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When I shot this statue at the Hirshhorn Museum of Art in Washington D.C. back on 2-7-2009 I was fascinated by the expression, the astonishing life like qualities and the enormous size of the statue. It sits on his butt at ground level and stands almost seven feet tall. It truly is like being in the presence of a giant when you are standing next to it. The statue is untitled but unofficially titled “Big Man”. It’s a piece created in 2000 by artist Ron Mueck, a native to Melbourne Australia. I had posted a shot in 2009 of this statue but recently ran across some other shots that people had done of the same statue and that got me to thinking about different approaches on presenting him. I wanted to zero in on that expression of destitute and vulnerability and I wanted to put him in a setting a little less antiseptic than a well lit metropolitan art gallery. I also wanted to try and use textures to interpret shadows were no shadows existed when I shot it. What you see here is the final product.

I hope in some small way it helps us all to remember the less fortunate in the coming year. There are still a lot of people living on American streets while our politicians keep on sending aid to countries populated with people who would love to see us wiped off the map.

I blended several textures from the commercially available texture packs from Distressed Textures and a creative commons licensed texture “Smoky Light Beam” from Flickr member Visualogist to get the lighting qualities I had envisioned in my mind.

You can see an original shot of this statue on the Hirshhorn’s web site.

For more information on the Hirshhorn Museum, visit their web site at hirshhorn.si.edu/

Another shot from my parent’s backyard while my leg is healing. I went to the Orthopedic Surgeon today and they removed all the staples from the leg but he said I still can’t put any weight on the leg for another four weeks. My Summer is quickly evaporating before my eyes.

Statue at the Charles Evans Cemetery in Reading, PA taken on Saturday 2-14-2009.

B & W Processing by NIK Software’s Silver FX Pro

For more information on the Charles Evans Cemetery, visit their web site at www.cevans.com

“Distlefink” sculpture by sculptor Ramon Lago. The Distlefink is the good luck bird of the Pennsylvania Germans. It actually is a stylized version of the goldfinch. The goldfinch eats thistle seed and uses thistle down for its nest and was called a thistlefinch from which comes the Pennsylvania Dutch “Distlefink”. Distlefink is often seen on traditional Pennsylvania Dutch Hex Signs and is a symbol of good luck and happiness.

I took this on Saturday afternoon 1-24-2009. Processed as a single RAW image through Photomatix Pro to make an HDR.