More than 4000 copies sold! I’m pleased to say that the third printing of Waffle House Vistas is up in The Bitter Southerner General Store. If you haven’t picked up a copy, now is your chance.
Updates from the Studio
While it has been a trying year, I remain thankful for all of the professional opportunities that have emerged from the virtual social space necessitated by the pandemic. I’ve taught workshops for McColl Center and Atlanta Photography Group, Zoomed into classes across the country for artist talks, and recorded segments for podcasts. All from the comfort of my home studio.
And I’ll be honest - I did not feel creative for much of 2020. I spent my time in survival mode. Obsessed with keeping my family safe and strategizing a variety of contingency plans in case I lost my job, creating work was far from my mind. But things are changing: I’m deep into research for my next two major photography projects, working on a publishing deal for Book #3, about to begin fieldwork for the second edition of Waffle House Vistas, and thinking seriously about a suite of paintings and accompanying woodblock prints that I want to make. It has been a while since I smelled of paint thinner, but I have the itch.
So stay tuned. It is going to be a busy second half of 2021 and I’ll be sharing it on social.
WHV in the Los Angeles Review of Books
Check out this thoughtful review of Waffle House Vistas by Amy Bowers:
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/comfort-and-transience/
She gets it. I appreciate her reflection on these images with the context of the pandemic and how our lives have changed over the past year and a half.
Some WHV Love from Vancouver
As my friends at The Bitter Southerner said on social, “being mentioned in the same paragraph with Sean Brock and Anthony Bourdain, well…that makes us a little emotional!”
Scout Vancouver’s Cool Things We Want: Waffle House Vistas
Thanks to Andrew Morrison at Scout Vancouver for the mention!
WHV Interview on UPROXX
I sat down with Dane Rivera from UPROXX last week to talk about Waffle House vistas:
These Photos from ‘Waffle House Vistas’ Capture Fascinating Scenes of Late-Stage Capitalism.
It was nice to chat about the concept behind the project and focus on how my interests in the built environment nestled into the frame of Waffle House.
First Printing is SOLD OUT
What just happened?
Y’all, the first printing of Waffle House Vistas is completely sold out. It is hard to believe that 2000 copies of this book are out in the world. I am eternally grateful to everyone who has purchased a copy for themselves, bought one as a gift, and made this project so successful.
If you want a copy, DON’T WORRY. The Bitter Southerner and I are currently working on a second printing. Expect it to be back in stock in the BS General Store very soon! It will be the exact same book (with a few grammatical corrections).
So keep checking back with them and get on their mailing list, because they’ll let you know when its ready to ship!
NEW PRINTS IN THE STORE!
I hope you are safe, healthy, and well. Quarantine has been difficult for a lot of us, and it certainly has been a time of anxiety, depression, and exhaustion. However, it has also illuminated what is truly important in life: family, friends, compassion, and community.
While 2020 hasn’t been the year we thought it would be - especially for an artist that prefers to be on the road, I wanted to offer something new. So I am printing a group of five Instagram images as open editions. All prints start at $25 and if you purchase all five you receive one for FREE.
I made a little video announcing the prints:
Waffle House Vistas in your Ears
Last month I had the honor of sitting down with Tommy Tomlinson of WFAE to talk about Waffle House Vistas. We had a lovely conversation and you can check it out on the SouthBound podcast feed:
https://www.wfae.org/post/southbound-micah-cash-viewing-waffle-house-inside-out#stream/0
You should also check out a special episode of The Bitter Southerner Podcast titled The Ways of Waffle House. Editor-in-chief Chuck Reece digs deep into the cultural significance and corporate philosophy of Waffle House and lets me chat a bit about why we published the book.
The episode end with a powerful reading of Maurice Carlos Ruffin’s forword to Waffle House Vistas. You don’t want to miss it!
https://bittersoutherner.com/podcast/season-two-episode-five
Order Up! Waffle House Vistas is Now a Book!
2019 was an incredible year! And the team at The Bitter Southerner and I are capped it off by releasing Waffle House Vistas as a hardcover book.
The book, designed by the amazing Dave Whitling, collects the entire Waffle House Vistas project - over 40 photographs - and includes new essays by New Orleans novelist Maurice Carlos Ruffin and North Carolina writer Laura Bullard. I’m thrilled that these two talented and brilliant individuals were willing to add their distinct voices and perspectives to this book. My original essay from March 2019 is updated an reprinted, allowing may thoughts and experience to better color all of the photographs instead of the ten that were featured in the original Bitter Southerner piece.
You can purchase your copy EXCLUSIVELY at The Bitter Southerner. Your purchase supports not only my work, but also the incredible storytelling found at The Bitter Southerner. We’re incredibly proud of this book.
Waffle House Vistas at The Mint Museum
Three photographs from Waffle House Vistas are included in the Mint Museum’s Coined in the South exhibition.
Featuring the work of over 40 artists from across the southeast, the purpose of the show is simple: to bridge the gap between the museum, the gallery, and the studio and to showcase fresh and innovative works that have not yet been seen by a broader audience.
October 10, 2019 - February 16, 2020
Opening reception October 10 from 7-9pm
Be sure to check this one out! I’m thrilled to have my work in conversation with so many incredible artists, many of whom I’ve known for a number of years! You don’t want to miss it!
Store #1449: Calvert City, Kentucky
Store #604: West Memphis, Arkansas
Store #1912: Mobile, Alabama
Waffle House Vistas at UNC Charlotte
The first solo exhibition of Waffle House Vistas is currently on view at UNC Charlotte! I’m thrilled to have this work at an institution that means so much to me - I taught there for two years and my wife teaches for the Cato College of Education.
The exhibition looks incredible and the photographs are installed in a way that immerses the viewer into the project rather than emphasizes individual images.
The public reception is Thursday, August 29 from 6-8 pm with an artist talk around 6:30pm - hope to see you there!
Waffle House Vistas
Storrs Gallery at UNC Charlotte
August 8 - September 20
Public Reception: August 29, 6-8 pm
Artist Talk at 6:30pm
Store #1655: Monroe, North Carolina. Archival pigment print, 24 x 36 inches.
Waffle House Vistas at ArtFields
You have one week to check out five photographs from Waffle House Vistas!
I’m honored to be included in this year’s ArtFields festival in Lake City, South Carolina - it is always a wonderful experience and the ArtFields team does an amazing job. Do yourself a favor and get to Lake City by this Saturday and see a tremendous amount of excellent art!
My contribution to this year’s festival can be found in The Jones-Carter Gallery.
Selections from Waffle House Vistas - ArtFields
Waffle House Vistas published in The Bitter Southerner
If you haven’t had an opportunity to check out The Bitter Southerner’s feature about Waffle House Vistas, please do so. You can catch it HERE.
I am incredibly honored to have the BS team debut this project. Ten photographs from the series are paired with an essay I wrote that discusses why I chose to create this work and what I experienced along the way.
Let me know what you think. This won’t be the last you’ll see or hear about Waffle House Vistas, so stay tuned - we’re just getting started!
Store #1449: Calvert City, Kentucky
From The Bitter Southerner’s collection of featured articles, Look Away:
Since our beginnings, we’ve welcomed the contributions of photographers who were ambitious and adventurous enough to use their cameras to search for deeper meaning. Our first contribution from Micah Cash came several years ago. Called “Dangerous Waters,” it was a series of photographs chronicling the public works projects of the Tennessee Valley Authority, whose dams brought electricity to the rural South but sacrificed the homes, land, and ways of life of people whose communities now lie beneath the lakes created by those dams.
Late last year, Micah called to let us know of a new project. He had traveled across seven Southern states and visited about 60 Waffle Houses to photograph the environments around them from inside them. He stuck to his own rules and made photographs only from the table or counter-stool where he was having coffee.
The resulting story could have a simple, heartfelt tribute to these little diners where Southerners have consumed millions of waffles and eggs, where “scattered, smothered, and covered” is a completely familiar order with no mystery to it at all. Micah instead looked deeper and made us see how a Waffle House offers the best view of the modern South as it really is.
“Waffle House is the stage for the country we live in,” Micah wrote. “There was approximately a 50/50 ratio of women to men, and no obvious age range. It’s everybody from high schoolers to parents with babies to the elderly. As a whole, the ability for the local culture of a place to exist within the walls of a pervasive fast food restaurant is amazing.” For the folks who read his essay and studied his photographs, their next trip to a Waffle House will have deeper meaning.
<REPLY> exhibition at Hodges Taylor
<REPLY>
Amy Herman + Micah Cash
March 1 - May 10
Hodges Taylor
Opening Reception with the artists: March 1, 6 - 8 p.m.
Every Friday for twenty-four weeks Amy Herman and I sent each other a photograph in response to an earlier exchanged image. <REPLY> presents these photographs and the non-linear visual conversation that formed. Each image has two authors and could not exist without those made before.
This is a collaborative exhibition of forty brand new photographs and we're excited to present this project publicly for the first time.
Check out the Facebook event and let us know that you'll be there!
selected photographs from can i have more time, 2018.
selected photographs from and then you left, 2018.
Regional Artist Project Grant
I'm happy to announce that I was awarded a 2019 Regional Artist Project Grant last month to complete a new project documenting historic fishery locations in the Albemarle Sound. I'll be working with my friend Marguerite Roby, a photo archivist at the Smithsonian Institution, and we will be researching locations featured in a collection of glass negatives the Smithsonian made in the late 19th Century.
Here is lovely write-up from the Independent Tribune about my work and the grant.
You can also read the grant announcement from the Arts & Science Council and see some of the other amazing artists from the Charlotte area who received awards.
Winter 2019 Newsletter
I’m making a serious effort to send out quarterly newsletters this year, and I’m happy to say that my latest one hit inboxes last week.
Check it out HERE.
Winter updates include:
My upcoming exhibition at Hodges Taylor with Amy Herman.
Waffle House Vistas at the Ogden Museum of Art in New Orleans, Louisiana
Being awarded a Regional Artist Project Grant from the Arts & Science Council
If you want to get email from me, you can sign up on the ABOUT page.
PhotoNOLA
I am excited to be included in this year’s Currents exhibition at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art as part of PhotoNOLA.
This will be the exhibition debut of Waffle House Vistas - a project I’ve been working hard on for the past six months! Five prints from the series will be included. I’m honored to have work alongside so many wonderful artists.
If you’re in the area, please swing by check them out. I will be at the opening reception Friday, December 14 - I look forward to seeing you!
You can check out the artists HERE. Info on the exhibition is below.
CURRENTS 2018: New Orleans Photo Alliance Members Showcase
December 6, 2018 – February 15, 2019
Opening: Friday, Dec 14, 5-7pm
Juror’s Talk with Anjuli Lebowitz: Dec 14, 5:30pm
925 Camp Street
New Orleans, LA 70130
504-539-9600
Hours: Wed-Mon 10am-5pm; plus Ogden After Hours, Thurs 6-8pm
CURRENTS is an annual exhibition which highlights the diverse photographic work being created by New Orleans Photo Alliance members. Established in 2009, CURRENTS was designed as a showcase exhibition, featuring multiple images per selected photographer, to offer an overview of contemporary photographic practices and projects. For the 10th annual CURRENTS exhibition, Anjuli Lebowitz of the National Gallery of Art selected work by 13 artists. Featuring:
Gary Burnley | Micah Cash | Francis Crisafio | Benjamin Dimmitt | Rich Frishman | Sarah Hoskins | Daniela Leal | Ryan Lips | Christine Osinski | Donna Pinckley | Jared Ragland & Cary Norton | Adair Rutledge | Jenny Sampson
Store #604: West Memphis, Arkansas (from the series Waffle House Vistas)
Fall e-newsletter is out!
Here is a link to my fall newsletter:
https://mailchi.mp/46419934a585/studio-updates-fall-2018
I talk about the anniversary of the Dangerous Waters book, my 2017 social media print sale, and some upcoming projects that I’m particularly excited about.
Feel free to sign up for emails if you’d like to receive periodic updates from me about what’s going on.
Exhibition in Hendersonville, NC, through July 14
If you find yourself driving through Hendersonville, North Carolina this summer, please swing by Crate Project. It is a lovely contemporary art gallery nestled next to a wine store - a perfect alternative art space that supports research-based artists.
I'm thrilled to have a selection of Dangerous Waters prints on view through July 14.
The closing reception will be the afternoon of July 14 and I'll be in attendance to give a brief talk and sign some books.
Dangerous Waters Exhibition (Charlotte, NC)
My most recent exhibition, Dangerous Waters, was held in Charlotte, North Carolina, at C3 Lab. The exhibition included 40 photographs from the book. The photographs, all signed and editioned, were installed in sequence and grouped according to the four sections of project: Northeastern Tributaries, Southeastern Tributaries, Central and Western Reservations, and the Tennessee River.
The installation included a wooden map made by furniture designer and woodworker Jeffrey Barninger and an eight foot Dangerous Waters sign created by Barninger and ACSM's Glen Nocik.
This exhibition is ready to travel and will be installed again in June 2018 at Crate Project in Hendersonville, NC.
Dangerous Waters, C3 Lab (Charlotte, NC). December 2017.
Dangerous Waters, C3 Lab (Charlotte, NC). December 2017.