2024 05 27
I love simple photos like this. I could’ve spent all day photographing this little neighborhood which was full of detail — and full of stray cats!
This year, I’m going to push myself to get out into the world simply with the task of making photographs. While this image is outside of my scope, the boundaries I’ve given myself is Illinois and all of its towns, cities, farmland, countryside, and anywhere in between, but excluding Cook County (Chicago), as I’ve spent my entire life living in this county and want to explore new landscapes less familiar to me. I likely won’t be sharing images from this project here on the blog as I’m aiming to make them come together as something that exists on its own. But we’ll see. Things change and I’m already finding myself stressed about missing out on capturing early summer, as I’ve been busy working back home in Cook County. Likely, this project will span multiple years as I grow and shape a larger body of work.
Happy Memorial Day!
-Clayton
Middle America vibes in Vincennes, Indiana. April, 2024. © Clayton Hauck
I love simple photos like this. I could’ve spent all day photographing this little neighborhood which was full of detail — and full of stray cats!
This year, I’m going to push myself to get out into the world simply with the task of making photographs. While this image is outside of my scope, the boundaries I’ve given myself is Illinois and all of its towns, cities, farmland, countryside, and anywhere in between, but excluding Cook County (Chicago), as I’ve spent my entire life living in this county and want to explore new landscapes less familiar to me. I likely won’t be sharing images from this project here on the blog as I’m aiming to make them come together as something that exists on its own. But we’ll see. Things change and I’m already finding myself stressed about missing out on capturing early summer, as I’ve been busy working back home in Cook County. Likely, this project will span multiple years as I grow and shape a larger body of work.
Happy Memorial Day, America.
-Clayton
2024 01 03
Steubenville, Ohio topped out around 38,000 people in the 1940s. Today, roughly 18,000 people live here — a loss of over half the population from its peak almost a century ago.
I have no magic takeaway from these stats but a desire to see America’s Rust Belt re-filled with people. Trends, however, are tough to fight against. To succeed in business you have to go to where the people are. To run a city you have to maintain your infrastructure. With a shrinking tax base, this math becomes impossible to manage very quickly. Its hard to blame people for moving to new southern cities, where budgets are flush and the crafty and connected are able to more easily fill their coffers.
Cheap home prices help, but there needs to be an additional catalyst to get enough people motivated to move back to these rusty towns and refill their full potential.
If elected mayor, I pledge to Make Refurbishments Exciting Again. A ribbon cutting for every alley repaved. A fish fry for every sewer line replaced.
Enjoy.
-Clayton
Downtown Steubenville, Ohio. November, 2023. ©Clayton Hauck
Steubenville, Ohio topped out around 38,000 people in the 1940s. Today, roughly 18,000 people live here — a loss of over half the population from its peak almost a century ago.
I have no magic takeaway from these stats but a desire to see America’s Rust Belt re-filled with people. Trends, however, are tough to fight against. To succeed in business you have to go to where the people are. To run a city you have to maintain your infrastructure. With a shrinking tax base, this math becomes impossible to manage very quickly. Its hard to blame people for moving to new southern cities, where budgets are flush and the crafty and connected are able to more easily fill their coffers.
Cheap home prices help, but there needs to be an additional catalyst to get enough people motivated to move back to these rusty towns and refill their full potential.
If elected mayor, I pledge to Make Refurbishments Exciting Again. A ribbon cutting for every alley repaved. A fish fry for every sewer line replaced.
Enjoy.
-Clayton