getting to a point where there's gonna need to be some regulation or something because uh, you know, I'm sure there's it's protected by you know First Amendment or something, you know, but it is a lot. And you could argue like, hey, the street photographers are out taking pictures of everyone and is getting a little much guys taking pictures of all of us while you you can't have the right to do that. Like, can you just fucking chill out?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:54

Well, yeah, but it's like you know, the street photographer in Times Square is not the same as the guy trying to sell you his mixtape 30 times, right? Or like when you're in Paris and you've got the keychains. Yeah, like hey, buy earth when you're in Rome and they're putting roses in your hand.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:08

The one here that gets me is um I forget what charity it is, but they set up a table and they have two people at the table, and they they have been trained with uh essentially a script that they say something to you like, can I ask you a question? And you think it's an innocent thing, but it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:33

Can I what time is it? Right.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:35

It's a tactic to pull you in, and they they have evaluated human psychology and and and gotten this approach down to sort of a science that if you do and say these certain things and you have this energy and this vibe, you're gonna pull people into something that is going to force them to give you money so that either they can extract themselves from the awkward social social situation they don't want to be in anymore, they're gonna buy their exit, or they're gonna donate because you make them feel guilty if they don't, because they've developed a relationship with you. And so there's there is this highly crafted psychological um experience that they're forcing upon you. Um and I think that's an extreme version of what you're talking about. That when you put this thing in your yard or you put this flag on a pole or you put this license plate on your car, you're in a sense co-opting someone's someone's emotional experience of existence that they don't believe they are putting something negative on you. They're having a personal experience, it's it's the the house and the nature and the birds and all this stuff and these symbols or actual text is is uh offending offending that experience. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:05

And this being an extreme case is that's a really good, that's a good description of it too. You're you're not offending me. Yeah, you're not offending, you're f you're offending my experience. And my experience in the world, and I you know, the the argument that the first argument that I thought of was like, well, it's private property, you should be able to do whatever you want with your property. And I'm like, yeah, but the sidewalk is public property. And so, I mean, there's a reason like HOAs are you know, they're HOAs in certain places are like you can't put that shit in your yard. Yeah. Because you are you are offending the experience of anybody else who wants to and you're trying to it's like, well, why the fuck I I own the property, why can't I paint the fence green? Yeah. Because nobody else has a green fence, it's gonna stand out, and you know, and so and you know, some somebody might try to make the argument, well, isn't that just like a form of like tyranny that you're you know you're not allowed, and I I don't think it is. Like if you want to paint the front the fence green, then you know go buy a house in the middle of nowhere, right? And like you have the option to do that. Yeah, it's like but if you want to live in a community, then you have to respect the bylaws of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:23

And you have to accept that there are good things and bad things that come with living amongst other people.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:28

Yeah, yeah. I mean it's it's the it's the difference between living if you want to live in a city versus living in the middle of 20 acres of land, there are trade-offs for both. And there in that interest if you live in the middle of 20 acres, you can do whatever you want.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:43

You can paint your burn trash, you can cook smelly food, you can have your dogs bark all day, whatever you want to do.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:51

You can have a loud muffler, 35 cars in the middle of yeah, but when I'm driving and I'm driving in um, and this is really a really big thing in in southern small towns, and you're driving along a highway and you see 35 cars rotting in the drive in the that's the same thing as you know, Janet's 16 political signs and you know the pink house or whatever. Yeah, you know, I I feel the same way about that kind of pollution.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:21

Like, get yeah, I don't want to see I don't want to stare at your cars when like I'm in this beautiful Appalachian countryside, and like yeah, and there's obviously different levels of of um there's sort of uh with the cars, you know, there's an argument that there's sort of a um that's like the accidental effect, the unintentional effect, whereas you know, you stake out a political thing or uh uh an ideological symbol, you know, something like that in your house. Like you you are choosing, you know, people who either agree or don't agree with you are going to take in this these images, um, and you're going to either unite unite with them in your tribe, or you're gonna um happily offend people that don't agree with you.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:14

Oh my gosh. I saw at the farmers market, it was crazy. Yeah. We went to both the farmers markets this last weekend, they're they're back back in effect, I guess. And you could just pick out like you're wearing the most inflammatory thing you can find in your closet right now, aren't you? Like you're just wearing that to try to stir it up, get a reaction. Little gnat. Little gnat. Yeah, I don't I mean, does it does it frustrate me? Yeah, it it like am I like, oh I I guess I don't care. Yeah, but it does frustrate me. And I think the world would be better if we didn't or like at least think about it. Like think about like oh, you know, I have the urge to put this up so I can fit in with some tribal community. Just have the thought, like, do I really need to do this?

SPEAKER_02 1:27:07

Well, do you you know what it all comes back to, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:27:10

Feeling feeling accepted, the century of the self, feeling loved, feeling expressed.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:16

It's just it, you know, it's it's it's just a hyper magnification of our own perception of who we are, yeah, and our desire to project that on the world.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:28

By the way, great t-shirt choice because it is subtle. I know. And if you were wearing like a fucking this would be a really awkward, yeah, right? I know. I mean, it is it is a an essay though I'm gonna be thinking a lot about over the next year. I mean, I've thought I've thought about different pieces of it, especially the advertising piece of it, just polluting the world with shit. Um Yeah, I mean, I think it goes for writing too, and like you see all this AI just garbage, just somebody spent three seconds. They don't even know what they think or care about a thing, and they're just like yeah, and as people sign their name on that shit too. I'm like, like, it's not the embarrassing thing that you're signing your name on AI, it's that you're literally signing your name on something you haven't thought about at all. That's dangerous. So I don't know. End of end of Fran. End of No, it's a it's a great essay, though. Yeah, it's a I highly recommend it.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:25

It it well, and it it made me think of some think of it in a way that I hadn't thought of it before. I've had the feeling walking by and being like, do you really have to have that thing up there? Like, do we need 12? Do we need do we need 13 signs like or do you have to be, you know, uh like like uh we all walk through the alley and a guy had music blasting off of his door.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:47

That's the worst. That's and I'm like or playing any playing anything out loud. Yeah, if if I'm if I'm out in my yard and I hear you're listening to a podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:56

I've been in a thrift store and somebody's just there listening full blast on their phone, like a podcast out loud. There was reports that people have been uh forced like forcibly removed from flights because they won't wear headphones, they're just listening to their thing out loud, and it's like, but they're fighting for their their what they think I guess is their right to be able to do so.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:18

And I think again, it it is like you don't have a right to pollute the world.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:22

But it's it's again the continued magnification of the of of the focus on the self and and not to start another thread, but is how we are bombarded between the the mechanisms of social media, advertising, commerce, all of these things. Um, moving from a needs-based culture to a want-based country c culture, Edward Bernays, all of that stuff is is this that that experiment to see how much money people can make doing it that way, is is are these the negative outcomes of that experiment?

SPEAKER_01 1:29:56

Of that waterboard everybody to the point of consent.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:02

I and this is not this right, this specifically what we're talking about. Because my my uh like an initial negative reaction to this was well this is this is like a violation of like freedom of freedom of speech, freedom of expression. And I mean the the gentleman who uh wrote this, he lived through you know, uh literally Mussolini and Hitler like understands the importance of propaganda and or not the importance of it, but the significance of it and a visual like this is different. This it it's separate, it's a separate issue. And this is this is you know, you you want to talk about naturalized rights or rights that you're born with. The right to not have to you know consume the shit of your neighbor.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:07

Well, we we um you know what's interesting is we we go, we take a break from it all, we go to a national park where we can just observe nature untouched, right? It's not tilled, it's not harvested, it's not advertising. Yeah, obviously there's human impacts, you know, there's there's calling a forest, there's this and that, you know, like all this kind of stuff that goes on, but for the most part, it's pristine nature, right? You know, uh especially in an industrialized world. Um, and I think maybe the argument is why can't we have a little bit more of that here? Yeah, why can't it be why can't it just be nice? Yeah, why can't we just keep some of this shit to ourselves? Obviously, and he made the example graffiti in an oppressed in a in a place where there's severe oppression. Yeah, and you know, there's some subjectivity there, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:53

Maybe some of the things that's oh yeah, and I was I was like useless like I was like reading this, people are gonna be like, well, I have my sign in the yard because we are in a fascist, and it's like, no, we're not like but they feel you know, in the and they and and it's it's a perception, and I I totally understand there's a lot of subjectivity there, and and I mean there's subjectivity on the on the advertising thing too. He's like, you know, sure. But I'm like, I'm with you. Like you go to a national park, and I learn a lot more about myself and the conditions that I live in, and the three days that I spend in the national park or whatever. And you know, than I do walking down my street and being bombarded with nonsense. Yeah. And I I get it. It's like, well, it's not nonsense to me. And you know, yeah, where do you draw that line? And it opens up a whole realm of questions. And yeah, it's like, well, what if I see that we're what if I think that we're like in an oppressive regime, or if I think we're in this, or if I think we're in that, and it's like does that excuse the lack of subtlety? Like, yeah, I mean, what are we doing? Like you you you know, you you look at some of like the great, you know, you know, European art from um, you know, World War II, or some of the great, and I mean we're talking about like true regimes of or you know, just any any kind of you know uh totalitarian or like media controlled center or you know, you know, you have Soviet Russia or just like the subtlety, or you know, even code Hollywood, you know, for really, you know the subtlety is what makes it so interesting. You have to engage with it on a level that's actually you actually have to think about it. You have to think, what am I what am I seeing? Do I agree with it? What do I think actually think about this? Not just I don't I don't know, I don't I I'll I'll cultivate my thoughts on this more, yeah. And again, my initial reaction was that of like, oh well, I don't I don't think I I necessarily and it's not that I have to agree or disagree with it, I don't need to do anything, but yeah, it is it just put words to a feeling that I haven't dissected that I think and you know you you kind of said it right. Like, yeah, you go to a national park and you're just like, Can we just have more of this? Yeah, can we just just like let things just be nice?

SPEAKER_02 1:34:29

Yeah, just be where we all agree that it's beautiful, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:32

Like, oh, this is gorgeous. And you know what? There's somebody who's like, this yard is hideous. Like, you know, it'd be really nice if we cut down all the trees, we put some concrete, a couple of fountains, like it'd be gorgeous. Like, and I get it, that's all subjective. But nature is nature, like that tree. I've I've never looked at a tree and been like, God, that is the ugliest. Like, there's some scrappy trees out there, but you're still like trees, but you're like, no hating.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:56

Like, that's a it's a pretty good tree. It's a fine tree.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:58

It's a pretty good tree. It's gonna be entirely opposite. It's a pretty good tree. It's a pretty good tree. Yeah, I don't know. It I mean, it's it's begging for a photographic investigation of some kind. And I'm sure there's probably something out there. Maybe I I just need to look if anybody's listening to this and they're like, oh my god, this project talks about exactly what you're talking about. Send it our way.

Tree Stumps, Litter, And What We’ve Built

SPEAKER_02 1:35:19

Well, one project that I've you know uh been doing, and I just took a photo of it um the other uh yesterday. Anytime I am driving around and I just see like the husk of a what was a beautiful tree, and it's just mangled, it's dead. And I I don't mean like an upright tree. I just mean like I took one of one yesterday. It's just this looked like it had been a 200-plus year old tree, it died, whatever happened to it. They cut off all the limbs and just left this 12 foot tall, trunky, husk nightmare-looking thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:57

They tried to kill this tree and cut down every single like yeah, it was just a trunk. Yeah, and it's grown back.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:04

And I'm like, let's go. I I take these pictures because uh I this to me, these are like the the tombstones of what used to look like pristine nature, and this is you know, this is this is what we've done to strangle these it's it's like trees.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:21

There's there's a there's a really good Louis CK joke where he's like I don't know if it's him or if somebody but somebody litters in New York City, and somebody's like, hey, you should pick that up.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:30

You you don't you shouldn't litter, and he's like, it's all fucking litter like the whole building, the cars, everything, the area reading, it's all literally all we are doing is we've created every single bit of this is litter.