Time to change the look of things...

I started hand-coding my website 12 years ago (before we had all the sophisticated templates, large screens and high bandwidth). I now think it is time to completely re-design my website and blog, the question is, "What would be the perfect website?". I'll be researching that over the coming weeks, to see what format really shines as a fine art photography website. Time for a change, stay tuned.

My how time flies...

Well the first month of the year has already passed and Spring will be here in a matter of weeks, too bad Winter hasn't shown up much around here recently. Speaking of time passing, I just posted my 500th photograph on Flickr today. Most of the pictures were posted two at a time on a weekly basis. This happens to be the 500th picture, not one of my usual landscape photos, though most of the ones posted on Flickr are landscapes.

You can see them at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lance_kuehne/

My how time flies.

The Studio is Slowly Getting Organized

Doing an annual Open Studio with lots of foot traffic forces me to clean my studio once a year (whether it needs it or not). It also forces me to get organized in areas that I often let drift. For instance, I have two beautiful posters that were published by Editions Limited back in January, but I have not yet sold them directly to the public myself. As part of my Open Studio, I am making the preparations to display and sell these posters, and I must say, they do look nice. They are available for $40 each, here is what they look like:

I'm getting ready to do an Open Studio

Every year I participate in Sonoma County's Art Trails Open Studios. This will be my 10th year of participation in this program. I have been in the same studio all that time. This forces me to thoroughly organize and clean up my studio once a year (whether it needs it or not). To find out more about Art Trails, visit http://sonomacountyarttrails.org.

To see me in person to talk about art, photography, or which picture you just need to know more about, visit me on the weekend of October 11th or 18th. It is always a fun time.

A new show at Riverfront Art Gallery

I have made thousands of fine art photographs over the decades, and to make them easily retrievable I use keywords. This way, I can call up every landscape photograph, portrait, or still-life I have shot, or even every picture taken with a particular camera. As time goes on, I add additional keywords to make finding particular photographs easy to do.

I am one of the featured artists in the current show at the Riverfront Art Gallery, and my show is entitled "A Walk in the Park". It is all about our local, state and national parks in California. I am a great fan of parks. I have been a member of the California State Parks Foundation for many years. Recently, I keyworded my photos as to whether they were taken in a state, national or local park. This way I could find a photo to submit to the foundation for other members to enjoy, or perhaps be in their calendar. I was surprised by what I found.

Over 30% of the fine art photographs I have taken of the California landscape have been taken inside a park. I shoot a lot of wine country images, so this was a bit of a shock to me. Since 2014 is the 150th anniversary of the Yosemite Grant establishing the California State Park System, and the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act, I thought I would celebrate our various California parks with an exhibition.

By the way, the California State Parks Foundation revamped their website in August. The photograph they put across the top of their home page is one of my photographs. That photograph is in this show.

An Article about my Gallery

Being a fine art photographer is my day job, but part of that job is running a gallery. I have been doing this for the past 7 years. This weekend an article was written about the gallery that explains its history and purpose pretty well. You can see the article at http://www.positivelypetaluma.com/2014/08/31/petalumas-riverfront-art-gallery-celebrates-their-7-year-anniversary/

Working with Limitations

Sometimes you can't bring your fancy camera gear, sometimes the lighting is horrible, sometimes you are not allowed to freely move about, sometimes you are far away from your subject, sometimes you are busy enjoying the moment and can't concentrate solely on photography.

At times like that, just work with what you have and use your creativity within the limits that are imposed upon you. Here are some handheld shots taken with a pocket camera, taken under difficult lighting conditions, while enjoying a concert. It's not about the gear, although it helps.