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| "almost gone" |
If you had told me even a week ago that I would be posting pictures of artificial flowers I wouldn't have believed you. I have long shared with the late
Bobby Darin, and the boards of many cemeteries, a disdain for these fakes. In my experience, they never look nice, even new, and soon get much worse.
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| "earthen between fakes" |
Unlike real flowers, they lack the good sense to wither and fall apart after a few days. As a consequence, they get to stay at the cemetery all year, until finally, amid howls of despair from their planters, they are harvested off to the dumpster in the fall, or just before mother's day.
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| "rain and red" |
What I didn't realize, and what I'm grateful to the artist, Asher, for showing me, is that artificial flowers don't really blossom into their fullest beauty until they have weathered at the grave for several years.
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| "in the fall, they try to blend" |
To find such beauty in something I once despised brings me a great joy, and I hope that you will share my enjoyment of these compelling graveyard photos.
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| "in the porcelain valley, only lilies grow" |
Instead of describing his work, Asher preferred for the images to speak for themselves, and I think that they do so eloquently. He has however, allowed me to share with you an excerpt from his artist statement:
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| "like spring, in late fall" |
"You're here for the images. Not for the bio. To that end, enjoy them for how they make you react; for how they make you feel. The moment you see them, they become as much your reaction as they were mine. It is in that moment of passing, that transgression from my world to yours, that singularity of event that the art lives. Before and after that moment it was just an image. In that moment it sputtered and spewed, it came to life in a spasmodic fit. In that moment you saw with my eyes and we were human together."
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| "long since forgot" |
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| "we love you" |
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| "yellowed" |
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| "caution" |
The beautiful textures and unexpected graphic qualities that can be found in the things man has built and then left behind, are not limited to the graveyard. Here are a few more of Asher's photos from a set called 'Kingman'. For more of his work, visit his website,
13ft fall.
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| "drive by" |
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| "spectre" |
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| "together" |
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| "we were young" |
All photos have been copyrighted by Asher, and are used with his permission
For more on cemeteries and flowers, visit:
2 comments:
There's a heartbreaking sincerity in fake flowers that's always moved me. Finding beauty in decay, especially in unexpected places like this is always a gift.
There’s a haunting beauty about his images so strong that they stop you from your everyday life. You find the artist perched in every image. Same man but each image is a different experience; perks a new fibre in you every time. I don’t know how he manages that. Good. Very good!
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