BOOK:John Miller-Shooting Log, Michèle Didier Editions

Along with Mike Kelley and Jim Shaw, John Miller r was part of an influential group of artists who studied at CalArts in the 1970s. In 1994, John Miller began a series entitled “The Middle of the Day”, comprising thousands of photographs taken between 12pm and 2pm. This goes against the elementary rules of the discipline: not to photograph when the sun, shining at its zenith, makes shadows and contrasts disappear. What these photographs show at first glance are harmless, almost banal scenes. Divided into two sections, “Shooting Log” (Edition of 270 numbered copies and 30 artist’s proofs) by Mfc-Michèle Didier Editions, offers in its first part a text taking the form of a diary split into ten chapters accompanied by ten images all taken in 1994, including his very first photograph.  The second section comprises a set of photographs from the series the “Middle of the Day” taken between 20 May 1994 and 4 July 2008. The story of “Shooting Log” starts in the present, examining a picture taken in the past. Agreement between the past and present tenses of the photograph activates memories of the circumstances of the shooting and sometimes recovers those associated with what was actually photographed. The Middle of the Day series is also a diary in the strictest sense of the word since it accumulates documents, in this case photographs, which provide a day to day account. The journal is kept for the purpose of remembering past events, things seen, thoughts and emotions evoked. In Shooting Log, John Miller matches the coming and going between two superimposed “journals” with introspective comments on the photographic act. – Dimitris Lempesis