Tasty. Gotta see this. I'm a believer that the witness of beauty is one of humankind's best endeavors, and here's somebody witnessing where he finds it, in all its contradictions.
That clear-cutting photo reminds me of the scenes in David Lowery's recent The Green Knight adaptation: Gawain cuts across a blasted field of felled trees, uprooted stumps, & the rotting corpses of soldiers — and here you realize King Arthur's words to his knights are indeed true: (highly paraphrased) "You have fought my wars & changed the land itself for us."
Nicely done. I didn’t know anything about Robert Adams’ work. Apropos the stump photo, my younger self’s unwarranted assumption that beauty and ugliness were objective realities was upended on a hike in the Marble Mountains of Northern California. Where the trail topped out there was a Visitors Log. I meant to make a comment about the wonder I felt in that old growth forest but was brought up short by the most recent entry. Someone in a family group noted they had come the day before and wrote, “The clear cut on the west side of the valley is beautiful.” You could indeed pick out the brown scar on a distant mountain. Given the many families in the area that sent loggers into the woods, I guess “beauty” includes “cash in hand” for that commentator.
I've always been skeptical when I hear people who live in flat, featureless places go on about the majesty of the sky, or the light, in their home-place as being something special. Hell, it's the same sky everybody else has, it's just in other places people have something to look at other than the damn sky.
“while the ocean fog may have been meant to look ominous”
Realtor: “Sure, some people think the cloud waves breaking along Lake Hali are ominous, but between you and me it’s the most desirable real estate in Carcosa.”
I generally don't have much interest in landscape photography either. For me, it's mostly because a photograph cannot even begin to convey the feeling of being out in the open, which includes all the senses, not just the visual. But when looking at pictures, the crucial thing for me is what I call the difference between a picture of a thing and a photograph. A picture of a thing is just that. A photograph, on the other hand, has layers of meaning that go far beyond the thing that is photographed. It sounds like that's why you like Adams. You are looking at photographs, not pictures of things.
Most landscapes we see are just pictures of things, but there are notable exceptions. In photography, two of the masters are Edward Burtynsky and Sebastião Salgado, so you might want to keep a lookout for any exhibition by either of them. I think you would find Salgado particularly fascinating. Salgado was one of the foremost people photographers in history, capturing horrific conditions in Brazilian mines and Saharan famines among other horrors. Then he apparently had enough of misery and set out to capture the disappearing natural world, resulting in an incredible work called Genesis. I don't know if D.C. has anything like the New York Public Library but if possible, maybe someday go and see Salgado's books. They are world class works of the bookmaking art on top of the incredible photography.
Regarding the Hudson Valley School, we differ on that. I think the best of those paintings are far beyond mere pictures of things and they are a huge influence on my outlook on light. But that's fine. There's so much out there to appreciate, none of us can get it all.
In those first few weeks of covid lockdown, when enough people were taking it seriously, I took some comfort in how quickly and noticeably the air became cleaner, and in how so many birds quickly grew comfortable enough to appear outside my city window. I had not realized the former buzz of the world had been making them uncomfortable, furtive. We need to stop fucking up, and I'm ready.
(Then, of course, I interact with a friend who will drive his SUV to grab a bag of chips and some guac, which he does not need. All the things we do not need... I've been walking to the store, I say. "This store is half a MILE," he says. Aka nine minutes of mild exercise. I remember how in first grade we were taught it was amazing, it was a startling insight into his unique, impossible, alien character, that Abe Lincoln once walked five miles to give a lady her money. I was six, and already being taught that walking is incomprehensible. The gods alone do it.)
Circling back just to gloat that my friend the retired NatGal cultural historian just gave me the curation text and gallery map and lending institution details and a copy of the NatGal coffee table catalog/doorstop/book.
Tasty. Gotta see this. I'm a believer that the witness of beauty is one of humankind's best endeavors, and here's somebody witnessing where he finds it, in all its contradictions.
Wow - agog at this (& Magog too...)
That clear-cutting photo reminds me of the scenes in David Lowery's recent The Green Knight adaptation: Gawain cuts across a blasted field of felled trees, uprooted stumps, & the rotting corpses of soldiers — and here you realize King Arthur's words to his knights are indeed true: (highly paraphrased) "You have fought my wars & changed the land itself for us."
"a carnival ride at night gleaming like a fluorescent jellyfish"
This new month is barely 7 hours old and I got my 7 Bucks worth!
On one hand there is the honest insightful criticism /comment on art, film, music, literature. On the other, brutal takedowns of Republican assholes.
This is truly a full service substack.
Nicely done. I didn’t know anything about Robert Adams’ work. Apropos the stump photo, my younger self’s unwarranted assumption that beauty and ugliness were objective realities was upended on a hike in the Marble Mountains of Northern California. Where the trail topped out there was a Visitors Log. I meant to make a comment about the wonder I felt in that old growth forest but was brought up short by the most recent entry. Someone in a family group noted they had come the day before and wrote, “The clear cut on the west side of the valley is beautiful.” You could indeed pick out the brown scar on a distant mountain. Given the many families in the area that sent loggers into the woods, I guess “beauty” includes “cash in hand” for that commentator.
“After people live awhile in a place to which they've laid waste, it gets to be easy to hate a great many things.”
Jesus, that's heavy. Not sure"place" has to geographical to work but could be metaphysical, emotional, whatever, everywhere.
Always a treat when you write on the arts. Your final sentence is worth a year's subscription!
I've always been skeptical when I hear people who live in flat, featureless places go on about the majesty of the sky, or the light, in their home-place as being something special. Hell, it's the same sky everybody else has, it's just in other places people have something to look at other than the damn sky.
“while the ocean fog may have been meant to look ominous”
Realtor: “Sure, some people think the cloud waves breaking along Lake Hali are ominous, but between you and me it’s the most desirable real estate in Carcosa.”
I generally don't have much interest in landscape photography either. For me, it's mostly because a photograph cannot even begin to convey the feeling of being out in the open, which includes all the senses, not just the visual. But when looking at pictures, the crucial thing for me is what I call the difference between a picture of a thing and a photograph. A picture of a thing is just that. A photograph, on the other hand, has layers of meaning that go far beyond the thing that is photographed. It sounds like that's why you like Adams. You are looking at photographs, not pictures of things.
Most landscapes we see are just pictures of things, but there are notable exceptions. In photography, two of the masters are Edward Burtynsky and Sebastião Salgado, so you might want to keep a lookout for any exhibition by either of them. I think you would find Salgado particularly fascinating. Salgado was one of the foremost people photographers in history, capturing horrific conditions in Brazilian mines and Saharan famines among other horrors. Then he apparently had enough of misery and set out to capture the disappearing natural world, resulting in an incredible work called Genesis. I don't know if D.C. has anything like the New York Public Library but if possible, maybe someday go and see Salgado's books. They are world class works of the bookmaking art on top of the incredible photography.
Regarding the Hudson Valley School, we differ on that. I think the best of those paintings are far beyond mere pictures of things and they are a huge influence on my outlook on light. But that's fine. There's so much out there to appreciate, none of us can get it all.
In those first few weeks of covid lockdown, when enough people were taking it seriously, I took some comfort in how quickly and noticeably the air became cleaner, and in how so many birds quickly grew comfortable enough to appear outside my city window. I had not realized the former buzz of the world had been making them uncomfortable, furtive. We need to stop fucking up, and I'm ready.
(Then, of course, I interact with a friend who will drive his SUV to grab a bag of chips and some guac, which he does not need. All the things we do not need... I've been walking to the store, I say. "This store is half a MILE," he says. Aka nine minutes of mild exercise. I remember how in first grade we were taught it was amazing, it was a startling insight into his unique, impossible, alien character, that Abe Lincoln once walked five miles to give a lady her money. I was six, and already being taught that walking is incomprehensible. The gods alone do it.)
That's a complicated final sentence but it sure pays off.
Circling back just to gloat that my friend the retired NatGal cultural historian just gave me the curation text and gallery map and lending institution details and a copy of the NatGal coffee table catalog/doorstop/book.
She's a pal!