I signed up to participate in a book/project called, Grab Bag, that is being put together by Ethan Bodnar. Ethan’s not famous yet, but he is an 18-year old who is about to start his first year of college and somehow he has his life together enough to already have clients and book deals and connections with the upper tier.

He filled a hat with different tasks and drew them at random. Whatever he drew for you was what you had to do. The only catch was that it couldn’t have anything to do with your area of expertise. I was picked to be the kid who designed a building. That’s right, a building. Guess who has a hard time thinking three-dimensionally? Guess who has always been mentally challenged when it comes to Legos and LIncoln Logs?

For a couple of weeks, I sat with it, trying to think what the heck I was going to do to not look like an idiot in print. With the deadline fast approaching, I bit the bullet and took a chance on this idea I had that could either be really awesome or fail miserably. There wouldn’t be enough time for a Plan B if it didn’t work out, so I told myself I had to make it work out.

A stack of 79 photographs had been sitting in my apartment for close to four years now. They are all shots I took that span the last days I spent in Dallas through my first months in New York. Arguably one of the biggest heap of crap times ever.

I decided I’d use those photographs to build shapes that would build my building. For several days and nights, I did nothing but score and tape these photographs until all 79 were ready to go. On Sunday, I loaded them up into a duffle bag and headed out to Williamsburg, where I met Angie, who helped me create a building down in no man’s land. When she said, “I smell crack,” I knew we had found the perfect spot.

At the time those shots were taken, i didn’t know what to do with myself. i didn’t know who i had become or what any of it meant or what was a mistake or what was good, and so began this process that has carried on until today–picking myself up and trying to straighten myself out and get everything in line and soften up all of the edges and create perfect symmetry. At least on the outside.

And then the wind blows.
And parts of me get knocked down again.

I’ve come to realize that i can’t really control all of those things.
And that i don’t even want to.

And that what the wind creates is better than what i set out to create anyway.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 9:50 pm and is filed under Brooklyn, Design, Photography.
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