museums

Americana

/ Tracy Abell

It was my turn to choose our “date night” activity, and I chose the AMERICANA juried exhibition at Colorado Photographic Arts Center.  CPAC is Denver’s only nonprofit dedicated solely to photography.

There are 32 photos in the exhibit. Images include a man holding a Confederate flag, groups of people at small town parades, dead coyotes in the back of a pickup adorned with a U.S. flag, a girl and her goat at the county fair, and cell phone towers that are camouflaged as a eucalyptus tree in one photo and crosses outside a church in another (two of my favorite photos in the exhibit).

This powerful photo (Alister & Sherie) is from Michael Joseph:

Zippy chose this as one of his favorites, should a mythical Uncle Mortie show up with a blank check to buy one of the photos. I, too, admire this image, but don’t think I could summon the emotional courage to look at it every day.

Remember the Vasa

/ Tracy Abell / 2 Comments

I photographed these carved figures with my phone while visiting the Vasa Museum in Stockholm, and have held onto the bizarre image for months as I waited for the right time to display it here.

Today feels like an especially good day in the Corporate States of America to share these figures from the Vasa’s prow.

I’ll let Wikipedia explain:
[The Vasa] was constructed at the navy yard in Stockholm under a contract with private entrepreneurs in 1626–1627 and armed primarily with bronze cannons cast in Stockholm specifically for the ship. Richly decorated as a symbol of the king’s ambitions for Sweden and himself, upon completion she was one of the most powerfully armed vessels in the world. However, Vasa was dangerously unstable and top-heavy with too much weight in the upper structure of the hull. Despite this lack of stability she was ordered to sea and foundered only a few minutes after encountering a wind stronger than a breeze.

Militarization.
Privatization.
King’s ambitions.
Dangerous instability.
Greed and arrogance.
Epic failure.

The Vasa sank after traveling just 1300 meters.

Today I’m indulging in a little wishful thinking.

(NOTE: As a writer, I’m also thinking about how there’s truly no such thing as an original plot line. Greedheads gonna be greedheads, from the beginning of time…)