illinois and mississippi
this will be all over, from chicago to holly springs. i don’t usually do posts like this but these photos have been sitting un-seen in my space phone and i thought i should share them with whoever happens to be watching.
first, i went to chicago over the weekend of my birthday in april. a girl i had never met (or even spoken to, for that matter) made me a cake in the shape of a rocket. no kidding. it was the nicest thing i’d ever received from a stranger. her name was meg and her friend has a tattoo of a zombie that my boyfriend drew years ago. we did lots of things while we were there, ate pizza twice at the same restaurant and saw 30-million year old mammoth bones and a big t-rex, but my favorite thing of the trip (and possibly anything i’ve ever seen) were the thorne miniature rooms in the basement of the art institute. they are essentially dollhouse-sized rooms that span interior design from the 1700’s through the 1920’s, collected and arranged by Mrs. James Ward Thorne. they are perfect, literally, and beautiful beyond any words.
I wanted to shrink myself down and live inside every single one of them. the light was unreal, coming in through the windows exactly like sunshine. some of them had adjacent rooms, no less detailed than the “main” room, but which you could only peer into through partially opened doors.
You can find much better photos of the rest of the rooms online (most of them were far more ornate than these two), but i feel like there’s something to be said for a flashless, partially blurry, cell phone photo that still somehow manages to convey the sense that you’re not only there, but standing inside a full-sized room.
i got in trouble for snapping this next photo, but i couldn’t resist. there was a william eggleston exhibit at the art institute’s new “modern art” wing, which i found jarring. even the photos i hadn’t seen a hundred times had a familiarity about them, many of them having been taken in memphis and almost all of them of the South. if you’re not familiar with eggleston’s work, you should be. anyone who has ever lived here will immediately feel a connection with the thick colors and weird characters and crumbling buildings that, to this day, have not been updated. seeing them up on pure white walls in the modern art wing, people from all over the world admiring them quietly, seemed absurd and hilarious. apparently, though, eggleston had befriended an abstract painter in his time studying at Ole Miss and had even tried his hand at art himself, as evidenced by this open journal they had sitting under glass. what struck me though wasn’t the art, but the small sketch on the adjacent page with the name “alex chilton” written on it.
after some digging, i discovered that he’d designed this album cover for chilton’s first solo record. i imagined eggleston talking to him and saying, “okay, so the photo will be here,” and making a little scribble to represent the dolls on the hood of the car.
after the lady said, “ma’am! no photos, please!” i booked it on out of the modern art wing and that was that.
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i’ve been obsessed with the idea of exploring weird little towns in arkansas and mississippi lately, so this past friday i decided to drive down to holly springs for the day (next i plan on finding my great grandmother’s house in mcdougal, arkansas, population less than 100). holly springs is home to, among other things, graceland too*. i ate a grilled cheese and onion rings at phillips grocery, which is at a dead-end road next to an old abandoned train depot. i went to the marshall county museum where, for a $5 entry fee, i got to see a three-story building stuffed full of military uniforms, civil war weapons, old wedding dresses, and just about anything you might find in a mississippi attic and/or barn from the years 1870-1940. this kid (who was “new,” he kept saying) rather clumsily followed me around the whole time trying to remember the stories behind the artifacts.
on my way out of town i stopped by the now-abandoned mississippi industrial college, which consists of three huge brick buildings (one of which collapsed in the big string of storms we just had). i fought my way through a ton of weeds and vines and bees to get up into the auditorium of one of the buildings, which still had the seats and the big, purple, satin curtain half-hanging over the stage. the photo isn’t mine (i was too worried about falling through the floor to attempt going in alone) but gives you an idea of what the inside looks like. this guy’s whole set is really good.
*i would attempt to describe graceland too, but since i didn’t go there on this particular trip, it doesn’t quite belong in this entry. i would advise you to look it up though (and to visit if ever you’re able to), since it is a great little case study in obsession, americana, and The Extremely Weird. my decision not to go was based on the very dirty things i have heard this man say, the even dirtier things he’s said to men i know when there weren't women around, and the fact that the last friend that went said he handed her a gun to “play with” without mentioning the fact that it was loaded.
first, i went to chicago over the weekend of my birthday in april. a girl i had never met (or even spoken to, for that matter) made me a cake in the shape of a rocket. no kidding. it was the nicest thing i’d ever received from a stranger. her name was meg and her friend has a tattoo of a zombie that my boyfriend drew years ago. we did lots of things while we were there, ate pizza twice at the same restaurant and saw 30-million year old mammoth bones and a big t-rex, but my favorite thing of the trip (and possibly anything i’ve ever seen) were the thorne miniature rooms in the basement of the art institute. they are essentially dollhouse-sized rooms that span interior design from the 1700’s through the 1920’s, collected and arranged by Mrs. James Ward Thorne. they are perfect, literally, and beautiful beyond any words.
I wanted to shrink myself down and live inside every single one of them. the light was unreal, coming in through the windows exactly like sunshine. some of them had adjacent rooms, no less detailed than the “main” room, but which you could only peer into through partially opened doors.
You can find much better photos of the rest of the rooms online (most of them were far more ornate than these two), but i feel like there’s something to be said for a flashless, partially blurry, cell phone photo that still somehow manages to convey the sense that you’re not only there, but standing inside a full-sized room.
i got in trouble for snapping this next photo, but i couldn’t resist. there was a william eggleston exhibit at the art institute’s new “modern art” wing, which i found jarring. even the photos i hadn’t seen a hundred times had a familiarity about them, many of them having been taken in memphis and almost all of them of the South. if you’re not familiar with eggleston’s work, you should be. anyone who has ever lived here will immediately feel a connection with the thick colors and weird characters and crumbling buildings that, to this day, have not been updated. seeing them up on pure white walls in the modern art wing, people from all over the world admiring them quietly, seemed absurd and hilarious. apparently, though, eggleston had befriended an abstract painter in his time studying at Ole Miss and had even tried his hand at art himself, as evidenced by this open journal they had sitting under glass. what struck me though wasn’t the art, but the small sketch on the adjacent page with the name “alex chilton” written on it.
after some digging, i discovered that he’d designed this album cover for chilton’s first solo record. i imagined eggleston talking to him and saying, “okay, so the photo will be here,” and making a little scribble to represent the dolls on the hood of the car.
after the lady said, “ma’am! no photos, please!” i booked it on out of the modern art wing and that was that.
--
i’ve been obsessed with the idea of exploring weird little towns in arkansas and mississippi lately, so this past friday i decided to drive down to holly springs for the day (next i plan on finding my great grandmother’s house in mcdougal, arkansas, population less than 100). holly springs is home to, among other things, graceland too*. i ate a grilled cheese and onion rings at phillips grocery, which is at a dead-end road next to an old abandoned train depot. i went to the marshall county museum where, for a $5 entry fee, i got to see a three-story building stuffed full of military uniforms, civil war weapons, old wedding dresses, and just about anything you might find in a mississippi attic and/or barn from the years 1870-1940. this kid (who was “new,” he kept saying) rather clumsily followed me around the whole time trying to remember the stories behind the artifacts.
on my way out of town i stopped by the now-abandoned mississippi industrial college, which consists of three huge brick buildings (one of which collapsed in the big string of storms we just had). i fought my way through a ton of weeds and vines and bees to get up into the auditorium of one of the buildings, which still had the seats and the big, purple, satin curtain half-hanging over the stage. the photo isn’t mine (i was too worried about falling through the floor to attempt going in alone) but gives you an idea of what the inside looks like. this guy’s whole set is really good.
*i would attempt to describe graceland too, but since i didn’t go there on this particular trip, it doesn’t quite belong in this entry. i would advise you to look it up though (and to visit if ever you’re able to), since it is a great little case study in obsession, americana, and The Extremely Weird. my decision not to go was based on the very dirty things i have heard this man say, the even dirtier things he’s said to men i know when there weren't women around, and the fact that the last friend that went said he handed her a gun to “play with” without mentioning the fact that it was loaded.