From Brent

i decided that this year i would be completely drug and alcohol free at thanks giving. then i got into the sublime with my camera, my sublime: plastic, dayglo-in-the-dark sublime. this is the kind of sublime where omniscience is a product of sobriety, the sudden awake of conscious acknowledgement that we are wrapped in family.

that's the family at the bottom reach of an endless blue wine, the one we sink into after struggle against rip tide, when the life guard is away.



it's all fantasy though... i paint shadows and funeral reds into things where they don't belong... i make a wake out of a tea party... i define positive space through the juxtaposition of so much shadow so as to say: this is who i am in the eyes of myself, family...

Christmas

This is a picture of my sister, brother, and me (I’m the one on the left) at Christmas.  It’s from somewhere in the early 90’s, maybe 1990 or 1991?  It was taken on Christmas morning and I think it kind of exemplifies some of the aspects of the iconic American Christmas.  Between the coordinating pajamas and the shiny new bike off to the side, this picture could have been taken in any number of American households. You obviously can’t tell it from the picture, but we all still believed in Santa Claus at this point, so Christmas still had this awesome sense of mystery attached to it.  The day after this picture was taken, we went to show the kids next door our new bike that Santa had brought, and they informed us that they had seen our parents sneaking it in on Christmas Eve.  So subsequent Christmases, although still fun in their own way, just didn’t have that same sense of mystery and wonder that this one had.  (Off topic, but I also really like this picture because it reminds me that at one point I was taller than my brother and sister ) 

Cultural Identity Snapshot

Unfortunately I don't have any of my old family pictures with me here in the US so I had to choose from the limited photos that I have with me. I also wanted to add some multi-cultural flavor into the mix :)

This is a photograph of my friends and I during my wedding a little over a year ago. I look at this and other pictures like it to remember my friends, family, culture and who I really am. I guess cultural and personal identity are the truths that I perceive within this picture. Our truth(s) that we portray to others differ from any given moment of time. You know me one way and each person in the picture knows me slightly differently.

Nintendo Culture

Okay, here I am in the early nineties just moments after beating Super Mario Bros. III for the first time. My mother wanted me to look at the camera, but having just spent the last 6.5 hours working my ways through almost every level (really, who didn't use the warp whistle? Who? What purist dare not use the warp whistle?), I just couldn't bare to look away from the final credits even for a second while she snapped a picture of this historic moment in my life.

Looking back at this photo, I see many examples of visual culture that shaped who I am today. Nintendo was always a favorite escape, and although video games are typically associated with boys, here I am, a girl complete with a skating skirt and cabbage patch kids beating one of the most famous video games of all time. You can also see how technology has changed in the past twenty years...the t.v., the game system, and the camera all demonstrate how technology permeates our lives in very meaningful ways, no matter how advanced the graphics system may or may not be.

I have kept this photo with me for years, and often show it off like I'm doing now. I'm really proud to proclaim that I was a video game nerd, eventhough I don't know the 99 lives code on Contra...but I know of it...It's just an example of how people use images and experiences to construct identity and relate to others. Here it's in the form of a generational myth...that all kids from the early 90s loved Nintendo!

fake memories of 1970

This image is important to me. I found it in some of my Mom's old things that I was helping her clean out when I was in middle school or early high school, and I have kept it ever since. I am not in this picture. I was not born when this photo was taken. My mom was probably in her senior year of high school or her first year of college.

I love this photo because I can see myself and my cousins in it, even though the photo actually contains images of our parents. My mom is the oldest daughter (in the black turtleneck) her slightly younger brother is to her left with the funny face, and her younger sisters are in the front. (The two men in the back are my mom's boyfriend at the time and her best friend.)

We all have strong family resemblances, my cousins and I, so when I look at this photo not only do I see my mom, my aunts and my uncle, I also see the next generation because of how similar we all look to our parents. The photo also represents the picture of close-knit sibling relationships that I have always pictured whenever I hear stories from their childhood. My grandmother divorced my grandfather when my mom was 13 and the family moved to Texas from Georgia to live with my great grandmother. This photo was taken at her house because that's where the family lived. My grandmother worked a lot to support the family and when she wasn't working she liked to socialize. My mom and her siblings looked out for each other a lot and they were a very close family. I am an only child and I have always kind of idolized their sibling relationships, in the past tense based on the stories they have told (the ones I have heard over and over since I was a child, and the ones I am only now getting to hear that I am an adult--those are the really good ones by the way). I also read a lot of J.D. Salinger in high school and I used to think of them as a kind of Southern gothic version of the Glass family.

Here's one of my favorite stories just so you get the idea:
When my youngest aunt was little (maybe so young she wasn't in school yet) there was a very mean, evil boy who lived in their neighborhood. One day, she found this kid drowning two puppies! She was so upset she ran all the way to my uncle's high school. This was a very long way for a very small child to go on her own. She found him in the hall between classes. She was crying and she couldn't really talk. My uncle was very confused as to how she had gotten there and after a while she calmed down enough to tell him what happened. He immediately ditched school to take her home. He also took care of that kid, if you know what I mean. Also, my uncle once had a dog he named "Cigar Tree". Best. Dog. Name. Ever.

And, their aunt, my great aunt, used to care for her namesake niece, my older aunt, all the time because my grandmother worked so much. (Actually my youngest aunt used to think my mom was her mom because my mom took care of her all the time, but that's another story...) Anyway, the great aunt and uncle had a pet monkey. Really. It was a capuchin. It used to terrorize my aunt when she stayed there. It would steal her food jump on her, etc. Are you starting to get the Southern gothic picture, yet?

As siblings they are all still very close, as they always have been, and live within twenty minutes of each other. Most of them talk on the phone to each other every day. I don't know if I could handle that close of a sibling relationship, but I do respect it and I see so much value in it. So I have all of this mythology of siblinghood built into this image, especially since it is something I have never and never will really experience. I have ascribed so much meaning to this photograph, and all of it comes out of my own assumptions, values and ideals.

Grandma & Grandpa Fry

Piedmont, Oklahoma (1945).
I barely remember my great-grandparents. They were very hard working farmers and ranchers. Mae Fry came to Oklahoma with $15 sewn into her skirt hem. William Valentine Fry still had a thick German accent. They did not acquire their land during the Oklahoma land run. They purchased it from someone who did and paid $12 for 500 acres of land.
I will always remember my great-grandmothers hands...they were huge! Her hands were never idle, constantly pruning, weeding, gardening, chopping, cooking, or sewing.
My grandmother is the person who took the picture. She remembers how much they loved and supported one another through all their hardships.
Great-grandpa Fry built the two-story house they lived in and it had this very narrow and steep staircase that I played on as a kid. I still remember the sound of him snoring in his rocking chair and their German cuckoo clock in the background.
It is significant to me because I remember that they were true partners & pioneers that made their living from the land.

I'll start

I have kept these two pictures for almost 20 years. Both are a combination of memories (that I never actually experienced), the stories I have heard about my parents' childhood, and an American mythos of the 1940's and 50's.


The first image is of my mom's family from 1959. By the time I was born, my grandparents had divorced, so I was never with both of them at the same time. To me, it represents the American family of the 1950's: my Gran's bangs, the kids all together and so excited, the furniture, and almost everyone smiling.
Black and white images seem to always reflect a sort of dream though, like the dream sequence in a movie. They are equally historical fact and non-reality. I was heartbroken when it got damaged, but it has since taken on a meaning of its own since the my uncle Jimmy (the boy on the left) was always the black sheep and actually was killed in 1984 at the age of 32.
I think this picture is so important to me because it captures my past. It's a past I never knew, but one which Americans are constantly reminded of, a myth of innocence and prosperity.


A myth. My grandparents fought terribly. There is a famous family story of the Whataburger that was thrown across the living room and slid down the wall. My grandparents were both too pissed and proud to clean it, and the kids were too scared, so the stain remained there until they moved out of the house.



This second image is of my other grandparents. They were the opposite of, but probably as mythical as my mother's family. I have been sort of mystified by this image since I discovered it in a drawer my grandma kept of old photos. It looks like a film still. My grandma had to tell me that the man was my grandfather and that was it was her behind him.
As much as the other picture represents the 1950's, to me this is 1940's America: the young attractive sailor possibly getting off a train, and a young woman behind him. It almost appears as if they haven't met, but we can imagine him opening a door for her and they look into each other's eyes. If he bent her down to kiss her, it could be the famous V-J day image of the sailor and the nurse in Times Square.

My memories of my grandparents feed into the myths I choose to believe in this image. To me, they were the picture of true, unconditional love. They were both hilarious and independent. They played off each other with witty comments while discretely showing a deep affection and respect for one another. Like this picture, I'm sure that much of it was simply a snapshot in a long complex life together.