Holy hannibal, shit is getting real.  Earlier this year when I started taking photos again I never dreamed several things would happen.  

1. The collecting of many film cameras I thought I would never shoot with let alone be able to call my very own. 
2. Having an experienced, established and acclaimed photographer mentor me. 
3. People contacting me asking to do photographic work for them.
4. Being contacted to show my work.
5. Having a photo book with my name on it.

2017 was a pretty wild year, leaving my world behind in the west coast and moving to Toronto.  Having some extra time which I never really had the luxury of before.  A man named Rex who I respect deeply instilled unto me the importance of having something tangible to work on.  My primary profession is of a technical nature, that means I can spend 10’s of to 100’s of hours staring at a computer screen and never seeing a tangible result from that effort.  Rex explained this kind of behaviour could drive a person to the brink of madness.  To prevent this madness he stressed the importance of finding a tangible outlet.  Something a person can work on and see a direct result from which would make that person feel good about that effort.  I applied this new found time towards photography, finding a used Nikon D300 and using an old lens from my D70 I set out to capture Toronto.  In the initial days a lot of time was spent in Kensington Market.  Its a fascinating place that changes daily, there’s always new stickers or graffiti to check out.  My friend Derek suggested I check out some other photographers on line and challenged me to shoot more than random stickers.  While I was exploring these other photographers I found some documentaries on Jason Lee.  His love of instant photography immediately appealed to me.  I wanted to do 8x10 polaroids too, holy shit balls is that stuff expensive as heck.  So next best thing I started picking up old Polaroid cameras to play with.  Now that shit isn’t cheap to shoot with either, at 30+ tax for 8 frames you can’t just be shooting random crap willy nilly, I’m not that rich.

Armed with these old Polaroids a new mindfulness developed and I noticed my interest in subjects changed and my shooting style evolved.  Thru this Polaroid phase I met Sabu and ultimately was introduced to medium format via the Bronica SQAI which is one of my most beloved cameras.  Slowly less images were caught on digital as a massive shift took place to film.  Film is such a beautiful fucking thing, it has life, it has rarity, it requires mindfulness and I love it so goddamn much.  I could go ape shit for hours about why I love film and what’s attractive and blah blah but I’ve already digressed so much from my original point of this post.

I am riddled with excitement and anxiety at the moment, just super jazzed but could also probably shit myself and barf all over the place.  With the help of one of my good solid friends, I have a book coming out.  Its all shots of Toronto and will be part of a larger series if this first one goes well.  I also am having my very first showing, that is exciting and terrifying.  Hence Anxiement!  2018 you’re looking interesting so far…

-MDB

Merry Holidays to you all, I hope they have been well and you have experienced good times with people that you care about.  This has been my first holiday season in a new place far away from everyone and everything that I know in quite some time.  The past few years has brought on new challenges and adventures, lots of unexpected turns.  Christmas solo in Toronto has been different, lots of time to work in preparing for the new year as there are no distractions.  Had an interesting Christmas Eve spent chasing a young Raccoon around Queen and Kingston that seemed frozen and lost in the early hours.  I can now check off my bucket list picking up and petting a Raccoon and even taking one for a short car ride to get it away from that busy intersection into more of a quiet neighborhood not far from where I found it.  Met up with some new friends for Christmas dinner at a spot in chinatown for some family style chinese food, some new and interesting things to eat and see.  I am missing my people and send out heartfelt feels to anyone who is in the same boat.  Here’s to 2018 being fruitful and interesting, smell ya later 2017.

-MDB

Thing’s have been evolving lately and my work has been expanding.  I was recently approached by a lovely human to potentially show my work in her space.  This discussion compelled me to get my proverbial shit together because well people might want to try and find me and my work once this happens.  So here is my new web space.  I will work on updating this both with words and pictures as frequently as I can.  If you get impatient, hit me up on instagram @merlindb that shit is constantly updated because easy.  Stay tuned for more stuffs to come.

-MDB