Cindy Geary 9/30/22 Cindy Geary 9/30/22

New exhibit: Landscapes of ancestral migration

My ancestors drew me to landscapes they inhabited before and after over a hundred of them emigrated from Europe to this continent during the 17th, 19th, and 20th centuries. I traveled to and photographed these landscapes in the Netherlands, Germany, and England, on one side of the Atlantic, and on the other, to Virginia, Iowa, New York, and North Carolina. In those places I often felt a quiet knowing inside myself that specific ancestors had been where I was standing, sensing their presence in the present as I felt the hard edges of my linear sense of time dissolve.

Cindy Geary 5/22/22 Cindy Geary 5/22/22

More than we can see—Dorothea Lange’s ‘Migrant Mother’

Learning more in Linda Gordon’s biography of Dorothea Lange, A Life Beyond Limits (NY: WW Norton, 2009) about the history this photograph—Migrant Mother—made me consider my own photography practice in light of hers.

Cindy Geary 3/24/22 Cindy Geary 3/24/22

Just Us: An American Conversation by Claudia Rankine—A review

Claudia Rankine searches for conversations about white people’s complicated understanding of white privilege in Just Us, a beautiful book of poetry and essays accompanied by curated imagery.

Cindy Geary 1/8/22 Cindy Geary 1/8/22

Listening to Richie Havens sing “Helplessly Hoping,” New Year’s Day, 2022

Creative inspiration often takes its time meandering over multiple paths around my consciousness—certainly more often than it arrives quickly on a straight path from desire. After any angsty, confusing search, when I finally get to the idea I was looking for, I usually am certain that I got more from a slower, richer process and am grateful for what I saw along the way.

Cindy Geary 9/10/21 Cindy Geary 9/10/21

Book review: Clint Smith’s How the word is passed

How the Word Is Passed is a first-person account of Clint Smith’s travels to places in this continent and Africa to uncover stories that have been lost or hidden about the tragic legacy of slavery in this country.

Cindy Geary 8/9/21 Cindy Geary 8/9/21

Reading family photographs

“I thought about how there is so much information in a photograph--especially in a family photograph--that we never get it all in one go. We rarely see the same picture exactly the same way twice.”