Photograph This!

Every thirty seconds in the USA, 106,000 aluminum cans are discarded; every 30 seconds.  It’s a compelling statistic, but what does that look like?  Can you picture in your mind 106,000 aluminum cans?  What about the total number of cell phones retired every day (426,000)?  Too passé?  How about photographing 29,569 gun related deaths (the total in the USA in 2004)?  How would you do that?  Well Chris Jordan, a Seattle based photographer, found a way.

Chris photographs small samples of his subject matter and then weaves the images together in Photoshop to create massive photographs representative of everything from the number of disposable batteries that Energizer cranks out every 15 minutes, to the hourly financial cost of the war in Iraq.  His photos, usually measured in feet rather than inches, capture consumerism at its best and worst.

Prison Uniforms, 2007  - Depicts 2.3 million folded prison uniforms, equal to the number of Americans incarcerated in 2005.

Though I am not one to encourage you to ever leave AnD’s website, there’s no way around it.  Check out www.chrisjordan.com and look at his exhibition, Running the Numbers, for some extraordinary images of ordinary things.  There’s also a link on the site to an interview he did on the Colbert Report.  I located some things on YouTube from his work on this project, but the quality doesn’t do it justice.  Cans Seurat, 2007

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I think Chris' technique is an innovative means of conveying a message important to him and it really made me think about the products that I use and their impact on the environment.  It also made me glad I haven't killed anyone - yet.  Kudos to Chris Jordan.