{"id":749,"date":"2014-12-06T01:34:38","date_gmt":"2014-12-06T06:34:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/?p=749"},"modified":"2014-12-06T01:34:38","modified_gmt":"2014-12-06T06:34:38","slug":"jeffers-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/?p=749","title":{"rendered":"Jeffers Project"},"content":{"rendered":"

The most effective actions are those conceived in the wisdom of clarity.\u00a0 \u2013 Sylvia Boorstein<\/em><\/p>\n

Robinson Jeffers was a poet who worked on the central California coast from the 1920s through the 1950s.\u00a0 His poetry often emphasized ecological themes, addressing the wholeness of earth and that man is part of the ecosystem, rather than separate from it.\u00a0 I first became aware of Jeffers\u2019 poetry from a book titled \u201cNot Man Apart\u201d that combined Jeffers\u2019 poetry with the work of several famous photographers also working on the California coast at the same time, including Ansel Adams, Edward and Cole Weston, Philip Hyde, William Garnett, Cedric Wright, Steve Crouch and others.<\/p>\n

Jeffers writes of man\u2019s destruction of the earth:<\/p>\n

\"\u2026remember<\/a>

\u2026remember that civilization is a transient sickness.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Through<\/a>

Through wars and corruptions the house will fall.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Mourning the broken balance, the hopeless prostration
\nof the earth
\nUnder man\u2019s hands and their minds,
\nThe beautiful places killed like rabbits to make a
\ncity\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

But also of the earth\u2019s beauty:<\/p>\n

\u2026but to fling<\/em>
\n Rainbows over the rain\u2026<\/em>
\n And beauty above the moon, and secret rainbows<\/em>
\n On the domes of deep sea-shells,<\/em>
\n Not even the weeds to multiply without blossom<\/em>
\n Nor the birds without music\u2026<\/em>
\n Look how beautiful are all the things that He does. His<\/em>
\n signature<\/em>
\n Is the beauty of things.<\/em><\/p>\n

I find Jeffers’ poetry moving and insightful, and often very well-informed technically and scientifically; I connect with his subjects and his metaphor. \u00a0I am starting a new\u00a0project to illustrate verses from Jeffers\u2019 short poems with my images. \u00a0The images will perhaps not address the environmental\/ecological issues as broadly as did the Sierra Club in Not Man Apart, but I hope that the combination of images and text will be more compelling than either of them separately. \u00a0I have organized approximately 75 verses I wish to illustrate into the following categories:\u00a0 Man Destroying Earth, Beauty, Gulls, Ocean, Metaphor, and \u201ceverything else.\u201d<\/p>\n

In some ways I have been considering a project of this type for a long time. \u00a0I have over 50 pages of quotes, and you \u00a0may have noticed that I start most blog entries with a quote. In this case, part of the intent is to focus on a specific project and better develop a personal style and vision, by going out with purpose rather randomly taking (rather than making) images that catch my attention. \u00a0I need to do more making and less taking.<\/p>\n

These images are very much exploratory — proof of concept images, so I would greatly appreciate any comments that might help me to improve the project.<\/p>\n

\"Old<\/a>

Now the spoiler has come …It has all time.
It knows the people are a tide
That swells and in time will ebb, and all
Their works dissolve.
— Robinson Jeffers in \u201cMan Destroying Earth\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The most effective actions are those conceived in the wisdom of clarity.\u00a0 \u2013 Sylvia Boorstein Robinson Jeffers was a poet who worked on the central California coast from the 1920s through the 1950s.\u00a0 His poetry often emphasized ecological themes, addressing … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[],"tags":[1,10],"class_list":["post-749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-uncategorized","tag-vision"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8lcUy-c5","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=749"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":760,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749\/revisions\/760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/richeskinphoto.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}