The White Scut of Her Bottom
Saturday, January 10, 2015
Swimming in the Woods
By Robin Robertson
Her long body in the spangled shade of the wood
was a swimmer moving through a pool:
fractal, finned by leaf and light;
the loose plates of lozenge and rhombus
wobbling coins of
sunlight.
When she stopped, the water stopped,
and the sun re-made her as a tree,
banded and freckled and foxed.
Besieged by symmetries, condemned
to these patterns of love and loss,
I stare at the wet shape on the tiles
till it fades; when she came and sat next to me
after her swim and walked away
back to the trees, she left a dark butterfly
Today
Saturday was a satisfying day. There were no teenage conflicts, no computer
breakdowns and the four of us (Rosemary, our daughter Hilary and her daughter
Lauren) sad down for dinner. There was a nice fire in the den. The menu
consisted of my Shepherd’s Pie. The recipe is a tad complicated. I grill the
ground meat in the barbecue after I coat the meat with molasses. I also grill a
couple of red peppers moistened with olive oil. I cut up an onion and grind up
a garlic clove. I finish this off on a fry pan while I make mashed potatoes
(with cream and butter). While the meat is cooking I pour about a cup of liquid
that is made up of a bit of soy sauce, mustard, ketchup and chopped olives.
Once the pie is ready for the oven I grind a lot of good Romano Cheese and mix
it with finely chopped onion. Rosemary made a salad and I prepared some corn on
the cob. Our drink consisted of fresh orange juice blended with canned peaches.
Dessert (Lauren demurred) consisted of fried bananas. At the last moment I
decided against firing it up with Calvados.
The evening’s
film was Robert Altman’s beautiful and awfully realistic ballet/modern dance
film (2003) The Company. I had seen it before so I knew that Lauren, who is a
keen balletomane, would enjoy it. We all did.
After
taking the two home I settled on the bed with Rosemary to read the Sunday NY
Times which is delivered on Saturdays around 9.
In the Book
Review I found a page with the portrait of a man (Scottish poet Robin
Robertson) who resembles John Irving. I read the review and I was flabbergasted
by the intensity of image of this man’s poems about women, their bodies and I
guess,sex.
One of my
peculiar delights is to illustrate poems I like with photographs from my files.
I realized quickly that I have not photographed too many women in forest
environments (Swimming in the Woods) and the second one from Venery “the white scut of her
bottom” left me in a quandary. I narrowed it down to the two photographs you
see here. In order to “filter out” some of the bits I scanned the b+w negatives
(from the bottom part of the scanner) with a sheet of smoky paper I purchased
at Opus last month.
I believe I
will have to buy Sailing the Forest –
Selected Poems by Robin Robertson
Venery
By Robin Robertson
What am I to think now,
the white scut
of her bottom
disappearing
down the half-flight
carpet stair
to the bathroom?
What am I to do
with this masted image?
I put all my doubt
to the mouth of her long body,
let her draw the night
out of me like a thorn.
Sean Rossiter Memorial - January 15 - 4:30-6:30
Friday, January 09, 2015
A memorial for Sean Rossiter will be held at Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden on January 15 from 4:30 to 6:30.
578 Carrall Street, Vancouver, BC V6B 5K2
(604) 662-3207
Sean Rossiter 1946-2015
Terabytes, Mirror External Hard Drives & Images Found & Saved
Thursday, January 08, 2015
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| Rosa damascena bifera |
In the beginning of this century I came up with the idea of
scanning plants (mostly roses) from my garden. Originally my intention was to accurately
record what my plants looked like (at 100% magnification) on the précised hour
and day of the year. It didn’t take long before I realized that my accurate
representations of my roses had as pleasant baggage, beauty.
Since some of these roses would bloom sporadically and in
many cases some of the plants died, the scans became unique. I stored these
scans in CDs. Some of the scans are pretty large 600 megabyte tiffs. I have a
drawerful of them. I am aware that CDs can deteriorate. My CD scan of Rosa damascena
bifera
is unique in that the hard to grow (in our Vancouver weather) rose has
long died and it would be impossible to replace it as most rose nurseries that
might have carried the rose are long gone.
I stopped using CDs and started storing my plant scans on a
mirror Raid hard drive. It is a mirror hard drive in that what is store into
its 500 gig drive is simultaneously stored into one next to it.
Since Christmas Eve I have had terrible computer problems.
My friend Paul Leisz has advised me to purchase a one terabyte solid state
drive and to transfer all the plant scans (and lots of other important stuff)
into it. Leisz spoke much too soon and my friend Benson at Powersonic (in
Richmond) is currently retrieving the stuff from one of those Raid hard drives
(the other one is “in error”). He will then save it into another 1 terabyte
external hard drive.
In my until recent profession as a photographer I never accepted the terms “It should…”or “It will automatically …” I always went to
assignments with two or three of everything.
In my basement I have 14, four drawer metal filing cabinets
full of negatives, slides and photographs. Those files represent my output
since I was in my late teens until just a few days ago when I shot film. All
that I have done with my Fuji X-E1 digital camera since August 2013 can be
found in a 1 terabyte external hard drive and shortly will be in another and
with all the plant scans from those CDs that I am planning in saving.
I wonder and I throw this to anybody reading this what will
happen in future years to all those digital images being taken today?
Sometime in the late 70s
I photographed Sean Rossiter washing his Austin Healey. I processed the
film and put it in a file (a drawer called authors). I found that negative just
a couple of days ago. What is important is that because it was in the file
called Sean Rossiter anybody looking into that file would have suspected that the
man doing the washing was and is Sean Rossiter. Had it been a digital file what
would anybody have known?
Wednesday, January 07, 2015
A very good friend, I have found out of late (but in time to
help in what is left of my life) is not one who allows you to know him well. A good
friend, those rare and very good ones, is the friend that points you in the
opposite direction and that is to know yourself. That was the man that was my friend Sean
Rossiter.
For most of my life I was surrounded by women (that is still
the case) so my concept (and I almost believe that this concept is purely North
American) of what a man is and what it is to become a man and stay one is
something that came to me in very small quantities.
It was in Nueva Rosita, Coahuila, Mexico in 1955 that I met a most
manly mining engineer called Juan Jaime. He was from another town so he stayed
at the American Hotel where my mother and I were living. My mother taught the
American children of the mining engineers. Jaime was subscribed to True,
Argosy, Esquire and Playboy. He would leave his already read copies in the
hotel library. It was in one of those magazines (not Playboy but Esquire) where
I spied my first almost complete female nude. It was In True or Argosy where I
read of a young boxer called Cassius Clay who said he was going to become the
heavyweight champion of the world.
It was in those magazines that I learned about that North
American cultural icon, the manly man. It was through them that I first
noticed male fashion.
Looking back now at those times today during the Epiphany of
January 6 I can ascertain that the manliest man I ever met was Vancouver journalist, political columnist, airplane enthusiast, etc, Sean Rossiter.
While as St. Edward’s High School at Austin, Texas in that second half of the
50s I was exposed more to this idea of the manly man. One of my dormitory
friend’s father had an Aston Martin DB-4. He taught me to pronounce the car
brand Peugeot. From him I found out that the only car magazine worthy of the
sophisticated North American man (one who even at that age read Esquire) was
Road & Track. From him I discovered the manly humour of Shelley Berman and
a lifelong distaste for buttermilk.
I learned to shop for Bostonian loafers that had to be made
from cordovan leather, blue button down shirts and Hart Schaffner & Marx
sport coats at Reynolds-Penland on Congress Avenue in Austin.
Looking back now it seems that I never ever
appeared (or felt) half as good or even half as manly as Sean Rossiter.
By the time I married my Rosemary in Mexico I was living in
a macho culture that felt alien to my more “sophisticated” South American ways.
Even the ranchera women (who sang ranchero songs) seemed more manly than I was.
In fact I felt a tad confused about all that manly thing. I was preoccupied
with the idea of always appearing to be a gentleman which I defined as a man in
the presence of a feminine woman. What did I know? Rossiter would have set me straight.
Now in this 21st century, Rossiter’s brand of manliness may
be in jeopardy. His was a life of fast English sports cars (no sophisticated
Jags for him) he loved in spite of their electrical troubles. His life was about quaffing beer (almost
always in moderation) in strip bars surrounded by this three architect friends,
his journalist friend and occasionally this photographer. His was a life about
airplanes, and hockey and politics. His was a life of talking to architects
(and in this city mostly men). His was a life of looking at the city he lived in, which he loved, to see how it was changing for the better. He would have posted himself in the office of Malcolm Parry at Vancouver Magazine or with Charles Campbell at the Straight to voice his concern and offer and essay on the subject.
His was the life of checking into a Vancouver VD clinic and
write about it in his12th & Cambie political column for Vancouver
Magazine.
Rossiter occasionally smoked, but not often, as he had to
make sure he could breathe for his amateur hockey goalie gig.
In this present atmosphere of misandry in which men seem to
have to recede into a background and be quiet about affirming any intimations
of manliness I know that Rossiter would have been the man to have written the
essay that would have explained this curious phenomenon. No woman would have
been offended by any of his remarks.
Once I had gone to the Vancouver Board of Trade to
photograph Carole Taylor ( a person Rossiter often wrote about in his political
column, 12th & Cambie for Vancouver Magazine). He asked me, “Was she
wearing that little red dress of hers?”
I answered in the affirmative and he countered with, “She always looks
sensational in that dress.” There never ever was a hint of lewdness in his
appreciation of a woman.
Rossiter would have known better than to ever have indulged
in social media. The only social media he would have practiced would have been
the one so familiar to me. Rosemary would tell me upon my arriving from a
photographic job, “Sean called. He and the architects are meeting tomorrow
Thursday.” I always suspected that Rosemary, while perhaps in silent
disapproval at the fact I would be meeting Rossiter, the architects and the
journalist over beer (and strippers) at the Marble Arch, I also knew that she somehow approved.
She approved at my going to a situation in which I would be surrounded by men
who were men, who had convictions. They always knew when it was time to go home
even if Tony, the man at the Arch, offered up another free pitcher of brew.
Only today did I find that curious b+w 35mm frame of
Rossiter washing his Austin Healey. Across the street you will notice my Fiat
X-19. Rossiter in his curt and polite manliness never ever commented on what I
perceive might have been his thought that the Fiat was not quite the manly car
that I made it out to be. But I do remember him riding shotgun as I
drove up the ramp to the Granville Street Bridge and that he said, “Time to floor it and clean those spark plugs.”
It was that sort of thing that I know always separated the
professional man from this vile amateur.
Of all this he would just almost smile and I would know that
all was well with the world. Now I am not quite sure with him gone.
He was the perfect Esquire man.
Tuesday, January 06, 2015
Just a couple of days ago I found myself having coffee with
a Vancouver Sun columnist and with a Sun editor. I accompanied the Sun editor
to Sikora’s where we chatted with an LP Record seller. We were joined by a
bookseller. At that point seeing myself as a magazine photographer I realized
that this was a reunion of a dying breed.
The journalism that I knew as journalism and when magazines
and newspapers competed to have the best photographs and illustration is all
but moribund. Citizen journalism and selfies now rule this world where the people
I used to work with and for are disappearing.
One of the best, journalist, writer, hockey goalie, English
car enthusiast and airplane nut, Sean Rossiter died last night. In the last few
months the Rossiter I knew was rarely in evidence. Just a year ago the mention
of an airplane, perhaps an obscure fighter jet of a foreign air force brought the
Rossiter I knew to me if only for a few moments of lucidity.
He had a radio voice. I would have bought from him a used MG with a
notorious Lucas electrical system without a second thought.
Driving with him within the city was to learn the story of
our buildings through their architects and developers. If there was anybody
that could have explained our city politics it was Rossiter. Mike Harcourt
would have agreed.
Rossiter had a love (a defect in this 21st
century) for beautiful women. He would never say, “She is
gorgeous or beautiful.” His choice of word was that Rossiterian “sensational”.
Quite a few years ago I noticed the tremors in his hands.
When Rossiter finally accepted his malady he told me that he could build his
elaborate and intricate model airplanes with no problem. It was three years ago
that I took him to the Abbotsford Air Show and just the sight of a Phantom Jet
on the tarmac was enough to bring back that joy for life that was Rossiter’s
almost constant companion even though Rossiter could in the presence of
strangers not crack a smile. He would look at you through those glasses,
seriously, and you knew that it was all show and that there was warmth underneath
that brought to mind all those hamburgers we ate at The Five while watching the
sensational.
I learned lots from Rossiter. I learned the whys of
architecture. I learned to admire and ultimately become a friend of his friends,
Arthur Erickson and Abraham Rogatnick. I learned about hockey (a sport that as an Argentine I
disdain). I learned about Pratt & Whitney radial engines for De Havilland
Beavers. I learned about Austin Healeys.
But best of all given manuscripts of his columns for Vancouver Magazine or his
essays on architecture for the Georgia Straight I learned, if only
superficially, the workings of his elaborate but orderly mind.
I will have always many memories of our time together but
there is one that is paramount to any other. That is standing on the tarmac of
the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station, watching an A-6B Intruder with its turbo
jet engines roaring at take-off while we chomped on sensational American hot
dogs.
Missing the living
The Last Intruders
Model Citizen
Looking Back Into My Latent Past
Monday, January 05, 2015
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| Yuliya in my studio, Nikon FM-2 Kodak B+W Infrared Film |
My wife keeps harping at me that I live in the past. I
did ask her a most personal question for which I knew the answer in advice. In
her almost 70 years of existence she has lost her father and mother and a
favourite aunt. Because my Rosemary is very shy she has made few friends on her
own through the years. Many of her friends who have died have also been my friends. One of them
was my mother whom Rosemary loved lots and the feeling was mutual.
But to be accurate here in my comparison, I have had many
friends ( I photographed many of them) and a much larger family. I did not come from a small town like New
Dublin (where Rosemary was born) so my exposure to people was greater.
As I look at my last yearly agenda (2010) at least half of the
names in the address book are of people who have died or disappeared. I think
of them all the time. That is why Rosemary says I live in the past.
In one of those marvellous moments when you finally find
something to rebut Rosemary’s argument about my sinking all too much into my
past I found a wonderful quote. Unfortunately she was asleep as I read this
passage from George McWhirter’s lovely (and erotic) book of short stories The Gift of Women The passage is from the story Sisters in Spades about a young grade
11 girl from Mississauga who is being pushed back to grade 10 in a nun’s school
in Ireland.
“Don’t feel that you are behind Jean. The Irish are
always ahead of themselves in their educational standards because of their
reputation for being backward, but then, the Irish always see their way forward
by looking back.”
“Sounds like everything slips into reverse, here! Even common sense,” I say before I can stop
myself."
Film was always expensive and more so now. But I shot a lot so
I have hundreds (thousands, in fact) of negatives that have never gone past the
contact sheet that I always make in my darkroom before I decide on which of the
individual exposures are worth enlarging. The one you see here is from a short
strip of six shots taken with Kodak b+w Infrared Film. There are others taken
with conventional b+w film with my medium format (6x7cm) Mamiya RB-67. In fact
as I was so stunned by the beauty and look of the picture taken with that
camera that I simply lost interest in looking at any of the others.
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| Mamiya RB-67 Pro-SD |
I took some pictures of Yuliya wearing a stretched
fishnet pantyhose (and nothing else). Those will not see the light of day here.
Then Yuliya said, “Alex I want you to take this picture.” She sat by my studio
table (you can see another of my Mamiya lenses and in the infrared film version
you can see the tripod with the Mamiya on the left side). I knew she was right
and I snapped and snapped some more.
Looking back I could not have foreseen giving up my
studio nor the pleasure in writing here on how right Yuliya’s idea was. I might
not have realized what a wonderful moment it was when the shutter of my camera
went at (1/8 of a second, I have that kind of a silly memory) but I do so now.
Feeling wonderful now is the only way I can somehow rebut my Rosemary. And I
know that the knowledge of the feeling and mood of this photograph of Yuliya in
my long gone (the building was demolished three years ago) studio today will
push me to take something like it in a near future. McWhirter is right about
the Irish even though I am no Irish.
Maddalena - The Woman With The Black Gloves
Sunday, January 04, 2015
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| Maddalena |
In my life as a photographer I have divided it into two categories. One involves
taking pictures for hire. I can be hired by a newspaper or magazine, a TV
station or a private person. It can also be a company (many in my past) which commissioned
me for annual reports. The second category, I sometimes call it my personal one.
The personal one can mean taking pictures of family and friends, of landscapes
that might interest me. Some of these can just be snapshots. There is also
within the category the art one –shooting pictures for the simple reason that I
am told I have artistic sensibilities. These art ones can be scans of the
flowers of our garden or portraits (serious ones) of my granddaughters. But
more often than not these art pictures are about my concern, obsession, and
interest in the undraped female figure with an ancillary interest in what can
make the undraped female (or dressed!) erotic.
For these
latter ones I obtain women that I know (or not know but get to know) to come to
my studio (now a home studio) to pose for me. The process can be in two
different ways much like in the two ways we may take a swim in a cold pool.
Some of us might go in little by little in what amounts to slow torture or we
might just jump in, in spite of the fear of that initial shock of the cold. Some of
these women who pose for me undrape gradually. Some simply take it all off.
The most
important ingredient of a successful photographic session is the frank
communication with my subject (beforehand, usually over coffee or tea) of my
intentions. I lay them out and if my subject is interested I explain what
lights I might use, film, cameras, etc. You never ever have someone come to
your studio without a game plan.
In a few
cases in my past, perhaps because of a trust developed with my subject after
many photo sessions in long periods of time (years) it was my subject who came
to my studio with a plan (not announced to me at all) that in many cases was a
complete surprise or so surprising that I could not read the purpose at all.
For many
years one of my favourite subjects was the Italian Maddalena. Finally she moved
to Montreal (to my chagrin) and from there to Italy to that city that has one
of the largest Gothic cathedrals. Perhaps it was when she had settled in
Montreal that she came to Vancouver for a visit. I don’t remember all the
details but I do know we had an intimate dinner at a beautiful little
restaurant in the West End called Lola’s (now long gone) and that one of the attendees
was John Armstrong. I may have enquired if Maddalena was into photographs. She
must have said yes as one afternoon she appeared and instructed me to do as I
was told.
I did not
use any lights and I took pictures of her with two Nikon FM-2 cameras loaded
with very fast b+w and colour negative film. Here they are, all the black and white ones.
But as my memory has confirmed, look below, Maddalena always
had a thing about black gloves and their variants.
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