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For Thanksgiving this year, I decided to eschew the regular interview-based podcast and ask all of my past guests what they’re thankful for. Since it’s a mere couple of weeks from the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, responses were all over the spectrum. Here’s everyone who participated (with links to their episodes of the podcast):
- Andrea Tsurumi • starts at 4:15
- Dmitry Samarov • starts at 4:30
- Chris Nelson • starts at 4:50
- Sheila Keenan • starts at 5:10
- Wallis Wilde-Menozzi • starts at 5:20
- Summer Pierre • starts at 6:45
- Glen Baxter • starts at 7:25
- Hayley Campbell • starts at 7:40
- Kathe Koja • starts at 7:50
- Charles Blackstone • starts at 8:00
- Elizabeth Hand • starts at 8:50
- David M. Carr • starts at 9:25
- David Jaher • starts at 9:45
- Zachary D. Martin • starts at 10:00
- Willard Spiegelman • starts at 10:15
- Roz Chast • starts at 10:25
- Mary Fleener • starts at 10:35
- Glynnis Fawkes • starts at 11:00
- Ed Hermance • starts at 11:30
- Josh Alan Friedman • starts at 11:40
- Jonathan C. Hyman • starts at 12:20 (more about Jonathan below)
- Liesl Schillinger • starts at 13:00
- Rachel Hadas • starts at 13:45
- Ron Hogan • starts at 14:10
- Scott Edelman • starts at 14:45
- Tom Spurgeon • starts at 16:55
- me • starts at 18:35
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A few guests sent along material in addition to their written or recorded responses. Liz Hand sent a link to this video about Lincolnville, ME’s Move It! Project:
Bob Eckstein (who you oughtta follow on Twitter at @bobeckstein) sent two of his cartoons, including the one at the top of this page:
Jonathan C. Hyman’s contribution is the most involved, and requires a little unpacking. In the podcast, he says, “Despite the 2016 presidential election and the myriad social, environmental, and economic issues that have fractured our society, I am thankful that we are, and hopeful we will remain, a vibrant culture where people are free to speak openly and publicly.”
Background information and narrative: Known for his decade-long project which documents the vernacular public art, public speech, and memorial language that emerged across the United States in response to the 9/11 attacks, documentary photographer and past Virtual Memories guest Jonathan C. Hyman photographed the signage, displays, and public dialogue surrounding the 2016 presidential election.
His work on the election — including the seven images he contributed to this Thanksgiving podcast — is not meant to endorse or disparage Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, or their supporters. As a photographer with an interest in public expression — visual and speech — and in “things by the side of the road,” Hyman traveled within an approximate 150-mile radius from his home in Sullivan County, NY to areas in New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania.
Here, Hyman presents a sampling of the images in this series as they appeared when he came upon them. He photographed each display keeping in mind his interest in handmade objects, the American flag, and the houses, buildings, and neighborhoods people live and work in. The majority of the signs he saw, many handmade, were supportive of Donald Trump. The large majority of the handmade signs he encountered were displayed by Trump supporters on their own property. Realizing that his findings are anecdotal, Hyman says, “I have no doubt others have seen things I have not and that there were signs supporting Hillary Clinton in areas I have both visited and not traveled to. Nonetheless, it was clear to me that where pro-Hillary Clinton signs did exist, they tended to be of the more pre-fabricated, generic lawn sort and generally less likely to be on front lawns.”
Photographs © 2016 Jonathan C. Hyman All rights Reserved
Click to enlarge each picture:
In addition to being featured on the PBS NewsHour, Hyman’s work has been featured in Time Magazine, The New York Times, the Journal of American History, and several well-known European newspapers and magazines in print and online. In the fall of 2008 Hyman toured Europe as a U.S. State Department Cultural Envoy (as part of a program organized by the American embassy in Vienna and the University of Graz, Austria.), lecturing at universities in Berlin and Tuebingen, Germany, Vienna and Graz Austria, Brno, Czech Republic, and Zagreb, Croatia about his 9/11 related photographs. In addition to lecturing publicly since 2002 at well known academic institutions, from 2008-2016 Hyman was Associate Director for Conflict and Visual Culture Initiatives at Bryn Mawr College’s Solomon Asch Center for Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict, where he also supervised the Center’s online gallery.
For More Information:
- www.jchymangallery.com
- www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/911-as-art-photographer-captures-vernacular-response-to-attacks/
- www.amazon.com/The-Landscapes-11-Photographers-Journey/dp/0292726643
- exhibits.library.duke.edu/exhibits/show/hyman/
Jonathan C. Hyman can be reached at arthoops55@gmail.com
The thing I’m most thankful for is having such wonderful guests who are willing to pitch in to projects like this (and otherwise help keep me sane)!
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