Flaking Jesus

8x10-inch Silver Gelatin Print, 2024

Basin St. Things, Contact Grid #2

Digital crop from a scanned analog contact sheet

Moira in her music studio, the Bellow Shed, Bristol, Vt.

with Snowy Roots, Silver Gelatin Holga print, 2012

In this era of social and political separation, I want to share an appreciation of my good friend, the singer, composer, song-collector, and musician, Moira Smiley, who’s work embraces a spirit of connection, love and empowerment.

Moira Smiley has performed, recorded and collaborated with Laurie Anderson, Tune-Yards, Sam Lee, Sam Amidon, Eric Whitacre, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Chris Thile, Fretwork Consort of Viols, The National Symphony, Solas, and The Lyris String Quartet, among others. Folded into her busy commission and performing schedule are guest artist residencies at universities and music organizations, and stints volunteering in refugee camps in Europe and the Middle East. Moira’s original compositions, choral arrangements, and folk tunes are sung by millions of voices around the world.

I have twice had the pleasure of joining Moira’s Community Choir. In the fall of 2022, the Choral Lab, a group of around 50 people of all ages and backgrounds, met weekly in Burlington to bring songs from varying cultures to life. It was a new experience for me to sing with a large ensemble. Moira led us with her expertise and a joyful sense of improvisation. Each week, I could feel my heart expanding into the warm fabric of the supportive group. This spring, a new Choir met for six weeks. In addition to songs that members suggested, we learned parts to several of Moira’s new collection, The Rhizome Project.

In the artist’s own words: “The Rhizome Project is the velvet ferocity of voices & strings, very old folk song and their power to remind us of our shared ‘sugar-in-the-ground’ – an unsentimental, underground connectivity that defies a divisive era.”

The culmination of our Community Choir was to sing behind Moira in a performance with her fantastic string quartet on May 22, in Richmond, Vermont.

Please visit Moira’s Website, explore her soulful music, and catch one of her upcoming shows!

Callejon de Hamel 2, Havana

11x14-inch Silver Gelatin Lith Print, 2015

18 framed lith prints from my Cuba series is hanging at Burlington’s UVM Medical Center, on the 2nd and 3rd floors, including 5 images that have not been previously exhibited.

Callejon de Hamel is a lively side street in Havana festooned with art, where weekly dance performances draw crowds of spectators. On the roof of the building are two water tanks. The black one says, “Aqua Blanca,” while the white one is labeled, “Aqua Negra”. They are inverted, to convey the message that water does not discriminate based on skin color; water is water.

Matchbox Cars, Of Gavin

Silver Gelatin Emulsion on Arches watercolor paper, Toned in Sepia, 2019

My Mother’s Things, Contact Triptych #1

My Father’s Things, Contact Triptych #1

33-inch Archival Inkjet Prints, 2024

This week, my two “Contact Triptychs” will come down from the Art Hop exhibition at Burlington City Arts Studios.

The Pantheon, Rome

11x14-inch Silver Gelatin Print, Bleached and Toned in Selenium, 2012

$225

Memory

11x14-inch Silver Gelatin Lith Print, 2003

$275

Memory was published in master photographer Tim Rudman’s compendium World of Lith Printing, 2003.