W.M. Hunt

 #somereallygoodones, #<johndaniel>, #wrightbrothers, #flight, #kittyhawk, #dannylyon, #dumbosfeather, #uncanny 

There was a large, handsome print of this image in an office I used to frequent in the Flatiron District of New York, a part of the city that housed much of the photography trade during the twentieth century.  The sense of uplift in the photograph is palpable.  The print was made from a glass plate negative made by John Daniel, a colleague of the Wright Brothers.  That is Wilbur at the controls.  The beach is near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina where the brothers made the first controlled, sustained flight of a powered, heavier than air aircraft on December 17, 1903.  This was one of the major technological advances to the modern era.  

Of all the images made that day, this is the one with the most basic of information: Man, machine, and sky, no more than that, like a pencil sketch.  It seems slight but endures.  It encourages the viewer to savor lightness and release; it argues existence or experience beyond the normal or physical level.  I crave and find that in photography and I find it here.

There is a real magic in photography.  The seeming alchemy of the process itself coaxes a sense of disbelief out of first time visitors to a darkroom.  So much of photography, “drawing with light” *1 is uncanny, inexplicable.  It is achieved remarkably and then it can have a huge, residual impact.  It seems so simple but leaves me full of wonder.  How can a photograph transfix and unsettle?  The information — the visual report — can be astounding and revealing but the emotional jolt to the solar plexus or brain makes me dance.  Witness someone encountering a great photograph for the first time.  Our feet often seem to know before our minds and will walk us over to it; our unconscious is sometimes wired not simply to our brains, but also to our feet.  We need to come closer, to investigate, to share.  Watch your own feet.  

Seeing the Wright Brothers’ glider, I lose my connection to the ground, I imagine I can fly or better.  I AM flying with it.

Uncanny.  

On a studio visit with Danny Lyon, American photographer, he referenced “Dumbo’s feather.”  I can’t remember the exact context, but I was enchanted by the suggestion that an object might empower or enable someone to fly, to accomplish more than expected.  

It is an enchanting metaphor. 

I think of talent in photography and elsewhere and wonder about greatness.  How does someone achieve that?  How do you go from good to great?

We imagine we need Dumbo’s feather to raise above our limitations — assuming we are intent on that and that we want to be great and to create great art.  The world is already brimming with good things.  How do we escape that and up our game?  

How is one to be magical without holding on to Dumbo’s feather of self-possession and inspiration. 

Flying is a big commitment.

*1 The word photography literally means “drawing with light”. The word was supposedly first coined by the British scientist Sir John Herschel in 1839 from the Greek words phos, (genitive: phōtós) meaning “light”, and graphê meaning “drawing or writing”. <https://www.napoleon.org/en/young-historians/napodoc/the-birth-of-photography/>

©2021

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