Charis is someone who I have gotten to know through photo walks with our Photo Collective of Gainesville group. If you don’t know Charis, she is worth getting to know. She is a Gainesville native, and currently at UF working towards a BFA, and Studio Arts degree.

I met up with Charis at Afternoon coffee. She said that she was a little concerned by taking me away from my normal spot where I meet people at Loosy’s. As much as I love Loosy’s, new places are always good. While we were talking we actually got to meet the owner of Afternoon coffee who stopped by after seeing my Rollei 6008i apparently had a Rollei 6003pro that he sold a while ago for a decent amount of film. Later on in the conversation we had the pleasure of meeting Miguel, the owner/operator of Florida Film Club. Apparently when you put a camera on a tripod in a popular area, you’re going to get some people stopping by.

I should state here that I had a false impression of her artistic side. While I did get to know her through the Photo walks, whenever I see her post on instagram, it’s almost always about ceramics. When we started talking about school she cleared this up for me. She started her degree at Santa Fe, there she was given the impression she had to do painting for her degree. Once she got to UF, her options were limited and decided to pick up some ceramics classes.

The key thing I learned from her is that she loves art, in all its forms. She is currently working on a photography project that focuses on “Qualitative Time”. Qualitative time would be a door handle that is worn down from use, or a statue that is aged by time. She is currently trying to find a way to merge. Ceramics and Photography.

I asked her about a current art exhibit she is participating in at Gainesville Fine Arts association. The name of the exhibit is something to draw you in, Exquisite Corpse art-athon. Each art piece has three sections, with a different artist working on each section. The artist has 24 hours to complete their section, and they don’t get to see how each other section was done. So the end result will be very interesting to see. This will be on display for the Halloween art walk, and 31st-29th of November.

When talking about the Exquisite Corpse I actually learned something a bit about myself. Charis said she was drawn to that exhibit because it reminded her of the Fluxus art focus, for those who don’t know, Fluxus is less about the actual physical art piece, but it's about the process and the process is the art.

I will be the first one to say that digital photography is practically superior to film photography in every way. As a photographer, I don’t think it's uncommon to think of ourselves as documentarians. I don’t really consider my photography as art, even if I do try and make it look good. When you think about taking a photo with film, and all the extra precaution and work you put into that, from shooting it, to developing it yourself, and everything else that you have to do, I feel like that scratches the artistic itch for me. It's the art of the process, not the art of the photo.

We eventually got up and started a little walk down to Depot Park, while I might be waiting on a part for my 4x5 camera, She had one in hand. It was a Toyo 4x5 on loan from her art department. We were both able to walk around a bit, she let me take two shots on it, and I let her take some IR photos on my camera.

We eventually split ways after we shot all the film we brought and will no doubt see each other again this Saturday at the next Photo Collective of Gainesville meet up. We began our walk to Depot Park, both eager to photograph. I was still waiting on a part for my 4x5 camera, but she had a Toyo 4x5 on loan from her art department. We explored the park, and I had the chance to take two shots with her camera, while she experimented with infrared photography on mine. After we had used all our film, we parted ways, looking forward to our next meeting this Saturday at the Photo Collective of Gainesville meet-up.