Philly On Film! - Volume 3 - Bartram's Garden

Hey there, welcome back to Philly On Film! This week we're in Bartram's Garden, a 45-acre community garden, learning center, and urban growery nestled on the banks of the Schuylkill River in Southwest Philly. In the warmer months it is a beautiful, colorful collection of gardens, plots, and apiaries, connected by winding paths that take you through the woods, along the river, and by the pleasing architecture of the few standing buildings on the property.

As is our style, however, we went on a cloudy day in February. Most of the trees were bare, the ground was soft and muddy, and there were very few flowers brave enough to bloom despite the rumors of spring weather that had come in recent days. I was shooting Ilford's Pan F+ film, a slow-speed (50 ISO) black & white stock that meant I'd be carrying around a tripod for most of the day. The lack of anything colorful in the landscape led me to stick with b&w, so the only photos you'll be seeing are monochrome.

The history of Bartram's Garden stretches as far back as 1728, when John Bartram purchased the land from the Swedes and began cultivating an extensive collection of plants and seeds from around the Americas. As time progressed, both the ownership of the property and a passion for botany were passed down through generations of Bartrams. Today, ownership is shared by an Association formed by his descendants and the City of Philadelphia.

Today, though, I don't feel very up to delving deep into this location's history. Today I think I'd just like to ramble about art and photography and depression, and share some images. I've been thinking a lot lately about the role art plays in our humanity, about our uncanny tendency towards trying to share individualistic experiences. We are drawn towards representation; we see or hear or feel or experience something, and we want to communicate that something to others. But since we can't put others in our head, the best we can do is make art.

We take a photograph or make a sketch or paint a painting or write a song and we say "Look! Do you see? Do you understand?" and we hope beyond hope that the answer is "Yes! Yes, I see! I understand!". It's in that understanding that we feel most deeply connected to our fellow humans, that moment of shared experience which brings us so close to bliss.

It's why I so enjoy taking photographs with Rish. Quite often I will see something beautiful or interesting and will start to try to explain it to him, and before I can finish my string of adjectives he will nod his head and smile and say something along the lines of "Yep. It's really beautiful." In my photography, I strive to capture moments worth seeing in otherwise monotonous or commonplace situations, because those are the situations we most often find ourselves in, and if we can't find beauty in them, our lives become hopelessly mundane.

Most of us don't have the luxury of seeing beautiful, sweeping landscapes every day, or living wild, nomadic lifestyles filled with parties and interesting people and adventure. We walk with our heads a bit low, repeating our motions, growing bored and tired as we pass through our routines without anticipation or excitement. And for most of us, there isn't anything we can do to change that. The larger structures and systems which dictate our lives are for the most part beyond our power to change. What we can change, though, is how we choose to experience and appreciate the time we're given. We HAVE to notice how beautiful that flower is; we MUST appreciate how happy that couple looks on the bench as we pass by. These moments are our sweeping landscapes.

Rish stopped for a while to talk to the fisherman in this picture. I don't know what they talked about; I didn't ask. But I'm glad they talked. He saw a moment waiting to be made and he made it. They're everywhere if we look for them.

** Pictures were taken on Ilford Pan F+ film with a Yashica FX-D 35mm camera. All pictures were developed at home. Information on the history of Bartram's Garden was gathered from bartramsgarden.org. If you enjoyed this post, feel free to follow me and check back in for more soon!