SPOTLIGHT: JORDAN DOUGLAS—PORTFOLIO CONTEST WINNER
Words: Michael DiGregorio
Jordan Douglas
Thirteen years ago March, educator-artist Jordan S. Douglas began to exhibit a body of work, by turns curious and anonymous, he calls (Re)membering. “It’s been a sidecar to many other projects/exhibitions. Over the years, I’ve shown it here and there,” including a space called Speeder & Earl’s in Burlington, Vermont (August 2019). To date though, “(the series) hasn’t received much press.”
Small wonder that. (Re)membering reflects nothing more than artist dedicated to the beauty of craft; an undertaking that transcends self-interest. Marked by a respectfully light touch, Douglas’ series breathes new life into dust-of-age quality photographs. The latter range from 1860s ambrotypes to tintypes; damaged 19th century metal plates up to 70-year-old photos. The vibe or feels of these standalone portraits is equally broad: from the odd and quirky to spooky to arresting.
Small wonder that. (Re)membering reflects nothing more than artist dedicated to the beauty of craft; an undertaking that transcends self-interest. Marked by a respectfully light touch, Douglas’ series breathes new life into dust-of-age quality photographs. The latter range from 1860s ambrotypes to tintypes; damaged 19th century metal plates up to 70-year-old photos. The vibe or feels of these standalone portraits is equally broad: from the odd and quirky to spooky to arresting.
Civil War Era Tintype
Ineffably, Professor Douglas’ nameless subjects knew not of Instagram, MMA/cage fights, QAnon or the Kardashians. No. Their lives were informed by Spanish Flu, Temperance, Pentecostals wielding snakes, Dust Bowl, Jim Crow and lynchings.
From my view, at least three stood out. “Man with a Gun, 1950s” shows a typically unprepossessing male, mid-30s or early 40s, holding a rifle in tight. The image is almost claustrophobic; the language, Lynchian. Yet it’s not object but subject who raises the black flag, given his resemblance to America’s most conflicted assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald.
From my view, at least three stood out. “Man with a Gun, 1950s” shows a typically unprepossessing male, mid-30s or early 40s, holding a rifle in tight. The image is almost claustrophobic; the language, Lynchian. Yet it’s not object but subject who raises the black flag, given his resemblance to America’s most conflicted assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald.
Man with a Gun, 1950s
Far less enigmatic, though equally profound, is “Civil War-era Tintype.” The portrait a Union soldier sat for—likely his only photograph—is torn, at a rakish angle, wide as the Mighty Mississippi, from end-to-end at midframe. Was the private cut down in battle, the found photo tucked into coat pocket? “My Father as a Boy, The Bronx, 1940” evoked a completely different tone: one of pure cherubic joy in short pants. The presenter finding his Happy Place.
From ends to means now, as aging bestows grace, if not dignity, Douglas’ own process lends figurative elevating. In literal terms, the rephotographed photographs, “with their cracks, bubbles, dirt and folds” first undergo a hand-applied silver gelatin, toned in sepia. Douglas, who teaches darkroom and digital photography at Vermont’s St. Michael’s College, closes the transformation by printing onto Arches cotton watercolor paper.
From ends to means now, as aging bestows grace, if not dignity, Douglas’ own process lends figurative elevating. In literal terms, the rephotographed photographs, “with their cracks, bubbles, dirt and folds” first undergo a hand-applied silver gelatin, toned in sepia. Douglas, who teaches darkroom and digital photography at Vermont’s St. Michael’s College, closes the transformation by printing onto Arches cotton watercolor paper.
My Father as a Boy in the Bronx, New York, 1940
Below surface, (Re)membering assumes something of a quiet, NOFX refutation of our dominant temporal logic. A visual archaeology construct, the series plays as much on periodization as typology. These hoary time-images subvert movement, action; subjectively they speak as much to space as time. In lieu of dramatic structure, the wonderfully spare portraits seem almost verged on neorealism.
Understated and minimalist, leveraging theoretical temporality and observation, Douglas seems to take his cues from Slow Art. Specifically, the likes of auteurs Chantal Akerman, Lisandro Alonso and Michelangelo Antonioni: all of whom refocused on the reality of the everyday. The lived experience.
Understated and minimalist, leveraging theoretical temporality and observation, Douglas seems to take his cues from Slow Art. Specifically, the likes of auteurs Chantal Akerman, Lisandro Alonso and Michelangelo Antonioni: all of whom refocused on the reality of the everyday. The lived experience.
Broken Ambrotype, circa 1860
In his intro to (Re)membering, Douglas said, “(These) antique photographs are re-contextualized to speak to our present day humanity.”
Indeed. Quoting Flavor Flav, “Y’all know what time it is.” The Age of Surveillance. Data Mining. Identities ceaselessly tracked, hacked; our very movements digitally traced by iPhone. The lines separating our online and offline selves blurred.
Indeed. Quoting Flavor Flav, “Y’all know what time it is.” The Age of Surveillance. Data Mining. Identities ceaselessly tracked, hacked; our very movements digitally traced by iPhone. The lines separating our online and offline selves blurred.
Woman on Back Fender, circa 1920
Hereupon, (Re)membering, given its broad timepoints and eras, not to mention intentionalities, arguably lands its most visceral message. In a word: contrast. Put another way: these glimpses of vestigial Americana as odometer. Disclosing how far we’ve traveled; from Age of Innocence to Shamelessness.
Douglas told me, “The body of work grows each year, as I find photographs that are able to speak through this process. After his death in 2023, I shot pictures of my father as a child.” The aforedescribed were printed anew “to fit within the series. It’s the only time I’ve used images of someone I knew.
Douglas told me, “The body of work grows each year, as I find photographs that are able to speak through this process. After his death in 2023, I shot pictures of my father as a child.” The aforedescribed were printed anew “to fit within the series. It’s the only time I’ve used images of someone I knew.
He expressed marvel “at these curious artifacts. At the immediacy of the stilled faces on their surfaces. And at the enigmas of contexts that swim underneath.”