Ike was pretty brutal to our family’s beach house on the Bolivar Peninsula. So brutal, in fact, that it’s gone. Before (from Google Maps street view):

And after (via Mom and my brother Ryan yesterday):

Ryan erected the flag pole and flew a flag that they found.

The opening of an installation at the University of Chicago Renaissance Society.

Y’know, the more art I see, the more I realize how little of it interests me. There are only three types of work that tend to catch my attention these days (with rare exception): photography (naturally), video and installation art. Video has the ability to draw you in, often creating a package that makes you think what’s happening on screen is (or could be) real. But an installation can actually do it. Transforming a space, even into something normal but different, can often have such a jarring effect as to make the viewer question what’s real about the space and what isn’t.

I know this isn’t always the primary role of installation art, but many times it’s what I find most intriguing. Sometimes sculptures will embrace this transportational quality. I saw a show a few weeks back when my friend Eric Hancock was in town. The artist had created some type of treehouse in the clouds (although the whole thing looked eerily like a mushroom cloud), and even though I couldn’t climb in it, the scale made me feel like I could have. I instantly forgot that I was standing in a gallery, just looking at a piece of art. This doesn’t happen to me so much with paintings (or photography for that matter).

That’s probably not the best way to judge art, but it’s at least caused me to consider different ways of art-making.

At the world’s first Sears.

I finally got my scanner hooked up at home. Oh how I miss the simplicity and power of the Flextight software with the Imacon. If I could only find a spare $18k.

Even to this day, this remains one of my favorite videos of all time. (Quicktime required)