Edward Steichens, “Heavy Roses, Voulangis, France, 1914

#somereallygoodones, #edwardsteichen, #heavyroses, #metaphor, #worldwarone

Metaphors are a funny, or at least odd business, particularly if you don’t know what is meant by the creator. Look at Edward Steichen’s “Heavy Roses, Voulangis, France, 1914”. The reproduction here is the image printed as a palladium print. The work also exists as more widely circulated photogravure.

What we see is a bunch of white roses just at the peak of their beauty, gorgeous even elegiac. This leaves the viewer with some wistfulness even grief for the passing of life’s fullness.

Eduard Steichen, “Heavy Roses, Voulangis, France, 1914

What is the impact if you learn that this image was one of Steichen’s last in Europe before emigrating to the US anticipating the start of World War I. Even without that information ones sense this may be about death. The whiteness is rendered as a sepia, the color the petals will soon develop.

There is also something in the weight of the flowers, how they rest on the tabletop. They are very heavy as the title indicates, having been robustly full of life.

So what’s the metaphor, what abstract idea is suggested? Mortality. Sure.

You get to figure that out while you’re reacting to the handsomeness of the image.

Greatness doesn’t always manifest itself immediately.

These posts are from my new project “Great Photographs …or, at least, Some Really Good Ones”. Photo, text, and some times, audio or video.

#somereallygoodones, #theunseeneye, #wmhunt, #collectiondancingbear, #collectionblindpirate, #greatphotographs, #howilookatphotographs, #photographsfromtheunconsicous, #collectingislikerunningaroundinat hunderstormhopingyoullbehit bylightning, #aphotographsogooditmakesyoufartlightning, #photographychangedmylifeitgavemeone,#edwardsteichen, #heavyroses, #metaphor, #worldwarone