Or will it...

(Photo is of the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, and is via here.)

love me

I just spent the last hour or so pouring over Maisie Crow's Love Me, a photo essay of a 17-year-old girl growing up in extreme generational poverty in a small town in Southeast Ohio. Crow recently earned a Ian Perry award for her project, which she describes as an exploration of a young girl's "coming of age in an environment that lacks the emotional and financial resources to facilitate her growth into adulthood." To say that the project is unsettling is probably an understatement, but having lived in a poor little town in Southeast Ohio I felt a certain sort of compulsion to peruse "Autumn's" (not her real name) story.

Although they weren't in my circle of friends, I most certainly knew girls like Autumn - thirteen-year-old girls who already smoked, lived on Doritos and soda, bounced from one crappy boyfriend to another, fought a lot, and who already seemed trapped. They scared me at the time, but as an adult what I mostly feel for those girls is sympathy. It's certainly possible to break a cycle of deep, generational poverty, but it's also a tremendously difficult thing to do.

Fortunately, my time in Southeast Ohio was a far cry from Autumn's life - we lived in a fairly nice house, my brother and I attended Catholic school, and my friends mostly came from well-educated, middle class households - but when you live in that part America, extreme poverty is never more than a few minutes in any direction. For a variety of reasons, it's a place I'm happy to have lived, but it's a place that I'm even happier to have left behind.

(Via Jezebel)

random posts of pretty

We saw some of the strangest, most beautiful street art while in Valencia. It's like every corner we turned there was a mural painted on the wall of a building lining some random alley. And no, no story behind this. I just love me some street art....

today in nightmare-inducing photographs

When I was eleven-years-old I was stung by a jellyfish while swimming in the Atlantic Ocean, and it was - at least at the time - the single most terrifying thing that has ever happened to me. That one little sting bashed my previously held dream of being a marine biologist, as my fear of sea creatures soon outweighed the prettiness of sea shells. I refused to enter the ocean long afterward, and to this day I'll only go up to my knees in salt water, shuffling the whole time for fear of stingrays.

So, needless to say this National Geographic picture along with the news that 1) jellyfish such as these exist, and that 2) experts are warning that "another giant jellyfish invasion may be on the horizon" all collected to send a cold shiver up and down my spine:

Bloody terrifying. My only solace is that they seem to be focusing their assault on the coast of Japan, and that Japan isn't Michigan. Which is where I live. Far, far away.

(Oh who am I kidding. I'm not sleeping tonight.)

(Via Boing Boing)

(not so) random posts of pretty

Thanks to my recent trip to Barcelona where his work is everywhere, Antoni Gaudi has become my all-time favorite architect. I got a chance to see some of his houses and, of course, the Sagrada Familia, and it all just blew me away. Pictures truly can't do justice to his epic, beautiful, strange designs. And while it was all amazing, my favorite had to be Park Güell.

In 1900, Gaudi was commissioned to build a neighborhood of luxury houses set atop and away from the crime and pollution of the city center. Enough lots were available to build as many as sixty homes, but when the model home was unveiled, the Barcelona aristocracy was shocked and appalled at what Gaudi had created, so only two homes were ever built and only one was sold, making it a massive failure. I suppose it's easy to imagine how folks in 1910 might not have been able to wrap their heads around Gaudi's design, however today the park teems with tourists, the dragon sculpture outside one of the homes has become a symbol of Barcelona, and I can imagine folks would drop some major cash if the houses became available for private sale.

Of course, I loved everything about the place. It's like being in a fairytale dream word created by a mildly mad man...

(not so) random posts of pretty

While in Valencia, Spain we had the opportunity to go to L' Oceanografic, and it was so nice I fear it may have ruined me on aquariums forever. Of course I took a bunch of pictures, and although I didn't think any of them would turn out, they ended up being some of the nicest images I have of our trip. I love my camera. I sing it love songs...

random posts of pretty: dina goldstein's "fallen princesses" photo series

For every little girl who's a little too fascinated with Disney fairy tales and happy endings, perhaps?






(Via Jezebel)

random posts of pretty weird

Today's LA Times featured this photoseries of Yemen's Socotra Islands, nicknamed the "Galapagos of the Indian Ocean" for their isolation and, thus, strangely unique biodiversity. And seriously, the place looks crazed. Like where Ompa Loompas come from or something:




The image above is a picture of a dragon’s blood tree unique to Socotra, so named because a "red resin drips from its bark when pierced." This tree BLEEDS. Redonkulous!

(Via)

secret garden

Taking a guided tour of any city is definitely a mixed bag, but it's usually worth schlepping off an on a bus and exposing yourself as a obvious tourist in order to see places one would never know to seek out on one's own. Case in point, one of my favorite NYC stops is a little garden adjacent to a unfinished cathedral in Harlem, a place I would have never seen had it not been for a tour company's itinerary. Even if you don't dig much on architecture, The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine is still pretty awe-inspiring, but I could spend hours taking pictures in the Biblical Garden on the cathedral's south grounds. (Of course, tour guides run a tight ship so I've never been able to spend enough time there to snap off more than a few pictures. Again, it's a mixed bag.)

This sculpture, The Peace Fountain, is the garden's impressive centerpiece......but it's the little sculptures surrounding it that are my favorite part of the garden. Each is cast in bronze using sculptures made by children, and they're full of whimsy, sweetness and light.

jungle fever

My Memorial Day weekend involved a trip to the Detroit Zoo, an excursion that's never anything but a good time. On the way there, I remarked on how great the Columbus Zoo is, and how lucky I was to grow up in such close proximity to one of the country's best zoos. I haven't been there since I was a kid, but from what I understand it's still a great zoo and one of the best things about it is its gorilla exhibit.

Coincidentally, today my mother forwarded me this slideshow of the gorillas of The Columbus Zoo. In 1956, The Columbus Zoo made history by being the first zoo in which a gorilla gave birth in captivity. The baby's name was Colo (a combination of Columbus and Ohio), and her and her offspring have all since become local celebrities. The link will take you to some great pictures of Colo and her clan, but these three pictures are my favorites:

Young Colo has her first playdate with Bongo, her future mate:

Colo's granddaughter, Jumoke:

Colo in 2006, "Queen of the Zoo":

And now I think I may have just developed an itch that only a trip to C-bus can scratch. This summer, perhaps.

random posts of pretty

These pictures come via Very Short List, and are full of pulp and awesome. Thomas Allen creates dioramas out of classic pieces of pulp fiction and then photographs them. The results are so campy and droll I can't even stand it. Love!

Tangle

Fury

Viewfinder

Venom

Gripping

Distraction

Stacked

spring fever

Today, I discovered that I prefer taking pictures of my garden from the bugs' point of view. Doing so required blindly shooting my camera up these flowers' skirts, earning me some veeery curious looks from the home improvement crew working on the house across the street; however, I'd like to think the results were worth it. Happy accidents all around...