TED Talks

Taryn Simon photographs secret sites

Simon goes through some of the work from her "An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar" series. Images that she originally set out to get to the "the core" of things, and came away with the realization that there is no ONE final all knowing authority, and that there's no definitive guide into the "core of issues, or truth". From TED: With a large-format camera and a knack for talking her way into forbidden zones, Taryn Simon photographs portions of the American infrastructure inaccessible to its inhabitants.

In addition, she shows a few images from her "The Innocents" series. "Haunting portraits of men convicted for crimes they did not commit.... The Innocents, she shot portraits of more than 80 wrongly accused death-row inmates who were exonerated by DNA testing, and investigated photography's role in that process."

“Distortion is a constant and our eyes are easily deceived.”
- Taryn Simon

This work embodies all that I consider "noble" about photography. As I struggle to understand the value of conceptual art in society, and the value I personally ascribe to it, work like Simon's is refreshing, haunting and inspiring. I'm impressed that there's no "photoshop" work here- just straight photographs. True, without the accompanying didactic text, each image would be nothing more than technically a well consructed image, but presented as intended, Simon’s images are heavy with sadness, charged with activism and quietly urgent.

---

A.J. Jacobs' year of living biblically

Jacobs, a writer for Esquire magazine in New York, spends a year, living as Biblically literally as possible. He started by going through the different english translations of the Bible, listing all the rules and laws, and then trying his best to live his life accordingly. From TED: Immersing himself in alternate lifestyles and long, hilarious experiments (usually with himself the guinea pig), writer A.J. Jacobs tests the limits of behavior, customs, culture, knowledge - and his wife's sense of humor.

Trying to fully understand the powers and tensions at play in society and larger culture clashes currently under way, i feel desperately uninformed. There are so many issues and subissues coming to a head, and I feel that in order to live, i must first be fully educated so that I can make informed decisions throughout my daily life. At the same time, there’s such a wealth of data and information, from such a variety of perspectives and authorities, I’m utterly lost as to who/what source I should be turning to. Jacobs does the one thing I wish I could apply to every facet of my curiosity. Live that life deeply, wholely, completely, personally, and come away transformed and educated, in many ways unexpectedly.

“I started the year as an agnostic, but by the end of the year, I ended up as a reverent agnostic... Whether or not there is a God, there is something important and beautiful about the idea of sacredness...”
- A.J. Jacobs