"Again, I was just using what was around me. I noticed certain repetitive elements in the neighborhood up here—basketball hoops, tire planters, tree-houses. But I'm not sure if I would refer to myself as a photographer. I'm certainly not a real one. I make a lot of mistakes. I use indoor film outdoors. I don't spend time in the darkroom. I'm still playing with the camera."

Richard Prince (b. 1949). Untitled (upstate), 1995–99. Ektacolor photograph, edition of 2, 69 x 49 inches (175.3 x 124.6 cm)

In 1996 Richard Prince moved to upstate New York and began a new series of creative investigations. After almost two decades of making work derived from images and phrases that already exist in popular culture, he took his camera outside and photographed the banal details of his everyday environment. Although this could be viewed as a radical departure, to Prince there is no essential difference between making photos of other photos and making photos of the world at large. He is always paying attention to what is around him with intense scrutiny.

On one level the Upstate photos chronicle a landscape of economic decline in an unremarkable semirural area. Pictures of above-ground swimming pools and melancholy images of abandoned-looking basketball hoops perched on the edge of overgrown fields suggest a region cut off from the cultural mainstream. However, Prince finds quiet moments of beauty in these overlooked and undervalued features of the landscape.

• Describe this work as fully as you can. For some this may be a familiar image. For others it may be one they have not encountered. Have you visited a place like this? When? What are your associations with it? Explain.
• As you look at this photograph, make a list of adjectives that you would use to describe the locale. Look at the list of words you have compiled. Can you think of a place in your community that has a similar "feel"? Describe this location.
• Prince has photographed this subject to make it both everyday and unusual. Describe both aspects of this work. How can one photo be both ordinary and mysterious at the same time?
• It is difficult to know whether Prince is attracted to, interested in, or critical of his subjects. Prince has stated, "My work is not judgmental; it's like a window I see through. Not censuring anything is something artists continue to do—at least some do, at least I do." What do you think? What does it mean for an artist to be "a window"?

• Many artists have found inspiration in their immediate environment. Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) repeatedly painted scenes of his home in Pointoise, a small town near Paris. Georgia O'Keeffe (1887–1986) fell in love with the landscape near Abiquiu, New Mexico, whose varicolored cliffs inspired some of her most famous landscapes, and Charles Burchfield (1893–1967) used the industrial vistas around Buffalo, New York, as an ongoing theme. Research the work of these artists and then bring a camera with you on a walk around your community. Take pictures of things that you find of interest. When you return home look over your photos. What themes, ideas, or subjects are repeated in your series?
  Visual Arts


• According to Prince, "After twenty-five years, I was tired of the New York City lifestyle. I found it boring and repetitive—you know, going to another dinner. Living in New York feels like you're always inside—inside buildings, inside subways. I needed a new experience, so I went to the opposite extreme. We have a small farmhouse in the Catskills at the end of a dead-end dirt road. Here I'm outside. There's no traffic. I don't have to walk down a set of stairs to get onto a sidewalk full of people. I walk out the door and step onto the grass. At first I found it all very exotic. I started taking my own photographs. I drive around in my truck and take my camera with me."
  
  Many people have strong preferences for living in cities or in the country. Express yours. Do your classmates agree or disagree about the pro and cons of city and country life?
  English / Language Arts