Mysterious Meadowlands

As I've been working on my project in the city, I have been commuting into NY by bus two or three times a week. It can get a little tedious but some stretches of the journey pass through interesting and beautiful areas; Long Pond, Monksville and Wanaque Reservoirs enroute to the Skyline Drive, NJ. Each time I pass, I take in the view, and each time, there is something different and magical to behold; like the dark primeaval stumps sticking out from the frozen whiteness of the winter's ice, or the mist steaming above the water on a crisp early morning. 

Then there is the area known as the Meadowlands, about two miles outside of Manhattan in New Jersey. I'm fascinated by this place, it's a strange mix of industry, deteriorating buildings, new hotels and wetlands, and I can imagine that most people simply do not see it. It's just a place to drive through quickly with out much thought. Indeed, at first glance the area is a mass of highways shuttling commuters back and forth to NYC, punctuated with pylons, and all manner of industrial towers, bordered with unattractive looking suburban towns named Secaucus, East Rutherford, Kearney, together with the Giants Stadium, and Continental Airlines Arena, with big billboards announcing such acts as Rod Stewart, and the American Idol top 10 finalists. They've even broken ground to build one of the biggest shopping malls in the country. It all reminds me of Walker Evans' photograph of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in which you can clearly see the layers of industrial and human development expand within the environment over time.

1935 - Graveyard and Steel Mill, Bethlehem, PA

But there is something very mysterious about the Meadowlands too. I see an incredible beauty and life in the grasses, and the waterways. It changes too with the quality of light. I have even found myself not minding the made-made scars that have intruded onto the natural landscape when everything is bathed in the fading glow of early evening. There's something very interesting about the juxtaposition, highlighting human nature to conquer the environment, to its detriment or not. I know nothing about the history of the Meadowlands but my interest has been sparked. Actually, my imagination had been captured a few years ago, after I read a National Geographic article about the renewal of these wetlands after decades of pollution, (my step son told me the other day that the place reeks of sulphur, though I wouldn't know about that since I am sealed in a NJ transit bus and haven't set foot on the lands themselves), and by Mark Helprin's descriptions of the Marshlands overlooking Manhattan (set in early industrial age) in his spectacular novel, Winter's Tale. Although I am not nearly as poetic and lyrical as Helprin, the other day I was inspired to write my own ode to the Meadowlands.........

Journey Home

Deep impenetrable grey

The backsplash colour of my journey home

Dusk slips to night and industry

suddenly illuminates it's beauty.

Meadowlands frame cell towers 

and factory columns,

their myriad shapes radiate against muted skies.

Then grasses and strips of silver water

give way to habitation.

Row upon row of clapboard 

crammed across my horizon.

Asphalt rivers cut a diagonal line above

silky metallic threads of liquid.

Struts reflected in the smoky stillness

turning this apparent ugliness on its head.

I travel this way roundtrip:

New York State, New Jersey, Manhattan

Re turn.

The patchwork topography of this waterlogged marsh

beckons as I pass, decoding its history

before progress marched in.

This strip of land, remnant of bygone time,

holding skyscrapers and rambling sprawl alike,

has never looked so beautiful.

I leave you with some images and some links of photographer, Joshua Lutz. His first monograph was published last year, and is entitled Meadowlands, and is a decade long visual exploration of this area and it's people. The images are incredible. Also worth watching is this short video podcast in which Lutz talks about the project.

A winter day

It's treacherous in Warwick, NY.....weather wise that is. There is a nasty ice storm in progress which began last night, and doesn't show any signs of letting up. I am marooned inside my house for the day, and happily so, for it looks bleak and uninviting outside. The world outside my door has turned into a giant ice-rink for which I have no skates, and certainly no balance for. So I gaze upon this grey winter scape from my studio window, watching an increasing amount of ice build itself upon the branches of trees, and ice crystals form like a blanket across the lawn. An ice storm is something to behold. It can be a majestic sight when there are blue skies, and sun to transform the ice into dazzling jewels. But as I discovered last year, it is much more dangerous than a heavy snow storm. It can reek havoc, bringing down utility cables, and giant tree limbs, the weight of the ice too much to hold. Already this morning I have witnessed such an amputation.....it's not a pretty sight. The poor lilac trees are bowing under the weight, and look like they could snap at any moment. The pear tree looks under a similar strain. I heard on the radio this morning that great swathes of trees have come down upstate, in Syracuse. It puts me in mind of the hurricane we experienced in the south of England in October 1987. Everywhere you went trees were laid down across the roads, once densely wooded areas thinned out to unrecognisable states. Such is mother nature, I suppose, she will do as she wants. I understand from the UK news that Britain has also been feeling on the chilly side after being hit with some of the coldest weather in a couple of decades. I came across these images on the Guardian Newspaper website www.guardian.co.uk (always a great source of information, and cultural interest).

Snow blankets fields in Kuttlehume, Cheshire, UK

Livestock Shelter From The Snow, Sittingbourne, Kent, UK

This particular image reminds me greatly of Paul Caponigro's wonderful image 'Running White Deer', something to do with the same framing, and backdrop of trees. Caponigro, a student of the great Minor White, is a photographer of great beauty, and eloquence. His muse is the landscape, mainly the New England landscape, but also that of Ireland, and Britain too. When you spend time with his work you begin to sense more than just the landscape itself but something spiritual, or mystical. You feel his connection with what he is photographing. Most recently he has been making still lifes, which also radiate this luminescence I see in his other work. I am intrigued by his studies of water and ice, and as they seem pertinent to my thoughts of winterness today I thought I would add these for you to look at.

Running White Deer, Wicklow, Ireland, 1967

 Frosted Window, Ipswich, Massachusetts, 1961

  River Ice, Newton, Massachusetts, 1960

Leaf in Ice, Nahant, Massachusetts, 1958

I have met Paul Caponigro. It was during my time at the Maine Photographic Workshops, or more specifically, Rockport College. I had been fortunate enough to have my image chosen to grace the front of the invitation postcards for the end of semester exhibition (along with Arduina Palanca, who coincidently is now married to Caponigro's son, John Paul). One day as I was leaving the offices of the school, a man sitting on the steps by the entrance who I'd seen around but didn't know, told me how much he liked my image. Not knowing who this man was, I quickly thanked him and went on my way. I later discovered that it was none other than the master himself, Paul Caponigro. A missed opportunity if ever there was one.