libraryman

This is Samuel Duncan and he is the Director of the research library at the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, which houses one of the nation's largest collections of photography. Yeah, it's about a 45 second bike ride up the street.

A few months ago Sam stopped by my photography show at Stir Crazy and today, as I was out and about on the bike, I thought I would stop into the museum to say hello. It is free admission after all (I mean, seriously, what an amazing victory for the citizenry, that).

This turned into a two hour chatting and reading session where I began mining some early sources for my proposed dissertation on the uses of photography in the postmodern short story, read through some photo periodicals, and looked at all the new books Sam has been getting in, including this incredible, and rare, tome from Phaidon covering Stephen Shore's daily photo journeys (somewhat appropriate to Blip too, eh?). A limited release of 250 and this, pictured, was copy 249. Frankly a little overwhelming to look through yet so, so beautiful. I also got to see the database created linking the libraries of all the other major museums in the immediate area, as well as the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT), as I'm sure you all have read about on Kathryn's journal. Came home to Blip and found an email from Sam with an attachment detailing the text panels and object labels from a recent past exhibit "Medium and Its Metaphors," which he thought could aid me in my initial research. I have sung Fort Worth's cultural praises many times before and today more than justified such hymns. Thank you, Sam.

And how could today get any better? Got home at the same time as Leah (and we get to go for beers tonight!). Oh yeah, and a D7000 was in the mailbox.

Cheers.