Here's the statement:
"This series explores how members of the suburban culture (that's me!!) seek to reclaim their nomadic roots and 'get away from it all' by ironically collecting together in tightly packed urban-like campgrounds."
Whew hoo!! What fun! Just for background here's Wikipedia's take on Vernacular Photography.
When I first saw intentional vernacular photographs I found them idiotic. Then, I saw some Stephen Shore images like this and this and the light bulb went off. I'm not sure anyone would call Shore's work "vernacular", but his well-composed images of banal scenes, as well as the work of other "New Topographics" photographers seemed to have spawned the intentional vernacular photography movement.
Vernacular photography evolved from "found" photos of common scenes by unintentional amateur artists to intentional, ironic photographs of cultural icons like suburban housing and malls, as well as people engaged in common activities like camping, hunting, eating, hanging out, attending county fairs, and so on. I think vernacular photography can vary from empathetic to down-right mean depending on the perspective of the photographer. I hope I've kept myself aware that I'm living the life I'm documenting (and making fun of). Maybe my photographs are aimed at ME?
These pictures were taken on a camping trip where 29 (not a typo!!) neighborhood families from Lake Oswego camped together at Mossyrock Lake in Washington. The organizers even gave each family a little wooden engraved name sign to put in front of their tent.
My previous attempts at vernacular photos (here and here) seemed too dry to me because they were missing people so I threw a couple photos of fellow campers into this mix to give the set a more human feeling. My hands-down favorite image is the Ford pickup with a boat on top- maybe my favorite of the year (couldn't say why). The second to last photo shows the Higgins family tent (with wooden sign) and our drying laundry.
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