Month: October 2016

Rendezvous With Ivi

Despite dense fog from Cabbage Hill* on, we charged forward for a meetup on Sunday at the Walla Walla Regional Airport with Ivi, who was driving the D-van from Seattle.  With a few hours to kill before her return flight that evening, we struck out for the nearby Bennington Lake Recreation Area for hiking and (really?) picniking.  Despite Dense Fog and intermittent rain, a surprising number of people were out, also walking their dogs. We probably saw only a small portion of the lake but are eager to see how it compares under normal atmospheric and lighting conditions.  After an hour or two, we went for dessert and coffee, then returned to the dry and warmth of the airline terminal for rest and conversation.  Our return convoy was successful, despite continued Dense Fog — even denser and more nerve-racking and down to 20mph going back up toward the aptly-named Deadman’s Pass — as well as rainy night time conditions and a gas tank empty warning, needle on “E” and glowing icon, for the final 17 miles.

* see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_T0aJLxZKvQ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHsmeXdOsEw and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1u5ZQzSEUk (and there are even more Cabbage Hill/Deadman Pass videos on YouTube)

[rDay585]

Country Doctor

W. Eugene Smith was already acknowledged as an all-time master photojournalist by the time I was starting photography in the 60s.  Here, from Life Magazine archives is one of the photo essays, including several images that I had never before seen, that made Smith famous: “Country Doctor”, 1948.
w-eugene-smith_country-doctor

(And the link to the full essay again, in case you missed it: 

http://time.com/3456085/w-eugene-smiths-landmark-photo-essay-country-doctor/?xid=newsletter-life-weekly)

Worth chasing down from many internet sources would be Smith’s other work such as that from his time as a World War II combat photographer, his investigation into mercury poisioning in Minamata, Japan, the Spanish village essay and his Jazz Loft Project.  And Smith’s most celebrated photo (of his young children, taken while he was recovering from WWII wounds) is probably this one, “The Walk to Paradise Garden” from the mid-40s:
w-eugene-smith_walk-to-paradise-garden

rDay Five-Hundred-Seventy-Eight: Mirror in the Sky, with an Audio Sidetrack

Somewhere between Hollywood and downtown LA, around 6th and Hoover, is a mirror-glass-wrapped skyscraper that I often drove or walked or bicycled by, admiring how it could almost disappear into the sky, depending on lighting conditions*.  The entire building could change color as the sky changed, something a bit difficult to demonstrate with black & white photographs.  Not always a big fan of commercial architecture, but this was a bit different for me, a mirror into the air, perched at an angle near the edge of Lafayette Park and attached at ground level by flowing buttresses or whatever those elements are called.  And I was taken by the way a nearby church — I believe it was the historic  First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, based on notes attached to the negatives — was reflected. Today I came upon some of my forgotten and unprocessed negatives from one of my photographic encounters with the building. April, 1974. Rated G.

*(Unfortunately, I don’t have examples here of how the building would reflect the sky and its clouds and changing colors, but I must have something like that somewhere, as I definitely photographed the thing from time to time.  For that matter, I know that I have photographed the church as well, as it abounds with history and art.  And I think that it is the church famed for its gigantic pipe organ, which I have heard in performance, years ago.  Any viewers who can chime in on this, feel free.)

UPDATE:  A little research discloses that this building was erected in 1972, has twenty floors, and was called the CNA Park Place Tower (CNA is the insurance and financial services company) and apparently now is the building of the Los Angeles Superior Court.  

UPDATE #2:  Holy cow.  Just discovered that YouTube has a series of videos on the “Great Organs of First Church”, starting with this one:

Art21

For those of us stuck in the outback, TV and Internet provide much of our art exposure.  I just discovered that one of my old favorites, Art21 (Art in the Twenty-First Century) is now into its 8th season.  Watching online is the alternative of choice for me, as it is broadcast by our local PBS affiliate only late at night. So far I have seen Los Angeles, Vancouver and Chicago from this season.

Famous Works of Art, A Postscript

Mentioned almost as a brief aside in the subject book (see original post here), in connection with the famous Apollo Belvedere sculpture, is a 1796 painting by Hubert Robert entitled, “Imaginary View of the Grand Gallery of the Louvre as a Ruin”. Being unfamiliar with this painting, I tracked it down and see that it is a rather crazy-radical-apocalyptic thing, showing the Apollo as just about the only intact piece amid the fantasized destruction, being calmly sketched by a seated artist. Half the fun of this book, which is utterly dense with historical notes and arcane and unfamiliar (to me) references, is chasing after the subjects of the author’s observations and comparisons and mentions. Of course, that means that — together with its small type which quickly exhausts my eyes — it will take forever to get through the book.  Here’s a look at the “…Ruin” (click image for expanded view):louvre-peinture-francaise-p1020324

[Source: Wikipedia – “Vue imaginaire de la Grande Galerie du Louvre en ruines” by Hubert Robert (French) 1796]