Along the Rio Grande in Albuquerque is the wild, wooded bosque. This buffer of land has traditionally acted as a flood zone, at the mercy of the rainfall and erosion that naturally occurs in these parts. Decades ago, an anti-flooding scheme was developed by the Army Corps of Engineers; an attempt to create some kind of defense to the whims of nature. Thus, much of the bosque is littered with these oversized steel and wire objects, known locally, affectionately as “jetty jacks.” There is an official name for them, I’m sure. I prefer the colloquial name, though. They acts as a sort of found sculpture for hikers and bikers along the river. They also remind me of something you might see along the front lines of a war zone ( in my mind it would be WW2, but I’m guess the war in Ukraine might be relevant as well.) The attempt to have the banks of the river conform to this kind of control may seem futile. Another thing that seems futile is my ongoing attempt at trying to create a good photograph of these jetty jacks. I’ve attempted dozens of times, and each time I fail to capture the essence of these metal beasts that dot the landscape near the river. I have yet to find a way to capture the scale, the geometry, the complexity and the oddity of these objects in their environment. I tried again today, while out on a (hopeful) mood shifting walk; see attempt above. Maybe this white whale will elude me forever. I’m sure to keep trying nonetheless, even if it is just an exercise in futility.
2022: 41 First Impressions
My wandering path away from straight photography has taken me on a surprising journey. Discovering alternative ways to make imagery has felt more personal, more unique, and certainly more tactile. Case in point: I returned to the Rio Grande bosque this week, an environment I’ve photographed numerous times over the past three or four years. This time, instead of taking my camera, I carried a pad of newsprint and some charcoal for sketching. I don’t possess any real drawing skills (hence my predilection for photography) but I ended up doing a series of relief rubbings, or as the French call them: frottage. Placing paper on rough surfaces of tree bark and cut logs and rubbing with charcoal, I was able to make new images in an environment that I thought had shown me everything it was going to reveal. The act of rubbing also engaged me in ways that went beyond just seeing. There are trails made by bark beetles scattered across many fallen trees in the bosque. Their destructive paths etched onto the stripped trunks of now dead trees. They produce wonderful patterns and textures, and they provided me with a new way to visualize my own path. Twisted, organic, wandering, yet expressive.
2020: 35 (Everything Is Gonna Burn, We'll All Take Turns)
Late summer and everything is on fire, or so it seems. Literally, fire is raging on bone dry land, consuming anything within its path. Metaphorically, of course, emotions are flaming, a virus is engulfing thousands, the planet is getting hotter, as are tempers. There was a small(ish) fire in the bosque last week, quickly contained and extinguished. I was drawn down there to see and smell for myself what the aftermath was like. There is a quiet beauty to the destruction of a fire. There is also a reminder of the cycle of life; birth, death, re-birth. Forests can recover, nature heals itself, if we can stay out of the way..
There was a clearly defined line along which the fire in the bosque raged. Blackened trees and grasses hit a point where the destruction stopped. Flowers were still present, birds and bugs still floated in the air. The thicket of the bosque is dense in the summertime. One can easily get lost in the deep of it; sometimes you need to look to the sky to remember which direction is east or west. The fire, surprisingly, cleared a path to the river that I had never seen before. As I wandered out of the burn zone, I saw the waters of the Rio Grande through a now clearing in the twisted underbrush. Fire can take, but it can give as well.