Monday, October 25, 2010

TC: Vanitas Goes to the Movies


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Image, Source: digital file from original neg.

Shoveling snow away from the movie entrance, Chilicothe, Ohio: photo by Arthur Rothstein, February 1940

Image, Source: digital file from intermediary roll film

Entrance to a movie house, Beale Street, Memphis, Tennessee: photo by Marion Post Wolcott, October 1939

Image, Source: digital file from intermediary roll film

Front of movie theatre, San Antonio, Texas: photo by Russell Lee, March 1939

Image, Source: intermediary roll film

Movie theatre, Saginaw, Michigan: photo by John Vachon, August 1941

Image, Source: intermediary roll film

Children at a movie house on Sunday, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: photo by Jack Delano, January 1941

Image, Source: intermediary roll film

The movie theatre of Escalante, Utah: photo by Dorothea Lange, April 1936

Image, Source: intermediary roll film

Movie theatre, Romney, West Virginia: photo by John Vachon, March 1938

Image, Source: digital file from original neg.

Movie theatre, Moore Haven, Florida: photo by Marion Post Wolcott, January, 1939

Image, Source: digital file from intermediary roll film

Children and farmers waiting to go into movie on Saturday afternoon, Littleton, New Hampshire: photo by Marion Post Wolcott, March 1939 or March 1940

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/fsa/8a25000/8a25600/8a25630v.jpg

Mexican man in front of movie theatre, San Antonio, Texas: photo by Russell Lee, March 1939


Photos from Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Collection, Library of Congress)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Having just completed the exam I was preparing for (it was an exhausting, draining experience; it wasn't one of those exams you could complete with a feeling of obvious triumph; I finished by driving, exhausted, over a parking barrier), I wanted to say that I have been turning to these photos for a sense of connectedness and comfort since they were posted. In college, I got into an unexpected, irrational argument (I didn't pick the fight) with a friend over Jack Benny. I love Jack Benny. My friend averred that there was something wrong with that. I'll (re)submit: There isn't. I love going to the movies. Each of these pictures reminds me of parts of my life and positive and hopeful feelings I've experienced just thinking about entering a cinema. That being said, Jane informs me that at the Anthony Wayne Theater in Wayne, PA, popcorn prices have now reached $8. End Times, I say.

TC said...

Curtis,

"In my End is my beginning."

Congratulations on the exam. I never doubted you would pass it... nor did I doubt that the thing was really putting you through the wringer for a month or two there.

(I'm just guessing in my certainties, naturally, as usual.)

Jack Benny... yes, that can be a difficult argument to sustain.

Years ago I had the acquaintance of an eager young American purebred poetry debutant upon whom I bestowed the legacy of an ancient Jack Benny appreciation, in the form of about 300 taped shows.

The bloom was off the rose before it even had a chance to see the light of day, I fear, in that instance.

Perhaps there are some tastes one should never attempt to explain.