Josh Kilmer-Purcell's Blog, page 51

Small Town American Summer

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We love summer. And while there was plenty to love about the summers we spent together in NYC (Coney Island, Central Park, movies in Bryant Park,) we still prefer spending our lazy hazy days in a small town. We both grew up in rural towns, and whiled away our long summer afternoons playing baseball with the neighbors, decorating our bikes, and “camping out” in our backyard. If summer is about making memories, ours were mostly made in Small Town America.

We were going through old family photos this past winter and realized that probably 90% of our Baby Books (do parents even create Baby Books anymore?) consisted of photos taken during summertime. (The remaining 10% were Christmases and birthdays.) Back in those days before cellphones & digital cameras film was precious. Remember buying a roll of 24 shots and then deciding which moments of your two week vacation were worth capturing for posterity? And if you blinked when the shutter clicked, well, that would become the only portrait of you, at ten years old, in front of Mt Rushmore. Forever and ever.

A few weeks ago we asked for you all to share your old summer photos with us. We said we’d be using them online, here and in our online Mercantile to capture the fun of Small Town American Summer. We loved looking at each one of them..they’re so different than the .jpgs of today. Taking fifteen selfies before deciding on the best artful pose for Instagram kinda strips all of the realness from our memories.

We much prefer your old photos to today’s Twitter stream. The awkward gangly teens. The adults goofing around on vacation.  The ubiquitous kiddie pool shots. The black and white stiffness.  The rips and scratches. And the blinks. Especially the blinks.

Because every blink reminds us that our youth, like summertime, is gone in one.

5 Beautiful Things

Solstice

For this week’s Five, I’ve decided to keep it simple. Nothing too deep, just several shots I took on June 21, the first day of summer, at my parents’ cottage in Ontario, Canada. These photos were all taken well after 8:00 pm, and I could not help but marvel at the way the warm light of the late evening sun was caressing everything it touched. I decided to capture those moments on film: shining through the porch screens, reflecting on the lake, spotlighting my parents’ dog, Della. It is hard to believe that the days now are getting shorter with each setting sun. I hope you are enjoying summer as much as I am. For a Canadian, such as myself, it is a fleeting and exuberant season.

 

Beekman Style

When we were preparing for the launch of the Muck B. 1802 boot collection, we worked with the stylist Montgomery Frazier and photographer Marc Dunn.  Shooting on location at the Brooklyn Grange, a rooftop farm in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, the team really captured the essence of Beekman 1802—a little bit of city and a little bit of the country.

 

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5 Beautiful Things

 

Bee Inspired

Honeybee hives have long provided human beings with honey and beeswax. But the benefit of the honeybee to humanity far exceeds these resources. All bees are tireless pollinators and are largely responsible for the proliferation and good health of many of our plants and flowers. Sadly, bees have undergone something of a plague in North America recently. Their numbers have dwindled rapidly due to aggressive viruses, but many scientists believe that pesticides are ultimately to blame. One study suggests that pesticides attack the bees’ immune systems, exposing the insects to viruses and bacteria they would ordinarily be resistant to.

The resilience of a bee colony, however, is not easily destroyed. Indeed, the entire species has informed and inspired us for centuries, thanks to their incomparable productivity and strength. The very design of their hives, their concise social structures, their communication techniques and the intricately interconnected hexagons of their honeycombs have each provided the human race with endless inspiration. I am always amazed by how perfectly nature seems to design itself. Clearly, I am not alone. Below are five images demonstrating how the humble honeycomb has inspired human design – from tiles, to storage and beyond!

 

Take a look at what the 32 hives on Beekman Farm produce!  Click here

5 Beautiful Things

 

Praying Mantis Style

 

When I was a little boy, I was fascinated by the insectt known as the praying mantis. With its svelte, machine-like body and its mean looking fore-limbs it fully captured my imagination and I became mildly obsessed with its habits. One of my fondest memories is searching for these elusive creatures with my father in our backyard and in the adjacent woods. Armed with a Mason jar full of grass and small twigs, we trawled the landscape until we found one – and then two! I studied them intently and I was quick to sketch them in my dogeared journal before releasing them the next day. My father still has that drawing. Looking at these insects today, I cannot help but be even more enamored of their inherent style and design. Mother nature knew exactly what she was doing when she created these finely-tuned hunters. They are visually stunning.

 

 

There are over 2,400 species of mantises in the world, found in both temperate and tropical climates. North American varieties are usually green and no more than half-an-inch in length but tropical species can be several inches long and wildly colorful. The insects were so named because of the prayer-like pose of its folded fore-limbs, which are muscular and spiked to firmly grasp its prey. They can fly, but only for short distances and prefer to linger under leaves and brush to camouflage themselves from birds and larger predators. If you find a praying mantis, consider yourself lucky. They are not only extremely shy but extremely beautiful. What fashion designer or engineer on earth would fail to recognize how inspiring and extraordinary they are?

 

No Fault in Our Star

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James Fenimore Cooper purchased 200 acres in 1835 there when he came back to live in Cooperstown and established a farm, primarily to supply his family and guests.  The remnants of that farm are now part of Fernleigh Farm and parts are open to the public with a well-maintained hiking trail that leads to one of the farm’s original pasture areas—Star Field.  Areas around the farm inspired Cooper’s “Leatherstocking Tales” featuring Natty Bumppo as the main hero.

There is room to park at the head of the trail.  There are no GPS coordinates to get you there, but once you get to Cooperstown, just stop a local on the street and they’ll show you the way.

 

Looking for other great hikes when coming to visit Beekman 1802?  Check out our hike at Vroman’s Nose.  Click here

 

5 Beautiful Things

 

Reality Check

One of the main functions of this weekly column has been to encourage people to look closer at the world around them, to hopefully inspire a deeper appreciation of the seasons, the elements or the objects we may generally think of as ordinary. The extraordinary can be found in just about anything if we train our eye to detect it and develop a sense of curiosity. More often than not beauty is right under our noses – even on the most grim of days – and once it is perceived, that beauty can lead to a a new kind of understanding. When I first saw these hyper-realistic pencil drawings I was astounded. They are so photographic in nature that I literally had to look closer to convince myself that they are, in truth, the creations of incredibly talented draftsmen. Sometimes what we perceive is not what we imagine it to be.

 

 

The Artists:

1. Franco Clun

2. Diego Faizo

3. Brian Boulton

4. Paul Cadden

5. Robert Longo

Party Monsters

 

For those of you who couldn’t make it to the Spring celebration, here are a few of Chris Stout-Hazard’s photos documenting the day.   Our next big gathering is Harvest Festival on Sept 20 and 21.  Hope to see you here!

 

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I Swear!

 

At this year’s Garden Party Festival, Mayor Doug Plummer presided over an Honorary Sharon Springs Citizen swearing in ceremony to welcome all the new visitors, friends and neighbors, into the fold (if only for the day)

Here’s the official proclamation penned by the village’s official speechwriter, Josh Kilmer-Purcell

 

Mayor:

 

We welcome you all to our dear humble village,

Our charms are well-known, and all yours to pillage.

We’re quite few in number, but have infinite heart,

Just like the waters that gave us our start.

 

Strangers trek here from both yonder and nigh.

We’ve overheard many folks ponder and sigh:

“If only, just maybe, for one day or two,

I could be Sharon Springs-ian, all through and through!”

 

Well, traveler, rest easy, I bring you good news!

I have a great treasure you cannot refuse.

To be one of us doesn’t take a degree,

You must simply, heartfelt-ed-ly, repeat after me…

 

I promise to wake up each day with a grin,

I promise to wake up each day with a grin

 

No matter my troubles, I’ll keep up my chin,

No matter my troubles, I’ll keep up my chin,

 

I’ll mend all my fences, in fields and with foes

I’ll mend all my fences, in fields and with foes

 

And upon all my neighbors, I’ll never impose.

And upon all my neighbors, I’ll never impose.

 

I’ll work to my limit, not expecting respite,

I’ll work to my limit, not expecting respite,

 

Till I lay in the ground for a well-earned good night.

Till I lay in the ground for a well-earned good night.

 

I may travel to cities, and hobnob with kings,

I may travel to cities, and hobnob with kings,

 

But my true roots grow deepest towards dear Sharon Springs.

But my true roots grow deepest towards dear Sharon Springs.

 

So now as your mayor, with bylaws and whatnot,

And legalese that may or may not be too clear-cut

I grant you your status right here in this quorum,

All honors and favors, rewards and decorums.

Go forth as new neighbors! Be ye hearty and hale!

(And watch for your tax bill, it comes first class mail.)

 

 

5 Beautiful Things

 

Things Come Apart

 

There is a certain kind of person – a curious sort – who looks at things and wonders, “How did they make that?” Photographer Todd McLellan must be this type. A commercial photographer living and working in Toronto, Todd’s latest series explores the details of the everyday world around us by deconstructing objects to their basic components. It is called Things Come Apart and the composition of each photograph in the series consists of what could be called ‘assembled disassembly’ – my term, not Todd’s. Snowblowers, watches, calculators, computers and pianos are all broken up into their basic parts, which are then artfully arranged to form a beautifully-designed tableau for his photography. You can learn more at Todd’s website, where you can purchase some of his prints in various dimensions. You can also buy his book, Things Come Apart, here. As for the five images below, look closely to see if you can determine what each object was before it was disassembled.