Three Poems to End the Year
Klaus, Lisa, Rob and me, overlooking the port of Livadi on Serifos, in the Greek Cyclades
The title of my final blog post for what has been a rather busy and (never mind the politics!) frenetic year, including trips to South Africa (Pretoria, for work, and Cape Town, for family); Florida, Pennsylvania and Michigan in the US; Greece; the US again, and now, in December, to Calgary, Alberta to spend Christmas with my daughter Eve and her family, was to have been (deep breath) Photography and Literature. A nice act of escapism, if you wish.
The inspiration - or provocation - behind this idea was Walker Evans, whose American Photographs (published by MoMA in 1938) remains a towering landmark and reference point. Before he became the photographer of a version of America that seemed at once real and present yet imaginary and timeless, Evans had dreamed of becoming a writer; had immersed himself in the novels and poetry of Flaubert and Baudelaire; had claimed, quite specifically - as his biographer, Svetlana Alpers records -
…that Flaubert’s aesthetic is absolutely mine. Flaubert’s method I think I incorporated almost unconsciously, but anyhow used in two ways: his realism and naturalism both, and his objectivity of treatment; the non-appearance of the author, the non-subjectivity. This is literally applicable to the way I want to use a camera and I do. But spiritually, however, it is Baudelaire who is the influence on me.
Not for Evans, then, the poetic subjectivity of a Robert Frank, the lyricism of a Saul Leiter, the self-expression (or obsession) of a Nan Goldin. T.S. Eliot (who Evans had also read and admired) would have approved.
But it was not Evans’ particular choice of approach or aesthetic that interested me so much as the way in which literature and photography had combined and inter-mingled, fused and blended, and played out in his head, in his imagination and in his art.
How, I wondered, had the need and impulse to write come to be channeled into the making of photographs instead?
Put differently, how had a literary sensibility and imagination come to find expression in a particular way of seeing and visually constructing the world, given form in a defining and finite series of silver gelatine prints?
What did literature and photography have in common, not in a general (cross-pollination of the arts?) but specific sense, influencing and nourishing each other? And why was it that so many would-be writers - Evans, to be sure, is not the only example - and creative individuals with backgrounds in literature (Robert Adams, for instance, was an English professor) - had become photographers?
There was, I confess, more than idle curiosity at work. I too was an English literature graduate; I too had dreamed, once upon a delirious time, of becoming a writer; had dabbled in verse (some of it published!) and struggled (endlessly, grimly) with a novel or two; had found, in my case later in life (and perhaps as I felt my dreams slipping away) solace - no, satisfaction and purpose - in becoming a photographer, in learning the craft.
It was precisely here, mind you - in reflecting on my own somewhat embarrassing journey of literary aspiration - that I found myself going deeper and deeper down the wrong rabbit-hole, and decided to pull out.
And so, at least for now, my epic on Photography and Literature has been shelved. But I will share (I have probably shared these before, but if I can’t remember, you probably can’t either) three little poems, that have flowed from my own pen, and which do say something (lyrical and subjective!) about me and my world. And, indirectly perhaps, about my photographs.
Being a failed writer, needless to say, doesn’t make me a Walker Evans, either. But that’s not the point of this story.
Merry Christmas, to all who celebrate Christmas, and a Happy New Year!
Clouds
A boy lies on his back
looking at clouds. Only,
he is not looking, he is
up there with them, up
where they slide and collide
mysterious as fate
insubstantial as air.
I have not seen clouds
in sixty years, until
today - there, overhead, in the blue
sky that scrolls and unfolds -
there, where they always were.
On My 70th Birthday
I saw you in the shadows, on the porch.
Changed, unchanged. You looked like me.
Cigar, smile, glass of whiskey.
Our solemn street was quiet, too -
hardly a stir among the leaves.
You might be still, but still I knew
you count the time and things to do.
Why not, I thought. Why wouldn’t you.
African Fish Eagle, Hamilton's Tented Camp
This was not one of those
Swooping soaring
Photo opportunities, you know,
Where the bird glides in from
Stage left and
Exits beautifully
To the right
With a pristine
Pink and silver
Salmon or something
A missile ready to launch
From its claw
Flakes of morning light
Falling from its not yet barbecued
Flesh.
This was murder, a brawl in the shallows
Which ended badly
For the thrashing creature in the water
Which had not started it
But for a moment there I thought
Could have drowned the fish eagle
Dragged it under.
I must have shot
Twenty pictures
Intent on the action, thinking of
Flickr, of the prints
I would make. Only after
Did I see what had happened.
There was drama, certainly,
Struggle, death.
The bird had to eat, and the fish
Grubbing about in the mud or slime
Had no idea
How its world would instantaneously
Flip upside down.
They make a good series,
Those images, nonetheless.
I am happy to show them.
The morning light fell in flakes on the deck
That overlooked the bend in the river.
We are leaving here, I thought.
We won’t see this again.
Greece - the Photo Book
The photographs from my Greek photo book can now be seen on my website, too. Click here to be whisked away! And if you’re interested, here is a link to the Blurb Bookstore, where both print and PDF versions are available for purchase.
Serifos
Portfolio Updates
Toronto | Fresh Impressions
Riding the bus
I have added a number of colour and black-and-white photographs to my Toronto | Fresh Impressions portfolio - the new images are embedded amongst photographs from earlier this year. You might enjoy a good browse.
Americana
Bay City, Michigan
It would seem that the US electorate missed the turn last month….
I haven’t the words. Still, life goes on.
So why not pour yourself a nice glass of wine (or whatever is your tipple) and click here to view the latest additions to my Americana portfolio; photographs taken during those family visits to Michigan and Pennsylvania in August and October.
Glasgow Gallery of Photography
Church of the Seven Martyrs, Sifnos
This photograph has been accepted for the Colour Exhibition which will show at the Glasgow Gallery of Photography from 3 -27 April.