The Online Photographer

A Chance Encounter

Walker Evans, A Graveyard and Steel Mill in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, November, 1935

Words and portrait by James Sherwood

Six years ago, my wife Shirley True and I were photographing in Eastern Pennsylvania. Upon deciding to check out Bethlehem, I suggested we look for the cemetery where Walker Evans made his iconic 1930s image [above]. Found it, but the large white cross was gone. After we surveyed the place for about an hour, we came upon this older couple sitting on a low stone wall up high on the hill.

As I approached them, perhaps fifteen feet away, I said, "are you Robert Frank?" He nodded and said, "yes" in a soft voice. His wife, artist June Leaf, was sitting beside him. They were on a road trip to North Carolina and decided to stop for a picnic lunch in this special place. We chatted briefly and snapped some pictures.

James Sherwood, Robert Frank and June Leaf, Bethlehem Cemetery

As lifelong photographers, neither Shirley nor I had ever experienced such a powerful, miraculous event. As our colleague Mark Power put it, "Searching for one great photographer and finding another." Needless to say, the relationship between Evans and Frank was significant in the course of history. They are certainly two of the most influential photographers in our lives.

Still gives me chills.

Jim

Old friend Jim Sherwood was once my boss at a photo studio, and his wife Shirley was one of my teachers at the Corcoran School of Art. Here's Jim's Facebook page. —Ed.

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Open Mike: What Danielle Jackson's Artnet Review Tells Us About What the Whitney Biennial Tells Us About the Future of Photography—and the Reviewers and Curators and Academicians Who Will Shape the Artists Who Will Shape It*

"Can we all just get along? Can we get along?"

—Rodney King

I've always thought that "political correctness" (PC) was for the most part a shibboleth, a cudgel fashioned by the political right for its own ends. The first four paragraphs of the Wikipedia article about it have it about right; the pull-quote might be, "in public discourse and the media, [PC] is generally used as a pejorative, implying that these policies are excessive or unwarranted," a sentence girded by no fewer than seven footnotes. An article I read in Harper's when I was visiting my liberal mother and Harvard-professor stepfather in 2016 makes the point that examples of political correctness on the left are catalogued and prized by conservatives and conservative media because it's an issue that plays so reliably to their base.

However, one problem with that contention, a thorn in its side you might say, is that there's no question political correctness exists. Excessive and unwarranted political correctness, I mean, not just people trying to be fair and considerate to others.

If you want a fascinating example, peruse Danielle Jackson's article "What the Whitney Biennial Tells Us About the Future of Photography—and the Artists Who Will Shape It" on Artnet. It struck me as a review written from the perspective of political correctness about a show that appears to be mainly about political correctness.

Both the artists and the curators of this year's Biennial come from a carefully calibrated mix of "historically marginalized group[s]," and much of the art is accepted by the reviewer to comment on "identity politics," "codes in multiple layers," "the Museum's project of historicization," and so forth. The actual photographs in the show seem to be secondary to the positions they take on various political implications. Disappointment is registered that the work is not more overtly angry, among other things, and that the artists aren't "announcing identity so loudly." The reason, the review proposes, is that they're the new majority and are no longer outsiders. (Can anyone really be an outsider and be included in the Whitney Biennial? That's what I'd like to know.) "Though the photographs are made by artists who are queer, gender nonconforming, Asian, Latinx, or black, almost none of them discuss these cultures directly in their work," writes Jackson, with disapproval. "Looking back, I’ve also wondered if, in some ways, this is actually a post-identity show that has managed to be framed around identity politics simply based on who was included." Whew. That makes me need to go lie down.

I didn't even recognize some of the language in the review as traditional artspeak, which, oddly, is annoying and refreshing at the same time. The work is definitely "framed in relation to recent trends and jargon." Although I've seen it before I had to look up "Latinx," for example. It's a gender-neutral coinage for a person of Latin American origin that obviates the need for the gendered "Latino" and "Latina." (Has someone alerted the Filipinx?)

Does the art world, I wonder, really want to stake itself out as the home venue, ground zero, for the ever more fastidious expression of political correctness issues and themes? Because those are bound to be neverending, never mind also being a very limited and not very natural subject for art. Art is about personal expression, among other things, and it seems counterproductive on its face to dictate in advance what art must express. At any rate, what this review seems to tell us is that if you aren't up on your Yale-inculcated political identity and sexual identity semiotics then there are some art shows that you're not going to "get." In the case of the Whitney Biennial, that's apparently the subject, on every level.

Of course, I'm an older white male, so whatever I think about identity politics is irrelevant by definition anyway**.

Protest like it's 1989
The review made me think about another series of articles I read this past year, on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Mapplethorpe debacle at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington in June of 1989—which arguably ended up torpedoing that grand old institution (my alma mater) and sinking it with all the agonizing slowness of an aircraft carrier going down.

If you're not familiar with the Mapplethorpe flap, basically the Corcoran had scheduled a show by the homoerotic classicist photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, who at the time had just died of AIDS. Because the show was funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), various figures from the neoconservative movement, led by the reactionary archconservative Southern congressman Jesse Helms, seized on the exhibit as proof that the government was funding immorality and that, by extension, the NEA should therefore be abolished (along with, by further extension, every other nonessential government program).

The Flagg Building, appropriately beflagged. It was not known
by that name in 1989. Photo by Daderot [CC0].

The Corcoran bowed to the pressure and cancelled the show. The stated reason was that the institution wanted to remain above politics; instead, the Corcoran's cave-in resulted in a much bigger and even more intense storm of criticism from the other direction. A public protest organized by freelance curator Andrea Pollan and gallerist William Wooby featured Mapplethorpe's self-portrait projected on the side of the beaux arts Corcoran Gallery building (now known as the Flagg building***).

At the time, I was a recent graduate of the Corcoran School of Art (as it was called when I was there), and I once worked for Bill Wooby—I was his exhibition printer for the jazz photographs by Charles Peterson that Bill exhibited in his restaurant gallery and arranged to have shown at the Monterey Jazz Festival. I remember these events and many of the names involved. Pretty much everyone from every side was mad at the Corcoran for a while. "The gallery stood at the center of a firestorm of protest and controversy," writes Ruth Steinhardt in GWToday. "Fellow artists canceled D.C. shows in solidarity, gallery members withdrew their support and hundreds of protestors gathered in front of the Flagg Building, across from Ronald Reagan’s White House, to register their disapproval." The Director of the Corcoran who had cancelled the Mapplethorpe show, Christina Orr-Cahall, eventually resigned.

The whole imbroglio is as good a marker as any for the beginning of the end for the old Corcoran Gallery and School of Art, which, while it was still independent, was the largest independent art museum in Washington. But the Corcoran had became uncool. It slipped and slid downhill from then on and was dissolved, riddled with debt, in 2014. Its treasures now belong to the National Gallery of Art and the rest of its collections are flung to the wind, and the School, although it continues to exist under its own name, has been absorbed into George Washington University. As an alumninx, I've become a wanderer.

The Corcoran as it exists now is having a show about that show that never was. Called "6.13.89: The Cancelling of the Mapplethorpe Exhibition," it's an archival exhibit that documents the unfortunate events of the Summer of '89. It will be on view until October 6th in the atrium of the Flagg Building. The outgoing Director of the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design (as it is now called), Sanjit Sethi, is quoted in the GWToday article saying "The Corcoran suffered a significant fracture to its philosophical foundation." "As a museum dedicated to 'American genius,'" continues the article, "the Corcoran had in some ways betrayed itself by adopting a definition of genius that excluded marginalized communities."

This isn't going to stop us
You would think that one party, at least, would have been pleased by the cancellation of the show: Jesse Helms, the Senate crusader against government-funded obscenity. Not so. Kriston Capps, in the Washington Post, writes, "One of the very first outraged phone calls that [Director Christina] Orr-Cahall received was from Helms’s office. The senator was displeased that he would not have the opportunity to stump on a show that he considered to be liberal obscenity.

"'This isn't going to stop us. Your cancellation isn’t going to stop us,' Orr-Cahall says now, recalling what a Helms aide told her. 'Looking back, the Helms call, it was clearly the start of the culture wars.'"

There's political correctness in a nutshell from both sides, if you ask me. You'd think we could all just get along.

Mike

"6.13.89" is on view until Oct. 6th. Exhibition hours are Tuesday to Friday, 10 to 6, and weekends from 1 to 6, at the Flagg Building, 500 17th St. NW, Washington, D.C.

*This is TOP's longest-ever post title.

**Maybe I should start a movement for "individualist-identifiers"—those who are aggrieved that they're not being considered as individuals who might have non-identity-group-conforming thoughts, opinions, or values. We stage protests against people who insist on lumping us in with all the other idiots and boneheads who happen to look like us. I'm joking, that would never work.

***After its architect, Ernest Flagg, not Colonel Flagg from M.A.S.H. Frank Lloyd Wright considered it the most beautiful building in Washington...which was in part a poke against the neoclassical Greco-Roman public architecture for which Washington DC is far better known, but never mind.

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Featured Comments from:

Gordon Lewis: "Re: '"Though the photographs are made by artists who are queer, gender nonconforming, Asian, Latinx, or black, almost none of them discuss these cultures directly in their work," writes Jackson, with disapproval.' This is nothing new about this line of thought. I explored much the same idea in a Shutterfinger blog post years ago, under the title 'Am I Still a Black Photographer?' The question is/was, does being black and a photographer make me a 'black photographer,' or does it mean that my photographs center on visual expressions of the black experience? Personally, as long as white photographers can enjoy the luxury of not having to be labeled as such, I would prefer to enjoy the same luxury of not having arbitrary labels and expectations attached to me or my work."

Mike replies: Well said. You sound like another individualist-identifier.  :-) 

Robert Roaldi: "The Rebel Sell by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter has a lot to say about 'nonconformity' and 'outsiders.' The culture we live in absorbs all of this and packages it back to us as products to buy. It's easy to look at suburban streets and come to the superficial conclusion that all those people are leading 'Leave it to Beaver' lives, but it isn't actually true, is it? Many of them are wife swappers, they take various drugs, they watch a lot of porn, etc. We draw these imaginary lines between progressive and not, but even the most right-wing person in our culture probably thinks it's OK to marry for love, or that we should be able to work at whatever job we like, or that women should vote. Those ideas were rebellious not that long ago. PC culture can get silly, but lots of ideas at the fringe are silly. They get modified a lot before they migrate throughout society. It makes for interesting argumentation but it's not worth freaking out over, in my opinion."

Sanjeev Arora: "I went to the Whitney Biennial with visiting relatives from India, who are a.) not young b.) not well-versed in modern art (i.e., wouldn't be able to tell even a Picasso from a Mondrian) c.) definitely unaware of US identity politics. They enjoyed the show, so I guess the art has some innate appeal. So please do not fret too much."

John Krumm: "Well, I just listened to a podcast interview of the English professor who wrote the book Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism and it was pretty good.

"He talks about how critics have always viewed language as in part a political struggle for power. So corporations obscure bosses and what they do in new language, for instance. For the young, there is a struggle for power too. Asserting new gender neutral pronouns and other words can seem very off-putting to some people, but if you are involved with politically active young people, or have a kid around the right age, you get used to it. That's how it works. After a while, if they succeed, it's the new normal.

"Here's some information on the term Filipinx."

Mike replies: Damn, and I thought I thought of that.

Amin Abdollahzadeh: "Re: 'Does the art world, I wonder, really want to stake itself out as the home venue, ground zero, for the ever more fastidious expression of political correctness issues and themes?' Good Lord Michael! The adage about the ship having sailed does’t begin to cover it. It sailed, circumnavigated the world, its crew was ravaged by scurvy and succumbed to cannibalism, and finally limped back to port, a very long time ago."

Richard Parkin: "I thought the gender neutral term for Latinos/Latinas in English was 'Latins'  ;-).  "

Robert Roaldi: "In the intro to one of recent podcasts, Joe Rogan said (I am paraphrasing) 'Ladies and gentlemen and other people, including people who don't identify as people....' I thought that was pretty funny. Is it still OK to poke fun at things?"

Mark Roberts (and the PDML)

TOP reader and old photo-friend Mark Roberts stopped by Penn Yan for lunch today. He was en route to Rochester on a very red and swoopy motorcycle. I first met Mark in person years ago at Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina. Actually I "e-met" him long before that on the PDML, the Pentax-Discuss Mailing List, where he was one of the most measured, friendly and knowledgeable voices among that chorus of measured, friendly and knowledgeable voices.

I spoke at Grandfather Mountain, at the Camera Clinic, one of two summer PDML group gatherings at the landmark park. I always figured I didn't do a very good job—my talk, about "reification and redacting," was a little dry and short on entertainment—but Mark told me at lunch that some of my comments were part of the inspiration for the PDML Photo Annuals, printed collections of participants' pictures that the mailing group produces every year. That make me feel better. I got to look through three of the recent annuals, and it was both nice looking at so many fine pictures and also seeing names still familiar from my years on the PDML. Back issues are available, and sales benefit the Global Health Initiative of Boston Children's Hospital and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

The PDML is the nicest forum you'll ever hang out on, and I mean it. And I'll give you a little secret tip—don't tell anyone there I told you—you don't actually need to be shooting Pentax currently to participate. Some PDML denizens are people who just appreciate the low-key, accepting and courteous online community and are only Pentax sympathizers or former Pentax shooters. (You do have to use either a Pentax body or lens to get a picture into the Annual, however. Seems fair.)

As you can see from the picture of Mark, "former Pentax shooter" doesn't describe him. First time I've seen a real K-1 in person so to speak. There's a nice new 35mm lens for that camera, too, I learned just recently.

Anyway, if you'd like to join yourself or just test the waters, the address is PDML.net. It's a nice community.

Mark teaches Photoshop, among other arty and design-y subjects, at Lasell University in Newton, Massachussetts, and he's doing some fascinating and impressive work right now with blended and merged non-HDR HDR images. Good to see you again Mark!

Mike

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Ned Bunnell: "For those who don’t know Mark, he has some wonderful photographs on his Instagram account."

Stay Cool

An extensive heat wave is forecast over the Eastern US for the coming weekend. If for any reason you or a friend or relative gets overheated, remember that the bathtub is a good way to cool down when there aren't other options—a long soak in lukewarm or coolish water can give one's body a break in coping with overheating.

Drink lots of water and remember that only "mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun"!

That's Noel Coward, who also wrote a song called "Why Do the Wrong People Travel," some of the lyrics to which go like this:

Travel they say improves the mind,
An irritating platitude, which frankly, entrenous,
Is very far from true.

Personally I've yet to find that longitude and latitude
Can educate those scores of monumental bores
Who travel in groups and herds and troupes
Of varying breeds and sexes
Till the whole world reels...

To shouts and squeals...
And the clicking of Rolleiflexes.

And you were wondering how this post was going to circle back 'round to photography, weren't you? Stay cool.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Today's the Day

It's Prime Day—a day of blowout deals from Amazon for people who have Amazon Prime, obviously intended to get more people to sign up for Prime. There are many pages of deals and many hundreds of items on sale.

A few things I can personally recommend:

Dyson Animal Vacuum Cleaner: I've written about this awesome thing in the past, and after a number of years I'm still very satisfied with mine. It's a good buy at $600 in my opinion, but why not pay $350 instead?

A Vitamix: I wish all products were like the Vitamix, a throwback to the days when things were well made and had simple controls and worked superbly. Especially if you eat plants a lot, this is indispensable—I use mine every day and love it. Mine was a refurb too, like this one.

An Apple iPad: I've said this before, but of all my Apple devices, the iPad is the least crucial and the one I'm the most attached to. My favorite Apple thingy. Except that I'm always misplacing the danged thing. Another item I use every day and love.

A kneeling chair: I don't own one of these now (although I should), but they're useful if you have any problems with your spine. Also great for meditation if you're not limber enough to contort yourself into traditional postures. (This deal is upcoming—a number of the deals haven't started yet.)

DNA test: I thought this was absolutely fascinating and well worth the cost. Turns out I have loads of Scandinavian ancestry, but through Vikings who settled in Northeastern England a thousand years ago—which we've always counted as English. (How long do you have to live somewhere before you're no longer a newcomer, anyway?!) And I had no idea how or why I am 12% Spanish, but that's what my DNA says.

An Instant Pot: Makes pressure cooking super simple, and it's a breeze to clean up. I love mine and use it all the time. Many foods taste better cooked in the Instant Pot—it makes soups super easy, and makes melt-in-your-mouth potatoes and sweet potatoes. You can use it as a slow cooker and you can even sauté in it. It's another appliance I use constantly and appreciate. I'm an Instant Pot evangelist—I've sold about seven friends on them so far, and all of them love it too. Mine was a birthday gift from my dear departed ex-girlfriend S. of ambivalent memory, just to give credit where credit is due.

The Starch Solution: The best, most practical all-around diet and nutrition book of the 120+ I've browsed or perused in the past six years or so (yes, I've been a bit obsessed). It's the easiest to follow and most sensible of the "health first" programs. Highly recommended for people who are humans. (Oh, okay, I admit it, this actually isn't a Prime Day deal. I'm just sneaking it in. It's plenty cheap as a paperback or ebook in any event.)

And finally, Prime itself: I've been a Prime member for years and have been nothing but happy with it. You get free shipping on most Amazon purchases free books, music, videos, and lots more. A no-brainer if you shop at Amazon more than a handful of times in a year.

Disclaimer: I'm an Amazon Affiliate and when you click through these links you are putting some pennies in my pocket. Just so you are aware.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Featured Comments from:

Jim: "I'd love to hear more about how you use your Instant Pot in one of your OT posts. I got one a while back thinking it would be great for meaty winter stews and the like, but I've been eating a lot less meat, so not really getting much use out of it. If there are plant things it does well, it'd be great to hear about them!"

Mike replies: I'm not the guy to tell anyone about cooking, except perhaps talking to other clueless bachelors for purposes of commiseration.  :-)  So bear that in mind please! However, a staple of my diet are bean, lentil, chickpea, and split pea soups, which I normally make on Sundays and then eat throughout the week—I get six to eight meals out of each batch. The Instant Pot makes cooking these simple and fast, and cleanup is quick. I often use "heirloom" beans from Rancho Gordo.

I recommend having 4–6 recipes you like so you don't get tired of any one of them by fixing it too often. Here's one nice recipe that I like and that Xander liked as well:

Split-Pea Carrot Garlic Soup
6–8 cups of organic vegetable stock
2 cups dried yellow split peas
1 medium white onion, diced
1 bunch (6 medium) carrots, sliced (carrots bought with the tops on taste better. If you don't have organic carrots, cut to top 1/2 to 1 inch off the top end of the carrot as that's where pesticides tend to concentrate. Carrots are healthiest if they're scrubbed but not peeled.)
5 cloves garlic, minced
3–4 grinds of pepper
1/4 tsp. cumin
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. dry basil or 1 tbsp. minced fresh basil
1/2 tsp. dry marjoram

Instructions: Mix together in Instant Pot. Cook on manual for 17 minutes, with 10 minutes of cool-down before venting. Allow to cool to room temperature, then refrigerate. When serving, salt it at the table just until it doesn't taste bland.

Options:

Take a few cups of the finished soup and blend it in the Vitamix then pour it back into the soup for texture; this will also bring out the spices a little more. For a nice touch, blend some unsalted pecans with the portion of the soup you're blending.

Add 1/2 to 1 cup separately cooked brown rice to the finished soup (but see halfway down this post about the safest, healthiest way to cook rice)

Add a couple of cloves of minced uncooked garlic to the finished soup if you like garlic.

Hope you like!

Merle: "Regarding the DNA Test, I think you'd enjoy A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes by Adam Rutherford. Lots of interesting tidbits, including information about DNA test results from a geneticist's perspective. Regarding 'How long do you have to live somewhere before you're no longer a newcomer, anyway?!,' I have some friends who moved to eastern Kentucky in the mid-'80s. Not long after they moved there, they saw an obituary in the local paper which described a man in his 90s and all the wonderful things he'd done. The last sentences read something like: 'He moved here when he was six months old. He was not a native of this county.'"

Mike replies: That does look like the kind of book I'd love.

In the 1990s I almost moved to a town called Battle Ground, Indiana, near where Tecumseh and The Prophet were defeated by William Henry Harrison, until I heard a native describe someone who had lived there for 20 years as a "mover-inner." One of the great things about the rural area where I live now is that there are a lot of lakeshore and Summer people, so newcomers get to blend in instead of standing out like sore thumbs.

Paul Amyes: "Lots of Scots and Irish have Spanish genes due to Armada survivors being shipwrecked on the Northeastern coast of Scotland and Ireland’s West coast."

Mike replies: That could be it. In Ireland, when I was young, I befriended a local girl for a few weeks who was "Black Irish," so called—a descendant of those Spaniards. She was very striking-looking, with light blue eyes and very pale, perfect skin, but beautiful black hair. She cast rather a spell over me, as I still muse over her in my thoughts from time to time.

Don't Forget Mother's Day

It's Mother's Day. Just a friendly reminder from your eternally clueless, chronically forgetful, and at best only partially organized host and M.C.

A brief history of Mother's Day
As with many things we take for granted, the backstory of Mother's Day is stranger than you might think. The day as we know it in the U.S. was founded 111 years ago by an activist who was the daughter of another activist, with the backing of a pioneering department store. The store was Wanamaker's, which was, among other innovations, the first retailer to use price tags. Anna Jarvis was the daughter of Ann Reeves Jarvis, both tireless reformers and advocates for various women's causes.

As a way of honoring her mother, who had recently died, the younger Jarvis organized the first Mother's Day at a Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia, in May of 1908. Concurrently, there was a big Mother's Day event at Wanamaker's in Philadelphia.

The Grand Court of Wanamaker's flagship Philadelphia store with its
famous pipe organ. The place is now known as Macy's Center City.

Arguing that most holidays were male-centric, Jarvis then mounted a vigorous crusade to formally establish Mother's Day. That it was envisioned as a private family affair is reflected in the spelling of mother's: "a singular possessive," Jarvis noted, "for each family to honor its own mother, not a plural possessive commemorating all mothers in the world." After a long and increasingly successful public campaign, she was rewarded in 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson designated the second Sunday in May as the official U.S. holiday. President Wilson used Anna's preferred singular possessive spelling.

Anna Jarvis in 1910

Anna Jarvis then quickly became disapproving of the commercialization of her holiday, and spent the rest of her life and most of her and her brother's fortunes fighting first to defend Mother's Day and then to get it abolished, even going so far as to file endless lawsuits against various parties for using the name "Mother's Day" (over which she claimed copyright) and urging boycotts of candies, cards, and flowers. (I'm not making this up.) By the time of her death in 1948 she had disowned the holiday altogether and even petitioned the government to have it removed from the official calendar.

Anna Jarvis never married or had children, so the founder of Mother's Day wasn't one herself. Wanamaker's, after years of decline and various insults to its once-glorious past, fizzled to an end in 1995. Mother's Day, no longer proprietary to any one person, endures as the token day when we formally appreciate everything our own mothers did and do for us.

(I dedicate this post to Mom, who has suffered from Alzheimer's since 2011.)

Mike
(Thanks to Ned Bunnell. Photo of Anna Jarvis courtesy of
West Virginia & Regional History Center.)

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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A Few Links the Morning After

Hybrid laser-scan/panorama photographs may be used to help rebuild Notre-Dame: Vassar Professor Andrew Tallon uses laser scanners to make incredibly detailed 3-D maps of ancient structures such as Notre-Dame cathedral, accurate to half a centimeter, originally to try to understand the methods of ancient builders. But his scanning maps (which he merges with panoramic photographs) of Notre-Dame could well become invaluable in the rebuilding and reconstruction process.

Because Andrew clambers around on ledges far above the stone floors of cathedrals, he refers to himself as a "tacklehead" rather than a gearhead. But you'll recognize a kindred spirit, albeit one with a honed sense of specific mission in life. Fascinating stuff!

Notre-Dame from the air. A photograph from the National Geographic
archives taken by the U.S. Army Air Service (cropped).

Notre-Dame from the archives of National Geographic: In the same article is a link to a selection of archive photographs of Notre-Dame over the years. Not exhaustive, but nicely inclusive. A portfolio worth seeing.

Bad coverage and good: Foraging for information, I happened across an almost absurdly hackneyed "news" clip from CBS News that managed to make even yesterday's epic conflagration seem rote and dull. They interviewed a fire chief from Philly talking about the difficulties of battling church blazes. Original. Forgive the sarcasm; actually it was straight out of the "When You Can't Think of Anything Else to Do" playbook. You almost knew what the chief was going to say before he said it, and the interview could do double duty for any little church fire in any little town anywhere. Really? Can't even work up a little juice when it's looking like we're losing one of the great wonders of the world's heritage?

By contrast, Frida Ghitis on CNN, employing the recently outmoded written word, got closer to the core of the event in her article "Watching Notre Dame burn, the entire world was in pain." Describes how I felt. "The conflagration brought a feeling of helplessness and foreboding—reminiscent of the devastation on 9/11, in some ways, and perhaps that was part of the effect for some people: the sense—real or imagined—that we were watching a metaphor, a prelude, a warning." The feelings she's describing are essentially religious/superstitious, so it was good she didn't add to her litany, "...a judgement." 

Soaring buttresses: I'm not normally a fan of Ross Douthat, a conservative columnist at a liberal paper, but he was inspired to write a beautiful essay this morning (speaking of judgements). He had been in the middle of writing a column about the troubles of the Catholic Church and was forced to incorporate the news of the fire into his thoughts, and—whether out of necessity or out of courage—he let the bones of both influences show through. The result embodied the sense of interruption that public catastrophes impose on us. He was focusing on the schism inherent in Benedict vs. Francis, the conservative and liberal strains within Catholicism, but returned to the idealism of rebirth, apropos Easter: "The church has always depended on synthesis and integration. That has been part of its genius, a reason for all its unexpected resurrections and regenerations. Faith and reason, Athens and Jerusalem, the aesthetic and the ascetic, the mystical and the philosophical—even the crucifix itself, two infinite lines converging and combining."

David Aschkenas: Finally, TOP reader David Aschkenas has put together a small portfolio of his pictures from the interior of Notre-Dame, taken over the years.

Mike

[CORRECTION: According to The Washington Post, Andrew Tallon died last year, and should have been referred to in the past tense. It brings up another wrinkle, however—the Post also references the fact that no one knows exactly where the late Prof. Tallon's laser scans of Notre-Dame are. Thanks to Ken Berke for this. —Ed.]

P.S. Most of this comes via the New York Times, by the way, my morning read; I'm cribbing from David Leonhardt. (Other still-functioning, not-yet-compromised newspapers are The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, and I routinely read The Atlantic and The New Yorker [on paper, which you must admit is quaint] and visit the BBC.) The Times, which I sometimes refer to as "the world's best photography magazine," has plentiful and robust photographic content, although it can sometimes be a challenge to corral it all. I officially recommend a subscription to the Times for the excellent photography articles. You can access ten articles per month for free. But subscribe. It's worth it.

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(Not) everything must fade away

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Featured Comments from:

Kenneth Tanaka: "Thanks to David Aschkenas for sharing his Notre-Dame images. Also, you have a delightful collection of very well-seen international street images, David. I plan to take a deeper your of your work later this week."

Moose: "Re '"the entire world was in pain." Describes how I felt. "The conflagration brought a feeling of helplessness and
foreboding—reminiscent of the devastation on 9/11, in some ways, and perhaps that was part of the effect for some people: the sense—real or imagined—that we were watching a metaphor, a prelude, a warning." The feelings she's describing are essentially religious/superstitious.'

"I don't get it. This hyperbole and these feelings are highly personal; she and you are treating them as universal. It's an old church, Catholic, in France. Churches have been burning since the first one was built. Old iconic structures have burned or been otherwise destroyed, intentionally or by accident forever. Yes, I've seen this one. No, I have no emotional attachment to it.

"We are in Bhutan at the moment, where the central temple of the iconic symbol of the country was was destroyed by fire in 1998 <i>". . . leaving the country in mourning for their holiest of spiritual places. But religious leaders and the King . . . Today, the magnificent temple is completely rebuilt to its original glory. Another monastery destroyed by fire has been rebuilt, all but the altar in a new style. It's glorious, literally awe inspiring, at least to us and our travel friends! Every old fortress, temple, monastery, etc. that one visits has a history of fire and rebuilding, it's only a question of how many times. Getting so worked up about this one, seems a bit like getting hysterical when the sun goes down. It's something that happens regularly, and won't stop. The sun will rise again, as will Notre-Dame."

Chris Fuller: "I was surprised by my response to the news about this tragic event: I mourned and I wept. I mourned for a building, a collection of stones and glass. But it is a collection of stones and glass arranged in patterns of inestimable and moving beauty. It is one of those special places where history, culture, religion, and personal aspiration intersect with one another in a way that is rare anywhere in the world. It's a place that feels still even as thousands of people traverse through it. It's the place that gave birth to the University of Paris, and, thus, it stands as a monument what is good about the Western tradition (without denying this same tradition's many problems). I'm Catholic, so maybe that's part of it. But my Protestant and atheist friends also mourned and wept. So, maybe there is also more to it."

Notre-Dame is in Flames

One of the great landmarks of Western civilization, 800-year-old Notre-Dame Cathedral on the Île de la Cité in Paris, is burning. The roof has collapsed and the spire has fallen. The fire is still raging and the cause is not yet known. There have been no deaths reported.

The Cathedral, built over the course of one hundred years, was begun in AD 1163. It has been modified many times and had been undergoing reconstruction recently. One of the glories of French Gothic architecture and intertwined with French history, in modern times it has been the most-visited site in the most-visited city in the World, drawing more than 12 million visitors annually.

The structure was attacked by rioting Huguenots (French protestants) in 1548, and many of its treasures were destroyed or carried off during the French Revolution. Napoleon I restored it to the church and crowned himself Emperor in it. It had fallen into partial ruin and decrepitude when Victor Hugo's 1831 novel Notre-Dame de Paris (published in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame) revived interest in it, with the result that King Louis Philippe ordered its reconstruction in 1844. It was then that the original 13th-century spire was replaced with the one which fell today.

The building is owned by the government of France and the Catholic Church is is perpetual beneficiary. More than 400 firefighters have been mobilized. It is a cultural and artistic catastrophe rather than a human one, but the fire appears serious enough to cause irreparable harm to the iconic building and many of its priceless contents; the cultural loss is grievous.

Mike

UPDATE the morning after: the fire has been declared extinguished, and there is guarded optimism that much of the cathedral interior was spared—it appears the roof burned on top of the stone vault, but the vault is holding. Damage is extensive, but French President Macron has declared that France will restore the cathedral and already, hundreds of millions of euros have been pledged for the restoration.

Photo taken by a tourist, Brooke Windsor, as the cathedral was closing, just before the fire broke out. She's asking for help in finding the man and little girl in the photo so she can give it to them.

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(Not) everything must fade away

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Manuel: "This is a massive tragedy for humanity, Mike. One of incalculable proportions. The Nôtre-Dame is a symbol of Paris and of France, mostly for the reasons you've mentioned, but there is a cruel element of irony here too. France is a proud nation: they have pride in their past. France conserves its monuments in absolutely pristine condition. If you see, say, the cathedral of Chartres, an imposing Gothic building halfway between Paris and Normandy, only the style betrays its age. The French really excel at preserving their heritage. No wonder, then, that this tragedy, although one not measurable in human lives, causes the French people such grief. And not only the French, of course. Just about everyone with a modicum of knowledge of history is in a state of shock today."

Thomas Paris: "I was standing amongst the crowd of people on the banks of Seine river yesterday evening, all of us stunned by what we were witnessing. I was standing there and yet still can't believe it. Couldn't bring myself to look at the photos I made. I was looking all morning at one I made in December 2017, when it was still intact. Let's just hope the structure is still sound. Last I heard, it was anything but sure."

David Lee: "Was Peter in Paris? I know one of his favorite restaurants is just behind Notre Dame."

Mike replies: He was en route from Paris to New York when the fire broke out, and arrived in New York to the news—so he got right back on a plane and headed back to Paris. Here's a photo he took this morning with his comments:

Peter Turnley, Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, April 16, 2019

"Notre Dame lives! She is injured, but alive. Mme. Martine Hercouet is one of thousands of people from Paris and the entire world that are lining the streets around the Notre Dame Cathedral that has suffered a major fire, but saved from total destruction by very brave French fireman who succeeded in putting out a blaze that has seriously injured the rooftop of this church that has touched the hearts of so many millions of people worldwide. I flew all night from NY to Paris and landed early this morning and made my way immediately to the cathedral. Like many, Martine told me her first vision of the cathedral today brought tears to her eyes."

The International Digital Photography Museum

Not that I mean to downplay this news at all, but, first of all, I'm getting married!

She's a TOP reader, and has been for the past eight years. She said she has watched my personal peregrinations with interest over the years, and 16 months ago now she decided to introduce herself. Her name is Magda, and she has residences in Budapest, Hungary, and New York City as well as a vacation home in a location she prefers not to disclose. After we get married we'll have two vacation homes, the second one being this little house I've been living in for three and a half years here in the Finger Lakes! I won't be giving this place up.

Now for the relevant part. Magda happens to be the widow of very accomplished and urbane man who was famously successful in business in Hungary. She married him when he was 54 and she was 32; he died five years ago now. She's one year older than I am. We both consider ourselves relatively young, and we're both in good health, so there is still time to do the things we want to do. And neither one of us is terribly interested in merely collecting the conventional trappings of wealth...we want to do something; something useful to society and, specifically, for photography.

Same shows, different audiences
Of course, I have spun my idealistic notions at her gleefully for some time now—a few of them, admittedly, pretty crackpot. (She would say "most," possibly with an exclamation point appended to that. I do get carried away with ideas sometimes.) But because her wealth is essentially limitless and her interest is in public architecture, we've decided on the following plan, which we're pretty well along with already at least in concept.

We've decided to create a series of "mirror" museums—so far, we have plans for three in the United States, one in Canada, and two in Europe—one each in Prague and Budapest. Each building will be proximate to existing museums that already draw crowds—for instance, the one in Corning (local to where I am now) will be a hop, skip, and a jump from the wonderful Corning Museum of Glass, and the one in Chadds Ford will be within an easy drive of the Brandywine River Museum of Art.

Each Museum will have its own architecture, designed to complement its setting and its culture, but all of them will have very similar facilities—three beautiful large galleries and two small ones, an entry atrium and book shop, a number of small offices, several workrooms, and so forth.

Celebrate the new
Here's where it gets interesting. We won't be showing existing art, at least in terms of the actual objects—we'll be making our own. The halo Museum organization, IDPM, will employ master digital printmakers as well as curators. The printmakers and curators will work with living digital photographers to create exhibitions that will then be mirrored in all six locations worldwide. This might be one large exhibit in all five galleries, or several concurrent exhibits split between the various gallery rooms. Since every venue will have its own conservator and framer and presentation specialist, all that's required for coordination between locations will be the shipment of the newly made unframed prints, whether they're made in Europe or America. Pretty simple. Each show will be up for three months, for a total of four "changeovers" per year.

Not only will every print be newly custom-made for each exhibits, but small limited editions of each photograph shown in every show will be available for sale to the public—with all of the proceeds going to the photographers. In that sense our strategy is something of a hybrid between a traditional museum and a gallery, as well as a hybrid of a business and a type of charity called a "grant maker." Oh, and by the way, photographers themselves will not have to bear any expense for their shows.

Here's a big difference from a traditional museum: the IDPM will not maintain a collection. We will keep a record of what we show, but we will not collect and archive work—rather, we will help create it and release it into the world at large, where it may fly on its own wings.

The Mission statement
That's because our overarching mission will be to support active, working photographers of all kinds with these shows. Not only will they receive the intangible honor of having their work shown in six premium venues in North America and Europe, with printed catalogues, but they get to keep all the proceeds from any print sales. (Unsold prints will become their property when the shows are over, too.)

As you can see, this is sort of like TOP's print sales writ large! Very large.  :-)

You would think all this would be a lot of work, but, it turns out, not so much. Magda is used to having "people" doing things for her. And boy, do we have people. We are in the process of hiring directors for every museum, curators, printmakers, architects, builders, you name it. And we already have a core staff of administrators and helpers. After working alone for a decade and more, it's heavenly, let me tell you.

Launch is scheduled for 2023. The initial locations are: Toronto, Canada; Corning, New York; Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania; Santa Fe, New Mexico; Prague, Czech Republic; and Budapest, Hungary.

Magda has plans for more museums—three more in Western U.S. cities, and one each in the UK, France, and Germany.

To say this is all exciting is a vast understatement! Oh, and by the way, my title is Director of Exhibitions. Our curators will work under me and although they will work largely independently, with lots of freedom, I'll have the final word on who, and what, gets shown. I'm chomping at the bit.

I'll keep you posted.  :-)

Mike

Original contents copyright 2019 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

Everything must fade away

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Dave: "Mike, Congratulations, and congratulations! Wow, that's a lot of news to digest. I'll bet you'll be inundated with requests from photographers who never thought such a museum (with such fair treatment of the artist) would ever exist. From your description, Magda seems fascinating. Best of luck!"

Zack Schindler: "Does this mean that the with your newfound riches that the first ten posters here will be sent one of the new Leica Safari Edition M10-P's with matching lens?"

Mike replies: Since you suggested it, yes!! Unfortunately, you are commenter number 13. Chance is cruel.

Robert Harshman: "What day is it?"

Mike replies: It's Monday.

Jnny: "Magda sounds lovely. Has she asked you to forward expense fees yet?"

Mike replies: Made me laugh....  :-)

Bahi: "Why am I reminded of buried Leicas? That one still hurts. :-) "

Happy New Year!

As I type this it's the very last little remnant of of 2018—in a few minutes it will be 2019. Just a moment to thank all my readers who came by the site in 2018 or read some of my articles on feeds. I'm especially grateful for "regulars," who come by every day or most days, and of course the often brilliant, always interesting Commentariat—you're a big part of my own enjoyment of my site. I'm extremely grateful for the generosity of contributors, including people who send checks in the mail, people who donate cameras or send other gifts, and of course all my Patreon subscribers. And if you ever ordered anything through one of my links, whether it's a D850 or a $13 pair of socks, bless you.

I'll be back in 2019 with the camera of last year! Happy New Year to you and all your friends, family, and pets. God bless you and keep you safe. May you have a most wonderful 2019.

—Mike Johnston
Penn Yan, New York

Earthrise and Merry Christmas!

Fifty years ago today—50 years ago this morning, at a few minutes after 10:30 Central U.S. time—a former USAF fighter pilot named William A. (Bill) Anders, who is now 85 years old and lives in Anacortes, in the State of Washington on the West coast, took one of the indisputably great photographs of the 20th century.

Even if you've seen this before, watch and listen as it happens—

Bill Anders was later the Chairman and CEO of General Dynamics, and started a Foundation to support educational and environmental issues. Oh, and do you happen to remember that scene in the movie Top Gun where the pilot played by Tom Cruise encounters a Russian plane and gives the pilot the finger? The pilot who did that in real life was none other than the guy who took "Earthrise," Bill Anders.

I've seen this clip before but it's inherently moving. Each time I see it I enjoy it. And if that's not just the quintessential "hurry up and get the shot" moment, I don't know what is, unless it was Ansel frantically setting up by the roadside near Hernandez. (First, get the shot.)

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you! From here in the Finger Lakes of Upstate New York to wherever in the world you are.

I'll be back after Christmas. We have a backlog of topics to cover. May great blessings be yours.

Mike
(Thanks to Gary Morris via Jack McD., and PDLanum)

Original contents copyright 2018 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Tim S: "Thanks! Great background info on one of my favorite images. It has been a background on my phone and computers for years. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to TOP!"

Yoram Nevo: "And he said: 'Oh my God, look at that picture over there.' A photographer state of mind. Merry Christmas Mike, from the sunny winter of Israel. Best wishes for 2019, your regular—Yoram Nevo."

Rod S.: "Thank you for the link. The reconstruction is beautiful and adds significantly to our collective understanding and appreciation of the Earthrise photograph. I recall vividly watching as a 12-year-old the reading of Genesis 1 during the live television broadcast by the crew of Apollo 8 on Christmas Eve 1968. During the reading, the television image was of the cratered lunar surface passing beneath. The clear implication to me was that we were, at that moment, re-living how God might once have gazed down upon the early Earth. It was electrifying."

Mike replies: It was the most-watch TV program ever, at the time. Here's the address from the crew:

William Anders: "We are now approaching lunar sunrise, and for all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

James Lovell:

And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

Frank Borman:

And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called the Seas: and God saw that it was good.

"And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas—and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth."

George H.W. Bush

© Peter Turnley, the White House, Washington, D.C., 1990

Guest post by Peter Turnley

One of the most surreal moments of my career was when I was introduced to President George H.W. Bush by Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev in the White House.

During a summit meeting in D.C. in 1990, I went in to the White House for a photo call, and President Bush recognized Gorbachev's personal photographer and said, "There's my old friend Yuri!" After the translation, Gorbachev looked around and saw me and said, "There's my old friend Peter!"

Then I heard Bush say in English, "Who is Peter?" Gorbachev replied in Russian and his translator Pavel said, "Peter is an American photographer—he's photographed me for a long time." President Bush laughed and said, "Nice to meet you, Peter!"

Peter

Text and photo copyright 2018 by Peter Turnley. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Ken: "Check out Kirk Tuck's story as well."

Cold!

I had a pretty good Thanksgiving despite being mostly alone. I treated myself to some smoked salmon, which I love and seldom eat any more, and bought a ready-made dinner from our esteemed local supermarket chain, Wegmans, the best grocery store in the U.S. (it really is, too). Turkey, squash, gravy, mashed potatoes, cranberry jam, and stuffing, $13. It tasted...a little lonely! I'm kidding. It was delicious.

As it happened, Thanksgiving yesterday was the first cold day of the Winter here, too. It was 11°F (–11°C) when I woke up at 7:00 and got down to 7°F (–14°C). So it was nice and crisp.

I much prefer freezing cold—for several weeks it's been hovering right around the freezing mark (zero degrees Celsius) which I find uncomfortable. There's something inhospitable about wet cold that goes away when the mercury dips. The air dries out and your metabolism kicks in to help you stay warm. Butters and I went for a long walk. I really need some warm mittens, if there is any such thing.

Falling leaves on top of the snow cover. This morning the
waterfall was silent—a sign of the freeze.

The air was vividly clear, and last evening the almost full moon (it's full tonight—"the Beaver moon") was dazzling in the freezing air, lighting up the countryside with a ghostly light on the blanket of snow. The oak leaves are finally releasing their hold—oaks really hold on to their leaves in the Fall. Still plenty of leaves left on the two majestic sycamores, too.

The two sycamores with the sun behind them—photo
taken before last Thurday's big snow

It's unsatisfying to take pictures of the sycamores. They're towering in person, but every photo that gets all of the two trees in the frame just seems to miniaturize them. They're nearly 12 feet in circumference at the base! Butters and I just went out and measured. (See what we do for you?) I've always been frustrated trying to show scale in photographs. Bugs look as big as flowers which look as big as mountains. The medium seems to fit normal human-sized subjects best, and equalizes everything else. It's almost more fun to play with scale in photographs than try to soberly show it. Timothy O-Sullivan would insert his darkroom wagon or himself into his early photographs of the West to indicate scale.

But that's a different topic. Now I'm off to...well, fake up a composite image. Me?! Really. I'll tell you about it if I manage to pull it off. (One problem about never faking up images is that my faking-up skills are poor.)

Anyway, you'll just have to take my word for it, those sycamores touch the sky.

Mike

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Andrea B.: "The leaves-on-snow scene is wonderful."

Mike replies: Thanks! And you know, apropos the "Lunatic" post, even that scene went past pretty quickly. The day prior, there weren't many leaves on the snow; the day after, the stream was frozen; and now, it's raining. Granted, the window in which I could have taken that picture lasted hours, not minutes, but one day in either direction and it wouldn't have been the same picture.

Seems to be just what this area is like.

Happy Thanksgiving

So here's a little conundrum. You could be forgiven for thinking that the big holiday this week is a thing called "Black Friday," and that we're in the middle of something incongruously called "Black Friday Week." (What?) But the holiday is actually Thanksgiving. Yet one of the things I'll be thankful for is if some of you use my links for, well...your black friday shopping tomorrow. Kinda circular, then—you see how that goes? On the one hand I'm critical of the confusing of greed with gratitude, and on the other hand I'm just like everybody else, in that I need to make a little money too. It's not like it used to be way back in 2010. There's so much competition now.

But I'm definitely still celebrating the secular holiday (quaint little old-fashioned Thursday Thanksgiving) in the middle of the other, bigger secular holiday (sprawling, modern, big-shouldered and brawny Black Friday). I hope those of you among my countrymen are with your families—my son was at my brother's house last night and I very dearly wish I could have been with them or with other family today. I did get to have breakfast with the family of some younger friends this morning, and that was a treat. Kinda made my day.

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. All that's demanded of us is that we gather, eat a good meal together, and be mindful all day of our gratitude. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours. And, in spirit, to all you non-celebrants outside the United States, too.

Mike

P.S. The engraving was made after a painting by one Charles Lucy, a native of Hereford in Britain, as published in Dibby's Annual in the Summer of 1911. His obituary states that "through life [he] devoted himself, at the sacrifice of many opportunities of immediate gain, and despite much unmerited discouragement, to the higher branches of historical painting." He died at age 59 in 1873. The phrase "Pilgrim Fathers" could not be more apt; estimates vary, but worldwide there are thought to be at least 7 million and as many as 35 million people alive today who are descended from that tiny band of immigrants.

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Tim Farnham: "Mike, you may be interested to know that here in the UK the retail industry has adopted Black Friday with enthusiasm and it looks like becoming Black Friday fortnight. And we don't even celebrate Thanksgiving. Best wishes, Tim."

Terry Letton: "Looks like dropping in background from another image is nothing new.  :-)  That darn sure isn’t Plymouth MA or Cape Cod behind those folks."

Mike replies: See, now isn't that annoying? Exactly what we've been talking about these last few days.

Fred Haynes: "We will know ‘the end is here’ when we start greeting each other with 'happy Black Friday!' My iPad said that should be initial caps! But this comment is more about saying Happy Thanksgiving to you Mike, and all you readers!"

Mike replies: Like this email I got this morning....

The 'Great' War

Field gunners loading shrapnel shells

I suppose I should have posted this yesterday, but I was having too mellow a day off to dip my head into thoughts of war. Yesterday was Veteran's Day, which used to be called Armistice Day. Yesterday (at 11 a.m., to be exact—the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month) marked the 100th anniversary of the end of WWI.

World War One—called "The Great [i.e., large] War" until there was an even greater one—was perhaps the most pointless catastrophe in modern human history. There was no reason for it to happen. It solved nothing. And no good came of it—many historians make the case that it laid the foundation for the rise of Hitler and WWII.

The human waste was utterly appalling. The Wikipedia page begins, "The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War I was about 40 million: estimates range from 15 to 19 million deaths and about 23 million wounded military personnel, ranking it among the deadliest conflicts in human history. The total number of deaths includes from 9 to 11 million military personnel. The civilian death toll was about 8 million, including about 6 million due to war-related famine and disease." It killed so many young men that males born from 1883 to 1900 were known as "The Lost Generation" in Great Britain.

The head of the German delegation that signed the Armistice
was murdered by right-wing German assassins in 1921

"Armistice" means truce, but the end of WWI was not a truce. It was a surrender. Yet, as one writer put it, if there was ever a war with no victor, WWI was it. Very little fighting occurred on German soil, and home-front propaganda was so relentless and pervasive that the surrender took the German population largely by surprise, planting the seeds of resentment and dark conspiracy theories about betrayals that surely contributed, at least indirectly, to the Holocaust. The head of the German delegation that surrendered to the vengeful French Field Marshall Foch, Matthias Erzberger, was murdered three years after the end of the war by members of an ultra-nationalist death squad—two former German naval officers—while he was out for a walk at a spa town in the Black Forest. The weapons of war were so brutal and the conditions so miserable that it marks the point at which all of humanity became aware of what's now called PTSD—in the 'great' war it was called shell-shock. The unending rain of explosives was as likely to unhinge soldiers' minds as blow them limb from limb. Roughly 60% of physical military casualties were caused by artillery.

 

As if relentless shelling wasn't bad enough, soldiers in the trenches had to deal with poison gas—the first widespread use of chemical warfare—which was so universally agreed to be inhuman that it later contributed to the establishment of the the Geneva Convention.

There are many great books about the First World War. Best of all might be Barbara W. Tuchman's The Guns of August—although her book The March of Folly might actually be more pertinent. ("Folly" is beginning to be an old-fashioned word, known mostly to people who read—it means foolishness. The book chronicles four of the greatest examples of foolishness by governments. She didn't include WWI, probably because it was the subject of her masterpiece, but she could have.) Great books came out of the war, including Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet On the Western Front, Robert Graves' bitter but darkly comic memoir Goodbye to All That, Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, and Paul Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory. (Consider getting the illustrated edition.)

Veterans Day is a day to honor all veterans—the survivors of wars—but, as a separate occasion commemorating the hundredth anniversary of the Armistice, the fictional veteran I can't help thinking of is Joe Bonham, the protagonist of Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun. I like reading books in pairs, and I'd pair that one with a book that is subtitled "The Antiwar Classic by America's Most Decorated Soldier": U.S. Marine Corps Major General Smedley Butler's War is A Racket. He should know. He was a veteran.

Soldiers washing in a shell hole

Off to play pool! I put this together in two torrid hours of work—please forgive typos! I'll proofread, fact-check, and make corrections when I get back home. [UPDATE: Done now. I had a great time playing pool with my friends, some of whom are veterans. My friend Loyle's father Fred—Loyle is soon to turn 90—had the unusual distinction of serving every minute of both WWI and WWII, beginning way back when WWI broke out in 1914. —Ed.]

Mike

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Patrick: "Someone tweeted this link yesterday. It's quietly very striking, about a minute or two audio clip."

Mike replies: Wow. There are so many written accounts of those moments, many of them very moving.

V.i. Voltz: "It’s little known, but a great account of the First World War is Frederic Manning’s The Middle Parts of Fortune. Manning died at 53 in 1935, still wracked by the memory of the war."

Mike replies: The writeup says that Ernest Hemingway re-read that novel every year.

Thomas Rink: "The men who murdered Matthias Erzberger—Heinrich Tillessen and Heinrich Schulz—were members of the Organisation Consul (O.C.), a right-wing terrorist group. The O.C. was founded by Herrmann Ehrhardt, a former Captain of the Kriegsmarine (German Navy).

"In the winter 1918/19, the political and social situation in Germany was very unstable; in some of the major cities, workers and disbanded soldiers seized power and established soviet republics (most notably, in Munich). Among other cities, this happened in Bremen. In this situation, Captain Ehrhardt gathered 300 troops and overthrew the local soviet system. This was the origin of what should later become the infamous Brigade Ehrhardt, a Freikorps (militia).

"The problem for the Weimar Republic was that the Brigade Ehrhardt was not a singular case. Around 1919/20, there were dozens of militias which had tens of thousands of well-armed and battle-tested combatants. Initially, the social democrat German government under Friedrich Ebert and Gustav Noske relied on the Freikorps to quench leftist turmoils and soviet republics. But, what to do with these militias after the political situation had stabilized? It was not possible to integrate them into the Reichswehr (provisional army of the Weimar Republic), since the treaty of Versailles limited it to 100,000 troops. An attempt to disband them ended in the attempted coup d'etat by Wolfgang Kapp and General Walther von Lüttwitz in 1920 (in which the aforementioned Brigade Ehrhardt played an important role).

"After the coup failed, the Brigade Ehrhardt finally disbanded in April 1920. Some members, Ehrhardt among them, later founded the Organisation Consul.

"Given all this, the treaty of Versailles doomed the Weimar Republic from its very beginning. It provided the anti-republican extreme right-wing forces with a founding myth (Dolchstoßlegende, or stab-in-the-back legend—allegedly, the German army would have won the war wasn't it for politicians like Erzberger), and made it very difficult for the democratic government to properly disband all these armed militias."

John Krumm: "I have my grandfather's diary around here somewhere, where he described the excitement on the ship heading over, how good the food was. Like most diaries, the entries became shorter and shorter as the fight went on. One was just the date and 'Gas.'Here he is before shipping out:

"But he made it back and started a family in Medina, NY. Later, working as a state trooper, he was killed by a drunk driver."

AlexV.: "Tragically for the people of northeast France, WWI's legacy of killing continues. Due to the stagnant battlefields in muddy terrain, poorly implemented technology, and the sheer volume of the shelling, a large swath of the region is polluted with unexploded ordinance.

"On maps, is is the 'Red Zone.' Animals and plants now thrive amidst the scenery, but no one is supposed to walk in many of these places.

"In other areas the have been returned to agriculture, farmers regularly dig up so many shells that they now place them by the side of the road for disposal. This 'refuse' includes shells with still active gas agents. The casings are now rusted and brittle, hence one can crack them open like an egg to release the toxicity inside. In the papers, one apparently still reads of the unlucky farmer who ran into one with a tractor, or a member of a disposal unit who had an unlucky day.

"National Geographic put up this site, but it is one of many.

"Just as tragically, Laos is even worse, because that country is covered in cluster bombs ('bombies' in the local patois) dropped during the Vietnam war. (I am sure there are other regions with equally grim tales of land mines, etc.)"

Joe Holmes: "My grandfather was in the trenches in France for WWI. He was living in Pennsylvania at the outbreak and volunteered at age 16, lying about his age.

"But over there he was gassed and also lost one finger on his left hand to a shell that landed nearby. (I inherited his Purple Heart.)

"He never told any of his children about his time in the war. When they asked about his missing finger, he joked that he had accidentally bit it off when he was eating a slice of pie. As far as I can tell, I was the only one who ever heard him say what really happened.

"In the trenches, he was so frightened that he promised God that he'd become a minister if he survived, and when he returned from the war, he went to a seminary and became an Episcopal priest, the rector of our town church for more than 30 years until he retired in 1970. He died only two years later at age 72—his lung cancer may have resulted from that early exposure to poisonous gas in France."

James Symington: "I spent a four years in the British Territorial Army (National Guard equivalent) as an artillery command post officer. As part of the training we were put in a bunker, on Salisbury Plain, with tiny, very thick perspex windows looking out over an impact area just outside. We were then subjected to a battery firing different kinds of 155mm shells at us. Even in the absolute safety of this bunker the concussion of the shells going off 10 yards away was breathtaking. I cannot imagine what months or years of it felt like whilst sitting in a muddy, open bunker."

Chuck Holst: "I once met a soldier of the Great War. It was 1966, and it was in a laundromat at 9th Street and Chicago Avenue in Minneapolis. He might have been in his early 70s, but he seemed older to me at the time—I was 22. As I recall, he just started talking about the war out of the blue, about the gas attacks and how so many of his friends and comrades had died in the war. I didn't know what to say to him, but I think he really just wanted someone to listen to his story, someone to serve as an excuse to talk about it. The war was still very much present for him 48 years after the events. I wish I had taken the time to sit and talk with him and hear more of his story, but I probably had things to do."

And So It Begins

I have four windows in my bedroom and this was the view this morning when I lifted the shade I always open first. It's always a bit of a surprise. And so it begins. Another Winter.

I never understood "snow birds," defined as Northerners who migrate to warmer southern States during the winter. Until I was about 55. That was six years ago. Now I understand.

The day matured into a brilliant one. The skies cleared, the wind began to buffet the land and the lake and stir the trees, and vast, solid clouds moved fast across the skies, creating quick transitions between brilliant sunlight and cloud-shadow. I drove home from town through plumes of snow and leaves spinning up the hills and arcing over the road. Whitecaps appeared on the usually well-protected lake. The wind moved a lot of snow around and mixed it with falling leaves before the snow began to melt.

I made a lot of progress on the X-H1 review today. Later I'm going to work on my photography book. (Working title: "Success in Photography," although please make no assumptions about what that means.) Now I'm tired. It's Saturday...I think I might need a nap!

And so it begins.  :-)

Mike

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Anders: "Out of necessity, since I live in Norway: Photography is possible also in the winter. Another light, another temperature, another mood and another result—but possible, still. We have to think that.  :-)  "

James Weekes: "I moved here, to North Florida, after 21 years in Vermont, a lovely state full of lovely people and a really long, harsh winter. I have not seen snow in person for 25 years and still shudder when I think of it. Most of our trees still have leaves and those that do lose them, regain them in 6–8 weeks. When I was younger (like you, younger than 55) I loved the snow and cold, and getting in wood, and the lovely smell of a wood fire, the warmth only a wood stove can generate, and skiing. But I cannot tolerate cold as well as I used to (nor can I tolerate high heat and humidity) so being here suits me better. It is 68°F here today and very pleasant, as the oppressive humidity is finally leaving. Very nice picture, by the way."

Sharon: "I moved to Nantucket from Texas 14 years ago. Thought I would die the first couple of winters. Now I love it. We shot in weather so cold the ocean froze!"

Christopher May: "Maybe this will change when I hit 55 but I’m a huge fan of winter and the photographic opportunities it offers.

Photo by Chris May

"I took this photo at Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs on Halloween morning. There were a few other people out enjoying the amazing views that the fresh snow offered but for the most part it was very quiet. Given the choice between sharing the park with thousands of people on a summer day or being out in the cold with a few hardy souls witnessing scenes like this, I’ll take the latter every time."

Vote

You?

Today's the day. It's still a democracy. Get out there, if ya haven't.

Mike

P.S. This post is OT for you non-U.S. peeps, but I'm sure most of you will sympathize. I should also confess I'm not in the best mood today. My usual good-natured self shall return!

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Happy 50th, 747 (OT)

Photo: Eduard Marmet

Ned Bunnell tells us that today it's been 50 years since Boeing announced the 747 on September 30th, 1968. It was expected to be retired after 400 planes were made, but the latest version of the aircraft is still current and production reached 1,546 last July.

Credit: University of South Florida

To put that in context, it was only 54 years, 8 months, and 29 days between the date of the very first commercial passenger flight (January 1, 1914) and the day the 747 was introduced!

Mike
(Thanks to Ned)

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R. Edelman: "The Boeing 747—what a great plane! I first flew on one in 1971, when they were still being introduced to the airline customers. I flew from Amsterdam to New York on a KLM 747, and what a ride. The entire plane was a student charter (the only criterion was that you were a student somewhere), so there was only one class of passenger. I asked for a forward seat, figuring correctly that I would get a larger, first-class seat. The cabin crew decided to open the bar (free Heineken!) and proceeded to kibbitz with the passengers. Some of the passengers finished smoking a certain mood-altering drug in the extra large open spaces that they had by the exit doors back then. (The drug was tolerated in Amsterdam, but not in the US, so the incentive was there to finish the stuff before the flight was over).

"That summer I also visited Israel. El Al had just taken delivery of its first 747, and they showed it off by flying it in circles over Tel Aviv a few times. The 747 was designed to be a luxurious jet in an era when airlines still felt that all of their customers deserved to experience a comfortable flight, no matter where they were seated. I think that we all miss those days."

Mike replies: ...Flying high while flying high. And yes, I miss the days when all the seats felt roomy and luxurious.

Speed: "The 747 is still in production at Boeing's Everett plant but it is almost a special order item. Wikipedia reports orders for six and 14 in 2017 and 2018 respectively and shipments of 14 and four also for 2017 and 2018 respectively. 2018 isn't over yet. For comparison, Boeing's 737 build rate is almost two per day! A tour of the Everett facility where 767, 777 and 787 aircraft are also built (cameras not allowed—not even phones) is time well spent. The 747 is almost hand built, riveted together from thousands of small bits of aluminum and magnesium (I'm oversimplifying) over many weeks, while the newest 787 is assembled from large components (lots of composites) in days.

"When I visited last year they were working on an order from UPS for 14 747 freighters and one 'executive' version for a wealthy middle-eastern customer. I was already amazed that such a large machine could fly but the engineering that goes into designing and manufacturing such a massive and complex device that routinely and reliably carries people and packages around the world is quite remarkable."

Geoff Wittig: "The Boeing 747 is indeed remarkable for its longevity, when many commercial and military aircraft run the gamut from first flight to scrapyard in a decade or less. But the champion for active lifespan has to be Lockheed's remarkable C-130 military transport. It's a strikingly homely and utilitarian aircraft, yet its efficient, practical, durable design has never been bettered. The first example flew in 1954, and it is still in active production to this day, an astonishing 64 years later. That's vaguely analogous to a Sopwith Camel [a WWI biplane —Ed.] still being produced in 1981."

David Zivic: "I remember two things about the Wright Brothers' first flight, one involving a 747. The length of the first flight was shorter than the wing span of a 747. And, the iconic flight photo with one brother the pilot and the other releasing the wing tip from the ground was taken by a friend, and it is the only photo he ever took before or after...you know, squeezing a bulb for a shutter release."

c.d.embrey: "In August, 1960, I flew from Monterey, California, to Baltimore, Maryland. A 24-hour trip flying on four different piston powered planes. In January, 1961, I did the return flight from Baltimore to LAX in a 707. What a difference a few months makes when it comes to technology.

"When I was young, Pan Am was the USA's premier overseas airline. Juan Trippe invented tourist class, and Boeing built the 747 at his request. Pan Am went out of business in the early 1990s."

Mike replies: There's a vivid and informative book that I enjoyed about the fall of Pan Am called Skygods by Robert Gandt.

Paul De Zan: "United made an excellent video on the occasion of their retirement of the aircraft."

John Masters: "As a young man, I worked for Delta for a number of years at both DFW [Dallas/Forth Worth] and ATL [Atlanta]. During those years, Delta had no 747s, and I would always pause when I saw one land or take off for American, Lufthansa and other airlines. For me, being drawn to a 747 is one of those nebulous things whose attraction could only be summed up as '...there's just something about a 747....' As awesome and long-serving as the L-1011, DC-10, etc., were, they didn't have the immediate eye appeal of a 747.

"I never flew on, but was part of ground crews on British Airways' Concorde aircraft in and out of DFW in the late '80s. The interior of the Concorde, while very nice, was necessarily cramped and disappointing. But seeing that Concorde take off was the only commercial jet that could cause more shivers in me timbers than a 747 roaring for takeoff. (Military jet roar is a whole other beast.) I was able to ride a 'tug' around and under one of the two Presidential 747 in Texas (in for electronics upgrade at a company I was interviewing with). That was beyond awesome for me. There's just something about a 747...."

Rick D: " I was a Boeing Kid whose dad worked there; he was part of the crew relocated from Renton to Everett to build and then run the new factory home of the 747. Heady days. Boeing supposedly developed the 747 after losing the C-5 transport contract to Lockheed. I picture them sitting glumly around a conference table asking, 'So we have plans for this ginormous airplane, what are we going to do with them?' Thus, they tackled the plane that changed an industry.

"Only problem was it cost so much to get to production the jumbo jet nearly bankrupted the company, and Seattle. Dad was among many thousands who lost their jobs and a famous billboard appeared: 'Would the last person leaving Seattle please turn off the lights?' Hard to imagine in today's tech boomtown Seattle how dire things were then. On a recent visit I took the kid past my childhood house and saw its eye-popping Zillow 'Zestimate' was precisely one hundred times what my folks paid for it when we transplanted there from Seattle. Dad found other work and we stayed.

"My junior high overlooked Boeing Field and we kids were all quite versed in their product line, literally able to I.D. the models by sound. The 747's sound was very different from the others and they were worth looking at; it has always seemed to just hover on its approach. Something about the scale has the brain asking: 'How does that thing stay in the sky?' If I understand correctly, very long-haul point-to-point aircraft like the 787 are shoving hub-and-spoke jumbos aside. I think they'll always be around, but no longer the dominant planes of intercontinental travel."

Coming Up at Christie's

Christie's will auction The Diann G. and Thomas A. Mann Collection of Photographic Masterworks two weeks from now. The auction will take place on October 4th and 5th at 20 Rockefeller Center in New York City.

It's pretty much all "greatest hits." A few samplings:

Edward Weston, Nude, 1934. Estimate $30,000–60,000

Dorothea Lange, White Angel Bread Line, San Francisco, 1933.
Estimate $100,000–150,000

Paul Strand, Blind Woman, New York, 1916. Estimate $70,000–100,000

Edward Weston, Pepper No. 30, 1930 (printed 1940).
Estimate $150,000–250,000

You can see the entire catalog of the collection, with nice JPEGs, at this link. A PDF of the show catalog can be seen here, and the print catalog itself can be ordered from Christie's here.

Mike
(Thanks to Dierk)

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Andrew John: "The estimated prices imply that some people have lots of pocket money. Are they happy? I'd love to hear the reaction to this auction of that poor man in the bread line."

Mike replies: Well, you and I can own every photograph in the collection for $40, and that makes me happy!

Also Due on the 25th (Fuji and Sigma)

Also expected on the 25th is the announcement of the Fuji GFX 50R, the rangefinder-style counterpart to the medium-format SLR-style GFX 50S. The new camera is expected to be somewhat lower spec and somewhat less expensive.

But we'll see.

And Sigma is expected to introduce a portrait lens in mounts for both Micro 4/3 and Fuji X-mount this week—a 56mm ƒ/1.4. I'd be in the market for that, so I'll be watching. But given that I have a Micro 4/3 camera and a Fuji X camera at the moment, the choice as to which mount to get could mean I'd be making a hard choice between the two cameras and formats, and it could potentially make my head explode. So if you stop hearing from me.... :-)

[UPDATE: Oh, sorry, "brain fart." The new Sigma will be Micro 4/3 and Sony E-mount, of course. Sorry for my confusion. Or wishful thinking, whatever. —Ed.]

Mike
(Thanks to Hugh Crawford)

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