From: Katharine Thayer (kthayer@pacifier.com)
Date: 12/22/02-10:16:02 AM Z
I like you, Jack, but I don't understand half of what you say. It
reminds me of my first term teaching statistics, when a student raised
her hand and said, "I hear words coming out of your mouth but they're
not making any meanings in my brain." That's how I felt reading your
post. I thought for a moment that maybe if I put it through babelfish it
would come out in English, but I suspect babelfish would be no help
either. I'll respond gingerly to a few points, with the caveat that I'm
just kind of grasping in the dark here. That's not to find fault with
your means of expression of course, but only with my own understanding.
Jack Fulton wrote:
>
> >>> In a way, this is a shame. Here you are, learned, and probably supportive
> of the do-not-pollute group . . . but you are bored by the constant
> juxtaposition of 'junk' and 'Nature'.
What do these two things have to do with each other? I sense a vague
tone of disappointment, or censure, about the fact that an educated,
politically savvy person would be bored by the constant juxtaposition of
junk and nature. Would it be understandable if I was bored by an
endlessly repeated cliche of any other kind? Is it just my boredom about
the constant juxtaposition of junk and nature that's at issue here? An
educated person who cares about the environment should never admit to
being bored by a boring repetition of a cliche that's offered in its
defense?
.
> Yet, like that young young person excitedly experimenting and learning with
> Catherine Rogers was "trying to find a voice".
What????
But, that visual icon of
> comparison is a lot like the continued cry against racism: necessary.
Yes, the continued cry against racism is necessary, but it doesn't
follow at all that the constant juxtaposition of junk and nature is
necessary. (I'm assuming that by "icon of comparison" you mean the
juxtaposition of junk and nature in this instance.) Necessary to what?
Since your earlier sentence seems to link a concern about pollution to
the juxtaposition of junk and nature, am I to infer that the
juxtaposition of junk and nature is a cry against pollution? Okay, I'll
grant that it could be, although it's rather... literal and cliched as
an expression, wouldn't you say? At any rate after 25 or 30 years of its
reiteration, don't you think maybe we could find a new way to express
the same idea? Not only that, but I've never seen that this
juxtaposition has done much for the environment, if that's what it's
about. Not that I'm a great fan of Ansel Adams, but I have to admit that
his straightforward (noncontradictory) statements of beauty did 100
times for the environment and for wilderness what all the icons of
comparison have done in all the decades since, so why should I believe
that the comparison is necessary to raise consciousness about the
environment, if that's what you're saying? I just don't see any evidence
to back up that idea.
I suspect that most of these reiterations have little to do with the
environment, anyway; I suspect it's more that several generations of art
students have now been taught that landscape must always contain a
contradiction, and so it has become a formula, and for viewers it's as
Clay said, a game of "Where's Waldo" --- it's a landscape, so where's
the styrofoam cup?
The
> dumb need eyes into thought. Photographers of conscience provide that no
> matter how disney(-pop)ular the visual voice is.
Eeghg.... People who can't speak need eyes into thought? What in the
world does that MEAN?
>
> >>> What is the iconic difference Katherine?
Boy you've got me there, I have no idea at all what the iconic
difference is. It looks like gobbledygook to me, but maybe it's
something really important and meaningful, in which case, you need to
translate it into English so I can understand its importance and
meaning.
Is is Salgado, M.E. Mark, Misrach,
> Ketchum, Klett or is it the 'spirit searchers' like Gowin, L. Connor,
> Giacomelli (to bring him back in)?
????
> We're in a real fix.
Now there's a sentence I understand and can agree with.
Peace,
Katharine
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : 01/31/03-09:31:26 AM Z CST