graeme mitchell

If you drive fast straight east from Portland for approximately 3 hours you’ll pass within about 9 miles of this place. It’s the kind of place that conjures absolutely nothing in the imagination. It’s a desert of sorts.

“Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucination of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death. -DE SELBY”

Epigraph from The Third Policeman by Flann O’Brien.

photo: Umatilla, OR. © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: A Road to a Prison, Umatilla, OR. © Graeme Mitchell 2008

B/c it is seems to fit the pattern of how everything is here right now: palpable disconnect. It’s terrible in many ways…maddening actually. When I watch people on the street, on the subway, sitting on the park benches, driving their cars, living life, following the traced lines that seem to have been set out long before them, when I watch this it makes no sense; they’re all unfinished; they’re fragmented outlines that were never put in order. It’s as though a fog has settled over that which is usually inferred, that which is usually taken for granted. I don’t know when one plus one didn’t equal two anymore, but I’m not confident it does. It’s like we’re on a deep superlative bender, but without the feeling good, just the psychological tremors and quakes and underpinnings of disaster…this could be a matter of projecting…but I don’t think so. I’m not getting this across very clearly, am I? But, listen, it’s has me worried. Even these simple little pictures, this record of someday what was, seem to have become slippery, so to speak, as if they’re without reason. My only reaction is resistance, a push to take them out to some other limit. B/c sometimes they’re all I can hold onto. The continued study of a ____, at whichever end of the spectrum it exists. You’d think it would exist at some end, right? That it’s a sort of maximum. Doesn’t strike me as something that would be subtle.

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell 2008

I had a lot of momentum this spring, more momentum than I knew what to do with; then I had to vanish for two weeks to the W. Coast and was, unintentionally, able to reset. I worked on a great commercial job, left my phone alone, saw a lot of the people that are important to me, and most of all I’ve had fun like I was a kid again: careless and reckless and alight…

I want to say congratulations to Tracy and Benjamin on their new marriage. And I want to tell my little brothers that in the last year they’ve both grown to become men I respect and look up to.

photo: a one of a kind c-print done exclusively for Benjamin and Tracy, 24×24.” © Graeme Mitchell, 2003

photo: Diggles’ wedding, clockwise from left, me, Diggles, Julian (in sunglasses), Garett, and, up front, Jeff. © Paparazri Tonight.

photo: my brother Ian and I at TRCI, Umatilla, OR. May 08.

These many photographs are from a trip I took recently to the Alto Plano of Bolivia to visit my sister, Erin, who lives there.

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008


photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

photo: © Graeme Mitchell, 2008

Over the years I watched as street lights were added.

Funny how easily we adjust. I can’t remember what this town was like growing up, or what memory there is is like a dream I remember having but can’t remember what it was about.

All of a sudden I have the notion that much of what we take for granted is vague.

photo: Canby, Oregon, Dec 2007. © Graeme Mitchell 2007.

Shot a feature story on Brooklyn. Currently working on prints.

This is a teaser:

photo: from the Brooklyn Bridge, ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

For the rest, watch the newsstands.

Shooting in color seems to be becoming a habit of late.

…like incipient sparks against a perfect darkness. That beautiful thing. That good thing. Like a starry night through wet blinking tired eyes…

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2001

You try so hard to displace the place in order to understand it or to make it more an obtuse phenomenon than the ugly actuality it is, that it is so perfectly; you do this in an attempt to justify or excuse it philosophically. But it takes heavy amounts of drink, drugs, regression just to make it bearable let alone excusable, seeing through eyes that won’t focus b/c in this place they don’t need to focus - focus is actually discouraged. It’s the premise of a child’s ball pit in the back of drab and tired fast food restaurant in the middle of the desert; it’s this premise expanded infinitely: padded surfaces, rounded corners, a cattle pen. Just when you attempt approach at clarity, some sort of recognition or disconnection, it dissipates, the clarity that is. It’s like running in a dream: the harder you try the heavier you become in a foggy futility. And there’s not even any redeeming giddiness or hopeful moments of expression, at all.

It is void.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.


photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

My brother, his girlfriend, and I recently drove from Washington Heights NYC to Canby, OR. (thus my absence here) on an impromptu trip home to settle some destitute and surreal family matters. Bittersweet, so to speak, as the trips ultimate reason became a faint yet ubiquitous backdrop to the otherwise wonderful time we had. There’s much I’d like to share about the trip, from becoming friends with my brother again to getting intoxicated in every state we passed through, but I feel like this is neither the time nor the place.

Less talk more pictures, right?

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2007.

I’ve held Hiroshi Sugimoto’s work in high regards since I first encountered it. His pictures of movie theater screens are strong, but my favorite are his sea ’scapes. I can imagine an argument that they’re not original, but I think they are elegant and beautiful. Now, unfortunately, I’ve only ever seen Sugimoto’s work in books, but one can only imagine his prints are exquisite. (If you’re interested, there are also some podcasts with Sugimoto here.)

photo: Boden Sea, Uttwil, 1993. ©Hiroshi Sugimoto

photo: Bass Strait, Table Cape, 1997. ©Hiroshi Sugimoto

1 of 2 is here.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004


photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

As usual I came upon these while looking for something entirely different amongst my humble little archives. My first sentiment was that I really miss nature and the damp fortitudes of the Pacific Northwest, my second thought was I should put them up here, b/c even though they’re pictures I’ve since rejected they are nonetheless of places not many people get to see - much like the Dammasche series (here and here).

I’m not in the mood to write much, so the short of it is that these are some pics I took in 2004 as a personal project shooting the lasting steam lumber mills of Oregon. I wandered from the project, but I still wish to go back and photograph the dwindling remnants of the timber industry. It’s the lasting remnants that in my mind symbolize a simpler time and way of life. This is a purely romantic notion - a silly one at that- and I’ve no shame in fostering it. Really, it’s so fictionalized in my mind, stills almost don’t do it justice; it’s the kind of project that warrants doing the director-moving-pictures kind of thing.

My biggest ambition is that these might inspire a daydream in you…

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2004

DbClay is an accessories company, and at the helm of it is my friend, Garett. Because I want to be honest about my respect for how much heart these guys put into their work and lives, I need to point out that the wallets are all a front. Beyond that shiny fashion world veneer dbclay is, in my estimation, more of a creative think tank appropriating the fringes of art, content, technology, design, and dreams - then incorporating such into an architecture accessible to all…but you really need to drink, uhm, say 6 rounds of Rainers at Shanghais with these guys to appreciate this. Don’t fret; Rainers are only like $1 at the Shanghei (a small entry fee to pow-wow in a place haunted with struggle). Now, mind you, I take pride in not offering props gratuitously, even to friends, but I admire those striving for something, those setting their alarm to prompt the beginning of something great, and that’s the kind of people at dbclay.

The first pic here is going to be in dbclay’s next line. The rest are from the same trip I took spring of 2002, back when I was in love and still believed in color…

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2002

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2002

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2002

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell, 2002

(p.s. Garett, about our discussion on exploring writers, when I said you should read Kafka, that I think he’d interest you, well it just occurred to me in writing this post that Borges maybe would suit you too. He is the kind of writer you read at night before taking a long walk on streets with the company of only your shadow and the out of tune noises of the night, the noises of life slowing forgetting the days fortunes and misfortunes, like the creaks of an old house settling it’s foundation. Indeed, Borges inspires reveries. Kafka…Kafka I think is more weekend morning sort of writer. You’ll need a day to unwind your mind after he twists and snaps it like a kitchen towel.)