1940s, Cars, Texas

WANNA RIDE WITH ME TOWARD THE SUN?

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’48 Chrysler, El Paso, Texas, 2022, photograph by Bruce Berman

Photograph and rumination by Bruce Berman

I’m out of words.
Taught photography for 25 years. F-stops, shutter speeds, composition, GET CLOSER!, on and on and on.
In the beginning there was just photography and me.
Burned out? Talked out?
In the end, what is there to say?
The world is LIGHT. Photography is Light-writing (Greek). Actually light-noticing, good and bad. And commitment to doing it. Pretending it can be taught is a wink. If you really have no heart for it and realize the part about sweating to get it (which is universal to all pursuits), why botha.
And then there is love.
The love you feel when it’s good. The love you get from others who felt what and how you saw something. The love you can give by giving your heart in the form of that image, whether it’s a print (especially if it’s a print), on a monitor or I don’t know what else.
There I go again.
Words.
Just can’t!
Do you love this image?

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Cultural Issues, El Paso, Ethics, Technology, Texas

EVIL EYE

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Evil Eye (of Google), El Paso, Texas, 2018

 

If a dude you don’t know was in front of your casita taking pictures, wouldn’t you go out and ask him/her what they’re doing? Would you not feel righteous indignation (your home is your castle…. why is this cat snapping photos of my castle?)?

Why does Google have a right to drive up and down the streets of this world taking pictures of your home? Who made a law making that alright? Where does this end? Is there an X-Ray camera that can penetrate the outside of your home and looks at your inside? When does that machine get arms and legs and jump down and punishes you -inside or out- for what they think is a “transgression? Is that OK for Google to do? Or the Government? Or your worst enemy? Or the local pervert?

Who is this OK with?

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Documentary Photography, Funklands, Texas

REDOING THE CLOCK

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Redoing The Clock. El Paso, Texas, 2018

It’s been 5:00 o’clock at The Clock on Dyer Street for as long as I’ve been in El Paso (43 years).

It’s reassuring that time does not change particularly after 43 years (if you know what I mean).

But even in a land where time stands still, once in awhile, roadside signs need to be renewed.

It’s an art form. The letters are made of rubbery plastic. You have to know what you’re doing and this phantom sign renewer does. Name? Withheld. Working for the restaurant? Not saying. Getting paid? Maybe.

It’s almost 5:00PM for this image. It’ll be almost 5:00AM in twelve hours.

Even a broken clock is right… twice a day.

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Documentary Photography, Funklands, Texas

CROWN OF CANUTILLO, TEXAS: RUMINATION ON FACTS

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Crown of Canutillo, Texas. By Bruce Berman, 2015

Text by Bruce Berman

Whatever this crown was announcing is long gone. A bar? A restaurant? A store? Probably a bar… but who knows?

The photograph of the Crown of Canutillo, Texas is what remains (and perhaps a memory here and there).

Who constructed it? Why a crown in this funky little town that’s on the border up against New Mexico? Was there dancing?

Who knows?

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Children, Culture, Documentary Photography, Labor, Photography That Matters, social displacement, Survivors, Texas, The Great Depression, The Human Condition

MIGRANT FATHER

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Migrant Father, June 1938, by Dorothea Lange

Dorothea Lange’s extended caption:

Old time professional migratory laborer camping on the outskirts of Perryton; Texas at opening of wheat harvest. With his wife and growing family; he has been on the road since marriage; thirteen years ago. Migrations include ranch land in Texas; cotton and wheat in Texas; cotton and timber in New Mexico; peas and potatoes in Idaho; wheat in Colorado; hops and apples in Yakima Valley; Washington; cotton in Arizona. He wants to buy a little place in Idaho

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America, California, Culture, Displaced Communities, Documentary Photography, Foreclosure, FSA, social displacement, Texas, The Great Depression

NO NET AMERICA

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Migrant family on highway, California, 1937

Photograph by Dorothea Lange

Extended Caption: California at Last: Example of self-resettlement in California. Oklahoma farm family on highway between Blythe and Indio. Forced by the drought of 1936 to abandon their farm, they set out with their children to drive to California. Picking cotton in Arizona for a day or two at a time gave them enough for food and gas to continue. On this day, they were within a day’s travel of their destination, Bakersfield, California. Their car had broken down en route and was abandoned.

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