Dear Readers:

It has been some time since my last substantive post. I've had a lot of questions about the value of Fugitive Vision and of blogs in general, so there's been a bit of a moratorium on my contributions here. But I'm at the front end of the kind of trip that inspired Fugitive Vision in the first place; an art excursion that touches spots that many are unable to see themselves. Starting at the opening week of the Month of Photography Festival in Bratislava, I travel in a large counter-clockwise circle touching Warsaw, Poznan, and Berlin before finishing with a week at Paris Photo. It seemed a good time to start the dialogue once again. But before I start my Bratislava report, I'd like to share a few thoughts and questions about the blog itself.

I've spoken with a few of you about why you read Fugitive Vision, but I've failed to come away with a distinct sense of who my readers are and why they visit the site. There's so much content out there, so much information fighting for screentime, what makes Fugitive Vision a destination for you? Ferdinand Brüggemann, of Priska Pasquer gallery says he only posts a few times a year because he views his blog as a kind of archive. He knows that when the artists he writes about come up in searches, people find his blog. As opposed to Twitter and Facebook -- which he characterizes correctly as writing that has, at most, a 24 hour lifespan -- a blog post lives in search engines long after its original publication. Perhaps this is the answer for me. I've noticed that my "hits" numbers don't change much no matter how much or little I post. So perhaps a regular contribution doesn't really add much to the site. Should I email a reader list when I do a new post? Should I only post on, for example, the first day of the month so you know when to check the site? I don't want this site to be an onanistic enterprise (as most blogs are), and I really began to question my goals in writing here.

So I turn the question over to you, dear readers. Please post your comments here telling me what you can about what makes Fugitive Vision useful for you or what you'd like to see in the future. If I can read a consensus in the responses, that will be my path for the future. I'm eager for your input. If you don't want to write publicly or navigate the Blogspot spam filter, you can write to me directly at emirapaul@gmail.com. With luck, the address won't get trampled by spam after I've posted it in an open forum.

Coming soon, a report from Bratislava. I'll post 3-5 entries about this trip after which I trust I'll have some responses from this post. From there, we'll see........