Hwhup The Deans List? The Jason Dean here, bringing you another end to a weekend. It’s the last Sunday in April, which means that we might be juuuuuuuuust maybe a l m o s t for certain* without a doubt are pretty much close to being at the start of spring season. (?) I’ve written before in this space how I’m SO ready for spring, so I’ll spare you a retread of those ramblings. Just know these damn April snow showers had better be bringing some damn May spring flowers.

Let’s get into it.

Art

The spring issue of Humana Obscura is live, and I am blessed to have had a few pieces selected to be in it.

Humana Obscura is an independent magazine that has an incredible vibe. In their own words, they “publish nature-focused poetry and art by…writers and artists from around the world”. Their focus is on work where people and the things people have made are hidden or absent in an effort to highlight the natural world. It’s pretty dope and I am proud to be a part of any of their projects.

I’ve already shared my images that were chosen on my Instagram page (and if you aren’t already following me- that’s okay! I’m not very good at Instagramming), but I figured I’d share a little bit of background info about them here.

The three pieces, in no particular order:

Home we fly was taken on May 27, 2024, during a side quest while I was hunting the powerful waves of the Black Rocks in Marquette. If you look at the photos I took on that morning in chronological order, you’ll find this photo nicely tucked smack in the middle of a bunch of those powerful wave photos. One of the lessons I am constantly learning in photography is to just look. Look up, down, all around, it doesn’t matter- just be aware and curious, because you never know what could be happening outside your field of view. In this shot, a flock of Canada Geese happened to be flying by against the grey, cloudy sky. I slowed the shutter speed down to 1/20 second in order to capture some of the motion of their wings in flight. And then I went back to taking photos of powerful waves.

Fun fact: this photo is currently hanging as a 56 × 12 canvas print in my mother-in-laws house.

I took Growing on May 1, 2024. Funny enough, May 1 of the previous year shattered snowfall records. It’s why I tread lightly whenever I talk about spring starting in the UP. You just. Never. Know. For this shot, I was drawn to the early shoots of some plants on the edge of our property, so I laid on the ground and starting snapping pictures. Eventually I started messing around with slow shutter speeds (this photo was taken with a shutter speed of 1/2 second) and doing an upwards motion drag, to see what happened.

I love this photo because the motion and shutter speed work together to give this illusion that the grass shoots are growing into trees right before your eyes. It’s one of the reasons I love experimenting with motion and slow shutter speeds.

The third and final photo is one I took of the May 4, 2024 sunrise on Lake Superior. I love shooting sunrises on the lake; the rays from the sun dancing on the surface of the water give brand-new/never-before-seen paintings every fraction of a second (in this photo, 1/5 of a second to be precise). And using different color and white balance profiles in Adobe Lightroom (Modern 01 and Daylight, respectively), I’m able to make those unique paintings even more unique.

If you want to purchase a paper edition of this glorious magazine, you can do that here, and I would strongly encourage you to do so! My copy arrived last week and the pictures look incredible on the page. What puts it over the top, however, is the pairing of the work of other artists and writers in the volume. In particular, the poems that were chosen to stand alongside my photos add exponentially to the pieces in ways I never could have conceived on my own. Bri Bruce, the Editor-in-Chief, does an amazing job of putting these issues together, and again- I’m proud and humbled to be a part of this outstanding publication!

I am coming up on the end of the 100 Day Challenge for Bonifas Art Center (April 30 is the last day). I’m pleased to report that I have not missed a day, but I’m pleaseder to report that I’ve had a TON of fun with it even though I’ve also been living every day with a little bit of extreme paranoia about missing a day.

I haven’t exactly figured out exactly how I’m going to roll out the final project; that’s a problem for future Jason. In the meantime, I will continue to share ‘outtakes’ from the challenge.

I do have some sad news regarding the project though- The Stem and The Leaf are gone.

They actually broke off fairly early on in the project (apparently The Apple was made to sit on a shelf and never, ever leave or go outside or be dropped or hung six plus feet off the ground and then dropped or dropped yet again). Someone suggested I use E6000 adhesive to fix it, which I did, and it worked….for awhile. Until it didn’t. Soon after the adhesive, The Stem started to wiggle and then wobble until eventually it just started flopping around like a zombie noodle. And to me, The Apple looked off without The Stem.

So a couple of weeks ago I just took both of them off.

At first, I missed them. I enjoyed capturing a distinctly Apple silhouette and experimenting with the form and shape of The Apple through the lens of my weird abstractosity (see the first photo above). What I’ve found since though is a freedom I didn’t realize existed. Without the limitations I had placed on myself of having to conceptualize The Apple as an apple, I’ve actually felt freer to explore shape, contours, and the motion and bending of waves of light through the various inflection points.

The moral of the story? If it’s broke, don’t fix it.

Light course load today. Mostly because I have lots of art to share, and mostlyer because I don’t have a lot to say at the moment. I hope you have a great week friends.

See you around,

Jason