Black Cat Crossed My Path

I’ve been down this alley in Miami, AZ many times before. There’s something about the vitality of the structures here that are simultaneously at the edge of collapse while being completely beautiful and full of life that I find comforting. It is the kind of place where I can imagine finding some alternative dream life in and where I might make one of these buildings into my home?

Then a feral black cat crossed my path. I am superstitious about nearly all random occurrences, but I’ve never thought of black cats as bringing bad luck. More than anything, I somehow always relate to them, thinking that if I had the opportunity to return in a different form, that my choice would be to come back as a cat. The black cat I saw, was a little female and very timid. She looked at me before scurrying off between some metal garbage cans and a brick building.

I thought that if I lived on this alley, that I’d feed this little cat. Maybe she’d get tame enough to let me pet her before she’d dash away into the night. Just a pleasant chance meeting. It’s funny how sometimes it’s just the smallest fleeting moments that make you smile and happy.

While the pressures and responsibilities of my real life weigh on me daily – parenting my three children and shouldering the financial responsibilities that goes with that – sometimes it’s just my ability of imagining some carefree alternative life that gets me through the week. Maybe, if I was just an odd-ball artist living in one of these old buildings, I would find peace. I was never cut out for the pressures and responsibilities I have taken on, but all I can do is the best I can while I keep moving forward.

At this point, I also wonder how I’d manage if the pressure were suddenly removed. Would it feel like freedom or would it leave me lost? You get so used to a constant load that you can’t imagine it being taken off you. Maybe it doesn’t matter. We all put ourselves where we’re at by our actions, either consciously or unconsciously.

I have a lot of friends talking about early-retirement, what they plan to do when they are free from their jobs and how they feel like they’ve already worked too much and need to quit it all. When they ask me what I’m planning, I have to just honestly say I have no idea what I’m going to do or when. I’m just getting by week by week. The only reason I had to get my “day-job” was because I had kids and afterwards, things went pretty wrong in my life — not that I’m complaining, but they did. My kids are everything to me and when I finally depart from this life, I want them remembering that I was always there for them, emotionally and financially. That’s what keeps me working.

Maybe that’s why it’s so important to let myself dream of alternatives. Give myself small mental holidays from the stress and pressure. Dream about living on the edge of society, in a dirty industrial brick space with a steal door on an alley like this one in Miami, AZ. Dream about being the weird/friendly artist/musician crazy-cat-man.

But maybe it’s not the actual escape that’s important, but the mental one. The times to live a daydream. Think about the unreality of some alternative life. Maybe that’s ultimately where art, music and writing comes in. It provides the structure for emotional and mental escape from the day to day. Maybe it’s the spirit’s way to create balance in ourselves. No matter what, I find ways to create. I’ve just sent out the final draft of my third photo/essay book, From the Inside – The Forest Haven Asylum, which should be released shortly. I’m also working on the final production of my sixth full length music CD, Drive All Night, and I have numerous other creative projects in the works. Maybe it’s not about how good your life is, but how good the escape is. Maybe art is better when it’s the escape and not your life. I really don’t know any of this…

But as I watched this little black feral cat disappear between the trash cans, part of my inner spirit went with her. Part of me dreamed of being that little cat. Experiencing that total freedom. Another part of me appreciated that I could just experience seeing her and think about how it would be to be free.

And just because everything always connects… here’s a recent song I recorded about a lost cat:

Forest Haven Asylum – Solar Culture Gallery

Opening Saturday 10 June 2017

6-9 PM

I think I needed some time before I could go back and do something with my photos from the Forest Haven Asylum. We spent three solid and intense days in the abandoned asylum and I took over a thousand photos. My goal was never to create a body of work that would shock or horrify the viewer, even though the facility had a brutal history and aspects of it are and were horrifying, but for me as an artist, I used the experience as a way to explore my own emotions though photography in a place where the archaeology could be used to transcend its past as well as my own past.

I have been immersing myself in this set of photos because I am very near to completely my photo/essay book project. While I’ll announce when the book is published here, I will say that I am happy with the final 120 photos that will be included and with my introductory essay. The experience of being here is one of those that I will never forget for many reasons.

I am showing these three new photographs in the gallery:

Come see the show if you are in town!

Solar Culture Gallery is located at 31 East Toole Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85701

All images and content copyrighted 2017 by Mark Hahn with all rights reserved.

The Possibilities are Endless – Benson, AZ

The sun was going down on Benson when we stumbled on this little row of very old houses just beyond the railroad tracks that cut through town. It was impossible to tell if they were being torn down or being prepared for restoration. There were burned out foundations on the block and a pile of adobe bricks which looked like it had previously been a house. I shot off these photos in around ten minutes while the light held out.

Even though a few of the houses were wide open and we could easily have walked in, there was a cop circling around watching us and it was too dark inside to take photos anyway. I looked in some of the broken windows at the dark rooms inside and kind of liked being on the outside looking in, in a sense, it lent an abstract aspect of infinite possibilities for me. Of the shadowed interiors, I let my mind wander on what they could be.

As a structure, an old house can stir a feeling of new beginning or a place where you can write a fantasy destination onto the end of your life. New rooms and new situations can be found in the corners or shadows in these old houses. Perhaps, there is place where all the struggles and memories we’ve stored up in our minds can find a place to rest with us in one of these houses.

Houses all have their own personality. It comes from the basic architecture of the structure, the lives they’ve lead and the spirits who still linger — call them ghosts or whatever term you chose. My feeling for these houses were all very positive and I could imagine myself living happily in any of the smaller ones pictured. They’re only one block away from the locally owned ice cream parlor! The possibilities of finding a new life here would be endless. Those are good thoughts!

 

Proof Copy of My New CD!!!

I’m posting this to my artist/photography blog because the photos used for my music CD are all my own. There is a strong tie-in for me. Best!!!

Guitar vs. Meds

I just got the proof copy of my new CD!!! Wow! I think it looks awesome! For me, the final physical object is part of the art. Best all!!!

I’ll keep you all posted when the album is released and available!

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Artificial Boundaries – Solar Culture Gallery

Opening Saturday 23 February 2017

6-9 PM

Last weekend, I was by the Mexican-American border near El Centro, CA. If not for the Border Patrol, their high tech surveillance gear — and of course — the steel wall that stretches as far as you can see, this would be just another patch of bleak Southwestern desert. Nothing aside from us humans, would see this as anything different. The wind blows across the border. Snakes and hares pass as if it is nothing… and nothing is really what it is.

These borders are simply man-made contrivances that separate “us” from “them.” While this divisive instinct is the root of all wars and used for the justification for oppressing of other peoples, it also provides many with their personal identity and pride. We apparently subdivide ourselves into different groups very naturally. Maybe it’s an adaption for survival, but at a minimum, this human divisiveness, hatred and anger lowers the level of all of our happiness.

But while walking in this no-man’s land, it seems to bring out the abstractness of this political reality. Do any of us actually have our own “tribe,” or are we all somewhat lost? Is this why we cling to our heritage, our country or our race as defining aspects of self? Maybe the visualization of being an individual walking alone in the desert and coming across another person is a better way to live — realizing that we are all just people lucky to have each other as-is.

I am showing these three new photographs in the gallery:

Come see the show if you are in town!

Solar Culture Gallery is located at 31 East Toole Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85701

All images and content copyrighted 2017 by Mark Hahn with all rights reserved.

Inauguration Day – Deep in Trump Country

I’ll just say that the politics of the last year have left me completely disgusted, so when it came to Inauguration Day, I really just wanted to forget the whole ordeal and the ugly campaigns that led to it. My girlfriend and I decided to just ditch out of the whole thing and take ourselves off the grid and ignore the controversy and the protests. We were blessed by beautifully overcast skies which are rare here in southern AZ.

So here we were, driving down a desolate highway only a few miles from the US and Mexican border somewhere south of Benson and Wilcox, AZ and we crossed over this bridge and see a wonderful winter wooded grove rising up out of the desert along a flowing creek. That’s when we decided to get out and investigate. It was like another world, so remote and removed from outside worries.

It was hardly like the wind or the trees cared about who won the election and nor were they filled with rage and hatred. For myself, letting go of everything and experiencing this stillness and remoteness was the perfect way to spend this day! While many other people have simply let go of all hope and are becoming completely suicidal because of politics, I look to scenes like these to hold onto hope.

I didn’t connect the dots until going through these photographs just now that ironically, in our attempt to escape the inauguration and politics, that we landed right here in the heart of Trump country! AZ is a Red state, aside from a few counties with university populations. Liberals here pretty much have to accept that our votes don’t count, even though I do always vote.

Later, we stopped at a diner which only had a sign that proclaimed “Food.” Inside, it was clear that everyone eating was a heartland conservative that probably voted for Trump. I shrugged. It was friendly and we got fantastic bacon cheese burgers to eat.

The other customers were primarily ranchers and workers in related businesses. They didn’t appear to have much fight in them. They were just beaten down and many were missing teeth. They were mostly here for the all-you-could-eat catfish special.

On inauguration day, many museums closed their doors. I personally felt that it was a counterproductive gesture. While Trump supporters would be watching the inauguration, museums could have been a space of sanctuary for those needing to look beyond the election and find some hope. Really, the important things we have are our love for each other, the beauty of nature and our culture. No politicians care about us. When you die, it doesn’t matter who you voted for and when you turn your back on everything but politics, you’ve essentially let them win. I will continue moving forward and finding beauty in everything I can until I’m gone. That was the joy I found in taking these photographs!

In such ugly times, the only true protest is beauty!

-Phil Ochs

Winding Our Way Out of 2016

It’s the end of 2016. I keep hearing, “Now that everything has changed” and “I’m so glad this year has finally come to an end.” I turned off my phone and TV and NPR and headed out into the vast outback between Tucson and Phoenix, a space blanketed with epic landscapes carved by the ravages of nature and those of humankind. Most of the small towns — dots on the map really where clusters of trailers are strewn into small valleys — are inhabited by miners and fed by the local economies built around copper mining. Times have already been hard for these folks for the past couple years. I’d doubt they have felt anything related to the recent elections. They are screwed no matter what. Copper prices on the world market fluctuate and it directly impacts their lives. The attack ads aired on network TV probably had little impact on their hopes or dreams. I’m sure the majority of people sitting in front of their TVs were only hoping that the price of copper rose again to the levels required to get the mines running at full capacity and being offered as much overtime as they could handle.

Meanwhile, Christmas has come and gone and the majority of children in more urban areas opened up the mass of presents that they had been hoping for and expected — all the high priced high tech gadgets produced cheaply in China, Korea and Taiwan and ordered from Amazon or bought from the big box importer stores. It’s hard to imagine these families really feeling that their lives have suddenly changed.

What perhaps has changed is the sudden fear of change. The fear of the unknown. The fear that the types of upheavals that are hitting the small mining communities now (and hit the Rust Belt after the passage of NAFTA) will somehow hit the educated and privileged urban-suburban white collar workers. The same people that pretend they care about those who have been hit by the global economy, but who do nothing to change things.

At some level, none of us are really in the position to change anything other than ourselves. Getting out into world and leaving our small lives behind can sometimes put things into proper perspective. Do the clouds rushing by think that anything has changed? Does the sly coyote worry about what has changed since yesterday to today? What does the wind tell you when you stand on the top a deserted bluff and look out at the world around you?

I think it’s there to remind us of how small we are and how lucky we are to experience all the good things that happen to us everyday. Maybe some days it is just a stray feeling of happiness for seemingly no reason at all. Perhaps feeling close with someone else in some unexpected way. Or maybe, just noticing how the shadow of the mountains moves across the landscape.

Anyway, there have been surprises this year for sure and who knows what the next will bring, but if we hold onto the good we experience in spite of the negativity, fear and hatred being thrown around us everyday, things will be better for everyone. Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

For times when things seem hard, I’ve written this song… Don’t Let It Get You Down!

Autumn Fields

With all the bad politics, police brutality and military atrocities being carried out across the globe, sometimes you just have to unplug and turn off your phone to get away from all the negativity. These photos are from somewhere outside of Wilcox AZ at twilight. There wasn’t anything special here, just a place to pull over and let the world come to a complete standstill around us. Sometimes it’s amazing the amount of beauty you can find in what seems to be nothing.

While walking around the edges of these fields, I wasn’t aware of how many snakes were still out. At soon as night fell, the rattlers all came out to warm themselves on the road. We had to swerve many times so we wouldn’t hit them. I never kill snakes!

Here’s a simple acoustic song I wrote that seemed to go with mood:

Solar Culture Gallery – Waves Crash In

Opening Saturday 8 October 2016

6-9 PM

I am showing these three new photographs in the gallery. They were used as the album art for the cover of my new music CD, Waves Crash In. All three were taken at the Salton Sea. That is a George Jones LP sitting on the table where it had been left by last owners of the abandoned trailer (Bombay Beach).

Come see the show if you are in town!

Solar Culture Gallery is located at 31 East Toole Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85701

This is the front cover of Waves Crash In:

The official announcement for the album is here (showing all album art and CD design).

Waves Crash In is available for purchase right now from Amazon.com here.

Digital distribution is being handled by bandcamp.com where the album is available here (along with my previous three albums).

For more information, contact Mark Hahn at markhahnpublishing@gmail.com.

All images and content copyrighted 2016 by Mark Hahn with all rights reserved.

Man with a Suitcase – Album Available Now!

Man with a Suitcase is available now in physical CD form and can be found on Amazon.com (eligible for Prime and SuperSaver shipping) or directly through my eStore. Digital sales are being handled by bandcamp — the entire album is also available for full preview streaming on bandcamp.

As always, thank you all for the support you give me, it really means a lot!

Also, for my online friends, I am offering a half price promo for the digital album download (discount code: “friends”).

Note: All photography and layout work done by me!