Friday, April 05, 2013

Left, unknown US Civil War soldier, right John Alleyne & Gail Skrela

My wife is in a deep depression because she says that everything she wants to do involves money.

I feel helpless in being able to help as I look forward to that first day sometime in May when one of my fragrant roses will bloom and beckon me to sniff. It will be pleasure at no cost.

Today I read a lovely review, by Ken Johnson in my hard copy NY Times about an exhibition of American Civil War Photographs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As a young boy I was inspired to photography at a United States Information Service library in Buenos Aires where in an American Heritage Magazine I saw my first image of the American Civil War taken by one Timothy O’Sullivan. What particularly intrigued me is that the men in the photographs looked contemporary and yet in one of my first realizations of death, I knew that they were long dead. Important in the equation is the idea that while long dead they were alive in that photograph.

If I had the money I would be on the first plane to New York to see the show. Luckily in my extensive collection of books of the US Civil War I have many (not all) of the images shown at the Met.

Perhaps one day soon Rosemary will say, “I am tired of not having money and living in a valuable house. Let’s sell and then I can do what I want to do with money and you can go to the Met to see a show.”

And there is this show at the National Gallery of Pre-Raphaelites…