tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post738286075007321379..comments2024-01-28T03:56:39.351-08:00Comments on TOM CLARK: Marc St. Gil: Wading in the Water (Leakey, Texas)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-68388818811727707082013-07-27T20:52:02.038-07:002013-07-27T20:52:02.038-07:00And we are lucky to be hearing from you, citizenj....And we are lucky to be hearing from you, citizenj. Marc St Gil was indeed among the greatest of photojournalists. And your comment reminds us that this series remains testament to his genius.<br /><br />Perhaps in seeking a clear view of American reality it has always helped to have that special bit of distance (a sense of strangeness, even) that comes of seeing through slightly "foreign" eyes.<br /><br />The uniqueness of the culture, its uncommon commonness, its seemingly impregnable yet at the same time curiously transparent mystery -- all these things stand out in the Leakey portfolio.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-74894880111894978602013-07-27T20:38:02.055-07:002013-07-27T20:38:02.055-07:00I was lucky to be a friend of the photographer, Ma...I was lucky to be a friend of the photographer, Marc St. Gil. He was a fascinating person. He was Dutch and had traveled the world as a photojournalist. He lived in Houston during the 70's and 80's. It's great to see his pictures again.citizenjhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01223679744086012062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-8549301116906382042013-01-16T00:10:43.402-08:002013-01-16T00:10:43.402-08:00A few nights of honest reflection (wading in the w...A few nights of honest reflection (wading in the water of reality) -- along with several conversations with people who've been in Texas lately -- have brought me round to the shocking recognition that insofar as liveability goes (a long way), Texas currently has it all over this ruined province that takes up the space on the map between Oregon and Mexico.<br /><br />As someone intimate with conditions in both places put it: "Texas has less people, more space, and... (long pause) actual functioning infrastructure!"TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-38820143421967141242013-01-15T12:30:06.240-08:002013-01-15T12:30:06.240-08:00great photos --a kind of shock to look at,
parts ...great photos --a kind of shock to look at, <br />parts of the memory jolted back to life. <br /><br />I have heard that song, Wade in the water . . . Nin Andrewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12643167108589844026noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-48258957120330316932013-01-15T05:10:38.997-08:002013-01-15T05:10:38.997-08:00The blood spilled atop and the blood swirling bene...The blood spilled atop and the blood swirling beneath the bonnet, in the sunset.<br /><br />In the dialectic of the visual story, what countermovement can follow -- or in therapeutic terms, what would comprise an antidote?<br /><br /><a href="http://tomclarkblog.blogspot.com/2013/01/george-herbert-vertue.html" rel="nofollow">George Herbert: Vertue</a>TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-71708516035483790562013-01-15T04:39:00.930-08:002013-01-15T04:39:00.930-08:00The blood on the bonnet echoed in the sunset; pola...The blood on the bonnet echoed in the sunset; polarities perfectly figured here.Mose23https://www.blogger.com/profile/01100756913131511440noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-5329088722875454852013-01-14T18:46:44.792-08:002013-01-14T18:46:44.792-08:00Tom, I’m with you and the deer. The so called spor...Tom, I’m with you and the deer. The so called sport of hunting—destroying the life of another animal for the thrill of it, for one’s pleasure—strikes me as obscene. The excuse that one eats what one kills, or gives it to the needy, is ethically baseless. Hunting has some validity when one’s day-to-day survival depends on it for food. Grain-baiting deer, as St. Gil’s men-with-guns do, is no sport at all. It's not even hunting.Hazenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13417573435195561519noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-10552773747043485412013-01-14T16:34:50.120-08:002013-01-14T16:34:50.120-08:00Hazen, thanks for the memories, which help to bala...Hazen, thanks for the memories, which help to balance the view here a bit. And the photographer's portfolio did indeed include some lovely shots of a milieu and place of common habitation that could without too much exaggeration be called golden (even adjusting the view for the rose-coloured glasses effect). <br /><br />The nagging reminder that this would also be a place of common habitation for those wild deer bagged for "amusement", that left a different sort of taste. I run into wild deer now and then at night and immediately understand two things -- first that these are creatures far superior to me in beauty and grace, and second that something seems to have taught them that contact with humans is bad medicine, plain and simple. To even think of shooting them for "sport" seems an idea that degrades the presumed thinker. And cozying up to them with feed lures and then waiting over beers and cards and impromptu handgun exercises at the man's-own-camp for a chance to blast away -- what is there to say. <br /><br />(Few loaded rifle racks around here, but the speedway vehicles are far more lethal in any case.)<br /><br />Vassilis, I too would probably want to vamoose, once the shooting-of-anything-that-moves got going. Too much karma in that storage locker.<br /><br />It was interesting to learn that Leakey, over the (nearly) century-and-a-half of its modest existence, has had a pretty stable population, usually in the low hundreds (as also now). I get the impression of a place people must in some way like to live in, an affection they express by staying.<br /><br />At any rate I am an outsider and ought not judge the ways of the place. I was grateful for the objectivity with which Marc St. Gil approached these scenes. I learned from that, and was made to think. That's the one sport at which I'm still able to apply myself these days.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-73687691099620513142013-01-14T14:08:18.373-08:002013-01-14T14:08:18.373-08:00In any season the Texas Hill Country is one of the...In any season the Texas Hill Country is one of the most beautiful parts of a beautiful state. I swam in and floated down rivers like the Frio. I lived right where the West begins, on the banks of the Comal River, which flows (still, I hope) along the Balcones fault line, the first major geological uplift between the Hill Country and the Gulf Coast. It’s upslope all the way from there to the Continental Divide. St. Gil’s photos bring to mind the pleasures I found: the immense open sky, the wild flowers in spring, the sub-tropic nights, the brilliant scorching days, the beautiful women, the weed, and whatever else. Texas over the years has been a mixed bag politically. Garner State Park, featured here, is named for James Nance Garner, FDR’s VP. Ralph Yarborough was a liberal Congressional leader during the conservative Fifties; and there’s LBJ, of course, liberal in domestic policies though an imperialist and warmonger as devoted to the military-industrial complex as any bi-coastal urbanite. Texas today is just one reactionary state in a reactionary nation.Hazenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13417573435195561519noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-18350599232929542732013-01-14T11:49:39.915-08:002013-01-14T11:49:39.915-08:00Leakey, Texas
Dear oh dear I do declare,
I hope t...<i>Leakey, Texas</i><br /><br />Dear oh dear I do declare,<br />I hope that toked-up Chevy’s<br />Driver scored that missing spare,<br />Took another toke and hopped,<br />And hopped the hell outta there!<br />vazambam (Vassilis Zambaras)https://www.blogger.com/profile/14515165428574974933noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-64502664587448762632013-01-14T09:25:13.436-08:002013-01-14T09:25:13.436-08:00Curtis, about the photographers on this project, t...Curtis, about the photographers on this project, that's an interesting story.<br /><br />Photographers -- professional photojournalists, including a number from National Geographic -- were assigned to work in regions of country where they knew the ground. An enterprising and industrious fellow named Gifford Hampshire, who'd been a p.r. exec with a camera company, a National Geographic photo editor and a speechwriter for the FDA and USIA, sold the idea of a documentary photo survey on environmental issues to William Ruckelshaus, the first EPA director. The project had the energy of the new Agency and in many ways it was the best thing the Agency ever accomplished. Starting in '72 photographers were contracted at $150/day plus film (usually color slide) and expenses.<br /><br />The photographers sent their film to regional labs for processing, did their own edits and then the edited slides went on to DC, where Agency staff picked out the shots that would go into the Documerica file. Photographers were fully credited for accepted images; rejected images remained their property.<br /><br />The model of the FSA was commonly acknowledged in all this, with the point of focus (subject matter) changed from poverty to environment. Hampshire's motto for the project was Barry Commoner`s first law of ecology: "Everything is connected to everything else." The ostensible subjects would be e.g. rampant freelance land development, urban blight in the decaying large cities, air, noise, and water pollution. But as with the FSA, considerable liberty was given the photographers, and finally they shot what what they chose to shoot. Marc St. Gil was documenting industrial pollution in Texas when he took this side trip to Leakey that provided some of the most potent images of the 20,000 or so in the project files.<br /><br />There were money problems from the first, to start with a great deal of wrangling over individual photographers' fees with the American Society of Magazine Photographers. Increasingly there was the question of how to pay the bills. A year or so into things there was administrative reorganization, Arthur Rothstein was brought in to help shape the project, hire photographers and design missions and it was at that point the affinity with the FSA turned into something more like a lineage.<br /><br />In the mid 70s Hampshire had serious health problems and what with continuing funding problems, the project began to flag. By 1975 it was pretty much over, though images were added to the file on up to 1977. It is an incredible resource, a window into the historical wall, one that did not stay open for long but provided a terrific vantage during its too brief half-life.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-28624799943207926282013-01-14T08:37:18.327-08:002013-01-14T08:37:18.327-08:00Swell to hear from you Michael, Curtis, Steve.
I...Swell to hear from you Michael, Curtis, Steve. <br /><br />Impossible not to love that idea of a Commode Bang,<br /><br />gravitational field “formed,”<br /><br />how evocative --<br /><br />Will that be a double or a single bang, sir? With or without the continental rattlesnake wakeup call?<br /><br />Speaking of wakeup -- waking up in the Army anyway, but in Texas -- yegads. <br /><br />All the ROTC commissioned officers of my day (59-60-61) came from Texas... good reason to stay in school. Any school.<br /><br />But that nervous target on the back feeling -- for that matter eerily descriptive also of the everyday urban reality feeling in the good old American here and now.<br /><br />Texas has always seemed a cartoon gigantism version of the USA. Baptism, Redemption and Salvation steeped in muddy waters and animal blood -- this must be our chalice as a culture, thank you Lord.<br /><br />Here in the land where unlimited rounds per mag are every godfearing citizen's divine right. Godless Communists like Joe Biden notwithstanding. Feed the deer, let 'em get to know you, then bang -- the David Lynch Storage Locker.<br /><br />Those Wade in the Water lyrics, by the way, diverge in the early 19th c. into several parallel but not identical streams, differing subtly in the particulars of the Biblical specifics.<br /><br />My favourite "oldtime" version of the song:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_g4sDSpW9Uc" rel="nofollow">Staples Singers: Wade in the Water</a><br /><br />Wade in the water.<br />Wade in the water, children.<br />Wade in the water.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br /><br />Well, who are these children all dressed in red?<br />God's a-gonna trouble the water<br />Must be the children that Moses led<br />God's a-gonna trouble the water.<br /><br />Chorus<br /><br />Who's that young girl dressed in white<br />Wade in the Water<br />Must be the Children of Israelites<br />God's gonna trouble the Water.<br /><br />Chorus<br /><br />Jordan's water is chilly and cold.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />It chills the body, but not the soul.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br /><br />Chorus<br /><br />If you get there before I do.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />Tell all of my friends I'm coming too.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br /><br />Chorus<br />See that ban' all dress'd in white?<br />It look lak the childr'n of the Israelite.<br />See that ban' all dress'd in red?<br />It look lak the ban' that Moses led.<br />Wade in de water<br />Wade in de water,<br />Wade in de water.<br />God's a-gonna trouble de water.<br /><br />I stepped in water and the water is cold<br />Don't you know that<br />God's gonna trouble the water<br />Said it chilled my body but not my soul<br />Don't you know that<br />God's gonna trouble the water<br /><br />Chorus<br /><br />Well I went to the water one day to pray<br />Don't you know that<br />God's gonna trouble the water<br />And my soul got happy and I stayed all day<br />Don't you know that<br />God's gonna trouble the waterTChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-53394679988573943532013-01-14T08:09:17.694-08:002013-01-14T08:09:17.694-08:00Tom,
Wade in the water, T for Texas (L for Leaky)...Tom,<br /><br />Wade in the water, T for Texas (L for Leaky), where commode bangs and teenage girls smoke pot (way back then, in living Kodak color).<br /><br /><br />1.14<br /><br />light coming into sky above black plane<br />of ridge, shadowed green of leaf moving <br />in foreground, wave sounding in channel<br /><br /> matter of charged particles,<br /> consistent with facts<br /><br /> gravitational field “formed,”<br /> pointed out, which is<br /><br />blue white of sky to the left of point,<br />whiteness of gull on tip of GROIN sign<br />STEPHEN RATCLIFFEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12339481653546188412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-13032706295680109422013-01-14T07:09:38.227-08:002013-01-14T07:09:38.227-08:00Tale of Two Larrys.
Reminds me of the work of Lar...Tale of Two Larrys.<br /><br />Reminds me of the work of Larry Clark, and Larry Fink, maybe a little Christenberry and William Eggleston thrown in. <br /><br />What is it about these Southern photographers, that they get so tangled up in the get-down-and-dirty?<br /><br />Bleed, baby, bleed.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-90979311157948721182013-01-14T06:45:07.704-08:002013-01-14T06:45:07.704-08:00Maybe it's cause I was an East coast city-and-...Maybe it's cause I was an East coast city-and-city-suburbs boy, but when I was stationed in the service in Texas in 1962 it was a revelatory, and as these photos evoke, slightly frightening proposition. I was turning 20 and felt perfectly safe on the most impoverished city streets, but in small town Texas, I felt like I had a target on my back.Lallyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05310472614196384595noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-914194400228695752013-01-14T05:59:51.635-08:002013-01-14T05:59:51.635-08:00As with last week's "Diamond in the Back&...As with last week's "Diamond in the Back" posts, the seeds of which came from William De Vaughn's brilliant urban historical tune, the idea for this one came from songs that have been around for some time...<br /><br />For those who may be interested:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSif77IVQdY" rel="nofollow">Alison Kraus: Down to the River to Pray</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dt_F-wMszqk" rel="nofollow">OBWAT soundtrack version, new arrangement by Dave Mackey</a><br /><br />And the text providing the title, "Wade in the Water" -- another chord.<br /><br />This traditional gospel song, a spiritual first published by the Fisk Jubilee Singers in 1901, has both Old and New Testament textual sources, referring to the account in Exodus:14 of the Israelites' escape out of Egypt, and, in the chorus, to the tale of riverine healing from John 5:4: "For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had."<br /><br />The song is thought by some to be a coded memorial to the plight of fugitive slaves being tracked by pursuing hound-dogs, which would be thrown off the trace by immersion in water.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMopqUwyD0o" rel="nofollow">Wade in the Water</a><br /><br />Wade in the water.<br />Wade in the water, children now<br />Wade in the water.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br /><br />I stepped in water, and the water was cold.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />Said it chilled my body, but not my soul.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br /><br />Wade in the water.<br />Wade in the water, children now<br />Wade in the water.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br /><br />Well, I went to the water one day to pray.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />And my soul got happy, and I stayed all day.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br /><br />(Help me Sing!)<br />Wade in the water.<br />Wade in the water, children now<br />Wade in the water.<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />God's gonna trouble the water<br />Don't you know that God's gonna trouble the water?<br />God's gonna trouble the water<br /><br />There is love (In the water)<br />In the water (In the water)<br />There is joy, yeah (In the water)<br />In your water yeah (In the water)<br />Your peace (In the water)<br />Is in the water (In the water)<br />Your deliverance (In the water)<br />Is in the water, yeah (In the water)<br />Oh step in, step in (In the water)<br />Joy is in the water (In the water)<br />In the water yeah (In the water)<br />Oh step in, step in (In the water)<br />Love is in the water (In the water)<br />Oh step in yeah (In the water)<br />For deliverance (In the water)<br />Everything yeah (In the water)<br />In the water yeah<br /><br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br />Everything that you need<br />(In the water)<br /><br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />(Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!)<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />(Ooh)<br />God's gonna trouble the water.<br />Oh wade in the water.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.com