It was good to be in Nebraska for a while - even though I was on the computer every day working on various projects (among them, the very recently finished - and still possibly subject to slight design changes - karenkunc.com).

I tried to stay away from the infernal machine for entertainment or personal work. In fact - almost the whole time I was in Lincoln, I was picking up new jobs while working on old ones. And because I neglected all of my own work, I think I got more done in just under one month than I have in the last 6.

And all the snow was nice too.

So, I’m now back in New York - back in my office - and editing some photos. There is a small, new batch of portraits up at justinkohmetscher.com.

One of the problems with being back at home is that I do not want to work on work stuff; I want to work on art stuff. This significantly decreases my budget for the art stuff and requires a total shift in attitudes. (Don’t you mean artitudes? -Eds.)

When I’m working on work stuff, I work sporadically at first: developing ideas, trying them out, re-designing and modifying. Then I’ll work practically non-stop for a couple of weeks, and then start over again, until the product looks and/or feels finished.

Some jobs take more cycles than others. And I’m always surprised at how incredibly simple my work is after I’ve refined it over and over again. The design always look very similiar to what it was when I had first started. Michael once told me that David Carson believes that the very first way you lay out the design of something is the most intuitive - and thereby the best approach (I am paraphrasing what I remember, which isn’t totally reliable, and I couldn’t find the quote anywhere using google, so correct me if I’m wrong) and even though when I heard that I thought it was kind of silly, I have come to realize that I work that way too, only it takes me way longer to get to it.

Working on art stuff is different - I get completely immersed right away and stay that way until it’s done. With most of the photos and videos I’ve been working on, it’s easy to make use of that first intuitive action. Most of my photo work is about an action (or reaction) to a present situation. I think. But I’m not sure.

School started this week, and I’m excited to be back. Today, during my first drawing class, we toured some of the students’ studios and had a kind of half-hearted critique. There was a lot of standing around - one professor and 6 students - not saying anything for a little bit, then talking about something - like a movie or dropping quasi-famous artist names - and then more standing around.

A couple of times, there was actually talk about art. I was told that my opinion of a girl’s painting was mostly wrong because I didn’t know the “law of painting,” whatever that is. (I did find

Minton’s Law of Painting: Any paint, regardless of quality or composition, will adhere permanently to any surface, prepared or otherwise, if applied accidentally.

from this site, but I’m pretty sure he wasn’t talking about that.) So the drawing class is going to be a challenge, I think. This will be the first non-photo studio class I’ve taken in a long time, and I’m anxious to get started on something that doesn’t involve a camera.

I suppose I should get started on figuring out what the law of painting is.

Any ideas?