August 2018 – Dietmar Tallroth

The Gentle Law

In Art & Photography / Lose thoughts

The world is going to pieces and people like [Ansel] Adams and [Edward] Weston are photographing rocks!
Henri Cartier-Bresson

You know why the beetles and buttercups so please you?
It is because you do not know the human soul, you do not see the stars!
Friedrich Hebbel

There is no denying: we humans love drama. Every nature documentary needs some of it. Will the young duckling survive? Will the antelope escape the lions? Mostly, however, we love drama involving ourselves. That might be a reason why artists, filmmakers and writers have and still do produce so much works about war. War as the ultimate human drama. Both quotes above were written at times of war. The Cartier-Bresson quote is from the time of WWII and Hebbel wrote at the dawn of the German Revolution of 1848.

Both quotes also sharply criticize artists that in such times of human drama do not pick up on this drama but continue to make nature the theme of their work. To me the criticism seems to be that such nature-artists don’t get their priorities straight. Is this right? Is there an implicit supremacy of human affairs over nature? There is an answer to that.

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The Golden Narrative

August 16, 2018 By Dietmar Tallroth With 0 Comment

In Art & Photography

“I have a dream…”
Martin Luther King

Some called him the most boring writer in German literature, others called him the best novelist of the 19th century. Some found him an idealist reactionary, for others he was a visionary and early ecologist and feminist. Strangely, all these judgements have some justification.

The list of his admirers goes from Nietzsche to Thomas Mann and W.H.Auden but his work is as good as unknown outside the German-speaking world. For me, his work was one of the strongest influences on everything I am and do.

This year marks the 150th anniversary of his death. Time to remember a tragic great man: Adalbert Stifter.

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A Whiter Shade of Pale

August 8, 2018 By Dietmar Tallroth With 0 Comment

In Art & Photography / Lose thoughts / On Location

“And although my eyes were open
They might just as well have been closed.”
Keith Reid, Procul Harum, A Whiter Shade of Pale

In 1967 a bunch of young men in their early twenties released their first single. The song on the A-side became an enduring success and is now one of the most played and sold pop songs of all time. This year, the song was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the list of superlative acclaim is long. In a way, like few other songs, A Whiter Shade of Pale has become part of our cultural fabric. I wonder how such a thing happens. Especially, if the song has such opaque lyrics – or have you heard of the Fandango before?

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