Hello friends!

Well, y’all. This past month was better than the month prior, thank goodness. The break was much needed. But while mine was better it seems like for some of the people I care the very most about it was pretty awful. Why does life have to be like that? Anyway, it’s had me wishing I could just pack up everyone I love and take them away to some place warm and sunny and serene.

So I’m doing something just a little bit different this month. I don’t have any new posts to share, no real news, and no photos quite ready from the past month either. What I do have, however, are some images I’ve been dying to share with all of you. The great thing about going to the shore in October is that the beach is empty and the weather is perfection. The less great thing is that I come home with pictures I love, but by the time they’re developed and scanned and sorted and what not it’s December, which seems like an odd time for beach photos. So I decided to save them for just the right time, which I feel like might be now. These were all made in St. Augustine this past fall, where I played with several different (and a few very funky) film stocks. I also discovered when I got home that one of my cameras has a delicious light leak, and that while developing two of the rolls I managed to either scratch the film or… something? I don’t even care. All of the quirkiness and supposed imperfections somehow made every single photograph better.

These are some of my favorite pictures I’ve ever made. When I look at them I’m transported back, not to when I made them, but to every perfect summer of my childhood; bicycles and sandcastles and time spent exploring. Looking at them makes me feel incredibly happy. So while I can’t physically pack you all up and take you somewhere that feels like these pictures look, hopefully looking at these pictures can transport you there in feeling, at least for a little while.

Much love to you all. Thanks for being here, and you know how much I love to hear from you, so write me back!

kg

SNAIL MAIL, ANYONE?

I mentioned in the last letter that it was my newsletter’s third birthday. It reminded me of two years ago when, to mark its first birthday, I sent out postcards of some of my most popular images to any of you who wanted one. It was such a fun way to celebrate! And, it just so happens that I have a set of postcards of some of my favorite images from Wild Blackberries sitting on my desk right now. I had them printed a few months ago, just for kicks, with no real plan for what to do with them. Now that the project is out and I still have no plans for them, I thought why not send them out! After all, it’s nice (and rare) to get good mail these days.

If you’d like one, with a handwritten note of course, just reply to this email with your address and I’ll send one your way! Just to say thanks for being here.

WHAT DOES A PHOTOGRAPH SOUND LIKE?

Y’all know how much I love a good playlist. I make a lot of them, and many times I use the feelings evoked by an image or a body of work to inspire them. In fact, more often than not what I’m listening to and what I’m making tend to go hand in hand; each mirroring, and at the same time informing, the other. So when I finished up Wild Blackberries of course I had to try to give it a soundtrack. Playlists are generally a living thing as far as I’m concerned so it may still get a little edit here and there. But if you liked the images in the project feel free give it a listen below.

And if you really dig this sort of thing, you can also check out the playlist I would call the soundtrack for this issue of the newsletter here.

AT THE MOMENT

LISTENING TO

Somewhat fitting for the summer theme I suppose, I haven’t been able to get enough of Hermanos Gutiérrez’ album 8 Años this month. Listening to it makes me long to be in a dry heat far away, without a care in the world. And maybe some tequila.

READING IN

I once saw a commenter leave a recipe review in the NYT Cooking app that said she would follow Eric Kim to the ends of the earth. I’ve always really loved him, but even I thought that sounded a little extreme. For Mother’s Day though my boys gave me his Korean American: Food That Tastes Like Home, and you know what? I think I might follow him to the ends of the earth too. The recipes are pretty stellar on their own, and his down-to-earth, über accessible approach to food feels like a cool summer breeze. But honestly it’s the many essays on home and place and the way our food and family histories inform who we are, all woven throughout, that make it such an absolute gem. I dare you to read them and not fall in love.

THINKING ABOUT

Documenting time; This past month a friend sent me this instagram post of one of the most creative - and beautiful - ways I’ve ever seen a mother document the passage of time. A few days later I stumbled across this interview with artist Sho Shibuya who has made a daily practice of painting each morning using the New York Times’ front page as his canvas. It got me thinking about how we perceive time, and how we mark it. I’ve talked before here about the effect time can have on an image, giving it new meaning or changing the relationship you have with it. But what about the way photographs can change the way we understand the time that has passed?

CRUSHING ON

I have a couple for you today…

I get a handful of photography newsletters in my inbox, and often I browse through them without much catching my eye. But this article about a woman who created a series of portraits - aptly titled A Chance at Love - of men she met on Tinder drew me in immediately. The photographs are so vulnerable, and the story is fascinating. It’s worth the short read!

And, a couple of months ago a friend was in town from Virginia and mentioned that I should check out the Instagram page of a guy he met up in the mountains not far from my house; said he shot film and loved old cameras and was pretty sure I’d like what he was doing. Of course he wasn’t wrong. I immediately loved Ronnie Pettit’s photography, but was even more enamored with his “visual exploration of Appalachia,” Local Exposure Magazine. His latest issue, Hiker Trash, is the result of a year long project interviewing and photographing thru-hikers on the Appalachian Trail (so you know it has my heart already) and it looks absolutely fantastic.

And as you scroll to the next photo, deep inhale… and, Ahhhhhhhhh.

Take care, y’all!

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