the reconstruction

With the installation of the air conditioners in time for the first hellacious heat wave of summer, sleeping has become not only easier but something of a much anticipated treat, nightly. Until today. It seems my landlord thought it a good idea to assemble a very vocal posse of men, armed with chainsaws, to hack back the tree in the yard outside my veranda door. They would then chop up pieces of the trees outside my window, yodel, then throw them to the ground and then move them to the chipper-shredder to make copious amounts of deafening mulch.


troubled © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

I guess I ought not lament so much as the month of June is being hailed as, among other things, Recovery Month, Sleep If Off Month and also as No Income Month. This weekend I am in training for later this month. Finally The Butcher and Dr. GI Guy have given me a clear assessment. Having seen all the results, Dr. GI told me that without running anymore tests on me, he can say that there is only a very small chance that I might, some day, present with Crohn's. But he doesn't want to run more tests and the surgery that The Butcher is planning on performing is one they would use on people with my condition who also have Crohn's, so it would still be an effective measure to take.

The Butcher and I sat down at discussed the finer points of what would be my 7th and most major surgery to date. The Advancement Flap. We did not start with this procedure even though it has a higher success rate than the 'plug', because it is more invasive. It will be inpatient, my first, and primarily for pain management purposes, which made me shudder. In past The Butcher has warned of grave pain which later turned out to be more bearable than he suggested, but he suggested I take two weeks off of work to recuperate. And to take the pain meds he gives me because I will need them.


heatwave © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved. music: Le Fil Du Temps (ft. Ami Sioux) (Piano Version) by Poni Hoax


Nurse Mom, Michael and I have been planning the first week, so that I won't be alone, I will be connected, comfortable, fed and hydrated... and probably entertained when I come to. I have quite a few people threatening to come visit me in the hospital, so much so that I might have to arrange for catering. They might be disappointed to find me unconscious the entire time.

So while I was processing the financial damage of not working for two weeks, I was also having a etsy sale dry spell, and a design work dry spell, much to my dismay. I've heard that sales have been slow everywhere, and it is summer, notoriously slow all round, but I can't help but get especially nervous, when I will be lucky to have 5 days of income this month. So if you've been putting off purchasing a print, anytime between now and June 15th is a super time to do it. hint hint


euphoria © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

The ideal plan for the three weeks prior to surgery included excesses of shooting, and getting out and frolicking. High leg kicks. Maybe trapeze routines. Actually if I really wanted to I just found out I could... but I don't function optimally when upside down. While this weekend starts a five day hot hot hot of heat index in the high 90s-100s, last weekend blessed us with one perfect day. Sunday. Miss Beaver and I had been plotting a styling/fashion shoot for c few months, basically since our last shoot together... y'know the saucy lingerie shoot on the coldest weekend in January. For some reason, the Saturday before the shoot, I had an inexplicable feeling of dread with regards to the shoot. I had this suspicion that we would get caught on entry. Or we would get hurt. Or it would rain.


flights © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Miss Beaver and her coworker (and our model for the shoot) Melissa showed up on the gorgeous afternoon and we slid into The House of Smoke and Mirrors completely undetected. While I realized too late that I had forgotten my tripod and we were haunted by the frenzied scurries of a squirrel on the other side of a locked door in the house, the shoot went off completely without a hitch.


visitation © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

In fact it was probably my favorite fashion shoot to date. Melissa is stunning, the clothes were sizzling, and the house sang for me. Having only discussed this with Gwyn, both she and I have found that that particular house seems to create inexplicable color and lighting effects in-camera. Tints of yellow, green, lavender appear in shots that are not visible in the room.... dramatic cars appear where there seem to be none.


recovery © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

It is a truly special place and I will really miss its offerings when it is demolished, which will be quite soon. Truly magical and quite surreal. A home that under different circumstance, I could see myself inhabiting.


willing © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

I hope in the next couple weeks I can squeeze a few more photographs out before I am bedridden, but even if I don't, the glee that came with the results of this shoot are sticking with me. I am truly proud of what we all created together on Sunday. We are quite a team.

On a lighter notw, I'm not one for gimmicky tech items but sheeee-yit, I am totally in love with this itty bitty digital rollei. I actually really want it. I've been wanting a little point and shoot even though I can't really afford such luxuries right now since I should use the economic stimulus check on groceries and well, gas. But I lust for this.



How friggin cute is that!!

refill

At what point did this stop being a photo blog and become a belly blog? I've started associating going to blogger.com to write, with drinking clear liquids and pining. I must say though, Trader Joe's broth is good. Like if I had the inexplicable hankering to drink chicken water on a normal day, I would pick this. These were obviously happy chickens... before they were dead chickens.


in the fold © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

For a fasting day, this one has been rather exceptional. I feel triumphant, if waterlogged. So I mentioned that I had a photographic illustration job involving constructing a wall, well that job is going to press on Monday, everybody is exquisitely pleased. I am chaffing at the bit to share it publicly. While that job was winding down I suddenly got a portrait job for the cover of the same magazine, same issue. The painter Dane Tilghman and I met for a shoot yesterday and despite doing five different set ups it only took me about 45 minutes. We shot in Taylor's at the Olde Mill in Norristown, where his work is currently on display. Shanners came along to assist though somehow Mr. Tilghman ended up helping us carry my equipment up and down between the four floors of the mill. Nothing like putting the subject to work. Such a character, singing along with the tunes, and since he, Shannon and I all went to Kutztown, we swapped tales about professors who started off straight-laced by the book in his time and went berserk by the time I had them, and retired in time for Shannon to cross paths.... some 30 years of comical KUCD history. Again I didn't regret bringing along my ladder as he had nearly a foot and a half on me. Even in my giant platform boots.


tomorrow's sun © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

I am reminded that I have done very little in the line of personal work since I got my new camera. But I have that on the list of things that must change, soon. I have accumulated a bunch of new wall materials, so maybe tonight and tomorrow afternoon while I am coming out of my anaesthesia stupor I will cobble something together.

Anyway, let's hear it for getting real paid for photography work. And what's that I hear? Bonus at Other Work too? That should put a dent in the equipmental debts. Let's break even baby.

Back to my fluorescent green Jell-O consumption.

medusa

tango © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Managing to get out of work a smidge early, so I took a walk with my new hot lady friend Five Dee. I coulda danced all night but I ended up soaking wet a little too soon. Snow will do that to you.

drift

Finally my cecum is done screeching great whelps of joy, or perhaps sorrow, upon refilling with unholy foodstuffs. It is curious to me how my gut can feel normal most of the time and then when I get these gross tests to see if anything is wrong with me, the prep for said tests makes me feel sicker than the actual sickness (which I may or may not have), would. I do indeed have a little cold but as soon as I ate I started feeling much much better. Of course, Jell-O doesn't really heal anything. The cold isn't gone but should be by the time I am drowning in a hospital gown again next week.


enterprising © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Today I am bundled ala Artic Explorer, with no less than three layers of clothing on most parts of my person. This last weekend gave us our first snowfall and today we are having something resembling a small snowstorm but it has petered out already. Before I had the chance to take out my new baby for a stroll in it. I dove headlong into purchasing another major bit of equipment in less than 6 months. 5D. Mine. Now.

It is larger than my face even without a battery grip. It will take some getting used to, though when I worked on Sarah Beaver's stylist portfolio this last summer and shot with one, it was deeeeeelightful. If nothing else, I feel like I have an enormous penis and will not be threatened by anyone's equipment. Less excuses on my part. And hopefully more work.


santa clara © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

As much as I love winter, I have a deep-seated fear of giving bad gifts and the misery associated with the holiday at large. I can handle the family mingling and stuffings, the traffic, the congested stores, even the music.... but awkward company holiday parties boost the Dread Level up to near yearly review heights. This might be an inflammation of the hermit, especially since the one coworker I once had in earshot has moved to a desk where I can neither see nor hear him. So, like when I first started working here, I am once again basically alone in the attic, kept company only by the occasional ring of the phone.


underpinnings © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

To reduce the need to actually go to a store and shop with intention of making progress towards gifting I did ALL of my shopping online and in two days. And my gift for Mr. D, (which we will actually 'share'), actually has me kind of ....ok, practically beside myself. It will require a day trip and some finagling, which I think will come post-holidays. The combination of this and our pending New Yearsish road trip, which will take us across the Canadian border if there is no snow, or back down south, echoing last year, leaving the snow to pelt our backs. While we cannot avoid the second wave of Fattacks completely, we can buffer ourselves by tempering them with live-on-the-slim escapades. West Virginia.... maybe, Kentucky? And perhaps spend a touch more time in Delaware, which is not technically The South, just south in relation to where I stand. But full of truly bizarre things with no sales tax. I've witnessed the vast array of flea marketry via friend's photographic escapades, but can they match the magic of a place like Renninger's that has an auction where the bids go down and down to $0.50 before people will consider biting.... more of a garage sale with a fast-talking announcer? Expect a full report.


mothership © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Tomorrow, if the roads are no longer mirror-slick, I will be wrapping up my shooting for the recent editorial photo job.... taking me to the farthest polar ends of the Philly suburbs. Though it remains a little challenging, I am still really into the assignment. Tonight, I must rub the brain cells furiously together to think of interesting things to do in the dark with my tall dark stranger camera. I will try to avoid putting absurd objects, curtains etc, on my head. No promises.

fast and slowed

It seems I misread my instructions for my testing for Crohn's on Thursday. Rereading last night, it appears I have to go on a juice fast starting Wednesday morning. The instructions also mention that I will be having a super-revolting test that no one bothered to mention at the doctor's last week. Super-plus-pleased. I wish I had something amazing to distract my likely-to-be-delirious self that didn't include looking at pregnant women at work. Since meeting with the Ass Doc last week I've had daily pain in my guts, which might be psychological or real. Who knows. Tomorrow might tell me.


weeds © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

The weekend was a long winding trek through some of our old stomping grounds. Up to Trevorton to Mr. D's parents for a visit, back down to The Burg for some thrifting, practicing, sushi and a NTTT show at Small's.


the cramps © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

It was an excellent show. I was shooting the band for an online magazine called Unsung Hero. Wish I had a link. The Night Train was headlining that night and in top form. Miraculously there was a very low level of generalized show assholery. And little alcohol-related violence. One braless dancing girl fell over on a slippy beer puddle. No randomly thrown punches or overzealous gyrating. But no lack of dancing either.


duo © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

The band was obviously enjoying themselves and the audience, likewise, watching. It was probably one of their best performances I've ever seen.


cmybalic © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Also of note, I have apparently not lost my general desirability in my time of aging and infirmity... not to say I am peaking in the quality of men I am piquing the interest of.


don't you wish your boyfriend was hot like him? © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Ahem. Cough.

I was sitting in an armchair and this gentleman pulls up the sofa next to me. And an ottoman. And faces me. That is the side of my face that was not turning to acknowledge him. At all. And he starts going on to my ear's dismay, about the comfiness of his seat. Then my phone rings. Its Dustin, calling from the back of the bar. To confirm that he see Monsieur Referee making his move. Simultaneously and obliviously, Mr. Referee continues talking to me while I am on the phone with Dustin, talking about him. Loudly. He scarcely pauses for breath, speaking to my hand holding the phone. It was quite a brazen feat.

Later Mr. Referee nearly got into a brawl with the obsessive sound guy who was marching back and forth between different parts of the bar, pausing to listen and then going back to his sound board to adjust. Mr. Referee, who was agitated at not scoring with me, decided that his displeasure with Mr. Sound might need to come to fisticuffs. Somehow, the smooth Mr. Sound manages to assuage him after some tense wrist grappling and sits down. Intense conversation, with wide open mouths close to each other's such that they appear to be skirting actual making out by a hair's breadth, ensues.


armed robbery © Laura Kicey. All Rights Reserved.

Phenomenal. The one that got away. My other pseudo-suitors included a married guy sitting next to his wife, one guy who knew who I was from flickr, and a total Bro with a nasty stogey. What did all these guys have in common? They were all mostly hitting on my camera.

Dustin was kind enough to dedicate a "to the four guys who hit on my girlfriend tonight, you guys are awesome!" Made my week, really.

joints

It figures that the time when the most is actually happening, oodles of slippery tales of trespassing, transvestites, scalawags and amazing lighting equipment, all running freshly through my head... I have the least time to actually write about them.

I write today in the wake of Thanksgiving and my show coming unhung... and my more faithful readers are probably fading off into the distance. While things are fairly stable on the whole, photography as 'business' to me is in flux and lots of things are shaking loose, for better or worse. I felt a little twinge of the sadness as I whisked all my photos from the windows on Butler Avenue. There was some rigamarole the night before where the next artist was amongst the missing and I was told I'd be up for another two weeks, until after Thanksgiving. Then the early morning call came and I was racing around, sweating, cursing, and nearly catching on fire thanks to my now deceased hairdryer. I sold another piece last week, from the show, it was one of the two most expensive, so I officially broke even on all costs for the show. I maybe made like $20. Heh.

After we were done packing my car with my show, the one curator said he wanted to select some pieces to be printed so he could frame them and hang them in his frame shop. Apparently Ambler Theater is still running my ad. Last week, I visited a restaurant that wanted to show some of my work, so I now have 6 pieces hanging at the Funky Lil Kitchen. They serve delightfully inventive food, the menu is never the same twice. I can be quoted as having told the chef/owner "My mouth is excited." They will be up until the show Dustin and I are having together opens at Mugshots in February. This is the announcement piece we put 'together':


joints © Laura Kicey & Dustin Fenstermacher

We are curating the show like an exquisite corps in a way. I select a photo of mine, he follows it with a photo of his that has a common thread, it could be color, location, idea, compositional device, whatever, so long as it shares something with the photo prior and at the same time, leads us away from monotony. Since we are frequently shooting at the same places at the same times, often side by side literally, we decided to capitalize on how our visions are distinctive and harmonious.

Also available for your reading pleasure is 10 Things About Helveticaneue on Utata, a very recent interview with Brittney Bush. Smithmag has asked to show some of my self portraits along with an accompanying interview (which I think will have fairly redundant content, alas). I'll post up a link when it goes live.

This long (too short) Thanksgiving weekend was nothing short of astounding. While the turkey and stuffing was right on par, all other excursions proved mind-bending. Dustin is flexing his studio lighting muscles and I got to lend a hand as photo assistant. Post holiday engorgement, we set up at his grandmother's amazing house for a portrait session.


jingle © Laura Kicey

He managed to persuade her to sit for him in her pink-metallic-flamingo-print wallpapered bathroom. For our Black Friday pleasure, we set off for what has become our traditional Thanksgiving destination, nearby Centralia.


brew © Laura Kicey

Dustin brought me to an abandoned trailer he had previously explored, but I had yet to enter. Apparently it belonged to Pastor Edward Chapman and his wife Marguerite. We found a photo of him and a number of correspondences between he, his wife and friends of their's. They kept a huge amount of newspaper and magazines (in relation to the size of the tiny trailer), spanning years 1999-2001. The latest calendar on the wall showed November 2001.


wardrobe © Laura Kicey

The kitchen was filled with bloated canned foods and cleaning supplies. The floors of the entire trailer were carpeted with books, letters, postcards, clothes and papers. This was another strange contrast to other abandoned homes I'd been in. The other house in Centralia had been carefully emptied of all its contents. The Rementer House had been left basically in the state Mr. Rementer left it when he died. Here, they had left things of possible sentimental value, but in a whirlwind state. Residents of Centralia were offered large sums of money by the goverment to purchase their properties. Many relocated to the nearby town of Mount Carmel. This couple's abrupt-looking departure seems different and so much less methodical, which makes it all the more unsettling.

We continued on our way back home stopping at the epicenter for outdoors equipment shopping, Cabela's. It was staggering in size, content and clientele. Taxidermy everyhwere, fish to big game, waterfowl to trophy heads. Men casually shopping with their families, decked out in head-to-toe camouflage, children toting toy guns.


fishing line © Laura Kicey

We walked around with our jaws dragging on the floor. Later filling the hatch with wild boar and smoked ostrich sandwiches. It was kind of like going to an amusement park of natural history museum in this twisted backwards way.


migration © Laura Kicey

Saturday I dropped off a piece at the Muse Gallery that apparently will be in a Small Works show opening this Friday night, 60 N. 2nd Street (between Market and Arch Streets). I have never been in a non-juried show and I am still confused how I pay $20 and suddenly I am being shown in a gallery. Alas I cannot come to the opening. But will check it out in the coming weeks. If I don't check it out I won't believe it is there.

A trek to Jim Thorpe yesterday proved to be my closest-ever legal call in terms of trespassing. Big oops. We took one pass by the Lehigh Valley Railway warehouse on our way into Jim Thorpe, saw someone there and decided to catch it on the way back. Jim Thorpe was slightly more underwhelming that I recalled, having camped there three years ago, B.C. (before camera). After a brisk walk through the town and its shops, a spot of lunch Mr. D and I decided we were up for some trespassing, instead of this nambypamby hippie open-door crap.

So we returned to the warehouse to find twice as many cars outside. We decided we would just go for it anyway. Crossing the railroad that was marked Private Rail, No Tresspassing. We pulled up next to this guy who was erecting up this enormous old camera complete with glass plate (at least 8x10) large bellows and a drape that he eventually pulled over his head while focusing. We said our hellos and I went into the nearest building. Moments later another truck pulls up.



where the twain meet © Laura Kicey

The guy who gets out calls us out of the building. From the patch on his shoulder he is a park ranger. He informs us we are trespassing, the buildings are dangerous, we can run but he won't chase us. We all just stand there and say nothing. He starts rambling on about the history of the buildings, how they used to repair train cars there, liability, squatters and graffiti, and how they are scheduled to be torn down, replaced with businesses or somesuch, and then the guy with the giant bellows camera asks if maybe we could stay and just shoot outside (since we are all obviously harmless camera nerds).


over the years © Laura Kicey

Mr. Ranger says he'll check with his boss and disappears into his truck. We stand in silence until he returns. He said his boss doesn't mind if we stay, we must be careful as they are old unstable buildings, etc, liabilty issues. But he is going to have to write us all tickets for trespassing.

Hahaha! Just Kidding! he says.

Still, we continue to say nothing and stare. He told us he wouldn't bother us anymore, but if a state trooper came around we would be in trouble for sure... as he leaves, we thank him profusely and we all immediately disperse into and around the warehouse and outbuildings. Being distinctly uncareful. Those buildings were solid, especially if they were meant to hold railcars... nary a brick had fallen from the vaulted ceilings.

..............................


As I am ridiculously backlogged on what I've been up to, I may have to come back and write up my visit to the Kulpsville Flea & Antiques Market and the Norristown Farm Park and State Mental Hospital. Or maybe I'll lazily post up a photo or 8 and just say it was cold and dismal and we didn't trespass but I may have been exposed to PCBs but I'll likely not die for a bit. And the flea market was in an old school that had an inexplicably still-filled swimming pool and lots of school furniture mingling with the items for sale. In the classrooms and offices.

Tomorrow I will be returning for an early morning shoot to Rementer House, with my boss. Wasn't the idea to skip out of work to go shoot, not pull me out of bed hours earlier than usual so I can't function at work at all? Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz......


the sitting room © Laura Kicey

working backwards

Falling ever further behind on everything, as the holidays open their big maw and swallow me... I have been wildly remiss with the blogging. Last-last weekend Mr. D and I ventured north-centralwards to crack open the strange dismal excitement of Minersville, PA and revisit our favorite Poorest City in Pennsylvania, Shamokin.


haunts © Laura Kicey

Basically everything we planned to do during the three day weekend ended up getting scrambled, twisted and/or rained on. The Metropolis of Minersville, which wanted for a longer stroll, received a quickly darkening gallop-through, during which we had our first ever house bar sighting:


snare © Laura Kicey

Apparently in its heyday, the town had 6-8 bars per block, so naturally some landed in homes. Obviously. Despite not really being a drinker, I was inches away from entering just to visuallly drink it all in. I mean, they had a giant plastic scare owl in the front window. What's not to love?


red leaves © Laura Kicey

Shamokin in its crumbling-but-not-abandoned splendor met us with cloudy skies and glares from pick-up truck drivers. We were only questioned once by a man who seemed to have tracked us down after seeing us earlier in our walk. I batted my eyelashes and said 'I like colors and textures' and apparently, this was sufficient. Baffling.


pulling the wool © Laura Kicey

This last weekend I got to exercise my brand new sparkly 10-22mm lens in the Italian market with a posse of flickrers.


cider © Laura Kicey

Accidentally stumbled upon the Mew Gallery in the neighborhood of the Italian Market, where I am hoping to show there (next year) or have works on consignment. Also in photo news, I got a photo published in JPG Magazine's self-portrait issue.


salsa dancing © Laura Kicey

Big congratluations are in order for Mr. D who is signing a contract with a fabulous photo collective which will help him hone his stellar talents. Woo Hoo!


stocking © Laura Kicey

Also I'm in the thick of things with processing photos from yesterday's shoot with Philly's own drag king extraordinnaire, Wang Newton. Daniel and I worked together to shoot her 2007 calendar. The photos will also be used in her publicity for the next year. Hopefully I can post some of those soon.

And just for kicks,


landing © Laura Kicey

I was introduced to Bill Brandt when I posted this on flickr. Apparently most popular for his eerily distorted nudes shots with a wide angle lens. Nothing is original, but yet, it doesn't stop being exciting learning this.