Make beauty.

I know, many of us grew up believing that making beauty was the sole province of only a very few, innately talented people called “artists.” What a sad deception.

Since Adam was invited to name the animals, humans have made beauty. We do it by drawing on cave walls and painting with oil on canvas and sculpting, of course. But sometimes we do it by seeing it–even in the mundane–and calling it into existence.

I love to photograph construction sites, like the one above in downtown Chicago. A construction site offers a million configurations of form and color, and each configuration here today and gone tomorrow when the hard hats continue their work. The view you see above will never be seen again. That building now is fully clothed in its glass skin.

I call this #HardHatArt. I imagine the hard hats know they are makers. I wonder, do they know they are artists?