Going Soft

Sometimes I find images (paintings as well as photos) that are really, really blurry to be compellingly attractive. Maybe it's because my mind wants to fill in the details. Or maybe it just enjoys the respite from constant overstimulation in this 21st Century. I've enjoyed creating my own pieces with that approach (Pumpkin Ether, for one) and also selectively blurring parts of an image, keeping other sections in sharp focus to create another type of viewer tension. This time I tried something slightly different: using layers to effect the softness but not lose all the detail.

These feel so juicy and sweet like this. But it doesn't seem to work for many of my works; I think it might be most successful with images that people can "read" faster-- i.e., subjects that are more familiar and don't need clear detail to explain itself. Many of my wabi-sabi shots aren't good for that, but working on both approaches informs work with the other. Wouldn't it be wonderful if everyone were to approach other, less-familiar people and cultures with that same perspective? Knowing another way of looking helps us see more of what is already familiar, or appreciate more what is strange.