{"id":2509,"date":"2026-06-12T21:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T01:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/?p=2509"},"modified":"2026-06-12T21:00:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T01:00:11","slug":"12-summer-shards-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/2026\/06\/12\/12-summer-shards-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"#12 summer shards 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I often make an analogy between reading poetry and reading pottery. When we read poetry we discover language that describes emotions, ideas, and feelings that are beyond words. I think of reading the qualities of pottery as something similar. We use the language of form, surface, scale, and heft\u2014to name a few\u2014to convey emotions, ideas, feelings that are beyond the strict confines of function.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

When the photographer Mitch Epstein was asked “what does it mean to look harder” his response was<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It means to\u00a0read<\/em>\u00a0pictures. We\u2019re taught to read literature, but we\u2019re not generally taught to read images. Photographs are used for so many different purposes, from journalism to advertising to family mementos. And I think remarkable photography insists upon a critical reading of a well-made picture\u2019s layers, its conceptual tension, its historical depth. Much of the backstories of these pictures are embedded in the pictures themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My goal with the\u00a0American Power<\/em>\u00a0series was to make pictures that weren\u2019t simply illustrative, but would resonant metaphorically, that could speak to the paradox, complexity and confusion of our cultural relationship to energy; that could convey what\u2019s at stake. Each picture stands alone, but they come together as a series to form a narrative that suggests the bigger picture.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014Mitch Epstein and Urban Omnibus , A Con<\/em>versation with Mitch Epstein<\/em><\/a>, Urban Omnibus, April 4, 2012<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

2<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I often make an analogy between reading poetry and reading pottery. When we read poetry we discover language that describes emotions, ideas, and feelings that are beyond words. I think of reading the qualities of pottery as something similar. We use the language of form, surface, scale, and heft\u2014to name a few\u2014to convey emotions, ideas, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rough-ideas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2509"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2511,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2509\/revisions\/2511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.catherinewhite.com\/roughideas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}