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A Disturbing Artifact of the Wild West
Continue ReadingWhen wandering a museum in the Southwestern United States, one expects reminders of bygone rugged lives, curated to local standards of conservative taste, intended to produce only mild provocations. I explored the exhibits in this archive anticipating relaxation — then this horror of an object confronted me. The outline and condition of the thing jolts […]
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Ghost Musician Near the Sunflower River
Continue ReadingThe Sunflower River flows serpentine-fashion through Clarksdale, Mississippi. In the same curvaceous manner it runs north and south out of the city among surrounding fields — planted mostly in cotton. I talked for an hour by the water with the subject of our street-portrait before making this image. I cannot remember his regular name or […]
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Experiencing Ordinary Art
Continue Reading“We do not have to travel to the ends of the earth nor return many millennia in time to find peoples for whom everything that intensifies the sense of immediate living is an object of intense admiration. Bodily scarification, waving feathers, gaudy robes, shining ornaments of gold and silver, of emerald and jade, formed the […]
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Honoring Local Heroes
Continue ReadingAn American GI stands in the square of a mountain town in Arizona. He does more than just stand — he assumes a classic posture with arm and hand raised at the perfect angle; the crown and the rim of his helmet follow the same line flawlessly. The soldier petitions the Divine for assistance perhaps […]
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Memories Of Dean …. 1956-2011
Continue ReadingCaptured along a mountain road of continual switch-backs and treacherous hairpin turns, our image shows a homemade memorial — in itself a creative still life, arranged on a slope descending steeply toward the pavement. The shrine contains rich information about its subject, Dean, alive on our planet from the year 1956 until 2011, when he […]
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Wishing You A Happy 2nd Amendment Christmas
Continue ReadingThe Massie Christmas greeting appeared on social media channels in time to celebrate the 2021 Holidays. The image comes from an iPhone camera and falls within a subspecies we might label: group-selfie. This particular group seems energized beyond common expressions of emotion; their manic joy exceeds what you normally witness in even the most animated […]
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A Prize-Winning Look?
Continue ReadingIf we held a competition among all the world’s photographs capturing ‘dirty looks’ — hateful, contemptuous gazes — the following image might be found among the contenders. It depicts what borders on a murderous stare, recorded by me while riding in a horse-drawn vehicle through an alleyway at Luxor, Upper Egypt. It reminds me of […]
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A Luckless Great Depression Family
Continue ReadingAs a child whenever possible I asked the adults around me for details about common ancestors and living family members. Not everyone complied in a forthcoming manner; some lacked interest in history altogether, while others clammed up for undisclosed personal reasons. The three people in our image — and everyone who knew them in life […]
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