W.M. Hunt

 #somereallygoodones, #donmcullin, #theroad, #somerset, #battlefieldofthesomme 

“Photography for me is not looking, it’s feeling. If you can’t feel what you’re looking at, then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures.”*1

American photographers do not have a monopoly on road pictures even through the romance of a Route 66 and the waves of migrants captured by FSA (Farm Security Administration) photographers in the 1930s are classic.

The great British conflict photographer Don McCullin has a lyrical, reflective side that has become increasingly evident in his mature work.  After retreating from the city and various hellholes around the world, he began to make black and white landscapes of his Somerset surroundings.  One imagines him tramping about and feeling a unique connection to the dark skies and rough land.  He printed these himself and the works are handsome and sobering.   

His road ends in a quagmire as the sun breaks through the clouds in the distance.  It’s brooding and haunted, with promise along the road.

He can be deeply sad and cynical in interviews, but his landscapes always seem to have light, some hope down the lane.  McCullin’s Road has an infinite quality; it curves gently and then keeps going.  It has grace, doggedness, and enormous grief in it.  The horizon bisects the imagea sharply, and there is the glimmer of something postive in the distance.  It is tragic and strangely optimistic.  

*1 Source?

©2021

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