Missing You, A History of Inspiration

Roaming the woods, Boonville, NY, November, 2007

This project is a dream come true. Traveling across the country, working on what you wish, when you wish; It all sounds very romantic. And it is! But not without some debate. I am grateful and very excited to be doing what I am doing. But it gets lonely.

At times I find myself down and uninspired. Yesterday was one of those days. This is the first time I have done a major project on my own. The only thing that comes close is a self-portrait series I did in May of 2005, titled Lycanthrope (example below). Otherwise, I have always had subjects that I often photograph for days or weeks. Johnsie, Sidne, and Jason, I am missing you!


Self-portrait, from Lycanthrope, 2005

Together, those three people have probably been apart of 50% of the images I have ever taken. They are my closest friends. Some of my favorite work was taken long ago of Johnsie. Unfortunately, none of it is digitized.


(L) Jason, Boonville, NY, 2003 (R) Sid & Chris, outtake from Vacancy

Sidne is by far the prettiest of my muses and has been letting me take photos of her on a regular basis since 1999. The last time we took photos together was in 2006 for my series Vacancy. Sid is now a photography undergrad at Columbia College Chicago. Not sure if I had anything to do with it, but I like to think so. Sid would spend days and nights letting me photograph her. One time, I think she was only 17 and I was 19, we drove to Chicago and spent the entire night, until sunrise, roaming around town looking for little cracks and underground garages to take photos in; She was fierce and not afraid of anything. Sid would let me take photos of her doing almost anything. I don’t have that luxury with strangers.


Sidne, from Vacancy, 2005-2006

Jason Covert is the latest in the line of muses. Jason and I met in 2000 while working for a photographer. We bonded over how much we hated that job. Ever since then we have continued to cause trouble and get on each others nerves. In 2003 Jason and I went on our first-annual photo excursion. We made our way up to a little Village named Boonville. That trip was the inspiration for this current project. Jason spent ten days letting me photograph him. Without Jason, “Boonville” would not exist.


Jason Covert, Boonville, New York, 2003

As I said before, I was a bit down yesterday. I miss home. I am on day one-hundred-and-six and a I'm bit photo’d out. After lunch, rather then just giving up for the day, I decided to take a left out of the restaurant’s driveway instead of a right. I followed a road to another road and found myself on a very long dirt path surrounded by woods. I ended up having to turn around about five miles in, but as I did, I found a path that lead me to inspiration. It was a tree, two trees actually. Nothing really special about them, but I could tell they wanted to be photographed.

Inspiration comes in funny ways. I ended up shooting past sunset and then made my way back to the car. As I was driving back, surrounded by the woods being illuminated only by my head-lights, I thought of the below image: A portrait Jason took of me on our second photo excursion. As I thought of that photo, I thought of how lonely it can be creating this work and how I miss my friends, family and muses.


Timothy Briner, 2004, Copyright Jason Covert

I awoke today and quickly ran back into the woods. I will do the same tomorrow. I am very antisocial this week, and rather then forcing myself to find people to photograph, I am roaming the woods for inspiration.