Unknown/Untitled Posted on February 25, 2010 by Dodie Bellamy
In 2012, one of the recent rash of apocalyptic disaster films, the governments of a dying world band together and secretly build arks to brave the tempestuous seas of Mayan Armageddon. The film asks, rather feebly, who/what deserves salvation? The original list is restricted to the rich, world leaders, and the Mona Lisa. Humanists argue this is wrong, that the bellies of the arks should open to the throngs of ordinary people squirming on the docks begging entry. Cut to SFMOMA, January 17, 12:50 p.m.: a camera crew is setting up in front of a photo that artist Anne Walsh has chosen to talk about. It’s a black and white photo from SFMOMA’s collection of anonymous photos, a rather blurry shot of a group of women running towards the camera, through a tree studded grove. Even though I cannot see them very clearly, from their upswept hair, long skirts and high necked blouses I place them sometime in the early 20th century. A crowd, mostly men wearing hats, looks on. In contrast to the men’s dark suits, the whiteness of the women’s blouses and skirts makes them appear to be bathed in light, glowing with youth and excitement. Evocative, yes, but still an unremarkable photo. I’m sure that most museum visitors can think of at least one photo in their own possession that has just as much right to be hanging on that wall. There must be a zillion comparable snapshots stuffed in boxes on closet shelves or thrown in the trash at a relative’s demise. Through what accident—or miracle—did this particular picture manage to sneak into the ark of high culture?
unknown artist, untitled (women racing)
Rather than analyzing Untitled [women racing], Walsh read Eileen Myles’ “Light Warrior,” a brief memoir about Myles’ childhood conviction that she has been chosen for greatness, like her hero Joan of Arc, whom she read about in a Junior Classics comic book. (The full text of “Light Warrior” can be found online here.)
Myles: I see my existence as similar to that of a sundial’s when I simply stand, and slowly the notion of movement is suggesting itself to my consciousness and action is also appropriate in the realm of the saint, the character who begins her life in the windows of a church, in the religious air of her own imagination until history lines up with her nature, and the path becomes clear—the storms of identity erupt and implode and gather again and one of life’s soldiers realizes her whole basis for living has changed and now she is impelled forward in a new film. (more…)
