Photographer: Alexander (Alec) Ricketts
Site: Flickr
Based In: Southern Indiana
ONE
This piece is titled Ritual. I think that the reason this has appealed to me is mostly due to the composition, just something about the contortion of his arms, which also happens to be the subject. I was in a very old cemetery outside of my hometown of Evansville, Indiana with a friend of mine, whom frequently models in my photographs. It was one of those days that was so strangely grey and overcast that it could almost make you feel like a living character out of a David Lynch film. This turned out to be my favorite shot of the entire day because it holds some sense of oddity to me. Even the hand gesture is significant, and like an Escher picture, although it isn’t significantly easy to see, once you see it you will always see it.
TWO
I decided to title this piece Arnlaug, which is Norse for “eagle”. It was literally just one of those pictures that I randomly shot and was completely surprised with whenever I saw it. I’m currently studying different fields of photography, one of which being the journalistic approach. One night before class, I hadn’t shot anything at all and decided to half-ass my assignment at the show I was playing at with Power and Wreck (two awesome bands, really awesome guys). This guy that I know was just standing outside, and being that I’ve always thought that his tattoo was really interesting, I decided to snap a shot of him really quick. The next morning whenever I was reviewing through a ton of bullshit pictures, I was completely excited to find this one. The lighting, the composition, and the subject just really drew me into it, but probably most especially the dramatic lightning that I happened to pick up. I do not photoshop my pictures whatsoever, so capturing pictures like this is always exciting for me.
THREE
Now this one has always been an attention grabber. I will only state that this piece has been titled Blind Justice. All that I can say about what was going through my mind was that this has “grindcore” written all over it, and that I’m not sure that I’ve seen this one done before! Besides the subject matter (which could be perceived as one hell of a political statement to those with the relative thought process), I am quite happy with the resulting composition. I feel as though it’s just one of those pictures that’s easy to look at due to the movement. I find that it’s common to first notice either the gavel or the gunny sack, which eventually works its way up the flag’s stripes, which then brings you back to the gavel, keeping the eyes busy.
FOUR
I’ve always been very happy with the way that this print turned out. There’s just something about the way that the shallow depth of field draws the eyes to Death so perfectly, while being framed by the pictures that are out of focus and my friend’s hands. This turned out to be a lucky shot because I was walking on a local bridge with my friend one day that I was out getting pictures and I just happened to see some type of small book on the ground. Whenever I opened it up I realized that it was some stupid little comic that christians tend to hand out to people, especially around here in the Midwest. I really was mocking it as I was reading through it until I came across this page depicting Death taking the life of a gambling alcoholic, which I found to be pretty dark and intense for such a childish comic. I called my friend over to show it to him so that he could laugh about it too, and as he got to that specific page I snapped a shot really fast. Funny how shit works sometimes, I guess.
FIVE
This picture was shot just after I took the “Death” one. I decided to go down to the shore of the river below the bridge that I’d been on because the water level was very low and I had noticed the depressing look that my town’s industrial horizon beholds, so naturally I decided to capture and embrace it. This one gave me a great opportunity to practice dodging and burning in the darkroom, as well. After I had made the print, I took it to the next practice to show my bandmates. Turned out that they really liked it because it was a darker, edgier take on the place that we live, which could make for quite an interesting cover for the album that we were soon to be recording. A few months later we recorded an E.P. that we entitled “Premonitions”, and we decided to use this picture to embrace our tribal Midwest/Evansville passion, as well that of our darker style of Punk/Hardcore. The album can be viewed/heard here at: http://soundsoflaughter.bandcamp.com/.
SIX
This one I entitled Realms, and eventually decided to use it for my split exhibition in Indianapolis, Indiana. North of my hometown of Evansville, Indiana, is a small German-settled town called Darmstadt which makes for a perfect place for dark, ritualistic photographs. This place was once used for the “Churchgoer” demo that my band put out a while back, as well, along with many other pictures that I have taken. My friends and I enjoy taking drives down these grim and secluded roads, and I enjoy taking advantage of the strange area to use as locations for my photography. This was a very productive night and resulted in several pictures that I used for my show, including this one.
SEVEN
I shot this with the intent to have the “conversation starter” at the show, it worked. I will also note that the show was held in a church, a very old one that held a very Sabbath-y atmosphere that complimented my prints. I have to say, this one turned out to be really wonderful as a 24×36 metallic photo print. The metallic prints have become my favorites, being that they really not only compliment the overall quality of the photographs, but they seem to really compliment the darker aesthetics behind my content.
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