Lee Barry Composition Diary

You Have to Take a Picture of SOMETHING (2015) I have always been a proponent of the idea of staying in motion creatively, which is counter to some other philosophies (such as wu wei), where we strive for simultaneity. Puns are interesting because they easily merge language with the visual arts, in this case photography. These are photographs of used stencils, and the title is a pun, word-play, self-reference, and axiom all at the same time. As Charles Mingus once said, "You have to improvise from something--you can't improvise from nothing."    Axioms: 0493 . If you don't know what you should be doing, do something . Your time wouldn't have been wasted anymore than if you did nothing. 0535. When you tell someone how something was made, you tell them why something was made. The how is the why. 0569. It's nice if sculpture looks like something you already know. 0706. In photography it is important to make the distinction whether something is a good ph...

Spiritual Storm (Animation) 1920 x 1080 Duration: 10:00 An animation using the three primary snapshots of the color projections through a stained-glass window. Let it run in the background while you are doing something else, and each time you glance at it a different "painting" appears. It is interesting that two human figures have appeared as they weren’t in the original images, or in the window. Also visible are the lines between the marble tiles. Let me know if you want a copy of the .mp4 file (max 10). This way you can run it on a continuous reverse loop on your own computer or TV. Feel free to take screenshots and share them. #2018

Spiritual Storm 30x30 inches inkjet on canvas A collage of light projections from a stained glass window, with colors inverted.  30x30 on Artisan Archival Canvas Spiritual Storm (12 Frames) 12 selected frames from an animation based on the main image, inverted vertically. 20x4 inches archival print, matted in black gallery frame . (Original Images) #2018 #yellow #orange #blue #abstract

Old Cameras Taken with the Sepia Camera app in 2009. The store is still there as of 2018. #antique #phonography

Winter Beach (5 multiple exposures taken with Holga camera) View more here . #2007 #continua #black&white

Macrophage 4 (Recovery) 28 x 7.75 inches, acrylic, hardware, seam tape, twine on plywood. $444 Fourth in the series: Macrophage 1 and 2 Macrophage 3 #2018 #layered

A song I wrote, using the poem " Lochanilaun " by the English poet Francis Brett Young (with a few tweaks). Young also wrote the poem " Dust ", which Danny Kirwan of Fleetwood Mac adapted on the album "Bare Trees." I've always loved that song for its harmonic and structural angularity, and only used just part of the poem. Very often poetry veers too far away from lyrics and shifts into art-song form, which I don't want. This is the image of my last content: My soul shall be a little lonely lake, So hidden that no shadow of man may break The folding of its mountain battlement; Only the beautiful and innocent Whiteness of sea-born cloud drooping [falling] to shake Cool rain upon the reed-beds, or the wake Of churned cloud [of a churning cloud] in a howling wind's descent.  For there shall be no terror in the night When stars that I have loved are born in me, And cloudy darkness I will hold most fair; But this shall be the end of my delight Th...

The New Aesthetic     The Google definition of New Aesthetic is: "The New Aesthetic is a term, coined by James Bridle, used to refer to the increasing appearance of the visual language of digital technology and the Internet in the physical world, and the blending of virtual and physical." Like the Pictures Generation , The New Aesthetic is a form of "meta-photography" (photographs of photographs, or photographs of TVs or monitors.) The photographer is essentially looking through another camera, in this case, as a form of street photography, looking through the Lidar camera instead of an SLR. New Aesthetic Images

                                        [3/2026: I have imported them into an LLM , and you can now use prompts to get song "recipes", to wit, Prompt: Create a strategy for a song using an entry form each of the categories and create a list. Abstraction : Turn on a radio stream and integrate something you heard into the work (such as news, a commercial, or music). Arrangement : Start with a title before beginning the composition. Dynamics : Use a Soft to Loud progression throughout the piece. Harmony : Use no thirds in your chord structures. Key : Set the song in G major/E minor . Melody : Compose a melody using 5 notes . Meter : Use a 6/8 time signature. Mood : Incorporate expansive strings to define the atmosphere. Rhythm : Ensure the bass never plays the downbeat . Style : Produce the track in an Ambient style. Tempo : Set the pace to Medium: 80-128 BPM. Topic : Focus the ly...

Soundwalk: DuSable Harbor (2010) June 17, 2010: Weather gorgeous! Sound walks: Michigan Avenue AI to River, Riverwalk, Harbor Walk Turning basin: The Turning Basin is the point where the Chicago River meets the Locks to Lake Michigan. I sat on a bench overlooking the small harbor towards the harbor house, then walked south on the promenade, with DuSable Harbor on my left. Harbor Walk: Continued walk past DuSable harbor towards the Abegweit. There was a blues band playing on deck which you can hear in the background. A passerby says 'Party Boat!'. The strong breezes make for very clanky boat masts. As I walked south along the curved shore along came several hundred joggers running past me. A guy on a rickshaw shouts 'This ride is better than an American Eagle'. Continued path past yacht club and into Monroe Harbor area, traffic noise from LSD on right, end at Balbo Drive. Listen to audio of walk here:  https://archive.org/deta...