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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery Thirty Eight: The camera as time machine: linking the past to the present > Imagined Passions, Winslow, Arizona, 2006
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10-JUL-2006

Imagined Passions, Winslow, Arizona, 2006

Winslow’s historical pride seems to rest more on the lyrics of a 1970’s popular song than on its role as a stop for Santa Fe railroad passengers and US Route 66 travelers. The song – “Take it Easy,” by Jackson Browne, and made famous by a group known as the Eagles, was set on a Winslow street corner. As in much of popular music, the lyrics are built around romantic passions, and Winslow built “Corner Park” as a nostalgic salute to them. The actual wall of a gutted building serves as a backdrop to the park. It is cleverly painted to bring the imagined passions of the romantic lyrics to life. I include only part of that wall here, which features an abstracted rendezvous in one of the windows. I layered this image by using the streetlight, gleaming in the late afternoon sun, as a foreground. The 70s are now long gone, its music treasured as nostalgia for those who remember it. Winslow does not want us to forget its claim to fame, and this image tells us what it wants us to remember. (There is also a statue and another painted wall panel in this monument to "Take it Easy." I feature that part in Gallery Seventeen. Click on the thumbnail below to see it:

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ30
1/640s f/8.0 at 30.6mm iso80 full exif

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Phil Douglis14-Nov-2006 01:28
The street lamp is an essential part of this park -- it must be part of the song it commemorates as well.
Guest 13-Nov-2006 13:18
I was fooled too. I like the way you included the street lamp. It somehow adds a sense of reality to the wall painting.
Phil Douglis30-Oct-2006 21:48
Thanks, Dandan, for puzzling over this one. You are dealing with a double illusion here -- the painted illusion and the photographic illusion. Even Kal was fooled. Is the street light that "turns on" the painting real or part of the painting? Still another part of the puzzle to figure out.
Guest 30-Oct-2006 20:52
What an intriguing image! It took me a few minutes to realize that the couple behind the window is actually a painting on the wall. I guess the light on the street lamp really turn the painting “on”.
Phil Douglis12-Aug-2006 17:38
You are woman of few words, Carol, but they mean much to me. You are right -- Jackson Browne is story teller. So were the Eagles. And so was the architect who conceived this monument to a song. I use still photography to abstract all of their contributions into an image that sums it up, at least for me.
carol j. phipps12-Aug-2006 04:23
A picture full of story.
Phil Douglis23-Jul-2006 18:39
Thanks, Kal -- photography is itself an illusion, isn't it? And when we photograph illusions, the mystery becomes twice as mysterious.
Kal Khogali23-Jul-2006 15:00
Love the image for the play of reality and illusion. Wonderfully composed and exposed Phil...unil I read you explanantion I was fooled..;-))K
JSWaters20-Jul-2006 00:58
Hey, I still think of myself as young! (Relatively speaking of course). My brain may meander around digging for meaning, and granted, to most this may seem a stretch, but I'd challenge any of the same age group if they did not confess to a strong emotional reaction to the song. And if I were the public leaders in Winslow, Arizona, I'd sure use the connection as my claim to fame!
Phil Douglis20-Jul-2006 00:20
Celia -- thanks for extending Cecilia's phallic street light as hot energy, the glow of passion, and the concept of turning on. You are right -- if you see the street light in phalocentric terms, it mirrors the sexual energy of both the song and the lovers in the window.

Jenene -- glad to know how significant this song actually was in its time. I can see how the memories of a young Jenene can add a personal context to this image that enhances its meaning greatly. As for that linkage of public display with public pride and public song, it's a stretch, but coming from you, I'll buy it.
JSWaters19-Jul-2006 18:54
Because it was such a pivotal song of my youth, I cannot even hear the name Winslow, Arizona with thinking of the Eagle's song. It's influencing my reaction to this image now, as I look at the couple in the window with the words, 'Take it Easy', playing over and over in my head. Maybe it's because their display, albeit a rendered one, is so public - ah, there it is - the couple's public display tied in with your description of Winslow's very public historic pride all tied up in the very popular and public tune! Very funny.
Jenene
Cecilia Lim19-Jul-2006 15:10
Phil, you blur the lines of fantasy and reality by bringing them together into a third reality that keeps us viewers wondering if what we see is actually real or not. It's intriguing! And the discussions here about the phallic meaning of this streetlight are also very amusing. Infact this streetlight opens the door to so many interpretations that can be associated with the couple - the light could represent hot energy... the glow of passion... the idea of getting "turned on", which can all be pointed to the sexual energy that is happening between the two lovers in the window!
Phil Douglis16-Jul-2006 23:31
Your comment delights me, Ceci, particularly your view of the glowing lamp as a phallic symbol for the passions displayed at upper left. As I was shooting this, that thought fleetingly crossed my mind, but I quickly dismissed it as a product of my overactive imagination and perverse sense of humor. Since reading your comment, I studied the form of the glass shade again, particularly its decorative tip, and I now see, with great delight, that I was on the right track after all. I agree about the trope l'oeil effect here -- the coloration, irregularities, and ivy are incredibly real, and become more so when photographed as an abstraction in the golden evening light. To put it mildly, because of you, Ceci, I will never see this image in the same way again. And I think that is wonderful. Afterall, what is the story here? As I put it in my title, "Imagined Passions."
Guest 16-Jul-2006 22:34
Ceci
A vibrant example of what I think is called trompe l'oeil, or "fooling the eye" in French. The colors capture sunbaked clay, handmade roughness and irregularity, cracks from age, old lettering, and the ivy looks substantial enough to be pulled down. The lamp is the perfect complement, a phallic symbol for what's "going on" in the upper left. It feels like "touché", a picture with subtle humor and atmosphere. Thank you for seeing it, and sharing!
Phil Douglis16-Jul-2006 19:12
That's the whole point, Shirley. What is real and what is not? This photograph takes us one step beyond, by removing a lot of the context I can make the imagination work even harder.
Shirley Wang16-Jul-2006 08:42
Nice composition. It's hard to tell the background is painted.
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