Election 2008

Beyond going “La La La La” with my fingers stuck in both ears to drown out the media, I feel as if I am caught like a deer in the headlights of the red and blue states hurtling down the highway.  There is no stopping now.  They are either going to mow me down or swerve into the future.

The original image was the one on the right.  Taken just before dawn one morning at a stop light.  Since I have many beautiful discs now as a result of this series in “intersection” photography, I began working with it without a concept other than blocks of color and pattern.  This has always interested me.

It was only this morning after viewing an online presentation of a Sol LeWitt ( a very abstract conceptual kinda guy) retrospective at the Mass MoCA (Mass Museum of Contemporary Art out in western Massachusetts) that it occurred to me that I might make these stoplights into individual headlights that appear to belong to the same vehicle.

Once I looked at the discs this way, I knew right away that it would be the red and blue state divisions so often referred to in the press designating Republican or Democratic leaning states in the US.  My abstract photograph became a player in a concept after all.

So much collective thought and anxiety has gone into this election season that it seems quite right that it should end for me on a creative note–and as much a vote for myself and where I personally want to go in my life, –to “swerve into the future” –as it is for my nation.  Joe the Plumber and I have priorities, you know.

But, for right now, the Sunday before Tuesday’s election, I’m standing in the middle of the road– (okay on the leftish side of the road, no surprise there)–with the blue/red lights reflected in my dilated pupils.

History, my country needs you to be kind and to be bold.

And I need to be those two things as well.

End of concept.

Let the “Doing” begin.

Fingers and toes crossed and throwing salt over my shoulder, I remain confident.

©Pat Coakley 2008

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8 Replies to “Election 2008”

  1. Oh Pat, I so share your angst and hope and anxiety and rational thinking that gets derailed and righted within minutes, sometimes seconds.
    Your symbology of one vehicle, two different lights is a visual summation of how opposing the ideals have become.
    It’s like one set of parents having two kids so diametrically opposite in character and ability that you wonder how they came from the same DNA and upbringing.

    Rome burns and Nero appears on Saturday Night Live.
    It’s all gotten so screwy that any rational thought could die of loneliness.

    Our TV is still out post Omar, so we’ve been unable to get the minute by minute. I can’t tell if that’s a blessing yet or if it will drive me to hemlock.
    I want to go to sleep tonight and wake up Wednesday morning to a screaming yowl of joy and tears.

    I don’t delude myself that any one person will change the direction of this runaway train in a term.
    But what I feel is that after 8 years of punishing absence of ethics and character, we all yearn for the potential that is within us and has been without us.

    Keep hopeful.

  2. BL: “We all yearn for the potential that is within us and has been without us…”My, my, my: what’s your word for something very, ‘bery’ good, “Yeow!!!” That says it all from my personal world to the wider world.

  3. I’ll tell ya…this is going to be one exciting election night. I am so hopeful! I am buying champagne premptively as I hope to be celebrating.

    Wanted to thank you again…for stopping by to comment on my articles. Please feel free to leave your link in your comment too. You are so kind to me…how can I ever repay you?

  4. Merely Me, Repayment? Never thought in these terms. But, if I do, each time I see a new article you have written on Heath Central or a new post on your blog, I feel good. I think that’s repayment, don’t you?

  5. Friday, I received enough automated political telephone calls, I thought we were voting for an automated candidate! Oh wait! We are!!

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