Art Bergmann - Remember His Name
Monday, July 31, 2017
My thickest
file of negatives is not what many who might peek at my blog every once in a
while think it is.
My thickest
file contains portraits I have taken since the late 70s of Art Bergmann. In many ways
I have begun to understand that we have a couple of things in common. A third
one is debatable.
Art
Bergmann and yours truly have remained faithful to one woman (His Sherri, my
Rosemary). Both of us have had long careers where we have managed not to
disappear into oblivion.
Where I
cannot match Bergmann (my debatable from above) is that my love of photography
does not compare to his extreme passion for what he does. His passion may have
been compromised a few times (if not many) by substance abuse. But from his
fresh hell (as he might say and has) he has emerged somehow untouched and the
better man.
As an
example I will place here three videos (not one of his earliest which is
available if you look for it). One is a video in which Bergmann incorporates
his wedding to Sherri in Mexico. It is this one.
Then there is a wildly
dissonant version of one my fave Bergmann tunes, Remember Her Name, at the Wise
Hall. I was present, back stage for that performance.
 |
| Art Bergmann backstage at the Wise Hall with Steven Drake |
The third one, quite
recent, shows him playing A Town Called Mean on acoustic guitar with Paul Rigby and he may be confused (am I? I am
not sure) as a folk singer.
If you
consider that this man may have been playing a purist’s punk style by 1975 and
then you listen A Town Called Mean you have at least a 40 year career where he
has not banged on the old drum but emerged every time with something new. And at all times he has not sold himself to any industry and remained faithfully himself (as he almost said once).
I tell
people that I am taking some of the best photographs of my life right now. I
get no reaction. But at the very least I have a role model. His name is Art
Bergmann.
For anybody who might not understand that second image, I used a Widelux swivel lens panoramic with very fast film and counted on the mirror's help.
For anybody who might not understand that second image, I used a Widelux swivel lens panoramic with very fast film and counted on the mirror's help.
