Photography Exhibition
Summer 2008
"Friends are Forever"
Gate Way To Heaven Church, '95
[Pastor Bill Noble in photo]
Exhibition Location - "The Gate Way To Heaven Church"
Hardshell Cannie Creek Road, Lostcreek, Kentucky
Photography Exhibition and cook out made with four generations of the Noble Family and friends. Exhibition Photographs were distributed to families at close of exhibit.
Many of my Kentucky friends and photo subjects pictures, over the years have been published in my three books and other publications at this writing in 2008. With pictures reviewed and printed together in newspapers and photo magazines, this event is implemented to bring all together in one place to meet and celebrate. Further, I think it important my long term friends and subjects of many years have some of the same limited edition prints that are collected and exhibited outside the area. That they know their market value, have a vested interest by owning a few prints themselves, affirming the multiple values, creative and cultural worth and personal relationships recognized within these pictures. This 2008 celebration begins a tradition I will always honor full circle.
Added text - 2012
In 1998 with the publication of my second book, "Appalachian Legacy," we celebrated that book with, "Shelby's Dinner On the Ground and Book Signing Party," held at Perry Co. Park, Hazard, Kentucky, the first formal public event. In 2010 we organized a get together in Viper, Kentucky called,"The Guggenheim Party." We plan to continue these celebrations when projects and funds are available.
Donnie with Baby and Cow's, 1999
[Noble Family]
This summer 2008 celebrates my 35Th year making pictures in this region.
Over 100 people attended the festivities June 8th, 2008
Exhibition photos now reside in many peoples homes.
"Gate Way to Heaven," Church on opening day.
Cookout side of Church.
Food
Cake Cutting!
Exhibition
Exhibition inside Church.
Musician's
Photographing
Vanessa being photographed with Dad before taking her photograph home.
Callie with her two photographs at closing.
Jason with Father and Uncle's photo.
Jason taking home photo.
Junior with photograph of Father.
Rachel holding her family photo.
Lloyd Deane, [Brother and Sister] holding photo of their father.
Thanks to all for attending.
Photographs courtesy of Paul Paletti.
To bridge differences and open hearts between the elite and the grass roots cultures of America, photography is an excellent creative tool. Openness, directness and honest communication help. It's easier than you might think.
SLA
"Friends are Forever."
___________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________
Quotes and Vision
_______________________
Open our Hearts
Many have admiration for those perceived above than those of their own level or below. Many aspire to reach higher, improve themselves and innovate. Admirable, but, when close and on an equal level, some tend to distance themselves, claiming their individual separateness and isolate. Viewing others below themselves, turning away, ignoring, not helping - but pitying and ridiculing; projecting onto those less fortunate saying - seek upward-ness. How can they, without you? We all know this. We are all interconnected; open your hearts to that truth, we are all kin, see this as your personal reality and our problems and differences will begin to diminish.
Basho, 1644-1694, Japanese Poet
“Go to the pines if you want to learn about the pines, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. And in doing so, you must let go of your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and don’t learn. Your poetry arises by itself when you and the object have become one, when you have plunged deep enough into the object to see something like a hidden light glimmering there. However well phrased your poetry may be, if your feeling isn’t natural – if you and the object are separate – then your poetry isn’t true poetry but merely your subjective counterfeit.”
Matsuo Basho
___________________________________________
Seeing another, as if not their.
Freedom from my reactive conditioning to this behavior has been a long time coming. As an adult today, I still witness this biased and prejudiced control. When back home, it still causes me pain seeing and feeling those affected and so treated today. At home, many see this behavior as non-existent. Does one really get used to it?
Yes, Im afraid so.
Knowing - both sides will deny.
_______________________________________
Reaching Out
Summer 2008
"Friends are Forever"
Gate Way To Heaven Church, '95[Pastor Bill Noble in photo]
Exhibition Location - "The Gate Way To Heaven Church"
Hardshell Cannie Creek Road, Lostcreek, Kentucky
Photography Exhibition and cook out made with four generations of the Noble Family and friends. Exhibition Photographs were distributed to families at close of exhibit.
Many of my Kentucky friends and photo subjects pictures, over the years have been published in my three books and other publications at this writing in 2008. With pictures reviewed and printed together in newspapers and photo magazines, this event is implemented to bring all together in one place to meet and celebrate. Further, I think it important my long term friends and subjects of many years have some of the same limited edition prints that are collected and exhibited outside the area. That they know their market value, have a vested interest by owning a few prints themselves, affirming the multiple values, creative and cultural worth and personal relationships recognized within these pictures. This 2008 celebration begins a tradition I will always honor full circle.
Added text - 2012
In 1998 with the publication of my second book, "Appalachian Legacy," we celebrated that book with, "Shelby's Dinner On the Ground and Book Signing Party," held at Perry Co. Park, Hazard, Kentucky, the first formal public event. In 2010 we organized a get together in Viper, Kentucky called,"The Guggenheim Party." We plan to continue these celebrations when projects and funds are available.
Donnie with Baby and Cow's, 1999[Noble Family]
This summer 2008 celebrates my 35Th year making pictures in this region.
Over 100 people attended the festivities June 8th, 2008
Exhibition photos now reside in many peoples homes.
"Gate Way to Heaven," Church on opening day.
Cookout side of Church.
Food
Cake Cutting!
Exhibition
Exhibition inside Church.
Musician's
Photographing
Vanessa being photographed with Dad before taking her photograph home.
Callie with her two photographs at closing.
Jason with Father and Uncle's photo.
Jason taking home photo.
Junior with photograph of Father.
Rachel holding her family photo.
Lloyd Deane, [Brother and Sister] holding photo of their father.Thanks to all for attending.
Photographs courtesy of Paul Paletti.
To bridge differences and open hearts between the elite and the grass roots cultures of America, photography is an excellent creative tool. Openness, directness and honest communication help. It's easier than you might think.
SLA
"Friends are Forever."
___________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________
Quotes and Vision
_______________________
Open our Hearts
Many have admiration for those perceived above than those of their own level or below. Many aspire to reach higher, improve themselves and innovate. Admirable, but, when close and on an equal level, some tend to distance themselves, claiming their individual separateness and isolate. Viewing others below themselves, turning away, ignoring, not helping - but pitying and ridiculing; projecting onto those less fortunate saying - seek upward-ness. How can they, without you? We all know this. We are all interconnected; open your hearts to that truth, we are all kin, see this as your personal reality and our problems and differences will begin to diminish.
Shelby Lee Adams
August 2009
August 2009
Basho, 1644-1694, Japanese Poet
“Go to the pines if you want to learn about the pines, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. And in doing so, you must let go of your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and don’t learn. Your poetry arises by itself when you and the object have become one, when you have plunged deep enough into the object to see something like a hidden light glimmering there. However well phrased your poetry may be, if your feeling isn’t natural – if you and the object are separate – then your poetry isn’t true poetry but merely your subjective counterfeit.”
Matsuo Basho
___________________________________________
Country Manners
Seeing and non-seeing is a part of the have and have not divide. Economic disparity here collides socially. Struggle is evident often when
specific rural town’s people meet country holler people, on mutual ground. For
example, in a parking lot, say at a school function. Time hardened biased community leaders can be found, speaking only among themselves to their herd, defying all others by their gaze and body language, clutching and strutting themselves, mutely and barely acknowledging holler folks just
met, standing among them close,
together-divided.
They talk
about the country folk, in front of—close to and around them, but not
directly too. As a child growing up in the mountains, I was uncertain what this behavior actually
meant. I felt the awkwardness and tensions created. I was told this kept people
in their place. Non-Seeing stops unconfident voices from developing ___silence causes and maintains invisible walls of isolation. Speaking of others-in third person, right beside and with you, as if they
were not their, but right their. Faces in front-of you, but you are not seeing or recognizing, still “face to face.” You are face to face, as in no other place, everyone's home-place too. Non-seeing
perceptions and non-affirming
behaviors are weapons of control practiced here, exercising
the power of who is up and over top of the one’s down and below; this has been
the practice for generations. This often
does transfix entire families,
especially children, forever damaging. I wanted to cry out as a youth
saying look here this isn’t right, this injustice of refusing to see and accept
each other. Seeing another, as if not their.
Freedom from my reactive conditioning to this behavior has been a long time coming. As an adult today, I still witness this biased and prejudiced control. When back home, it still causes me pain seeing and feeling those affected and so treated today. At home, many see this behavior as non-existent. Does one really get used to it?
Yes, Im afraid so.
Knowing - both sides will deny.
Shelby Lee Adams
2010
_______________________________________
Reaching Out
Ironic that some say my photographs are misrepresenting them, when I am not photographing the established that are speaking out, but something more interior to us all, our behaviors to each other. Some rural successful are the one's who refuse and deny some of their fellow man in need of help, support and encouragement, their own neighbor's. I do not create the conditions I photograph within.
Portraits mirror ourselves and our behaviors to each other.
I photograph within my community understanding and giving attention to some neglected and shunned isolated people. Many people are generous to their own, yet often shun and remain blind to some that could benefit from a little care and compassion. Reaching out, seeing and recognizing each other ever so slightly would begin to solve a lot of problems, in spite of differences not only in our hollers but around the world.
SLA
What does the photography accomplish?
A quote from one of Shelby's first book reviews, by John B. Stephenson
"Any but the most casual of viewers will be drawn into relationship with Adams' friends. Their eyes reveal that, unlike ordinary portraits, these "subjects" are looking through the window of the camera into our own faces, plumbing our depths, searching our cores to know what we are really like. And who, indeed, are we? Perhaps they know more than we."
"A book to be lived with, not merely scanned, Appalachian Portraits is both art and documentary. It is an unforgettable book, as Harvard's Robert Coles says, of "unsettling intensity."
John B. Stephenson, President of Berea College, 1993
Portraits mirror ourselves and our behaviors to each other.
I photograph within my community understanding and giving attention to some neglected and shunned isolated people. Many people are generous to their own, yet often shun and remain blind to some that could benefit from a little care and compassion. Reaching out, seeing and recognizing each other ever so slightly would begin to solve a lot of problems, in spite of differences not only in our hollers but around the world.
SLA
What does the photography accomplish?
A quote from one of Shelby's first book reviews, by John B. Stephenson
"Any but the most casual of viewers will be drawn into relationship with Adams' friends. Their eyes reveal that, unlike ordinary portraits, these "subjects" are looking through the window of the camera into our own faces, plumbing our depths, searching our cores to know what we are really like. And who, indeed, are we? Perhaps they know more than we."
"A book to be lived with, not merely scanned, Appalachian Portraits is both art and documentary. It is an unforgettable book, as Harvard's Robert Coles says, of "unsettling intensity."
John B. Stephenson, President of Berea College, 1993
A Commitment
"To know our fragile and dependent are not seen clearly by some.
To discern that all of us come from the same earthly garden,
each a part of this great
humanity, mirroring ourselves - some uniquely dissimilar, yet our kin.
Parts make whole, no part of humanity is an entity unto
itself, with most always needing others.
Searching and finding ways of opening connections—accepting all—creates a more
confident people.
A greater community is created when
none are excluded.
Photographing diverse people helps me with
this understanding. I hope some of my commitment is transferred onto you."
S.L.A.
________________________________________________________________________________
"You break bread with a man you have moved on to another level of friendship. I heard somewheres that that's true the world over."
The Sunset Limited - Cormac McCarthy
____________________________
Give with Care
"I hear people say: Oh, if I were only rich, I would do great things to help people. But we all can be rich in love and generosity. Moreover, if we give with care, if we find out the exact wants of those who need our help most, we are giving our own loving interest and concern, which is worth more than all the money in the world."
Albert Schweitzer
Give with Care
"I hear people say: Oh, if I were only rich, I would do great things to help people. But we all can be rich in love and generosity. Moreover, if we give with care, if we find out the exact wants of those who need our help most, we are giving our own loving interest and concern, which is worth more than all the money in the world."
Albert Schweitzer
Wide Screen
Experience has shown me that the greatest inner tranquillity comes from developing love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. Cultivating a close, warm-hearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. It helps remove our fears and insecurities and gives us strength to face obstacles - it is the ultimate source of success in life.
Dala Lama
Experience has shown me that the greatest inner tranquillity comes from developing love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. Cultivating a close, warm-hearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. It helps remove our fears and insecurities and gives us strength to face obstacles - it is the ultimate source of success in life.
Dala Lama
Steiglitz has written, “the most difficult problem in photography is to learn to see. All else is comparatively simple, and one can only learn to see through comparison, through contrast. That is every artist’s great secret.” Kertesz said, “everybody can look, but they don’t necessarily see.” Emmet Gowin , an eminent photographer, has said, “What always interests me is the story behind [pictures]. It’s the going to, as Diane Arbus said, the going to places, the going and stepping into mysteries that you don’t understand.” Gowin has explained, “the challenge of photography is to show the thing photographed so that our feelings are awakened and hidden aspects are revealed.” He feels that “whatever picture an artist makes it is in part a picture of himself — a matter of identity.” George Rodger said that one views what is out there but the real source comes from within you, “from inside your head or your heart.”
Claire Yaffa
It's distressing to me that there are people who claim that you exploit the people you understand and accept so fully. I do understand that not everyone can look at these people in the unflinching way that you or I might, and in an effort to make themselves comfortable, question your motives to ease their own discomfort. I find your work honest and real and true. Sometimes it's hard to look at my own parents ... but I'm not gonna stop just because it's hard, occasionally. To do that would be to cast shame on them, and there is no shame there. They worked hard all their lives. They never had much materially. But they accept who they are ... and amazingly, accept everybody else they meet without judgment. They are an uncommon kind, and I still have much to learn from them.
Sarah, Mississippi May 2010
Philip talking to Shelby
[Recorded at Philip and Corrine's home in Kentucky, summer 2009]
" It’s very important, to Mountain people – that they stick together. Because they started when they had nothing, and when they get a little something, they still stick together and help each other along. That’s how that we were raised.
The way we was raised, we sure didn’t have nothing."
" You respected us. If mountain people, if they don’t trust you they want let you in."
“We are a tougher group of people and we can share more.”
“You through the years, in your line of work, people who don’t trust, they want let you in at all,
but you through the years, have went-through to these people and they have accepted you and your work
and if they thought you done anything wrong your work would have stopped a long time ago.”
“You’ve done it, you have reached what your “continuing” set out to do, You’ve done - what you’ve set out to do. Your not failing, your doing exactly what you do, and theirs’ always going to be people, they don’t understand what your doing and their going to criticize you because of it.”
“We all are the same, we need to really – to look at this situation right here. We really need to look at life. We are a blessed people, because were able to walk and able to talk, we have the freedom to get out and to work and raise our families and we ought to treat each other equally.”
Philip Zambala 2009
____________________________________________
________________________
_____________
happiness we need to cultivate a healthy respect for the diversity of our peoples and cultures, founded on an understanding of this fundamental sameness of all human beings."
_____________________________Steiglitz has written, “the most difficult problem in photography is to learn to see. All else is comparatively simple, and one can only learn to see through comparison, through contrast. That is every artist’s great secret.” Kertesz said, “everybody can look, but they don’t necessarily see.” Emmet Gowin , an eminent photographer, has said, “What always interests me is the story behind [pictures]. It’s the going to, as Diane Arbus said, the going to places, the going and stepping into mysteries that you don’t understand.” Gowin has explained, “the challenge of photography is to show the thing photographed so that our feelings are awakened and hidden aspects are revealed.” He feels that “whatever picture an artist makes it is in part a picture of himself — a matter of identity.” George Rodger said that one views what is out there but the real source comes from within you, “from inside your head or your heart.”
Claire Yaffa
It's distressing to me that there are people who claim that you exploit the people you understand and accept so fully. I do understand that not everyone can look at these people in the unflinching way that you or I might, and in an effort to make themselves comfortable, question your motives to ease their own discomfort. I find your work honest and real and true. Sometimes it's hard to look at my own parents ... but I'm not gonna stop just because it's hard, occasionally. To do that would be to cast shame on them, and there is no shame there. They worked hard all their lives. They never had much materially. But they accept who they are ... and amazingly, accept everybody else they meet without judgment. They are an uncommon kind, and I still have much to learn from them.
Sarah, Mississippi May 2010
Philip talking to Shelby
Philip talking to Shelby
[Recorded at Philip and Corrine's home in Kentucky, summer 2009]
" It’s very important, to Mountain people – that they stick together. Because they started when they had nothing, and when they get a little something, they still stick together and help each other along. That’s how that we were raised.
The way we was raised, we sure didn’t have nothing."
" You respected us. If mountain people, if they don’t trust you they want let you in."
“We are a tougher group of people and we can share more.”
“You through the years, in your line of work, people who don’t trust, they want let you in at all,
but you through the years, have went-through to these people and they have accepted you and your work
and if they thought you done anything wrong your work would have stopped a long time ago.”
“You’ve done it, you have reached what your “continuing” set out to do, You’ve done - what you’ve set out to do. Your not failing, your doing exactly what you do, and theirs’ always going to be people, they don’t understand what your doing and their going to criticize you because of it.”
“We all are the same, we need to really – to look at this situation right here. We really need to look at life. We are a blessed people, because were able to walk and able to talk, we have the freedom to get out and to work and raise our families and we ought to treat each other equally.”
Philip Zambala 2009
Married to Corrine Childers, over 30 years, raised in Roxanne, KY
We have known each other since 1976.
____________________________________________
________________________
_____________
____________________________________________
________________________
_____________
happiness we need to cultivate a healthy respect for the diversity of our peoples and cultures, founded on an understanding of this fundamental sameness of all human beings."
