and opinions that generate thought-provoking viewpoints through the eye of the lens. Feel free to share your thoughts as IPC Visual Lab students engage the world through the power of their own visual voices.
Apocalypse Now
I shot some pictures at the July 4 fireworks on South Beach. I went to the fireworks with this Mike Sinclair image in mind:
http://www.20x200.com/artworks/1479-mike-sinclair-fourth-of-july-2-independence
I just like how the haze of the smoke and the light freezes the action on the hill. All the spectators look like they're frozen in some kind of post-apocalyptic reckoning, but a reckoning they willingly awaited. It's the light reflected in the grass, not the lights in the sky, that is the focus of this spectacle.
I was surprised of a post-apocalyptic scene of sorts on South Beach, too. The much-maligned police watch towers and paddy wagons that had been deployed during Urban Beach Week over the Memorial Day weekend were set up for the Fourth of July crowd, too, even though the holiday was on a Wednesday. I found my view of the fireworks obstructed by one of the police watch towers, and another tower was in view just a block up the beach. It was like, "Happy Independence Day, you're under surveillance!"I set my camera on a tripod and tried to make the best of the obstruction. After the main show in the sky over the beach, I turned toward the impromptu fireworks display set off in the sand by people on the beach. Their figures became silhouettes outlined by the smoke hanging low in the humid night air.
JKAY
I love the subversiveness of these images. They take a squeaky-clean, mythologized American celebration and make it look like war has come to our shores -- which, in many ways, it has.
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