I became interested in tornadoes and whirlwinds at a very early age- in church, sitting between my parents on a hard pew with nothing to read but the Bible. Genesis is an interesting epic. Job has terrific parts in it, including when God himself shows up in a whirlwind to godsplain to Job how things work. It really impressed me. God in a whirlwind.

My work flow for this batch of images is as follows:

1. An idea appears.

2. Figure out how to make it happen on film.

3. Fail a few times.

4. Get an image.

5. Move on.

I've made tornadoes full of bones, puzzle pieces, dice, mirror shards, leaves, flowers, flames, Cicada wings, moons, and in jars of water. There are about 35 images...with a few late arrivals still at the door. No electronics, just myself and an ancient 8X10 in a tiny studio. The first complete show of this is up at Angelo State University, continuing to Longview Museum of art.

Not to be too chatty but when I became a Guggenheim Fellow my first thought was that I would never have to frame a piece of my own art....ever again. Instead, I made every frame for this show and a few others. These are in four image folding frames and a couple doublet frames. Plus singles from 16 X 20 to 30 X 40. These are printed as contact silver or Cyanotype and as enlarged silver prints and really enlarged inkjet prints.

A few decades after church and before now I was crossing a country field on foot as a dust devil entered the other end. I figured it might be my chance to get in a whirlwind and see if God resided there. I shed my daypack and sprinted out to meet it. Inside was full of dirt and wind. I squinted my eyes in the whirling grit and shielded my face with my hands, just barely following the footprint in the grass in fits and starts as it tracked across the field. Finally it jumped a fence and left me, dirt down my collar, on my face, hat gone, spitting and wiping eyes.

When I got them open I was shocked to be covered by hundreds and hundreds of all sizes....of grasshoppers.

When you are admitted to the Guggenheim Fellowship, they have a little reception in NY that you can attend. No spouses, no significant others, no pets, just a room of newly minted Guggenheim smart folks. I didn't know one other person. About 120 of us, all fields, mixed together trying not to be too early or too fashionably late. I rode the elevator up and in the lobby was confronted with a table of nametags. Seemingly in random order. A beaming woman supervised. Of course, I couldn't make heads or tails.

"Are these in alphabetical order or by specialty..." I ventured..

"Who are you?" she demanded.

"I'm Robert Langham from Tyler, Texas."

Two index fingers on two outstretched arms were instantly pointed at my face.

"Light....having sex in the desert!!!" she exclaimed. "You nearly got in last year with those lovely tornadoes but we thought we'd wait one...more year. We love this portfolio!"

I guess. I'd given up photographing rocks and trees and moss and started just photographing the light out West. It's th polar opposite of still life, searching instead of building out ideas, but once I figured that out, it all just kind of fell together.