Tag Archives: Trees

MARCH 22, 2015

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7 in 1:

Announcement: I have to try an experiment this week. I am in the middle of preparing a set of 4, 20 foot high, 3 sided, triangular columns for the EXPO 2015 World’s Fair in Milan, which opens in 5 weeks. I have been given a whole Pavilion to install these works in. The theme of the Fair is “Feed the Planet,” and my Pavilion is dedicated to Cereals and Grains which translates, to me, as ‘Bread.’ So I have made 75 portraits of bread from all over Italy. These will be stacked on Totem-like columns. So I must, starting this week, post a weeks worth of my one-a-day images all at once, while I dedicate myself to finishing the work on the pavilion.

The week that I made these images took me to Lourmarin, near Bonnieux, and Bonnieux itself, then Paris, and after Paris on the TGV to Deauville, where Maggie and I were asked to do a commission about the town in Summer, but once we saw the place, we decided that it wasn’t something we were interested in doing, so back to Bonnieux we went.

I had the sense that the dogs in Lourmain (3/22) were ‘getting acquainted,’ and that these rituals are an interesting thing to consider, maybe even as a subject for a body of work. We see this in human beings all the time in the dance we do, the gestures we make, the knowing looks sent back and forth between people are all part of our subtle communication. Sometimes themes and ideas spring from surprising sources.

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The power of the tree in the landscape at this time of year is rich with suggestive force. The small shocks I get from these relationships of trees to the whole space never cease to please me and open me up to considering what makes a landscape photograph. Even with such minimal conditions as these something comes into play. That fountain-like tree in the distance and the groin of the tree in the foreground spoke to me of needs and surges that all nature’s things can express.

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In Paris (3/25-26) it’s always the parks and boulevards for me, where life is at its most Parisian and something always comes along, both the expected and unexpected. And lovers have arguments as well as making up, and an argument in public is an observable intimacy of the unguarded moment. Then, on a visit to the Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation, to see a great show of Howard Greenberg’s private collection, I found myself looking out the Foundation’s window at a scene that the master himself might have looked at, although this image certainly isn’t worthy of him. Nonetheless, the activity in the schoolyard below changed every few seconds and was fun to look at when seen with the running figure on the wall above the window. Later, while passing a shop, I saw this amazing 4 fingered glove. Eerie and mysterious, as well as a strong image all on its own, I asked the owner if I could buy it for my still life collection of objects with that kind of power. No deal she said! So, it’s just a memory now.

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(3/27) At 120 miles an hour on the TGV, things come and go in the blink of a second, yet every once in a while something lovely is revealed, plucked by speed itself. Here! and Gone! And all I have is the camera’s 1000th of a second to save it from oblivion.

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(3/28) The beach at Deauville, while wide and clean, had behind it a town that was developed by rich Parisian merchants early in the 20th century. It was a holiday town for the well to do who wanted to get out of Paris, and as such it had no history, and it shows it now. After 30 minutes of walking around Maggie and I were dispirited and longing to get back on the train and head for Bonnieux. Yet the red, white and blue of the beach on that second day of spring, bitter as it was, did bring a moment of longing for those sweet summer days by the sea.

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MARCH 21, 2015

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Notes in Passing:

Some days strange things come my way. A large boot made out of wax, oversized apples on a roundabout, a strange tree, and a woman looking at the passing scene. All notes in passing. And there were more, but one picture a day was my method and I have overdone it today.

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MARCH 13, 2015

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Glorious Monster

The French are brutal pruners of their trees in springtime. Not that I know much about the methods of pruners and what is right or not, although I am sure they are right since the trees live long and look healthy and produce well. This glorious monster had caught my eye countless times as I drove past, making my head snap to attention to catch a glimpse of its wild crown of thorns as I whizzed past.

On this day I had to stop. The tree had been given a Mohawk that really was fantastic to look at. I parked at roadside and waltzed around it for the 10 minutes or so it took to try and see where the image was at its best; where it sang its song, danced its dance, came into focus as an image as well as being just the tree itself. These exercises in limited situations (I couldn’t get behind it as the gate was locked) are fun to experience because they test one’s patience, inventiveness, and character.

Here it stands in all its grandeur, yet humiliated by the crappy sign, fence, and surroundings. I gave it all my attention but couldn’t rescue it from its fate.

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MARCH 12, 2015

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Monuments

Years ago when I was on a Guggenheim Fellowship grant I  toured America looking at the way Americans were living while we were in the middle of the Vietnam war. I was also interested in the way we were spending our leisure time, and how the culture was reflected in our monuments and tourist attractions, and I was curious about a lot of other attitudes of that period.

One of the things i noticed was that a lot of our military junk was finding its way into playgrounds, civic spaces, and intersections on highways, to name a few places. Old fighter jets, and missile launchers, armored cars and tanks, the rusting leftovers of the military-industrail complex that Eisenhower warned us against. What I seldom saw was the kind of memorial that The Great Wars of the 20th century produced, those valiant figures helping a fallen comrade, or standing firm against the onslaught, or looking toward the future with some degree of resilience and hope.

When I see these European monuments in small towns all over France I feel the tenderness that those losses addressed. Millions of young men were slaughtered by the incompetence of their war making leaders and the politics of their era. I find it hard to pass these empty plazas and not stop for a moment to read some names, take into account the ages of the dead, be surprised at how many were killed from some of these tiny villages.

On a day when the winter is giving up its bitter edge, human folly still shows its tragic face.

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MARCH 11, 2015

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Playmates

It was one of those spring days where everything seemed to be popping. Radiant greens along sun-warmed banks and walls, tiny buds pushing out of branch ends, grape vines beginning to look like miniature candelabras, a joyous day where I was aware of trees in a way that winter made me forget. When I stop to look at each tree individually their complexity and magnitude become astonishing, even trees that at first don’t seem to be worth the look, but then grab my attention because of where they are growing and what trials they had to overcome to survive.

I have probably photographed hundreds of trees in my life as a photographer, and none of them are just a ‘generic’ tree to me. They seem to me to be more like portraits of creatures who are extravagant in their proportions, structure, overall form, and, in season, their foliage. None of them are asking to be seen or photographed, but when I stand in their space I often get their message.

Here are some trees I encountered along the way, and what they suggested I do if I wanted to play with them, or watch as Maggie did.

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Maggie 4 trees

FEBRUARY 27, 2015

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License To see

It breaks my heart every time I see a tree cut down in a town. This one was hollow to the core as I learned when I walked around it. But first I stood there for awhile – it was market day and I had bags full of winter greens and root vegetables that I was happy to put down – leaving me free to contemplate the body of the tree and the emotions that came and went.

Then the woman in the beret walked by, and for some reason a figure entering the frame made me think that it would take about 8 people her size to equal to the mass of the trunk of that tree, that is if you stacked them up like cordwood. Not a pleasant thought but one that came to mind momentarily, as these things sometimes do..

Part of the pleasure of photographing is the amount of speculation that races along in my mind when I am out in the world. Carrying a camera is like having a license to see, and also to think about the unexpected ideas that rise up in relation to wherever I find myself. I have always said that photography – even though it is made of images – is really about ideas. Our ideas about who we are, what we feel, what things move each of us to raise the camera and acknowledge any given instant, as if it is only we who can see this. And it is!

I feel that photography, even though the format is exactly the same for billions of people around the world, gives us a chance to say something about what we see in a truly individual way. We just have to figure out who we are so our identity comes through clearly. Photography can help to do that!

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FEBRUARY 23, 2015

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Hodge Podge

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Sometimes a crazy, meaningless collection of objects, spaces, colors, light, and actions all come into play at once, and from it might come the call to pay attention to this hodge podge of stuff in front of us. I think hodge podge comes from an old Dutch or French word meaning a soup made from whatever was left lying around, probably meaning a hot pot, or something like that. In Amsterdam I once saw a Dutch historical painting where there was a hot pot made for the masses who were celebrating the Spanish defeat, or something like that. Anyway, as we know, sometimes a mess of a stew can be delicious!

And although this frame isn’t exactly delicious, it is interesting to me just how much it continues to hold its own and make me want to look at it again. A little uncertainty is useful sometimes as it presses the argument. First, there’s the sculpted figure on a marble block about the same size as that car, (not to mention that the figure seems to be an early prototype of the model draped over the car hood to show its curves, just look at that head and chest) and then around her head is the corona of the tree’s limbs which, when seen in relation to the crane’s beam and the lines to the light poles, both fill and fracture the space in provocative ways. And there is an interesting ‘read’ to the overall space through the way the figures – statue/car/couple – diminish on an angle all their own. I would bet that were I to print this at 60 inches the image would invite us to look harder and pay us back with interest.

It’s open-ended pictures like this that I believe help refine our sensibilities and enable us, in fact, urge us, to look more thoughtfully at all the spaces and moments we pass through. Let’s accept that there is nothing much going on here of note, but that it still has some kind of pull in spite of that shortcoming. I would rather make a flawed, but interesting to consider photograph, than a more successful image that uses conventional forms to tell its tale.

 

FEBRUARY 20, 2015

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Never Say No

There are roads in Provence that can break your heart. This road near the town of St. Remy is one I have traveled almost every time I come to the region, and in fact it is so moving to me that I published two pictures made along its course in our book,”Provence: Lasting Impressions”. In those images the trees are leafed out in the fulness of summer, and again when fall burnished their leaves a rusty gold.

Now, on a wintry day, with flawless sunlight etching every detail into my eye, the white bones of the trees are singing against the blue dome of the sky. I’m not stopping – as I have done before, to dance in the middle of the road and play in the oncoming traffic –  but I’m driving straight through and letting the windshield be my frame while the miles of trees fill and empty it as I pass.

I love this road and how I feel whenever I am on it. It always feels new to me, and yet it touches an ancient nerve where the definition of ‘road beauty’ lies in wait to be awakened once again. I remain susceptible to these quirks of mine and never fail to respond even if it seems as if I have had enough of them to last a lifetime. And I may have. But I believe in letting loose the arrows in my quiver whenever the impulse arises. That gesture, that Yes!, is my tipping of the hat to the spirits that have guided me to respond to the world for more than 50 years, and I never say no.

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FEBRUARY 17, 2015

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Show Me The Way

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A beautiful day for a walk through the fields of Provence. Here they let travelers and hikers cut across what we think of as private property, as long as you are respectful of the vineyards and orchards, which are the main crops of this fruitful valley, it’s fine with landowners. They must have been pruning the vineyards recently because I came across piles of vines like these everywhere, and while there were hundreds to choose from these two had a quality and form that spoke to me. And besides, I had to carry them for a couple of miles, so they had the right heft.

I was thinking they may work in a still life somehow, but as yet I have no idea what role they’ll play or how I’ll use them. Might just be for firewood in the long run. Who knows? When I got back I placed them on the terrace floor and just looked at them. Sometimes the quiet study of what I have in front of me sends sparks through my mind, which, given room to catch fire, can send me on flights of imagery; aimless, loose, sometimes insightful, and even more often not connected to anything I’m involved in, which is the best I can hope for since it may open a door not yet known.

The light was gorgeous, but on the wane, so I carried the vine around like Liberace with a candelabra, looking for a place to see it separate from the other vine, and not as a still life object. This is not something I have ever spent time doing before. My photographic stance has always been; “the world gives, I receive,” don’t touch a thing! But this year abroad, and the making of some recent still lives, has allowed me – in some cases – to play in ways I never have before. Where it’s all leading I don’t know.

I’m just letting photography show me the way.

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FEBRUARY 16, 2015

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Proof of Interest

For many years now I have seen dispossessed chairs hanging out wherever chance has tossed them, like old souls left on their own after a long and faithful service. Like us they have backs and arms and legs and feet and definitely bottoms, some even have a head of sorts. All of which, in some way, may make them so compelling. I have also photographed chairs within more noble or comfortable circumstances; thrones, Cardinal’s chairs, cushy corporate ones, and in nearly every imaginable location.

In fact, during my time working inside Ground Zero, one of the most surprising first sights was the unbelievable numbers of chairs that had been thrown from the buildings and remained intact upon landing! These chairs became the bleachers from which the exhausted rescue and recovery workers watched the amazing daily drama while taking their breaks. Every chair you might conceive of, from the most elegant to the most humble, found its way back to being useful once again.

How did I begin to notice ‘chairs’ as a subject? If I remember correctly it was while working on the light box (remember the light box?) when one day, while I was editing for something else, I noticed some funny chair pictures and tossed them to the top of the box, and then as others appeared I found myself becoming aware that this was a theme that I had not really known I was interested in. But the proof of interest was in the pictures that were appearing. And so I began looking out for them while editing and being more aware of them while out on the street.

I believe that it’s important to be open to the suggestive impulses that emerge, either from the world, or out of the work, for these clues have in them the clearest indication of our natural, instinctive responses, our identity even, and also some sense of the consciousness we may be overlooking when we act in more premeditated ways.

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