My Kind of Town - Austin Is

 

My daughter once told me that the thing she liked most about Austin was that it always felt like you were on vacation. I believe that's because there are so many cool things to see and do when you're here. And I've had the privilege of being semi-retired and have many friends and family who love to visit this weird, funky, colorful city, so I get many opportunities to get out and shoot it from many perspectives.

I was challenged to show Austin without it's iconic regular, signature images - Capitol Building, Frost Building, UT Tower.... by Mark Heaps, whose creativity I admire. He showed me how to mind map - that is by building a tree of bubbles of words that grow off one another.

So, with my sister and niece visiting, I set out to try and demonstrate a definitive Austin image utilizing some of those words. I had passed a brand new mural on South 1st Street and thought that would make a great backdrop. We added a guitar case and cell phone and voila, I captured youth and color and music and art.

 

We moved on to Hope Gallery (Graffiti Park) and had fun shooting some more. 

Cactus and color

Someone was taping an introduction to the park - figured I captured media and great signage with a cool message but somehow I felt this image was too busy.

Ultimately I felt like I couldn't use beautiful Kim as representative of Austin and I wanted two images for this challenge, so my second choice was back on South First - I think this captures the funkieness that we all love so much in Austin.

With #SXSW in town, I hope y'all are enjoying this wonderful vacationland of a place we call home, Austin.  Keep on shooting, friends!