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\"Don't bother to take photographs in Big Bend. James Evans owns the place and frankly you should simply buy his books and save yourself some time. He not only has what it looks like, he knows what it feels like and means. This is a very rare thing.\" ~ Charles Bowden
\n\n\"Outside is the side I take.\" ~ JHE. \n\n
Personal Statement: \n\nI moved to Marathon, Texas on December 28, I988. A month before, I was on a trip to Big Bend with my friend Clif Ladd, and on the way we stopped in Marathon to see a friend of his that worked at the Gage Hotel. I learned from that friend, that the Gage was looking for a cook. With that knowledge in my mind we left for the park. I had been to the park twice before and was already in love with the place. On this trip I met some locals, Uncle Joe, Aunt Roberta, John Suffaco, and Susan Bryant. We all partied together at Joe's place and I was totally smitten with them. They were unpretentious, educated, and I felt a strong connection. I was also still looking for what my life's work would be. After meeting these people and sleeping under the stars I devised my plan and thoughts. I would apply for the cooking position, close my commercial studio in Austin, and move to Marathon. I would make this area my place through my photographs. The books of the area I had seen up to that time were all pretty picture books. Tourists books taken by itinerant photographers. I didn't want to do that. I wanted to be an \"insider.\" A photographer taking photographs of his neighbors. I am in my 37th year of living here, and my original concept has not changed. I have published three books, Big Bend Pictures and Crazy From The Heat, and a new an updated version of Big Bend Pictures The first two are currently both out of print, and are valued collector's items. In 2026, I am working on a retrospective book, to be released in the Fall of 2027. \n\n
I print everything myself. Many of my images are in galleries, museum collections, and private collections.
Evans Gallery is located at 100 S E 1st. Street. Go across the railroad tracks (Post Road) and it is the first building on the left. The Marathon Health Center is on the right.
Gallery Hours are 10 AM to 6 PM most days. I work in the silver building directly in back of the gallery. There is a note on the door to let you know the current situation.
Ring the Bell and it calls me on my phone.
If you are planning a trip and want to visit, a call or email is much appreciated. I like to meet with people, but I may be on location.
If I am not in town Marci may be. Read the sign on the door for instruction.
Pandemic masks are welcome but not required.
Here are important numbers:
Studio: 432-386-four three six six. Landline. Leave message.
James' Cell 512-560-eight two six nine.
All Images are copyrighted © James H. Evans and may not be used for any reason without permission.
Evans Gallery
100 S E 1st. Street
Marathon, Texas 79842.
512-560-eight two six nine
432-386-four three six six. Workshop Landline
Email: jamesh at jameshevans dot com.
Stephen L. Clark
508 Baylor St.
Austin, TX 78704
512-477-zero eight two eight
Sarah Foltz
2143 Westheimer Rd.
Houston, Texas 77098
713-521-seven five zero zero
Evans Gallery 100 S E 1st Street, Marathon, Texas 79842 432-386-43 six six = Studio James email: jamesh at jameshevans. com 512-560-82 six nine = James Direct Landline = 432-386-43 six six. T - Shirts, pillow cases, camisoles, dinner napkins = Desertcritterwear dot com.
\"Bloom\" I have lived in Marathon, Texas since December of 1988. Big Bend National Park has been my muse and remains my life's work. I see myself as part historian, part documentarian and part artist, though I try to approach every part artistically. All of my images are portraits. In 2015 the Spring bloom was the best I've ever witnessed. There were flowers where I've never seen flowers and flowers that I've never seen. Not only that, but they lasted for weeks and there were hundreds of them. There were sweet smells in the wind. Every thing was abundant. Every living thing was happy. The desert was happy. It was a once in a lifetime experience and I immersed myself in it. My years of living here have given me a great advantage. When I go in to the park, I know where it rained last. I know when a mountain is dancing with light and I know when something is not \"normal.\" None of these images are \"Normal.\"
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. Thank you.
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Crazy From The Heat Notes and Stories. This book is a collector's item. It it out of print. Rebecca Solnit wrote the forward. She is a great writer, and I am very proud that she graced this book. These are notes and thoughts on the images in this book.
1. Meteor Shower: In 2009 I hiked at night for several months. I carried four film cameras with tripods and would set them up in locations mostly close to where I was. I also had my newly acquired digital camera free to use while the film cameras were exposing. The Perseid meteor shower was in full swing and I wondered if I could capture it.
2. Dust Devil: Highway 90 between Valentine and Van Horn Texas is a good place to see dust devils. With film cameras I always had several film backs loaded with different types of film in them. When I saw this dust devil I jumped out of my truck and photographed it hastily. When I got the film back from the lab I realized I photographed the image on slide film and not Tri-X black-and-white film. I also had a contrast filter over the lens. I essentially blew it. Then the digital age came along and I was able to scan that image and take out the filter cast and convert it in to the black-and-white image I had in mind in the first place.
3. Bull Snake on 385: I was on my way home and passed by this snake curled up on itself. I’ve never seen this before in my life. I jumped out of the truck shot a few images, then poked at it a little bit to see if it was alive. It was and not too happy about that.
4. Chisos (The Heat Series) I usually wait for the prettiest light of the day to shoot images. Looking for long shadows and nice puffy clouds. I decided to start shooting in the worst light and to just try and capture the heat. I love the way the mountains in foreground and background are all flattened out. It kicked off a new series of image making, and made me realize that I could shoot in any kind of light.
5. George Merriman: In 1992 I went on a lower canyons river trip with 10 friends. It was a great experience, the river was up and we floated fast. The hard part was finding a camp that wasn’t underwater. I took this photograph of George on that trip. Several years later he was doing acrobatic spins in his Cessna airplane. On a barrel roll the plane’s wing touched the ground and he was killed.
6. Self-Portrait Firing Pistol: I set the camera up on tripod and timer and just kept firing the gun to see if I could record the flame coming out of the barrel. For the record I am pretty scared of guns.
7. Chisos at Night Panoramic: The digital age resolved an issue I had with making panoramics. With film cameras the 35mm negative format was too small and with the 2 1⁄4 format the negative was too large for my 4x5 enlarger. With digital cameras you shoot pieces of the image and Photoshop stitches them together. Also digital sensors make it easier to record in very low light. This image was shot about 4 AM and is the first panoramic I made at night.
8. Chisos and Clouds: This is another image shot just like the dust devil image and saved in the same way.
9. Heart Cloud: I was out on a tour and lecture with Ranger Rob Dean. As he was talking to the class I saw this cloud and photographed it. Sometimes I will shoot an image just to remind me of the moment. It always reminds me of Rob.
10. On North County Road: This county road is one of my favorites to drive on. I have spent days back there. It seems I discover something new every time.
11. John L Guldeman: I spent the day with John on his ranch for an article for Texas Monthly. I was looking for a place to make a portrait. When we stopped here I was setting up the camera and a big wind came up and nearly blew John’s hat off. That was the perfect shot.
12. Rain with Lightning: Photographing lightning at night is somewhat easy. You put the camera tripod pick an f-stop, depending on the severity of the bolts, open the shutter and wait for the lightning to streak the film. In daylight you have to try to shoot the picture when you see the bolt or anticipate that is going to happen.
13. Texas Horned Lizard: People come into the gallery and tell me how they used to play with these lizards and kept them for pets when they were children. They also tell me that haven’t seen one in years. But in west Texas I see them all the time when I’m riding my bicycle. One time I saw one and turned back to look at it. I was no more then 10 feet from it when a red tailed hawk flew down and grabbed it right in front of me. The hawk had to make a decision to get it before I did. It was an amazing moment.
14. Dog Canyon: This is one of those beautifully lit nice tonal scale images. The rock slide on the far left happened Easter 1981 according to Ben Love the rancher who shares this range with the national park.
15. Nude at Agua Fria: To me there is nothing more beautiful than the form of woman’s body. And in the harsh but equally beautiful desert landscape it is breathtaking. The rock here is very light, like skin tone. This model and I started early in the morning shot all day till the sun went down. I made several fine images, but this is one of the best nudes I’ve ever done. Sometimes photo sessions are like songs and can take me back to a memory. I’ll never forget this day, how much fun we had, how we both struggled to make artistic images, and how totally high on life we were.
16. Clouds Near Indian Head: This is one of my favorite places to camp when I am tired and in a hurry to get to bed, and of course, I am on that side of the park.
17. Six man Football Team: Billy Faier asked me to do a portrait of him for an article in a banjo magazine. We went down to the post park in Marathon and shot for quite a while. The Marathon High School football team happened to be there too. So I asked them if they would get in the kiddie pool and let me do a portrait.
18. Boys: I was going out for a jog and I was just on my first quarter mile when I saw these boys jumping off the roof on to the trampoline. I jogged right back to my studio and got my camera. I love the fact that these kids are not wearing any protective gear helmets etc. It reminds me of when I was a kid, and before there were so many lawyers.
19. Javelina: This baby javelina belonged to Buzz Ross in Fort Davis. I set up a white backdrop and a light and Buzz would let the Javelina go and it would run across the backdrop. I don’t know how many rolls of film I shot to try and get an image where you can see all four legs but it was plenty.
20. Ocotillo Pamoramic: This too is a panoramic from the heat series as I explained previously. I call it Pamoramic because my friend Pam Shown is on the far right behind an ocotillo. It is also the cover of this book.
21. Monte Schatz: Monte was an artist and friend who lived here in Marathon. One day he called to ask if I would photograph about 25 bearded dragon lizard’s he had before they all left for their new homes. I asked where do you want to do this? He said how about your place, I said I don’t think so. I said, how about your place? And he said no, he had a painting in progress and he never liked anyone to see an unfinished piece. He said how about at the Catholic Church and I said yes. We shot for at least 45 minutes and they never moved. Monte really had a way with them. The light is all existing, and the negative is one of the most perfect negs I’ve ever processed. A few years later Richard Grant did a story on me for the London Times Magazine, and in that story they ran this image. Monte was so proud, he said he imagined the Queen on the toilet looking at his face.
22. David’s Grave: I was asked to photograph the graduating class of 2004. There were only six students. David Aguilar was the only one to show up for a portrait. A couple of days later he was riding with some friends to Fort Stockton and the driver lost control of the car on a curve. The car rolled and David was killed. By the time I gotten the film back from the lab he was being buried. I went to the cemetery the night before the funeral and set up my camera to do a time exposure. I opened the shutter and walked around the cemetery painting the crosses with the light and let the moon light the rest of the negative. I used my camera to honor his life and express my personal grief.
23. Tom Lea: I was coming back from an assignment in New Mexico and spent the night in El Paso Texas. When I got to my hotel room I thought about Tom Lea. I’d never met him and since I was going to be here I thought I’d give him a call. When his wife picked up the phone I introduced myself, told her I was a photographer and asked if I might do a portrait of Tom. She asked “for what” I said “posterity.” She asked” how much does it cost” I said it’s free. She said hold on. A few minutes went by and she came back to the phone and asked if I could be there at 2 o’clock. I said yes ma’am. Then she gave me directions. I asked “what is your name ma’am.” She said “what for” I said “just for respect ma’am.” She said it’s Mrs. Lea. We met at Tom’s studio and I did not bring in any lighting. Tom had a simple desk light and I kept it just out of the frame but enough to put a catchlight in his eyes. If you stood back from it you would think I was interrogating him. He was slow to warm up and said you’re kinda late. I was thinking, I was right on time, but he was thinking in the bigger picture. He wasn’t painting anymore. He was old now. He was really a good sport about the spotlight. By the end of the shoot we were laughing. I sent him the images and he wrote me a very sweet letter. I still have and cherish it.
24. Deer Leg: This is a very early photograph for me, probably 1990. I was still lighting everything with a generator and strobes. This phenomenon I’d never seen before. A deer attempts to leap the fence but doesn’t clear it and the leg gets caught between the barbed wire and the weight of its own body binds it, and it is doomed to die.
25. Mexican Hognose Snake: I like to photograph snakes. I have found that a lot of people are extremely afraid of them, but they’re mostly sweet little creatures. I’ll set up a table and white backdrop and wait for pretty light to photograph them. Marci helps me by keeping the snake on the backdrop.
26. Near Shafter: I took this photograph on highway 67. I was working on an assignment for Texas Highways, which I’ll explain in more detail when the portraits come up.
27. Panoramic From Comb’s Ranch: Sometimes the weather phenomenon is so amazingly beautiful and yet fleeting. At these times you have to be fast in finding a spot and getting the camera set. When there are big clouds in the sky and the sun is setting, the light will reflect off the cloud a create a glow. In this case I drove north from my studio about three quarters of a mile. That land has a few houses on it now.
28. Nude at Grapevine: This was a spontaneous moment. A great hike, good talk, good weather, good feelings, good collaboration. Sometimes I use my camera to hold onto the moment and remind me of the feelings of that moment.
29. Agave Swan: My artist friend, Abby Levine, had these beautiful agave’s growing in her yard. I made this image there.
30. Nude and Fence: I was thinking how horrified I would actually be to come across a nude body lying in the weeds. Looking at it now, I don’t think I achieved my goal.
31. Ghillie Suit: On May 20 1997 Ezequiel Hernandez an 16-year old high school student was out herding goats when he was shot and killed by a US Marine. I was assigned by Texas Monthly to be the photographer and Robert Draper was the investigative reporter and writer. The Marines we’re heavily camouflaged in Ghillie suits. I had no idea what a Ghillie suit was, and so I called a few friends who I knew were hunters and asked. Mike Evans happened to have one and I asked if I could borrow it and I photographed my assistant Mike Howard in the suit. This image is probably the most important photograph I’ve taken in my life. Enrique Madrid took all my photographs to Washington DC and lobbied to get the Marines removed from the border. These images were instrumental and this one in particular in making that happen. I am shortening the total tragedy of this story, but Google Ezequiel Hernandez to learn more.
32. Sotols In The Morning, Agave stalk, Lunar Eclipse, Sotols, and Moonlit Agave are all images from a series I call \"The Camera Never Sleeps.\" It began or I might say evolved while living on a ranch 12 miles south of Marathon. I would open the shutter and \"paint\" with light, then I would do a time lapse anywhere from one to six hours essentially when I woke up. There are more in the book and I will get into more detail as we progress, but these are the beginning ones.
33. Ike Roberts: I have photographed Ike many times. He is an iconic figure in this area. He is handsome, witty, and quite a model.
34. Esperanza Montoya Fuentez: I mentioned earlier that I was assigned to pick a small town to photograph for Texas Highways. I chose Shafter, Texas. I spent about 10 days there and photographed many of the residents. I truly love that town. There is water, great places to explore, and it is close to Presidio.
35. Freddie: He just looked so pretty, I had to make his portrait.
36. From Castolon: This is one of the first panoramic type images I’ve produced. I actually shot it on 4 x 5 film and cropped it to look panoramic. I made several attempts at this image before I finally got the gradation the way I wanted it
37. Grapevine at Night: I mentioned earlier that I hiked and photographed at night for several months. At that time I was just starting to embrace the digital age and digital cameras. I would set up my film cameras to do these time exposures, and while they we’re exposing I would make images with the digital camera.
38. Ocotillo and Blue Sky and Ocotillo and Planets: Both of these images we’re shot on film and with the same technique of opening the shutter painting the plant with the light and closing the shutter.
39. Desert Tarantula: I have photographed many of the desert critters on white backdrops for use on photo lampshades. Now Marci has started a line of T-shirts and pillowcases with these critters on them. Go to www.desertcritterwear.com. and you can order them.
40. Rock with Hole: Again this image was made at night, and is lit with the moon.
41. Hidden Hot Springs: There was a beautiful hidden hot spring very close to the popular one on the east side of the park. It washed away years ago.
42. Grapevine Hills: A few pages back I mentioned that while the film cameras were set up making time exposures I was out shooting with the digital camera. This is the image I was waiting on with the film camera.
43. Alsate’s Face and Chisos From Maverick Road: These images are again from the hiking at night series.
44. Sleeping Pattern: I have a rack mounted on my truck above my camper shell that I shoot off of as well as sleep on. Marci says I am a jumping bean when I sleep, moving around a lot and twitching. She wakes in essentially the same position she went to sleep in. One night, I set the camera up by leaning it on the rail that goes around my crib pointed it at the stars, opened the shutter and went to sleep. Every time I moved it jiggled the camera and created my sleeping pattern in the stars. If you look closely you can see and count how many times I moved.
45. These next few pages finish up the night series, and light painting images. Though they look simple, I experimented heavily, changing f-stops, shutter speeds, lenses, film backs and focus. There were a lot of failures as well as a lot of successes. Occasionally I still do an image like this, but for the most part an idea plays out for me and I’m on to something else. Also the digital age has somewhat simplified night work. Remember that these were all shot on film. If you do a time exposure at night with digital cameras the sky is filled with stars. Even stars you can’t see.
46. Rangra Theatre: I don’t know what to say about this one. I just loved that she is dressed so nicely and the John Travolta poster.
47. Big Bend In The Morning: I hope you can feel the serene quietness of this image as the sun just began to rise.
48. Cloud at Night: I took this image around 3 o’clock in the morning. The cloud looked like a reclining figure to me, and I wondered if I could capture it digitally. This again was in my early days of digital photography.
49. Marathon Motel: The big thrill of the evening was the lighting of the Marathon Motel sign. Evan Voyles drove in from Austin to do the repairs. Monte Schatz and I (same Monte as the one with the lizards around his neck) met over there. It was just starting to rain so work ceased. Monte had an idea for an image so he lays down by the cactus and I open the shutter. The light that is lighting the cactus is also lighting him. suddenly there is a lightning strike on the left and that frightens Monte and so he gets up, and as he gets up the lightning strikes on the right goes off and it’s bright enough to create that ghosting image of Monte. I couldn’t have timed it better. LUCK! We were great collaborators.
50. Jesse Laughing: I mentioned earlier that I had an assignment to photograph the town of Shafter, Texas. Jesse was one of the residents there. I must have said something funny to make her laugh so hard. On the table is a photograph of her mother.
51. Storm Cloud: I started following this storm in Marathon and ended up in the national park where I made this image there.
52. Red Rain: This is one of those beautiful moments when it’s raining and the sun is setting.
53. Rough Run Flashing at Midnight: The challenge was how do I photograph this. I walked out to the bridge with my camera and tripod and used the moon to light the image.
54. Tres Nudes: I went on a river trip with ten friends including four beautiful woman. We were camped near a hot spring when I made this image.
55. Nude in the Clouds: This is the first digital composite image I made. I photographed the model at Chinati Hot Springs at night and under water. The water made her legs long and sinewy. I then dropped in a cloud sky.
56. Desert Box Turtle: I see these crossing the roads all the time. I brought him to my studio for this image. If you pick one up hold them away from your body and tail down. You’ll see why.
57. Deer in Ernst Tinaja: This is from the hiking at night series. I lit the image with a light to make it eerie.
58. Rain: I was out photographing in a storm, and it got close enough to scare me into the truck. I shot through the window to make this image. The lightning bolt is reflected in all the rain drops on the windshield.
59. Caballos Novaculite: I lived on a ranch for a year. This mountain range ran through that ranch. I made this image on the way to the studio and used the water filled dirt tank for the reflection.
60. Flood: This was the flood of 2009. My friend and pilot Guil Jones flew Marci and me from Marathon through Presidio and up through the park and back to Alpine. This image was made just outside of Presidio.
61. Swimmers: I had an assignment for Texas Monthly to photograph dude ranches. This image was a part of that assignment. Sometimes the best work comes from the parameter of an assignment. When I first started shooting assignments I would always try to please the art director more than myself. As I got more involved with Art Directors and assignments, I just tried to please myself and I hoped they would be happy with what I found. The work got a lot better and more artistic, and I think the Art Directors were pleased too.
62. Brooke Pregnant: Brooke was due to have her baby on Monday. We shot this picture the Friday before. I took her to this swimming hole and shot for several hours. I got the idea to cake her in mud. And actually I did not do the caking, her husband did. As we were shooting the mud started to dry and her belly looked like the continents.
63. Santa Elena Formation: For about four minutes on some mornings the Santa Elena formation glows red. I camped at this site for a week to make this image. It is one of my first panoramic.
64. Santa Elena Canyon: this is a series I made of Santa Elena Canyon. I took a river trip down the canyon with Bobski (Desert Sports) the day before to see how the river was and how my guide was! The first day I only brought a point and shoot. The next day, I did the river trip again but with all my equipment. As we went through the canyon I laid in the raft and only shot up at the tops of the canyon. . On one side of the image is the United States and on the other side is Mexico. I made about 40 images for this series and they’re very beautiful. I’ve never displayed them, and this is the most that has been published. One of the challenges I have with photographing Big Bend National Park is that it is photographed heavily. So I am always trying to show what has been seen hundred of times in a different way. And also, to keep challenging myself to find new ways of photographing the same subject over and over again. I mentioned before that a friend of mine said there are 30 pictures of the park and everyone takes them. That has always stuck in my crawl, I think there is less than 30.
65. Checkered Garter Snake: This is another portrait I made by setting up the backdrop and shooting in the existing light. Marci usually helps me by keeping the snake on the backdrop.
66. Pile of Rocks (the quiet series) One of the wonderful things about Big Bend is you can hike anywhere. Sometimes I grab my camera and just go walking that way, and see what I find. There is a stillness at times that is so peaceful. I’ve tried to capture that on film.
67. Willis and Butch: Willis lived in Shafter Texas and maintained the mines. He was walking me through one of them, and on our way out I asked him to stop, and I made this image. The light was low, the exposure long and I was so excited my focus is off. When I developed the film I was disappointed. I asked Willis if we could reshoot it and we did, however it did not have the same feeling and I couldn’t get it back. I decided soft or not it still had the energy I felt.
68. Nude at Indian Head: There is nothing more beautiful.
69. Pock Rock, Rock at Indian Head, and Tule from Indian Head: All of these images are lit by the moon. They are from the hiking at night series. The streak of light in Tule is me walking through the image with a light on my head to see where I’m going. In this way the images become somewhat self-portraits.
70. Ocotillo and Rock: This is one of my favorites from the night series work. I think of it as a couple, sometimes one is scattered like the ocotillo and the other is solid like the rock, and at other times it is opposite.
71. Moonset Panoramic: When I made this image I had a problem with the sky that I could not seem to fix, so I made a pancake on the griddle then scanned it. I then used that texture in the sky. It resolved my problem.
72. Leigh’s 79th Birthday: Photographs are great liars. I don’t know what Eula Mae is thinking while Carol is hugging Shirley. It’s a fraction of a second caught on film to create a feeling that is actually not there.
73. Shirley’s Fried Pie (Exploded View) Shirley Rooney owned and operated the Burnt Biscuit Bakery.. Her fried pies we’re shipped and eaten all over the state. I smashed this one in the scanner and made a large print. Looks like a jellyfish.
74. Millipedes: I picked up several millipedes and photographed them on white backdrops. If you touch them they curl up. This image looks like a division symbol.
75. Chihuahua Races: The residents of Terlingua always seem to come up with ingenious ideas, the chili cook off, skirt night, and this fundraiser, the Chihuahua races. Briefly, the dogs are put into a stall, sort of like horses, the owners are at the far end of the track, and when the gate is raised the owners call their dogs. It’s mighty fun. I called the one image Elliott’s dog because it reminded me of the famous photograph Elliott Erwit took of a Chihuahua with a hat on its head standing next to a larger dog whose legs are all you see.
76. Study Butte Mall Dog: I got the idea to mount a 2400 watt strobe light to the bottom of my deer guard on the front of my truck. My idea was to photograph anything that ran across the road in front of me. I had a generator in the bed of the truck, the power pack next to me in the cab, and I was shooting through the window. I drove the truck slowly through the park several nights, and I would turn around in Study Butte. I just turned around when I saw this dog in the middle of the road. It was about two in the morning when I took this picture. What was funny is when that flash fired that dog bolted out of there.
77. Van Horn Landscape: The drive from Marfa to Van Horn is one of my favorites.
78. Nude with Horse: I was in Presidio and saw this falling down Adobe house with horses inside. I brought this model in and we shot for several hours.
79. Vaquero: This is another image made on an assignment. Sometimes the images don’t necessarily go with the story, but they are there and you can’t help but take them.
80. Tule Mountain: When people see this image they ask if I have Photoshopped the sky. The answer is no. When you have a beautiful cloud covered sky and the sun breaks through it you get this beautifully lit foreground and a rich dark sky. Because I came from a traditional darkroom I still traditionally dodge and burn my digital images, except now you can dodge and burn with pinpoint accuracy. If I manipulate an image heavily it is usually obvious
81. Vinegarroon: These little creatures are harmless, but have a shape similar to more potent scorpions. I think the rule is the bigger the pincher the less harmful.
82. Goats: Sally Roberts raises all kinds of critters on her ranch in Marathon. She makes goat cheese too and Marci sells it at the French Company. She was raised to be a cowgirl and I suspect learned a lot about animal from her old goat Dad, Ike, featured earlier in this book.
83. Hailstorm: Another one of those sweet moments when the sun breaks out of a cloud covered sky, lights the forground, but keeps the sky blue black. It was actually hailing on me when I made this image.
84. The Aguilars’s: Stephen, Mercy, and Sixto own and operate the two gas stations in town. They are lifesavers if you are having automobile problems. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen their tow truck hauling back a broken down car from the park. Stephen is now a border patrol agent, in fact I saw him just yesterday on my bike ride.
85. Joe Vancho: I can’t say enough good things about this man. Joe came into my life when I was about 20 years old. I was fresh out of high school, working in a machine shop. I wanted to be a machinist when I was young. Joe was a welder there. He was a disillusioned Vietnam veteran who painted and sculpted when he was not at work. He invited me over to his place and we became very good friends. We would go to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and he would teach me things about art and artists. I was young and fatherless and he not unwillingly became my mentor. Under his influence, and let me say too, the art that impressed me at the museum, I started to paint. I made a few pieces I actually liked, but for the most part they were atrocious. Then another coworker, Jim Stanton, sold me a 35mm camera. After the first roll of film I was obsessed, and from then on I knew what I was going to do with my life. One of the hardest things about being young is deciding what you are going to do with your life. My mind was made up. A few months after that I quit my job and became a photographer. I photographed drag race cars, and I never looked back. There’s a lot more to the story, but if it wasn’t for this man I don’t know what I would be doing today. As I write this, Joe and I are still in touch, and his health is failing.
86. Iron Mountain road panoramic: This road leads up to Iron Mountain Ranch. I walk and jog this road. I spent a week photographing it. it rained a lot that week too. You can see Santiago and Elephant Mountains, the two mountains that remind me I’m home.
87. Train Car: I really should do more with trains. It seems I’ve always lived close to the railroad tracks. The graffiti you see on these trains is quite artistic. This train car was detached I assume for some problem.
88. Lightning and Tracks: This was one of those spectacular lightning storms that go on for hours, but are far enough away to not be affected by them. I made a self- portrait with the lightning in the background as well.
89. Hit and Run: I was driving through the park late at night and a car passed me with the front bumper dragging. I got down the road and saw this Javelina freshly killed. I set up the camera with the moon in the image and used a spot light to illuminate the animal. On the far left side you can see the cars headlights driving away.
90. Near Sam Nail Ranch (the quiet series) This is another one of those large format classic images I started several years ago. I haven’t worked on this series for a long time. What happens is ideas pop into my head, and I start working on that idea. Sometimes they can last for years and many images, and other times a few is enough.
91. Walking Stick: I found this critter in the bathroom in Terlingua. It has such beautiful colors that I wanted to photograph him.
92. Nude at Monohans: The day I was here the sky was overcast and nearly the same color as the sand. It made the line between Earth and sky very subtle.
93. Paulina: Paulina’s family owns the Museo Maderas land south of Boquillos and the mountains you can see in back of the Del Carmens. The owners were experimenting with opening it up for tourists, and I went there a couple of times. The land is rich with pine trees, and I saw bears every day. I hiked to a place that had hundreds of hummingbirds flying around. I made this portrait of Paulina the wife of one of the owners., She had recently learned she was pregnant.
94. Cormac McCarthy: Kay Burnett introduced me to Cormac at the Santa Fe Institute. I brought him my first book Big Bend Pictures, and gushed how much I loved his writing. And that was in the parking lot! Inside Cormac told stories, and I truly enjoyed him. I asked if I could make a portrait and he said yes. I also made a portrait of Murray Gel Mann and several other dignateries at the institute.
95. Fairfax Dorn: Fairfax owns and operates the Ballroom in Marfa. She is on the cutting edge of art and artist. She is quite a painter herself though I don’t think she paints these days.
96. Prada, Marfa: Fairfax Dorn commissioned me to photograph this art piece right when it was finished. I shot it in the early morning during that first few minutes of beautiful light. In the beginning I believe their intention was to let it deteriorate naturally. It was abused, broken into, and spray painted by the public. They’ve replaced the glass with Plexiglas, and I’ve heard the handbags don’t have bottoms in them. I’m glad that I got to photograph this before the public got to it.
97. April Sunday: I walked out of my studio to see this beautiful cloud formation. Marci and I got right in the truck and drove up 385 to make this picture.
98. Ritchey Lorette: Ritchey was an art teacher in Odessa, Texas. Her son Linneaus introduced me to her and I made this image. She was a very gentle woman. She was telling me about one of her students and she said “he liked to pick up things.” Lineaus put a finer point on it on the way home saying that the student was a kleptomaniac. I love her description though.
100. New Mexico Milk Snake: In all my years living here I have only seen this one milk snake. Right when I picked it up it bit me, and I was thinking what is that saying black and yellow kill a fellow, white on Black venom lack? I drove right to Ranger Rob and he confirmed it was a milk snake and harmless.
101. Shafter Landscape: the backcountry in Shafter is filled with these beautiful landscapes.
102. Cactus at Paint Gap: I woke up just before sunrise to make this image of the cactus. I would open the shutter paint the cactus close the shutter to try and get the sunrise, but not wash out the background.
For this series, I first floated the river to see how it was running and how my guide was. I only took simple equipment for this ride. The next day I went down again with the same guide, but this time I brought all my equipment. I laid on my back as we rafted the canyon, and shot up. It is America on one side and Mexico on the other. I can print these images up to 40 inches square. A disclaimer here. These images are copy work and low res. The finished prints are beautiful and sharp. I have only one full set of 16 x 20 silver gelatin prints. Please contact me for details.
These images can be printed from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" X 60.\"
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
All images are available up to 50 inches wide. Some older images are available in silver gelatin. Please call for details. Black and White square format up to 40 x 40 inches. Please call for details.
All rectangular images are available in sizes from 13\"x 20\" to 40\" x 60.\" Square format from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40.\" Images shot on film are available in silver gelatin darkroom prints. Most of the square format images were shot on film.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
Lucille French Clark was my landlady when I moved to Marathon, Texas in 1988. She rented me a building which was my first art gallery and darkroom. She also rented me a 500 square foot adobe house I still have today. The darkroom and gallery building was originally the W M Frech grocery store her father opened in 1900. That building was attached to the two story adobe house she lived in her whole life. Lucille was good to and for me, and if not for her I don't know what I would have done because my original plans for a space to work and live fell through the very day I moved to town. I got to know Lucille the last three years of her life. She was smart, frugal, had a great sense of humor, and was direct. She died April 4, 1990 around 10 am. That day started out nice, but then the wind picked up, and blew my flag off the pole and into her driveway. A little later it hailed in the glass mountains (the range that is north of town) and stayed there for three days. For a while the house just sat there, but I was now the caretaker and eventually I went inside. I started to document the house as it was left. I photographed all the rooms, but they were just documents. Then one day I found a tarantula and placed it on the dining room table and made an image. This really excited me and so I started to find a critter for each room. I've gotten a lot of interpretations about the meaning of the images. Like the furniture is representative of the old woman and the animals are nature reclaiming the land and property. I love hearing those analogies, but at the moment they were taken, I was just trying to get the animals to do what I wanted them to do, make beautiful images, and not get bit. I did love seeing the animals in the house and on the furniture. In retrospect, it was the first time I used my camera to pay homage to someone and express my grief. Please contact me about acquiring a boxed set or individual prints. Image sizes from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40.\"
Silver Gelatin
10\" x 10\" and 15\" x 15.\"
As of March 2025, I am offering a special edition portfolio of these images. They are printed 14 x 14 on 17 x 21 Hahnemuele Photo Rag paper. They will be in a beautiful handmade porfolio box with a cover letter description. To inquire about single images images or the portfolio click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
There is a bird called a Logger Head Shrike. It's is also called a butcher bird. It catches grasshoppers, lizards, beetles, and other small insects and impales them on cactus thorns or barbed wire fences. This is a series I made from these birds.
Print sizes are from 13\" x 20\" to 40\"x 60.\"
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
All Images © James H. Evans
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
I love photographing the landscape, but I love photographing people even more. Square format images can be printed up to 35 x 35 and as small as 5 x 5. Call for prices.
When the Flavin buildings were complete. I got to spend a whole week photographing them. They are amazingly beautiful, and at times I was overwhelmed and had to stop, sit, and be washed in the light. Being in the buildings made me so happy and in a good mood, and I was singing out loud mostly Jackson Browne songs. The images were all shot on 2 1/4 and 4 x 5 film. They can be printed from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40.\" The Horizontals 40\" x 50.\"
To inquire about these images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
All Images © James H. Evans
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
There is nothing more beautiful than a woman in a landscape.
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Evans_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Big Bend Pictures\n\nBoth books published by UT Press\n\nBig Bend Pictures 2003: This book is all black and white images shot on film, of the people and landscapes of the Big Bend area. I never wanted to do a tourist type, pretty, oversaturated color book of Big Bend landscapes. It's been done a hundred times. I wanted to show what kind of person chooses to live in this landscape. These mountains, these skies are addictive. You can feel it when you visit, but for some, myself included, I couldn't leave it. 37 years later, I can still hardly leave it. This book was reprinted twice and is now out of print. The 20 year updated version is available.\n\n\n", "type": "image", "content": "Big-Bend-Pictures2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1147, "height": 1170 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 160226 }, "overrides": { "captionDefault": true, "captionFont": "Helvetica:400:latin:system", "captionFontSize": 14, "captionAlignHorizontal": "center", "captionBackgroundAlpha": 0, "captionOffsetX": 0, "captionWidth": 0, "captionTextAlignVertical": "center", "captionFontColor": "#CC0000", "captionAnchorTo": "media area", "captionTextAlign": "center" }, "dateAdded": "2017-09-20T04:54:27.000Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "key": "13562" }, "13564": { "id": 13564, "label": "Big Bend Pictures _© James H. Evans", "caption": "Big Bend Pictures\n\nBoth books published by UT Press\n\nBig Bend Pictures 2003: This book is all black and white images shot on film, of the people and landscapes of the Big Bend area. I never wanted to do a tourist type, pretty, oversaturated color book of Big Bend landscapes. It's been done a hundred times. I wanted to show what kind of person chooses to live in this landscape. These mountains, these skies are addictive. You can feel it when you visit, but for some, myself included, I couldn't leave it. 26 years later, I can still hardly leave it. The book is in its third printing.\n\nSigned copies $55. plus tax and shipping\n512 560-82 six nine\njamesh at jameshevans dot com", "type": "image", "content": "Big-Bend-Pictures4.jpg", "thumb": "Big-Bend-Pictures5.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1147, "height": 1170 }, "thumb": { "width": 1147, "height": 1170 }, "bytes": 160226, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2017-09-20T05:15:42.000Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": { "captionAlignVertical": "bottom", "captionFontSize": 14, "captionDefault": true, "captionFontColor": "#CC0000", "captionAnchorTo": "", "captionOffsetX": 0, "captionTextAlignVertical": "", "captionTextAlign": "center", "captionAlignHorizontal": "center", "captionScrollbarWidth": 10 }, "filters": [] }, "13565": { "id": 13565, "label": "Crazy From The Heat_ Book", "caption": "Published in 2011 this is James' second book. It is a collection of images over a twenty year span of living in the Big Bend. It has color black and white, toned, film images, digital images, panoramic and nudes. There is a wonderful essay by Rebecca Solnit. Out Of Print. On the menu look for notes and stories for the images.", "type": "image", "content": "Crazy-from-the-heat-book2-.jpg", "thumb": "Crazy-from-the-heat-book3-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1137, "height": 1562 }, "thumb": { "width": 1137, "height": 1562 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 620294 }, "overrides": { "captionDefault": true, "captionFontSize": 14, "captionFontColor": "#CC0000", "captionAlignHorizontal": "center", "captionScrollbarWidth": 10 }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2017-09-20T05:31:22.000Z" }, "13566": { "id": 13566, "label": "© James H. 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Evans_Jackass Wedding", "caption": "Jackass Wedding", "type": "image", "content": "Jackass-Wedding1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 859, "height": 859 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 192811 }, "filters": [], "searchable": true, "key": "13593", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2017-10-18T02:53:16.000Z", "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "13594": { "id": 13594, "label": "© James H. Evans_Glass Mountains Panoramic", "caption": "Glass Mountains Panoramic", "type": "image", "content": "Glass-Mountains-Panoramic-1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1504, "height": 416 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 85859, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2017-10-19T17:55:23.000Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "searchable": true }, "13595": { "id": 13595, "label": "© James H. Evans_Rock In Fresno Creek", "caption": "Rock In Fresno Creek", "type": "image", "content": "Rock-in-Fresno-Creek-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 859, "height": 859 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 217660, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2017-10-19T17:59:44.000Z" }, "13597": { "id": 13597, "label": "© James H. Evans_Glass Mountains", "caption": "Glass Mountains", "type": "image", "content": "Glass-Mountains-Panoramic-2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1504, "height": 416 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 85859 }, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2017-10-19T18:03:51.000Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "keywords": [] }, "13600": { "id": 13600, "label": "Rain in the Chisos_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Rain in the Chisos", "type": "image", "content": "Rain-in-the-Chisos1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1285, "height": 859 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 182820, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2017-10-27T04:43:15.000Z", "overrides": {} }, "13601": { "id": 13601, "label": "© James H. Evans_Clay Henry", "caption": "Clay Henry", "type": "image", "content": "Clay-Henry.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 859, "height": 859 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 183285, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:05:02.977Z", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2017-11-07T15:38:38.000Z" }, "13602": { "id": 13602, "label": "© James H. Evans_Santa Elena Canyon", "caption": "Santa Elena Canyon ", "type": "image", "content": "Santa-Elena-CanyonH.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1286, "height": 859 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 424717 }, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2017-11-07T15:47:55.000Z", "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "key": "13602" }, "13603": { "id": 13603, "label": "Cottonwood_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Cottonwood _Homage to Reagen Bradshaw", "type": "image", "content": "Cottonwood-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 859, "height": 869 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 312629 }, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2017-11-20T13:34:05.000Z", "overrides": {} }, "13604": { "id": 13604, "label": "Cold Moon December 2017", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "\t\t\t Christmas Stories\n\n1. My mother had a warped sense of humor. My younger brother and I both inherited it. She liked a good joke, and she could dish it out and take it. One time she handed me and my brother a thick Sears catalog and told us to go through it and circle all the things we wanted for Christmas. I was about 8 years old, my brother 6. We sat at the kitchen table and pored over the catalog for what seemed like hours, circling tons of toys, and a Superman outfit. When we were done we gave the book back to mom, happy and thrilled. She left the room and came back a little while later with all the toys we circled cut out of the book and handed them to us and said, \"Here, Merry Christmas.\" My little brother and I started crying our eyes out, and I think my Mom was surprised that we didn't get the joke. My younger brother and I still have it seared in our thoughts. I think mom felt bad too, because that Christmas we got a lot more toys than we usually did. I miss her every day.\n\n2. When I was 13 or 14 we lived in what we called \"The Projects.\" It was low income housing in South Jersey. My little brother and I were little hooligans. Actually we were good kids, but mischievous. After the holidays, when all the Christmas trees were thrown out, several of us neighborhood kids would gather them up, stuff them in the monkey bars and light them on fire. It was quite a ritual, and the cops or fire department never came. They just let us have it. The flames could be thirty five feet high. It was beautiful.\n\n3. I want to thank each and every one of you that have supported me and my work currently and continuously over the years. You have not only defined my work, but have given it credibility and value. I am acutely aware of how fortunate I am to live in this part of the world, have a beautiful wife, and do exactly what I want with my time on this planet. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Merry Christmas and Happy Full Moon.\n \n\n", "thumb": "MomDecember2017.jpg", "featuredImage": "Scan.jpeg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1000, "height": 657 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 907, "height": 1160 }, "bytes": 2325 }, "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ], "dateAdded": "2018-01-01T23:18:09.000Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z" }, "13605": { "id": 13605, "label": "Beaver Moon November 2017", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "M2M\n\nThe 2017 Marathon to Marathon (M2M) on October 21st. was a great success. This year we had 438 registered runners. The day started out cool with fog in the lowlands, and warmed up nicely. It is beautiful to see runners start then thin out into a long line. The marathon winner finished in 2:50.24. My wife, Marci Roberts, tirelessly has organized the event for several years. It is her pride and joy, and the race raised $16,000. for our schools and fire department. Thank you all who attended. We hope to see you next year.\n\nNovember 22, 1963\n\nThere has been several events in my life, that I remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when they happened. The space shuttle explosion, in Tomas’ darkroom, 911 in Marathon on the computer in my studio. Man landing on the moon, at 1112 Thurman Street, I was a teenager and watched it with my Mom on TV. John Lennon, in a hotel room in Corpus Christi, talking to my mom on the phone. Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Elvis Presley, Princess Diana, I could go on, but point made. The first one for me was John F. Kennedy. I was nine years old and living in West Virginia. We were in class and it was announced over the PA system that our president had been shot. We were told to lay on our arms and rest our head on the desk, and shortly after that we were sent home. I remember grabbing a couple of pine cones and holding them like pistols and kiddingly saying I shot the president to some of the other kids as we were loading on the bus, my complete innocence still intact. Then the bus driver told me to \"SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP.” I think he was crying, but I don’t know if I am imagining that after all these years. When we got home the mood was somber, and the TV was on. I think they had the suspect by that time, but I can’t say I watched it. It was an early day off, it was nice out, and I went out to play. As it all unfolded we watched on television Lee Harvey Oswald get murdered by Jack Ruby. My little brother, who was 7 said he remembered thinking that now we are never going to know what really happened. The president’s funeral procession seemed to go on for days. The air felt thick and chaotic. It was an unhappy Thanksgiving, and even my little self was rattled. Anything can happen and it does. This story is not about politics. It’s about the end of innocence. Oswald stoled that from me and millions of others, and I am sure some of the events I've listed were your firsts. I have tried all my life to hold on to that boy playing in the woods before November 22, 1963. There is a bigger picture that we are not a part of, have no control over, but changes our lives forever. Then, the Beatles came to America. Happy Full Moon.\n", "thumb": "MamaGarciaNovember2017.jpg", "featuredImage": "MamaGarciaFM.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 906 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1146, "height": 1153 }, "bytes": 0 }, "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ], "dateAdded": "2018-01-02T06:25:09.000Z", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "13606": { "id": 13606, "label": "Harvest Moon October 2017", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "M2M \nThe Marathon to Marathon (M2M) is October 21st. It is one of the best events in our little town. It is a Boston qualifier. Last year we had 502 runners. The shirt this year is the best ever. Marci outdid herself. Go to marathon2marathon.net for details and registration. I hope to see you there.\n\nShoe Shine Boy \nIn New Jersey there are neighborhood bars. They were called “taprooms.” My Grandpa’s favorite was “Chaney’s.” It was literally around the corner and at the end of the block, about a minute and ten second walk. You could usually find him there after work and on the weekends. To get close to his grandson he devised a plan with Mr. Chaney to make me the official shoe shine boy. Grandpa built me a shine box way too heavy for my small frame, but it was sturdy and I wish I still had it. So every Saturday I would shine shoes. The bars are a man’s world. A low lit smoky den, with jukebox music, a coin operated pool table and dart board. When someone walked in the door it made you squint. I roamed freely among potential patrons waiting for them to get tipsy enough to be approachable. I learned the timing of when to ask a man if he wanted a shoe shine. “Shoe shine sir, no charge for the socks.” I usually made a few bucks, never much, but one time a man asked me if I would come to his house while he was at work, and shine all of his shoes. My first commission. \"Sure\" I said. He gave me the address and I went over. He lived in the back of a store. The store owner let me into his room. As I recall it was a small place, no kitchen. A bath room and a bedroom, a dresser, and a closet full of suits and shoes. A real bachelor pad. I was fascinated. I pulled out all of the shoes, 20-25 pair and began to work. Not methodically, like all the brown ones, now all the black ones, etc. While I was waiting for the polish to set up, I could not resist, going through his drawers and looking at everything. Touching stuff. It was innocent, my mother taught me well, but I was so curious about what does a man have and hold on to. More than likely I didn’t put everything back like it was. I finished the shoes all shiny and put them back in the closet. It took me the better part of the day, and the man came home as I was finishing. He only gave me $4.00. I felt like it was not enough, but was too timid to negotiate. I never forgot the experience. Later in life, I wondered if he looked around the room and could tell I'd had gone through his things. Did he think I’d done a bad job. Maybe, that was all he could afford. $4.00 and a glimpse of what it was like to be a man. Happy Full Moon.", "thumb": "SunsetThatSavedOurLivesOct2017.jpg", "featuredImage": "SunsetThatSavedOurLivesFM.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1140, "height": 1159 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1146, "height": 1165 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "SunsetThatSavedOurLivesFM.jpg", "width": 1146, "height": 1165 } ] }, "dateAdded": "2018-01-02T06:33:13.000Z", "linkTarget": "", "key": "13606", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ], "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z" }, "13608": { "id": 13608, "label": "Corn Moon September 2017", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Please come to my first opening at Hunt Gallery September 7, 2017 6 - 8pm. The gallery is located at 4225 McCullough Ave. San Antonio, Texas 78212. 210-822-6527. www.huntgallery.net. The show closes September 30th.\n\nWhen I was a boy my grandpa had a small farm with what I thought of as vast woods. I would play in those woods all day. I remember being 5 years old, laying on the ground looking up at turkey vultures that were starting to kettle, and I thought if I am still they will land and I will catch one. I got bored waiting! Later, when my mother moved to Philadelphia and then New Jersey, it was no different. I was on my bicycle as soon as school let out and until I had to come in. I would eat as fast as I could and get back outside. 50 years later, I am not very different. I can barely go a day without being outside. I still ride my bike, and I still lay on the earth and look up at turkey vultures. It’s being outside in nature that makes me the happiest. I hope to see you tomorrow or in Marathon. Happy Full Moon.", "thumb": "OcotilloandDarkSkySept.2017.jpg", "featuredImage": "RosillosMountainsFM.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1506, "height": 506 }, "bytes": 0 }, "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ], "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2018-01-02T06:45:41.000Z", "overrides": { "thumbScaleFactor": false } }, "13610": { "id": 13610, "label": "Wolf Moon January 31, 2018", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Fear of Cancer and the loss of trust: Smoking stories bad role models.
As long as I’ve known my Mom she was a smoker. She told me she started right after I was born. I am thankful she had me first. She was 22 years old. My own first experience with cigarettes was getting up one Saturday morning, making myself a cup of coffee, getting a Pall Mall out of my mom’s pack and sitting on the back stoop smoking and sipping. I was in third grade. I only did it a couple of times, but it felt so mature.
Next was when I was in 6th grade. My teacher was Mr. Mohrfeld. It was before you switched classes for each subject, so I had him all day, five days a week. I really liked him. One day in class, he had a special talk and demonstration about smoking and cancer. They put fear into us about the dangers, risks and short life expectancy of smokers. The finale was an older woman lifting the side of her blouse and showing us her stitch scarred ribcage pointing to the deformity of a removed lung caused by smoking. I think the whole class was horrified and traumatized, I know I was. I went home and that evening and at suppertime I was crying, begging my Mother and Grandfather to quit smoking. They made promises they knew they couldn’t keep to calm me down. I lived about 6 city blocks from school, and always came home for lunch. The very next day on my way back to class, I turned the corner to find Mr. Mohrfeld smoking a cigarette. He was as surprised as I was and dropped the cigarette while exhaling and asked me why I was so far from school. \"I live right around the corner sir.” It totally messed with my head, and made me skeptical of adults. I never believed they were telling me the whole truth after that. I began to notice a lot of adults smoked, my uncle, my older brother, our neighbors. It must be some kind of conspiracy they’re keeping from kids. So I saved my allowance and got me a small corncob pipe, and I would take the cigarette butts out of my mom’s ashtrays, pull them apart and get enough unburned tobacco to fill the pipe, and I would smoke it. I never inhaled. I didn’t know how. Again I was doing an adult activity. When I was in 7th or 8th grade my friend Jimmy Kearns and I would buy and share a pack of “True” cigarettes. That was the name of them and they had a plastic filter. We kept them stashed near a place along the railroad tracks, and we would walk there and smoke a few, one after another, and walk back. I remember that we seemed to have good conversations, though I can’t remember one. A trait of mine is that I barely remember what is said, but I rarely forget the emotion and what I felt.
I was an on and off smoker, but many years ago I quit for good. My mother only lived to be 70 years old, and every photograph I have of her, if there is not something else in her hand, there is a cigarette. Recently I was looking at an old Life Magazine from 1950. The ads are beautiful, mostly illustrations, with cars, washing machines, shoes, whiskies, and plenty of cigarettes. The Boomer generation never had a chance. If you’ve never smoked, it would be difficult for you to understand such a powerful addiction. Those of you, including my little brother who just recently quit or are trying to, good luck. The best lesson of all from running into Mr. Mohrfeld that day was, as an adult I’ve always been open an honest with children. I think no matter what, they want to be talked to and treated like adults and can handle any truth above catching you in an untruth.
I just read in the local paper that visitation is up 14% in Big Bend National Park. Raise your hand if you think that is actually good news.
These are photographs that are framed and currently hanging in the gallery. Please call for sizes and prices. They can be shipped out quickly or held for you if you wish.
\n1.\tI am off of Facebook. It is not for me. I am beginning to post images on Instagram. If you are so inclined please follow me that way.\n2.\tMarci has purchased a little 2 bedroom house in Marathon and she will be offering it up as a VRBO type rental, but only to the people on this email list. I’ll let you know when it is ready. If you email me with an interest I will make sure she gets it.\n3.\tPipeline releases gas without notice to local officials; pipeline spokesperson disagrees. This scares the hell out of me. You can read this story. Go to bigbendnow.com, and search pipeline. \nBy JOHN DANIEL GARCIA \njohndaniel@bigbendnow.com\nHALLIE STILLWELL\n\nWhen I first moved to Marathon in 1988, I was working at the Gage Hotel as a cook. I committed to a year there, and after that I would fully get back to my life and career as a photographer. I actually started shooting some about 6 months after I moved here, but mostly I would hike and sit and watch the mountains for hours. I wasn’t sure how to start my photographic life here, but I knew it could not be like anything I’d seen in the tourists books that come out every year (and still do). It had to come from love, knowledge of the area, and a deeper understanding of the people that were born in this desert, as well as those that chose it as their home. To be an insider. I relied on my ability at portraiture, and my belief that as long I was earning money with my camera I was successful. And so, I started to make portraits of the people for personal work, and for money I would do copywork, school photos, proms, magazine assignments and weddings. This is how I met Hallie Stillwell. She was the local Justice of the Peace, and married people. If the couples were looking for a photographer in the area I was there. The first wedding we did together was Susan Doyle and David Pampe. They got married at Grapevine Hills. I remember it well, funny enough. I was running around like a chicken with it’s head cut off snapping images. Hallie married people quickly. After we drank fine champagne, made portraits and celebrated, Hallie had to pee; she went around the side of my truck and did her business. I was impressed. What a woman. She was about 90 years old. She was unpretentious, quick witted, and wasn’t bashful with her thoughts. In a way she became a role model. One time on the way back from a wedding, I was taking Hallie home. and the lights on my old Chevy Luv pickup just stopped working. Nothing. It was dark. I had a Q-beam light. I plugged it in to the cigarette lighter and drove on, my left hand out the window with the light. I still had 50 miles to go after I dropped her off. I must have been a sight pulling into the border check point. \nAnother time Hallie was going to Alpine, and she stopped in to see me on the way. She drove an 80’s Chevy Impala. A long brown bomb of a car. Hallie wore thick Coke bottle glasses. I was talking to her through the passenger door window and I noticed the whole right side of her car had lots of dents and scratches, and probably some hair if you looked closer. I said \"Hallie, the whole right side of your car is banged up.” Without missing a beat she says “Well that’s my blind side!” I asked her to please call me whenever she leaves the ranch. I ride bicycles on that road.\n\nThen there’s Dadie, my surrogate Mom. She was the force behind the Stillwell family, Hallie, and the Hall of Fame Museum. I will write about her next time.\n\nPlease feel free to forward these emails to anyone you think that might be interested. Also, I have been writing these full moon stories for several months and I am going to archive them on my website. I just haven't figured it out yet.\n\nHappy Full Moon. Thank you all for supporting my life in the desert.
", "thumb": "HallieandDadieMarch12018.jpg", "featuredImage": "HalliesHands.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 1000 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 573, "height": 700 }, "bytes": 0 }, "dateAdded": "2018-03-31T07:42:59.041Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ], "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "13618": { "id": 13618, "label": "Blue Worm Moon March 31, 2018", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "1.\tMarci has purchased a little 2 bedroom house in Marathon and she will be offering it up as a VRBO type rental, but only to the people on this email list. She is still getting it ready. If you email me with an interest I will make sure she gets it. You can also call the number below and leave contact information.\nDADIE STILLWELL POTTER\n\nLast Month I spoke about Hallie Stillwell, and I felt like I left it a little short, so I am continuing on to the team of Hallie and Dadie.\n\nDadie was the glue that held the Stillwell family together. She is responsible for the Hallie Hall of Fame Museum, and she was always in the background working to promote Hallie’s extraordinary life as well as dote on her and prepare her for public events. The last few years of Hallie’s life, Dadie did the driving, making the world a much safer place. The both of them would show up for speaking engagements, weddings and events dressed and made up nicely.\n\nOne time Hallie had what they thought was a stroke, not significant enough to paralyze her, but they kept her in the hospital for several hours of observation. I don’t remember or think it was overnight though. She was scheduled to marry Pam and Andy Deas at the Gage Hotel that evening. We were waiting and waiting, and started celebrating early. Then, here she comes around 9:30 pm Dadie by her side; she married the couple and they drove home. Dadie would never let Hallie miss a commitment, and Hallie would never miss a paying gig.\n\nIt was Dadie’s idea to build and promote Hallie’s Hall of Fame Museum. In it contained the history of Hallie’s life in west Texas, with a replica of the small room she and Roy lived in when they were just married. The museum was modest and at one time family pictures were in a bowl to look at and go through. She was so trusting with her possessions, I don’t think it occurred to her that someone might steal the contents of the museum, and they did. Hallie had an arrowhead collection, artifacts she found on their land, that went missing. I don’t recall the details, but they were recovered by the Brewster County Sheriff’s department (AKA) Ronny Dodson. Dadie asked me to build a case to hold and secure them, and I guess it is still there.\n\nDadie encouraged Hallie to write I’ll gather my Geese, and finished My Goose is cooked after Hallie passed. I haven’t read it in years and maybe I should have before I wrote this, but I thought Roy was really hard on Hallie. I guess it was the “cowboy way” but the story that has stayed with me from the book was one day when they were gathering up cattle, Hallie was having trouble with this Dogie breaking from the herd and running away. She'd chase after it and get it back in the herd and it would stray again. Hallie did this all day till finally Roy scorned her for not looking at the brand and seeing it was the neighbor’s little cow and it had just been trying to get back to it’s mother. I would never let my mate wear herself out to teach her a lesson.\n\nDadie was my surrogate Mom, and I thought of her that way. My Mom was very affectionate, the touchy feely type, and never went a day without telling me she loved me. Dadie was like that with me. My mom was thousands of miles away. Dadie made me feel loved in a way that only a Mother can. She knew what I needed, and in this I was always anxious to do whatever she wanted me to do, and not waste any time getting it done. There was a viewing of a documentary made about Hallie, we watched it together and never let go of each other.\n\nDadie’s favorite song was “Volver, Volver” and at Hallie’s 95th birthday, The Border Blaster’s which is Todd Jagger, Jimmy Ray Harrell, with Washtub Jerry sang it for her several times.\n\nIt seemed the heyday of the Stillwell Store was in the early and mid 90’s. The Lalinda bridge was still open, and the store would be the first and last stop for trucks going both ways, getting food, supplies and fuel for their trip. Some of the most unroadworthy vehicles with high sided gates would be filled to the brim with all kinds of stuff to take into Mexico. It was busy.\n\nAfter Hallie passed, three of her children, Dadie, Son and Guy all died within the first year. Kay, WT, and Nan finished out the Stillwell era. It was a sweet time for me just at the beginning of my life in Big Bend. I’ve been blessed and loved to know the Stillwells. Of all the images I’ve made, with the exception of Marci, Hallie and Dadie is the only image of mine that is on my wall.\n\nHallie and Dadie were role models for me. They were down to earth, humble, frank, and honest. They knew what it took to live in and survive in this desert, and were grateful for each day.\n\nI thank each and every one of you that is supporting and have supported my life in Big Bend. I am your documentarian, I am your historian. I am your photographer.
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This portrait was made at Ross’s home in Austin. Ross Maxwell was the first park superintendent of Big Bend National Park. I called him and told him enthusiastically how I had moved to Big Bend and was going to dedicate my life to photographing this land and its people, and I wanted to meet and photograph him. He wasn’t impressed and was standoffish on the phone. I begged him and he finally agreed to a visit. I was so intimidated that I brought into the house only a 35mm camera and a tripod. It was dark inside and raining outside. I was nervous. I asked many questions, but got the briefest of answers. Ross sipped on a beer and offered me one, but it was too early for me. I kept trying to get him to open up , and was sweating bullets by then. He went for his pipe and started to light it. I asked if he would please draw on it a few times, and shot four frames. This image was the result. I sent him a print but he never responded, and I called him another time, but he would not see me. He died shortly after that. A couple of things that stuck with me. He said to meet Tom Alex, the park’s archeologist a good man that knows a lot about the park. And he spoke about his wife, who was deceased. I asked him how long he had been married, and he told me how many years, days and hours. I heard Ross never got over his wife’s death. Maybe on this day he was steeped in her memory. (From Big Bend Pictures.)
I thank each and every one of you that is supporting and have supported my life in Big Bend.
Sally Roberts raised this red tailed hawk from a fledgling. She could call it up by placing a piece of meat on the fence post. It would fly down and pick it off. It was faster than my reaction time and I missed
it by being too early or too late. I am a little late here too, but the image shows the piece of meat in the bird's talon and not having the whole body seemed perfect.
1. Marci has raised 4 beautiful kittens. She has had them since they were two weeks old. They are about 7 weeks old now. She has put a lot of love and care into these critters and they love people. If you are wanting a fine kitten, already litter box trained, please call or email me. We have three left. Manny, Moe and Jack.
2. Please follow me on Instagram - James H Evans - Big Bend Pictures.
3. I have an Epson 9900 44 inch printer for sale, It comes with 5 extra 350 ml inksets. It works perfect. Please call or email if you are interested.
4. I was supposed to give a talk at the Big Bend Museum during the Texas Photographic Society opening and exhibit. Unfortunately my younger brother, who has health issues, went into the hospital and I was anxious to be with him. As a result Marci threw together a presentation and filled in for me. She said things about me and my work from her perspective. Things I couldn't say about myself, and personally, it was very sweet for me to hear her point of view. She recorded her conversation and I am going to put the images together with the recording and try to post it on my website or the next Full Moon email.
4. Thank you all very much for your support. You keep me alive and shooting in this beautiful desert. Happy Full Strawberry Moon.
Marathon Motel
Marathon Motel
The big thrill of the evening was the lighting of the neon Marathon Motel sign. Evan Voyles had come in from Austin to do the work and a few of us gathered to watch the flipping of the switch. However it started to rain and thunder and so work was delayed. So Monte and I want to make a photograph and he lays down arms stretched. I open the shutter and wait for lightning. The bolt on the left strikes and I feel like we got it and so Monte gets up, but the shutter is still open and the second bolt on the right strikes. It's closer and bright enough to stop Monte's action and you can see his ghostly image rising. I could not have planned any better. A sweet twist of luck. We all miss Monte.
![](\"https://files.gem.godaddy.com/promotion_images/5080/4103/original/Billy.jpg?1526867519\")
Bill Evans
My Brother Bill
My younger brother has been in and out of the hospital recently. Actually he has been in and out of the hospital for the last 12 years, diagnosed with non-hodgekins lymphoma. The nodes would enlarge and the doctors would chemo them down to a slow leak remission that would last months, but not years. Even his job kept him in and out of hospitals. He installs and repairs the automated machines that dose medications to patients. The Evans' brothers, three of us, are a hard headed stubborn bunch. Recently visiting my brother in the hospital in the neighborhood where we grew up brought those traits to the surface. We are our mother's sons. Mom was a 3 1/2 x 5' little Italian woman who rarely took no for an answer. It was her way or the highway, and man you could rarely get anything into her thick head. My little brother continued to smoke cigarettes, work 50 - 70 hour weeks, play hockey, and eat whatever he wanted. Is it denial, stubborness, or that Evans' hardheadedness? He would tell me the doctors said his lungs were clear and all is well, but deep down I knew better. I would think how long can he go on like this? The answer, about 12 years. He's been coughing so much he had to stop smoking. Then his breathing got real difficult, and now blood clots have formed in his legs and his lungs. He is having a rough go. When I was 20 years old I was working in a machine shop when I purchased a 35mm camera from a fellow worker. I read Andrea Feninger's \"The Complete Photographer\" and quit my job to make pictures for a living. Making photographs has been the love of my life. The images like kisses. It is that Evans stubborness, hardheadedness, and determination that got us both where we are today, and now for my little brother, whom I love dearly, will be the traits that pulls him through this.
Call, text or email me if you have any questions.
The menus are on the left. Click on one and it opens up that series as thumbnails. Click the first image for a brief explanation of that series. At the bottom of the page there are buttons for thumbnails and full screen. If there are images you are interested in, click the inquiry button and it sends me an email.
I do not quote prices by email. Please include a call back number or call me directly. I am not hard sell, so do not feel like a phone call is a commitment. I just need to understand exactly what you are requesting, when you need it, etc.
Also, if you are considering supporting my life in the desert, it seems respectful to have a conversation. I am old fashion that way.
All images are available in digital format.
I print from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\".
In square format I can from print 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\".
These are usually images shot on film and scanned.
In panoramic I can frame up to 96 inches wide, but can print much larger.
I have hundreds of images in stock.
I have many silver gelatin prints in stock.
These are traditional darkroom prints.
Please call me with your requests.
I print everything myself. I sign and edition each image.
I can have the prints framed if you request. However, I can not quote frame prices. Unless it is framed and ready, or you live or travel to Austin, I would suggest letting me send the print directly to your framer. I know good framers throughout the state if you need suggestions. I recommend and only use Crescent 2239 8 ply mat and Optium/Museum Plexi.
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If there is an image you know about, but is not on my website please let me know and I will post it. Also, if there are some glitches with this site, would you please let me know.
I can ship anywhere.
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If you go to the \"Framed and Ready\" and \"Unframed and Ready\" menu these are the images on the wall in the gallery or are unframed and in stock.. I can ship them quickly.
The Studio Landline Phone is: 432-386-four three six six. Leave a message.
My direct line is 512-560-eight two six nine.
Sign up for Full Moon emails. Just email me or when you are on the site if you click on an image there is an inquiry button at the bottom of the page.
Follow me on Instagram at BigBendPictures.
Thank you very much,
James
I don’t think I ever knew what perfection was until I met Tomas Pantin'. In 1984 Tomas' hired me to be his darkroom technician. I processed all of his film and printed the negatives. He walked me through every print until I got it to his high standard. Looking back on it, I don’t know how he tolerated my stubborn, easily distracted, brain, but he was very patient with me. First, I would get the contrast and exposure right, then he’d say dodge this (hold back some exposure to a part of the print) I'd do that, show him the print, then he’d say now dodge this part, and I would go back in the darkroom, make another print with the changes and show him again, then another adjustment. This could go on several times until the print was perfect step by step. Then he would say, now make 6 of them or 8 or 10, depending on how many he needed. It was really hard, long hours, in the darkroom, but I was learning from one of the best photographers, Perfection. It is a great achievement for me, and has carried my work to the level it is today. My prints are as perfect as I can make them, and I thank and curse Tomas’ for the knowledge, because knowing it and trying to achieve it in any thing else I do is maddening. Living in west Texas for 29 years you learn the person you might hire to do something, will probably do a poor job. And so, I am the plumber, the electrician, the painter, the whatever. Here's the hard part, I am as bad or worse than the person I might hire. And, if I didn’t know what perfection was I wouldn’t drive myself so crazy when my attempts sometimes look like I’m using a chainsaw to do scalpel work. My averages are pretty good. I can usually fix it, but the days when nothing goes right creep up and I grind my teeth to stubs. The late great Billy Faier, who was a fine musician, said there was no such thing as perfection, and we argued about that, and every other subject for that matter. He confessed to perfect moments. He said he played on stage to a very large audience with Pete Seeger, and it was perfect. I do think that lawyers, doctors and all professionals find perfection in their work, but for me the perfection path is very narrow and I embrace it and am thankful that I can at least do one thing well.
The 28th of December was my 29th year of living in Marathon. It was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made in my life. I thank Giddings Brown for hiring me to cook at the Gage Hotel, and JP Bryan, whose own vision for the hotel provided me with the opportunity, and most of all Clif Ladd, who invited me to come out with him Thanksgiving 1988, and stop by the hotel to meet his friend Phil Thomas, who was the chef at the Gage at that time, and planted the seed in my head by announcing they were looking for a second cook.
Please feel free to forward these emails to anyone you think that might be interested. Also, I have been writing these full moon stories for several months and I am going to archive them on my website. I just haven't figured it out yet.
We have two Blue moons this year, that's two full moon in one month, in case you didn't know this one and one in March.
Happy New Year, and Happy Full Moon. Thank you all for supporting my life in the desert.
Robert Draper and I were assigned to go to Boquillas. The story was that this border village just across the Rio Grande from Big Bend National Park was going to get electricity from the United States. It was easier for us the run electricity from our side than to get it from Musquiz about 75 miles away. Everything was in place. Then some conservation group protested and the whole idea was scrapped. The narrative was about how they were not getting electric. I had already made my images for the story, but laying in bed Friday night I got this idea to photograph a man on a horse in the bar. I headed back Saturday morning and tried my best to convince Francesco, the bartender, in to letting me to do that. His firm answer was no, and no matter how I begged and bribed he wasn't having it. In my frustration I went outside to gather my thoughts for round two, when a woman approached and asked me if I would photograph her baby. \"Sure, of course,\" I said, and she walked me to her home. There I photographed Eliot in a bassinet and then, still sleeping, we sat her on the bed and made this photograph. You know when you know you just made an amazing image? I knew. I went back to the bar, thanked Francesco and went home a very happy man. This is photograph is in the collection of the Art Museum of El Paso.
I learned from Alan Tennant and Bill Montgomery how to look for, find, and handle reptiles on the road. I am still good at it, and I rarely go by a snake that I do not remove from danger. I was heading to the park and found this beautiful road killed specimen with no real visible damage. It was about lunch time so I got out some peanut butter and coated the bread, and somehow the two just came together. I've only made a very small prints of this, like 3 1/2 inches. Anything bigger just doesn't look right.
Thank you all for your support of my life in the desert.
A VISIT TO MECCA
A few years ago we had the good fortune of meeting Jeanne and Michael Adams, Ansel’s son and his bride. They had never been to the park and we drove them all around an overcast and rainy Big Bend. Not out of character for the time of year, and yet not disappointing. There’s really no bad time to be in the park. They said if you ever get to California look us up, and so we did. Jeanne and Micheal live in Ansel’s house. They are gracious, beautiful people. Jeanne took us to Point Lobo and everywhere you looked you could see Ansel’s tripod marks.
One the best parts of this time was a tour of Ansel’s darkroom that Michael gave us. Knowing what spending hours and days in a darkroom is like and thinking that when Ansel was working here, he was in his prime gave me a sense of reverence and delight. From this darkroom came his greatest work. Ansel has influenced generations of photographers. Anyone who has ever heard of the Zone system or has made a serious attempt at landscape photography with film is walking on the road that he paved. It was like church. I recorded the tour and I am going to try and make a podcast. I purchased an editing program (Hindenburg), but I am still novice. If anyone has advice or expertise, help me out. That would be a nice way to meet.
IT’S NOT DARK YET, BUT IT’S GETTIN THERE.
Thank you all for your thoughts and concerns about my little brother. He is doing better, but recovery is slow. I couldn’t even talk to him on the phone because he would start coughing. It was torture, but the other day we finally spoke and facetimed.
I think between my brother’s illness and this trip west that my priorities are realigning. Photography has always been my only passion. It didn’t let me share much. But as I age, and have lost some real good friends, I feel myself softening and wanting to spend more time with family and friends, and especially with Marci. I am a very fortunate man. Thank you for supporting my life in this desert. Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Hey, if these emails are getting too \"Newslettery\" let me know.
The Camera Never Sleeps
If you would like to receive snail mail invitations please email me your address.
Please follow me on Instagram. jameshevans.com.
If you are thinking a beautiful photograph for your mate, friend, or yourself for Christmas, please start now.
Lineaus Lorette and All His Dogs
Lineaus asked me if I would make a portrait of him with his dog Lucy Parsons. Lucy had cancer and was not going to live much longer and so it was. When I crossed into the gate to his home there were plenty of dogs, and this little one was nipping at my heels, but I made it inside and got to the portrait. On the way out I asked Lineaus to sit down and the dogs started to gather around him. I’m looking down through the viewfinder and I see this dog coming for me, and he’s mid air when I snap the shutter and raise my right foot up to stop him. He bounced off my shoe and then left me alone.
Ringtail
I was on an assignment for Texas Monthly to photograph Dickie Del Fiero in Iraan,Texas. Dickie lived in a newer home, but this was the original ranch house, and I wanted to see it. My assistant, Mike Howard was with me and when we went into the screened in porch this ringtail was in there. We really scared it and it stayed in the corner, and would not take his eyes off of me. I asked Mike to go inside the house and look out the window in a sinister way. Mike was my best assistant ever. We always collaborated on assignment photos, and he always said he had the better idea, but I got the credit. I guess that was true sometimes.
These are Digital photographs, printed and ready to be framed. Please call or email for sizes.
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A few couples and families came into the gallery all at once after Thanksgiving dinner. There were several kids, and they were running around, looking at the books, picking up things. Making noise. Some people were looking at the photographs and others at the T-shirts, so I am a bit in salesman mode. All the activity made me anxious. There was boy 8 or 9, I guess, and as he was thumbing through the book and every time he saw a nude photograph he would cover it with his hands. When he saw an image of my pregnant friend, he said he thought it was inappropriate for him to see it. My gut response was defensive, and I said, you don't have to look at it. I also said, it wont feel inappropriate in about 10 years, to which his mother said, probably less than that. Afterward, when I was on my bike ride I realized that I had an opportunity to teach something and I failed miserably. I should have said, all you see is a naked woman coated in mud, but it is so much more than that. Most everyone on the planet was in a womb. Your mom, my mom, everyone you will ever know, and meet, or see, including you. This image is a celebration of that. A celebration of woman. A celebration of lifegiving. Woman are the best thing on the planet, and every one of us literally owe our lives to them. The caked on mud on her round belly represents the Earth, and as it started to dry on her body it looks like continents. So I would ask you when you look at an image or a painting, or read a poem, if you think it is inappropriate, or funny, or offensive, or whatever. That's fine, but then put that feeling aside, and ask yourself what is the artist trying to say? This well help you become more tolerant, more open minded, and possibly teach you more about the world. Then, I thought, I too should have looked beyond the noise, and running around, and thumbing through the book, and had been more open minded, for these beautiful children are the end result of my photographic celebration.
Jeanne Norsworthy
Jeanne was a painter who lived at Fresno Ranch. She painted, surreal, sensual landscapes and has a book of her work called \"Healing Landscapes\" published by Texas A&M Press. I highly recommend purchasing it. It was published after her death. I think of it because she had an understanding of this place that is rare. I used to sell her paintings in the gallery when I first opened, but they were a little pricey at that time, and I too didn't have enough money to buy one, which I regret very much now. Jeanne developed cancer and eventually it took her in to the next world. I made this portrait of her right before she started chemo treatments. Her hair was still long and beautiful, and her thoughts distant.
December 28, marks my 30th anniversary of living in Marathon. I am letting it pass quietly, It's been wonderful for me to be a part of Big Bend. Big Bend is not for everybody. There are lots of down sides, but looking at mountains every day, waving to every driver on the way to Alpine, the sense of oneness of community, and yet remaining individual, feels right for me. I have lived an undisciplined life. Totally following my heart, and emotions. I am hoping I have lots of life left to finish the projects that are in progress. If I can do it, I'll have four books to complete. It's ambitious, but I feel healthy and my legs and eyes still work well. Now, my brain, it's always messing with me. Makes me laugh. Merry Christmas and Happy full moon.
Over the past three or four weeks I have suffered a lot of lost emails. If we were in the middle of a communication and I suddenly dropped off, this is why. Please reach out to me if this is the case.
If you would like to receive snail mail invitations please email me your address.
Please follow me on Instagram. bigbendpictures.com. or jamesevans.com.
\"Love is all you need.\"
**Ocotillo and Outhouses**
I was driving back from Santa Elena Canyon on Maverick Road. It was about 2 O’clock in the morning. At the very end of the road sat these outhouses. To make the image I set up two large light boxes. With flash photography, I use a light meter to determine F/Stop. It works like this. Say one pop of the strobe is F/2.8. Well then 2 pops is F/4, 4 pops is F/5.6 and so on. I was wanting a lot of depth of field so I needed to pop the strobe 32 times to build up enough light on the negative. It was a pitch black night, and I could not resist watching the pops. When I stopped all I could see for the next half hour was Ocotillo and Outhouses. The image was burned on my retinas, and I could barely take down the equipment, walking around in circles like a stunned bug. Emotionally, I was feeling lonely. I had been in the park by myself for a few days, and though most of the time I am ok with that, sometimes, it would slap me sad. I wanted to make an image to express that feeling.
**Ocotillo and Outhouses**
I was driving back from Santa Elena Canyon on Maverick Road. It was about 2 O’clock in the morning. At the very end of the road sat these outhouses. To make the image I set up two large light boxes. With flash photography, I use a light meter to determine F/Stop. It works like this. Say one pop of the strobe is F/2.8. Well then 2 pops is F/4, 4 pops is F/5.6 and so on. I was wanting a lot of depth of field so I needed to pop the strobe 32 times to build up enough light on the negative. It was a pitch black night, and I could not resist watching the pops. When I stopped all I could see for the next half hour was Ocotillo and Outhouses. The image was burned on my retinas, and I could barely take down the equipment, walking around in circles like a stunned bug. Emotionally, I was feeling lonely. I had been in the park by myself for a few days, and though most of the time I am ok with that, sometimes, it would slap me sad. I wanted to make an image to expres
s that feeling.
**Sarah Foltz Fine Art**
I was invited to show some work in a group show called Texas Aesthetic at Sarah Foltz Fine Art in Houston. The work is up till the end of June. Please stop by. The gallery is located at 2143 Westheimer. The gallery phone number is 713-521-75 hundred.
**My American Dream**
Let me preface this writing with I am not trying to make a political statement. What I know about politics you could fit in a thimble. I have mentioned before, how I dreamed of being a machinist when I was a young man, then discovered a camera and changed my life forever. That privilege, in part, is because I already hit the life lottery of skin pigment and being born in the USA. I love this country because it allowed me to pursue my dreams and didn’t punish me the years I struggled to make ends meet. In America I was encouraged to grow and develop freely into the kind of work and life I wanted. I am proof that the American Dream exists. Money was never the goal, but the reward to continue. A well earned bowl of beans taste just as good as a well earned Filet. I feel fortunate to have grown up with Bob Dylan, Jackson Browne, The Beatles, Muhammed Ali, The Kennedy’s, and Martin Luther King, to name a few. There was as much controversial things going on then as is there is today, but there was more tolerance in disagreement. There was also a number of high profile people prophesying that peace and love was the answer. No one is doing that at this time.
Thank you all for the love and support you have given me over the years. Your purchases have kept my goals possible. Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
If you would like to receive snail mail invitations please email me your address.
Please follow me on Instagram. bigbendpictures.com. or jamesevans.com.
\"Outside is the side I take.\"
**Border Walls**
One of the most photographed places in the park is Santa Elena Canyon. With the \"There are 30 pictures of the park that everybody takes\" comment by a friend, that is always stuck in my crawl, I set out to photograph the canyon. I went to Desert Sports and got on the river with Bobski, Crystal Allbright, and John Spong. The first day was a scouting trip to see how the river and my boatman was. I only took a point and shoot. It was all fine, so next day we packed in the cameras. I pretty much laid in the boat and shot up as we went through the canyon. This is a beautiful series with a nice tonal scale. America is one side and Mexico the other. It also proves that sometimes one must work on their back. There are about 45 images to complete the set, and I do have one complete set of 15 x 15 square in silver gelatin.
I hate to keep doing this, but our friend Ken Barnes died. He was a great guy. A self taught paleontologist who lived in Terlingua. He is of the \"old\" Terlingua. There was a sweet gathering last Sunday, telling stories and accolades. We are all going to miss him very much.
If there is an image or something you would like me to talk about, with the exception of real estate, please send me an email and I will answer it in future posts.
Marci Roberts, Kevin Urbanczyk, and I are working steadily on a new book. Will keep you posted. It's going to be a beauty.
Thank you all for the love and support you have given me over the years. Your purchases truly makes my dreams possible. Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
One of our finest citizens passed away this month. I shot this image at the funeral. I guess if I chose to I could publish funeral images every month.
This image was shot for a story for Texas Monthly. I was shooting Huck statically on the horse when Marci says \"move around some, ride.\" Who says art directors aren't helpful!
**The Fine Line Of Art and Commerce**
When I was 21 years old I read Andrea Feininger's book \"The Complete Photographer.\" Then I quit my job at the machine shop and went searching for my life's work. Just like that. There was a sense of urgency even then. A biological clock ticking like a womb. At that time, my only goal was to make a living using my camera. Copywork, portraits, weddings, dog photos, if I didn't have to get a real job I was winning. Mostly I did drag racing. I frequented several drag strips on the east coast and sold photos to the drivers of their cars launching from the starting line. Every emotion is at a drag strip, mixed in with mechanical ability, teamwork, talent, money and a healthy dose of luck. I learned timing and to never care about what the other photographers were doing.
I've had my own commercial studio, assisted several great photographers, I should say mentors till one day I finally found it. I went to Big Bend. I fell in love with the land. On my third visit I found the Gage Hotel. They were looking for a cook, and after being in the park a few days and befriending some locals, it hit me straight in the face. Here it is. Your chance at starting your life's work. I was 33 years old and the clock was loud. All I had to do is convince the manager that I could cook. But I didn't. I went with honesty. \"I don't know how to cook, but I know what taste good.\" That's how I pitched it. \"I am willing to shut down my studio, move here, and work for whatever you will pay me.\" All I saw was opportunity. I would have a little food, a little money, and my future in front of me. The photo books I'd seen of the area were mostly tourist intended. Pretty pictures. I didn't want to do that. My heroes were Arnold Newman. Duane Michals, Emmet Gowin, Eugene Smith, Andre' Kertesz, to name a few. How could I live up to that? For the first six months I just hiked and watched the light. The people and landscape were, and are still, my inspiration. I lived here, so I didn't have to force the work. I could let it come to me, slowly and purely. I could watch the light and wait for it. If it didn't work out I could come back the next day, the day after that, or maybe in May when the sun would be in the right spot. I've learned to see the nuances in the mountain ranges, and how they differ every day. I've witnessed young children in this town become adults, then parents, and some pass on. No one escapes the human condition.
My intention has never been to promote the area. I've never done a magazine assignment to promote tourism. My goal still, is to make a body of photographs that will justify my time on the planet, and hopefully show others that are living in my time, what they only get a glimpse of. For those just being born, and not born yet, what it was like then. It is a self imposed demand of my responsibility. It's my religion, my reason for being. It is the flame that lights my path.
Thank you all for giving me love and support for the work I am doing and have done. Happy Full Moon. Get outside.
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I would like make an observation of living on the border for 30 years.
1. The Mexican people are not our enemy.
2. All my border experiences have been rewarding. Here's two.
**Border Baby**
Robert Draper and I did a story for Texas Monthly about the bringing of electricity to the border town of Boquillas from the United States. The wiring was in place and it was just waiting to happen. However, some conservation group, won their protest and the town stayed dark for another 20 years. I believe this is how the little wire scorpions you can purchase there began. After the defeat, they started stripping the wire to make trinkets for tourists. But this is not the story I am here to tell. I had finished photographing the assignment when I got this hairbrain idea to try and photograph a guy on a horse inside the Park Bar. I went over on a Saturday and tried my best to talk Francesco, the bartender, into letting me bring in the horse and rider, but he was not having it. I tried to sweeten it with cash, the promise to clean up anything, and be totally responsible and safe, but he was a firm No. In frustration I walked outside for some air and to prepare myself for another round of talk when a woman approached me and asked if I would photograph her baby. Of course. And so I met Eliot Mesa and made this photograph. It was so beautiful for me to see this baby, so small and fragile laying on the bed. I knew I had made a fine image. I didn't care about the horse in the bar any more. I went back, had a beer, shook the bartender's hand and went home smiling.
I see little miracles every day. I like to be alone with them.
**Kickapoo Boy Swinging**
Jan Reid and I did this assignment for Texas Monthly as well. The story was about the success of drug rehabilitation program, and getting and keeping funding for it. At that time they only had one success story through the program. Jan, if you are reading this feel free to contact me if my brief synopsis and memory are not correct. We did the story over several visits. The Kickapoos are a sweet gentle people, and we were honored to be close to, but not attend a ceremonial dance under a star filled, obsidian sky and Hale Bopp comet. We watched from a distance, and I respectfully put away my camera. It was magical. Again, my mind wanders from the photograph. I think this was on my third or fourth visit. The kids were swinging off the rope into a stream. I might as well been invisible, for they were not intimidated or shy about me photographing them. They were, and I was, happy.
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**The Death of Lucille French Clark**
Lucille French Clark was an essential person in my life when I made the transition from Austin to Marathon. I had set up, by phone, to rent a building on the main street next to the post office, but when I got here with three truck loads of equipment and called my \"would be\" landlord, he decided that he didn't want to rent the building. Had he given me this news prior, I may not have come. So here I am in town without a home. I panicked a bit, but Giddings Brown drove me around looking for a building. I liked the one across the tracks and we knocked on the owner's door. 88 year old frail, but sharp, Lucille. Giddings and I sat down in her room, and made introductions and discussed the possibilities. She told me she would rent me the building for $50. a month, but all repairs would be up to me. Then she asked me where I was going to live, and suggested I look at the little adobe house next to hers. It was perfect for me, and that was going to cost $50. a month too, with the same conditions. I was so happy that when I hugged her she crunched. And thus began our friendship. I was flanked on both sides of her. I would go over and sit with her and talk, but sometimes I would go for days and not see her. I was getting the building set up, going to the park as much as I could and learning how to cook. It was all so exciting. Over the next few years Lucille's health slowly declined. On April 4, 1991. It started out sunny, but then a norther blew in and tore my flag from the pole and into her driveway. She died in the morning. Later that day it hailed in the Glass Mountains, and they stayed covered for three days. I don't know if you get to make a statement in death, but if so that sure was one.
I had become the caretaker of the place, but I didn't go in much. It was too sad and fresh for me. One day I decided to document the house as she left it. I did that, but it didn't do much for me. There was a tarantula in the yard, so I brought it in and put it on the dining room table and made photographs as it crawled across. I loved it. I went looking for more critters, and over several weeks photographed each room with one. It was great. The Bull Snake on Sofa is the most popular one, and is in several museum collections. And it's funny you know because I've heard analogies that the furniture represents Lucille, and the snake is a reclaiming by nature. It is an interesting concept, but it wasn't about that at all for me. I just loved seeing the animals in the house and on things. I like the repetitious pattern of the snake and the sofa, but I was trying not to get bit by them. The main accomplishment for me was that I was able to use my camera to pay homage to the life of my friend.
This is the portfolio in its entirety. Individuals or a complete set in a portfolio box is available.
Happy New Year and Happy Full Moon. Remember there is an eclipse tonight.
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Boyd Elder
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If you are thinking a beautiful photograph for your mate, friend, or yourself for Christmas, please start now.
**Jack Wilson and Wann Langston**
I hung out with Jack and Wann for a week while they were digging up a 65 million year old crocodile. These two were in their 80's and played in the dirt like kids. The park had put them up in that house on the East side and I stayed there with them. I remember there was a young woman doing some research, and she was staying there too. She had cameras set up somewhere as I recall, and her hours were up early. I think Jack was a little put out with her because she did not know, and show proper respect for Jack who was the man that discovered all the bones that were on display at the fossil bone exhibit. At the end of this week Jack formerly retired. He gave his rock hammer to a protege.
**Tom Lea**
I was returning from an assignment in New Mexico and stopped for the night in El Paso. When I got to my room I looked in the phone book (remember those) and called the Lea residence. Sarah answered the phone and I explained I was a photographer and wanted to make a portrait of Tom. She said \"what for.\" I said \"posterity.\" She asked \"how much does it cost.\" I said \"It's free.\" She said hold on, and returned to the phone a few minutes later and said to meet Tom in his studio at 2PM. I thanked her for the appointment and asked her name. She said \"what for.\" I said \"respect.\" She said \"It's Mrs. Lea.\" I never get to meet her, but I made it to Tom's studio on time the next day. I didn't take in lighting and thought I would just shoot existing light. Tom warmed up slowly, but during the shoot he said \"you're late.\" But not because I was late for the appointment, but I was late in his life. He wasn't painting any more. I sent him some prints and he wrote me a very nice letter which I am proud to possess.
**For those of you interested in the Marathon to Marathon Read This.**
The race is October 27, 2018.
For more information:
www.marathon2marathon.com
Nicole Davenport is hanging out with our fabulous Fire Department cooking up her finger licking delights for M2M this year!!!
Nicole appeared in \"BBQ Pitmasters\" in 2010 and \"Chopped\" in 2012.
In 2012 she was one of Five of the greatest BBQ Pitmasters in the USA who
traveled to military bases in Kuwait to stage a once-in-a-lifetime
Southern-style cookout. It became a documentary released in 2013 called \"The
Kings of Barbeque Kuwait\" .watch the trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjQKYr6PNJU&feature=youtu.be
She will have her food truck set up at TheFrench Co. Grocer for a first ever
Sunday breakfast serving up Breakfast burritos, cowgirl cinnamon big-butt
buns, smoked cowgirl coffee or iced smoke coffee - all for $8.00. Pre week
race - her food truck will be set up at The French Co. for breakfast and
dinner. Grab some wine or beer and eat on the porch!
AND
The Marathon Motel Post Race Party is back!
Saturday night party in their courtyard enjoy a Live band with a great dance
floor, fire pit and Nicole will have her food truck delivering up
Steak, Pulled Pork and Chicken Tacos with toppers of queso fresco, ensalada, black or barracho beans, jalopeno, Serrano, chili pequin, pickled onions and sweets. 12.00 for 5 tacos!! There may be a chef plate special in there as well.
The Motel will provide a keg of beer until it runs out. But BYOB if that doesn't satisfy your needs
The motel will be pulling out their telescopes for a star party under our stunning Class I dark sky. We hope to see you there, and thank you all.
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I am looking for an assistant to learn matting and framing and help me run things around here. Please call 512-560-8269.
Please follow me on Instagram. jameshevans.com.
If you are thinking a beautiful photograph for your mate, friend, or yourself for Christmas, please hurry.
**Melba**
When I first moved to Marathon the money for water utility was collected by Melba. She once owned and operated a bar on South 385 just past the railroad tracks, and it was at this location she lived. People told me when she ran the bar, she didn’t tolerate any crap from her clientele and she talked like a sailor. I mentioned that and she laughed real hard and I got this shot.
**Cormac McCarthy**
Kay Burnett introduced me to Cormac McCarthy. We met him at the Santa Fe Institute, and she debriefed me before we left that he may be outgoing or very reserved and we would have to feel him out, and to keep calm. I brought him my Big Bend Pictures book, and we pulled into the parking lot about the same time and actually met there. So I spilled my whole guts all over his shoes right there in the parking lot in the first minute telling him how much I loved his work and putting my book in his hands. So much for the debriefing. We went inside and he was very sweet and told us some stories, which I can not remember a one. I have to excuse myself about that sometimes, because I find that I am studying faces more than listening to the words. It’s a disorder I have, but it really helps with my portraiture. Anyway, I asked him if I could make his portrait, and he said yes. I also photographed Murray Gell Mann, and a few other scientists.
Thank each and every one of you that has collected my work and supported me over the years. December 28, marks my 30th year living in Marathon. I am so lucky and fortunate to find my life's work at a relatively young age, and pursue it wholeheartedly. The love and compassion I have for the people and landscape of my community keeps me humble. I have made a lot of bad decisions and a few good ones. It is natural. I'm just trying to find my way, and be the best person I can be. Your support has proved that my decision to live here was a good one. You have helped more than you will ever realize. Happy Thanksgiving and Happy full moon.
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Evans_Milk Snake and Skirt", "caption": "Milk Snake And Skirt\n", "type": "image", "content": "MilkSnake1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 606 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 498077, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2019-08-05T19:06:48.106Z", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "keywords": [ "adobe:docid:photoshop:b5dd9447-7c50-b748-b747-f031ea75dabf", "xmp.did:F77F1174072068118A6DB9408B9B1AF2" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:43:54.246Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "13794": { "id": 13794, "label": "", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Bear Box**
I promised last month to talk more about the night work. The first time I got interested in it was pulling up to a ranch gate and seeing how the headlights lit it. I made an image, it wasn't iconic, but I was intrigued by the idea. I lived on a ranch for a year, which is a story in itself, but I had a several thousand acres to explore, and I began doing night work right in the front yard. I set up a camera in the dark night, opened the shutter, \"painted\" the yuccas with a light, left the shutter open and went to bed. I got up a few hours later, still dark, and retrieved the camera. I loved the image, and having several cameras, I began setting them up all over the ranch. I could make several images a night. This led to taking the idea to the park. I would set up cameras in several locations, focusing, painting the plant, and doing a time exposure. I put reflective tape around the tripod legs because it was easier to find them in the night. I wore a headlamp to see what I was doing, and in some of the images you can see a streak from it. This made the image somewhat of a self portrait. I changed F/stops, focus, lenses, film backs and even locations. Opening the shutters and going to sleep. If I would wake up and it was sunrise, all my efforts would be lost. This happened several times too. John Spong wrote an article about the work called \"Light In The Darkness\" August 2006 for Texas Monthly. I purchased my first digital camera , and as the film cameras were exposing I would shoot with it. Digital sensors are much more responsive to low light. I would point it at the sky and make a 30 second exposure and you would see a frame full of stars, but when I looked up they were barely visible. I think this is why there is a flood of milky way photos now. It's gotten relatively simple. That being said, there is nothing simple about digital photography. The only thing that is easier is that you do not have to process film for an image. There is so much control and literally anything you can dream up, you can make in a digitaI photograph. I love that. The night work was a wonderful few years for me. Like all my photographic explorations. I do it until I run out of ideas and move on. I've had the most extraordinary times in the park, sometimes going for days without seeing another human being. It was all mine.
**Painting the Rock**
I mentioned that I wore a headlamp. So I set the camera up, opened the shutter, and walked down to the rock. I stayed in one position so the light would reflect back and create a self portrait.
**Bill Wittliff**
I was shocked and saddened to hear about the death of Bill Wittliff. I used to sell images from his Lonesome Dove series at the gallery, and instead of paying Bill with cash we would trade dollar for dollar my images. These would go into the Southwest Writers and Photography Collection. It was a good deal. He also lobbied to get my image of Cormac McCarthy in the National Portrait Gallery. He told me they already had one of Cormac, but he tried to convince them my image was better. We didn't always see eye to eye, but we always got through it, and we never held a grudge. When Marci and I would visit him, he would spend as much time as we wanted. The last time I saw him he showed me his newest series of beer can images, and like always we horse traded. Bill was a great many things to a great many people, but there was nobody like him. The art world will miss him. He took a piece of everyone's heart.
", "thumb": "BearBoxTheCameraNeverSleeps.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1152, "height": 1155 }, "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "postDate": "2023-03-25T11:12:29.923Z", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2019-08-16T04:00:40.826Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ " Full Moon Archive" ] }, "13795": { "id": 13795, "label": "Yucca in Fog_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Yucca in Fog", "type": "image", "content": "Yucca.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1515, "height": 736 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 388736 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2019-09-08T22:33:21.561Z" }, "13796": { "id": 13796, "label": "June 2019", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "I promised last month to talk more about the night work. The first time I got interested in it was pulling up to a ranch gate and seeing how the headlights lit it. I made an image, it wasn't iconic, but I was intrigued by the idea. I lived on a ranch for a year, which is a story in itself, but I had a several thousand acres to explore, and I began doing night work right in the front yard. I set up a camera in the dark night, opened the shutter, \"painted\" the yuccas with a light, left the shutter open and went to bed. I got up a few hours later, still dark, and retrieved the camera. I loved the image, and having several cameras, I began setting them up all over the ranch. I could make several images a night. This led to taking the idea to the park. I would set up cameras in several locations, focusing, painting the plant, and doing a time exposure. I put reflective tape around the tripod legs because it was easier to find them in the night. I wore a headlamp to see what I was doing, and in some of the images you can see a streak from it. This made the image somewhat of a self portrait. I changed F/stops, focus, lenses, film backs and even locations. Opening the shutters and going to sleep. If I would wake up and it was sunrise, all my efforts would be lost. This happened several times too. John Spong wrote an article about the work called \"Light In The Darkness\" August 2006 for Texas Monthly. I purchased my first digital camera , and as the film cameras were exposing I would shoot with it. Digital sensors are much more responsive to low light. I would point it at the sky and make a 30 second exposure and you would see a frame full of stars, but when I looked up they were barely visible. I think this is why there is a flood of milky way photos now. It's gotten relatively simple. That being said, there is nothing simple about digital photography. The only thing that is easier is that you do not have to process film for an image. There is so much control and literally anything you can dream up, you can make in a digitaI photograph. I love that. The night work was a wonderful few years for me. Like all my photographic explorations. I do it until I run out of ideas and move on. I've had the most extraordinary times in the park, sometimes going for days without seeing another human being. It was all mine.
**Bear Box**
I promised last month to talk more about the night work. The first time I got interested in it was pulling up to a ranch gate and seeing how the headlights lit it. I made an image, it wasn't iconic, but I was intrigued by the idea. I lived on a ranch for a year, which is a story in itself, but I had a several thousand acres to explore, and I began doing night work right in the front yard. I set up a camera in the dark night, opened the shutter, \"painted\" the yuccas with a light, left the shutter open and went to bed. I got up a few hours later, still dark, and retrieved the camera. I loved the image, and having several cameras, I began setting them up all over the ranch. I could make several images a night. This led to taking the idea to the park. I would set up cameras in several locations, focusing, painting the plant, and doing a time exposure. I put reflective tape around the tripod legs because it was easier to find them in the night. I wore a headlamp to see what I was doing, and in some of the images you can see a streak from it. This made the image somewhat of a self portrait. I changed F/stops, focus, lenses, film backs and even locations. Opening the shutters and going to sleep. If I would wake up and it was sunrise, all my efforts would be lost. This happened several times too. John Spong wrote an article about the work called \"Light In The Darkness\" August 2006 for Texas Monthly. I purchased my first digital camera , and as the film cameras were exposing I would shoot with it. Digital sensors are much more responsive to low light. I would point it at the sky and make a 30 second exposure and you would see a frame full of stars, but when I looked up they were barely visible. I think this is why there is a flood of milky way photos now. It's gotten relatively simple. That being said, there is nothing simple about digital photography. The only thing that is easier is that you do not have to process film for an image. There is so much control and literally anything you can dream up, you can make in a digitaI photograph. I love that. The night work was a wonderful few years for me. Like all my photographic explorations. I do it until I run out of ideas and move on. I've had the most extraordinary times in the park, sometimes going for days without seeing another human being. It was all mine.
**Painting the Rock**
I mentioned that I wore a headlamp. So I set the camera up, opened the shutter, and walked down to the rock. I stayed in one position so the light would reflect back and create a self portrait.
**Bill Wittliff**
I was shocked and saddened to hear about the death of Bill Wittliff. I used to sell images from his Lonesome Dove series at the gallery, and instead of paying Bill with cash we would trade dollar for dollar my images. These would go into the Southwest Writers and Photography Collection. It was a good deal. He also lobbied to get my image of Cormac McCarthy in the National Portrait Gallery. He told me they already had one of Cormac, but he tried to convince them my image was better. We didn't always see eye to eye, but we always got through it, and we never held a grudge. When Marci and I would visit him, he would spend as much time as we wanted. The last time I saw him he showed me his newest series of beer can images, and like always we horse traded. Bill was a great many things to a great many people, but there was nobody like him. The art world will miss him. He took a piece of everyone's heart.
**Sarah Foltz Fine Art**
I was invited to show some work in a group show called Texas Aesthetic at Sarah Foltz Fine Art in Houston. The work is up till the end of June. Please stop by. The gallery is located at 2143 Westheimer. The gallery phone number is 713-521-75 hundred.
Happy Full Moon.Get Outside
July 2019 Buck Moon
**The Nature of Healing**
You see it all the time, especially out west. Some abandoned ruin of a house or a trailer or business. A rusted truck next to a building, hood up, no tires. A history of appliance purchases in the back yard.
The previous manager of the Gage Hotel, Brock Walden and I, on a road trip back from California, would call them “VISIONS.” Referring to the person that left it as having one, that in the end was, maybe a bad idea. Truthfully there’s probably some amazing, or not, life story behind each \"vision\", and so here is one.
Jeffrey was headed for a divorce after 12 years marriage. In hindsight he knew the relationship had shifted into a downhill trajectory in half that time. They used to be able to talk things out to some compromising solution and be laughing again by dinner, but it got harder to talk and sometimes seemed easier to go to his workshop and sand and polish his way through the issue at hand, not resolving it, but hitting the spike into the wood of their marriage and making the split a tiny bit bigger. It wasn’t a surprise when she asked for it, but there is an emptiness in the reality and fear of the void that follows.
Jeff was familiar with alcohol and pot and he knew he could soak and smoke his feelings into a dead end street or he could physically and mentally work his way through it. He was still in his 30’s, strong, healthy and not bad looking.
He signed two papers that week, Monday for the divorce and Thursday for this sweet piece of property in the desert. On Saturday he visited it for the first time as the owner and started making plans. He’d buy materials during the week and leave Friday after work with a trailer. It took three years of weekends to build his little get away place. No water. No electric. Just protection from the elements and 360 degrees of healing views. Every rock, every piece of wood and every nail, a therapy session.
That was a long time ago. I don’t see him any more. There’s still a few piles of rock around that were going to build additions. He remarried and has a son.
We all have to choose how we get through the lessons that life forces us to learn. You can become bitter. You can anesthetize yourself. Or you can put a rock on top of a rock, and a rock on top of that rock, and a rock on top of that rock, and keep doing that till you find what you need to get through this day.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Coachwhip**
It is rare that you get a second chance photographing animals in nature. Last Sunday I was walking to my house from the studio and a coachwhip was on my front porch with a baby roadrunner in it’s mouth. I dropped what was in my hand, quickly snapped an I phone photo and ran back for a real camera. He was still there, but on the concrete sidewalk. I took a few images before he slithered off into brush and I couldn’t find him. I totally blew it. Then the next day, here he is again, and what looked like the same roadrunner in his mouth, like he couldn’t swallow it. But this time I had my assistant Ali with me and she ran and got my herp tongs and we took it out of his mouth while the snake escaped into a wood pile = great backdrop! Ali had the bird in the tongs and was \"snakefishing\". It took about 10 or 15 minutes, but here he comes, back to get his dinner. I made some excellent images and we left him alone to have his meal. Now, how lucky am I?
**Sarah Foltz Fine Art**
I was invited to show some work in a group show called Texas Aesthetic at Sarah Foltz Fine Art in Houston. Please stop in and buy everything. The gallery is located at 2143 Westheimer. The gallery phone number is 713-521-75 hundred.
**A Trip To India**
Well, this month went really fast for me, and I am ill prepared. I am leaving for India in a few days with my friends Ingrid and Guil, with what seems a crazy idea. It’s Ingrid’s fault. See, she had a whole mouth full of dental work done there, and is going back to finish up. I had just gotten a $41,000. estimate from my dentist in San Antonio. So Ingrid encouraged and set it up with her dentist there, and the cost. $6000. So under the wing of Guil and Ingrid I'm gonna do it. It says something about our health care system, which I am not trying to do. I am nervously excited, traveling half way around the world, but most everyone I talked to said it is an amazing country. I must admit that I am not worldly. I’ve been to Italy, Brazil, South America, and Canada. But I have not even seen all of our states. Ingrid and Guil are very worldly and a great asset to this experience. Big Bend is all the world I ever needed. Before I found Marathon, I had actually gotten a passport and was planning to go to Europe for a while, thinking I needed to see more of the world and live in a different culture. Marathon, at the time of my discovery, seemed equivalent. I eat like a pack of hyenas, so I can’t imagine what it will be like with a full set of teeth. Maybe I will finally just chew, instead of inhaling. I am going to try and post images on Instagram during the trip. So check in. It’s bigbendpictures or James H. Evans
**Scott Carrier and Home of the Brave.com**
If you have never heard of Scott Carrier, I highly recommend his podcast. He is sensitive, and his approach to a subject is most unique. He has a beautiful, compelling voice, and his delivery is heartfelt and honest. Introduce yourself this way. Go to ThisAmericanLife.org and listen to podcast #181 The Friendly Man. Then check out his website.
**The Trip To India**
Last month I mentioned I was making a trip to India for dental work and that I was anxious about the whole idea. It seemed crazy to travel half way around the world for dental care. I am back with at least 20 good stories, and to say it was one of the greatest experiences of my life. I met so many wonderful human beings, made great photographs and had some of the best meals I've ever eaten. The dentistry was painless and perfect. I boarded the plane for home with a beautiful set of teeth. I could write every one of the stories, but instead I want to give you my take away thoughts. It was mind opening for me. I am so wrapped up in my work, and living in a small town, that I have become somewhat of a hermit. Also, I haven’t had to think on my feet in a while. Marci, always covering my ass, and tolerating my loftiness. When you are in a new environment all your instincts are heightened, and you are keenly aware of what’s going on around you. That being said I never felt threatened or in danger, except for maybe the traffic, which is horrendous and funny. All the people I met seemed happy, even the people living on the streets. Everyone seems to get something to eat, and their friendliness is genuine. The waiters, hotel staff, and doctors go to depths to make you comfortable and pleased. I mentioned, too, in my last email, that I am not worldly. I may have not seen a lot of the world, but I am worldly. People all over the world are the same. They want the same things, food, shelter, a way to make a living, and the best for their children and family. I feel like I have grown. It made me a better person. My wife, my family and my friends are the most important thing in my life, and while making photographs defines me, I have more room for both.
**Uh Clem**
Another friend passed away. I've known Clem for thirty years. He was a unique individual, a fine musician, with a great voice. No one could sing Randy Newman's \"Guilty\" like him.
In the beginning he lived in Marathon and built a shed of a house in the southeast corner of town. He was here a year or so I guess. Not long enough. He moved to Terlingua and was a fixture on the front porch and the Starlight Theatre, most recently forming a duet with Rob Dean. I may be the last person to see him alive. I went to the place he was staying in Odessa, to find him asleep. So I ran an errand, and came back, and he was awake. He had a trach tube connected to his throat and the mechanics of the machine were quite distracting. At one point the tube disconnected and I had to get a nurse to reattach it properly. There was a meal on the table. Ham, butter beans, and some green stuff. Maybe spinach, or collard greens. He didn’t touch it. Even legally blind, he sensed how bad it looked. I understood. Clem had no voice, and lipreading confuses me, so I asked him to write on a piece of paper what he wanted. He asked for his teeth that were in a cup at the bathroom sink. I got them and he put them in. He then wrote Marfa. He wanted to listen to the radio station. His computer was dead, so I plugged it in and let it charge. He asked for some blankets and laid down with hands together and fingers index next to index, middle next to middle, and so on. His eyes were closed. I tuned in the radio, but it was news, so I went to his Itunes library and found Hot Tuna, Captain Beefheart, and other music he liked. I made sure it looped, so it would not stop, and I put his earbuds in. Then I remembered that for some reason, and this is how higher power works, I had noise cancelling headphones in my camera bag. I got them, and put them on his head to drown out the noise of the machine. That’s how I left Clem.
Thank you for all your love and support.
Happy full moon. Get outside.
October 2019
**Scott Carrier and HomeBrave.com**
If you have never heard of Scott Carrier, I highly recommend his podcast. He is sensitive, and his approach to a subject is most unique. He has a beautiful, compelling voice, and his delivery is heartfelt and honest. Introduce yourself this way. Go to ThisAmericanLife.org and listen to podcast #181 The Friendly Man. Then check out his website.
**Someone Else's Blues**
I am a pretty fortunate person. I found what I wanted to do early in life. I have a lot of distant friends and a few close ones. I always have enough money to cover my expenses. I have a few roofs over my head, two good pets, a great wife and soulmate. I ride my bike nearly every day. Every minute is mostly my decision as to what I want to do with it, which is priceless. I am healthy so far. My body doesn't ache too bad. All this and, I was born in America. Yet as easily as the mood of a song, I can feel so blue and sad, with a tinge of sorry for myself. David Bromberg wrote a song called Someone Else's Blues. That's exactly what it is. Somebody creeped in my mind while I was sleeping and broke a knife off in my emotions. I've learned to deal with it. I don't think I am any different than anyone else. It used to last for days when I was younger, but now it goes away pretty fast. I've come to believe it is part of my creative process, just as is procrastination. It's the cusp of change or a new direction. I can feel it. I am right at the wall of change, but can't seem to climb over. That's when this blue feeling makes it's way inside. Here's the funny thing. I know the answer is take a deep breath and get to work. Stop staring at the blank piece of paper and write something. Wet the watercolors. Fire up the computer and printer. Get the camera on a tripod. Stop feeling sorry for myself.
In the mid 90's Keith Carter took me on several assignments. It is great to watch anyone do anything beautifully. He was an asset to observe. We were in Brazil and in a no where place. I asked \"Keith, how do you start?\" He pointed to an interesting building and said let's go in there. He walked inside looking for a human, and started making images, and just like that the assignment began. He taught me that it is just that easy. Just writing this has helped me put a foot up on the wall. So thank you for this group therapy session.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Introduction for an upcoming exhibition
When I moved to Marathon Texas in December 1988 what appealed to me as much as the mountains and space were the people. A month before I had visited Marathon with a friend. He knew the cook at the Gage Hotel and we went to see him. In that conversation the cook then, Phil Thomas, mentioned that they were looking for another cook to replace one that was leaving. I left with that information tucked in my brain. This was the third time I visited Big Bend, and I was already in love with the place. That week I met and partied with several locals. Uncle Joe, Aunt Roberta, John Suffaco, Susan Bryant, and a few names I can’t remember. I fell in love with them too, and on the way home I asked my friend Clif Ladd if he would stop back by the Gage Hotel. I met the manager, Giddings Brown, and applied for the cooking job. He asked if I knew how to cook, and I admitted that I didn’t. But I know what taste good I said. He hired me any way, and I went back to Austin, began closing down my studio, and contemplating my new life.
Since I was 21 and purchased a 35mm camera, I knew I wanted to be a photographer. I devoured books on the subject. In Austin I was doing commercial work and making artistic images on the side. I was aware of my age, and where my photographic career was. So when the cooking opportunity presented itself, I totally got what it would mean. I finally found it.
For the first six months I didn’t take a photograph. I would hike to a view and stay there all day, absorbing the light, the feeling, and the landscape itself. At that time the books of the area were mostly heavily filtered pretty picture books. Tourist directed taken by itinerant photographers, with no people. My strong suit was portraiture so I thought I would start there, and then learn how to photograph the landscape.
I mentioned that I was slow to photograph this landscape. I think I gained full knowledge of landscape photography in 2015, but until then I was still working on it. I am sure I could still be surprised. A friend of mine once told me there are 30 pictures of the park that everyone takes, and that has always been stuck in my crawl, and I too have taken those. It’s a barometer when I look at paintings or photographs of other people's work of the area. One of my first images of Santa Elena canyon is exactly where Ansel Adams stood. I am guilty.
I have a rewarding life. I have spent the best days of it in Big Bend. As I write this, I am looking out my window and clouds are breaking over the Glass Mountains. The mountains I’ve lived in front of for 30 years. The mountains I see today are the same as every human being before me has seen, and every human being after me will see. I have been in love with these people and this landscape since I found it. It is all ever wanted to be. It is all I can be. My wish would be that you can feel that love when you look at the work.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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**Old Man Rant**
The other day I called a business to order some of their products. Almost everything I asked about the person had to put me on hold, apparently walk to the warehouse and come back with an answer. After several of these simple questions and holds I realized this is a byproduct of a low unemployment rate. Now, every moron that shouldn’t have a job is on the other end of the line when you call and need information. This has happened with so many business calls that I have learned to hang up, call back, and hope to get a person that actually cares and knows about the products they sell. And don’t get me started about FedEX
**Dave Hamrick is Retiring**
My dear friend David Hamrick is retiring from U T Press. Dave has been at the helm of the book department. His vision is unparalleled. He produced many first rate photography books and brought the Press to be a highly respected and sought out publisher. Always bluntly honest, and blatantly excited when he could see the vision or lack of, an idea. He donned me his photographer of Big Bend, an honor and responsibility I've never taken lightly. He is going to come out to Marathon and help me with a retrospective book of my 31 years in Big Bend. I can't wait to have him here. Good luck my brother. U T Press was very fortunate to have your talents.
**Marci Sold the Grocery Store**
After nearly 15 years Marci has sold the French Company. Meet Sam Stavinoha, a young and bright man from Spring Branch. The store has been Marci’s baby, and though she has wanted to sell it for a while, she held out for the right person. Sam will bring fresh ideas and innovation to the store and Marathon. It is perfect timing too, Marci and I have been building a house for a few years now, and we are almost ready to move in. It is no surprise that the whole Big Bend area has been discovered. Marfa has been in the headlines for over a decade. Terlingua is booming. So it stands to reason that Marathon too, is seeing new growth. All three of us are ready for a new phase of our lives, and so it begins. Please stop by, say hello, and welcome Sam to the neighborhood.
**A Christmas Story**
My Mom was a little Italian woman who grew up in South Philadelphia. She was one of the most hard headed stubborn persons I've ever known. It was her way or the highway always. Her children were everything to her. She didn't spare the rod, but she didn't use it freely either. It was a different time, but my little brother and I both agree that we don't think it damaged us in any way. We still raise our voices in argument, and I still am working on that one. My mother would go to the mat with anyone in defense of her children. We were her meaning of life. She was full of cliches. \"When one door closes another one opens\" etc. But the best thing she gave me was the confidence that I could be what ever I wanted, that no person was better than me, and I was better than no person. She had a warped sense of humor and I inherited that. One time right before Christmas she gave me and my little brother a Sears catalog, and told us to circle every thing we wanted. I was about 8 years old, my brother 6. We poured over that thick catalog for what seemed like hours. I remember I picked lots of toys, a bicycle, and even a Superman outfit. We handed her back the catalog and she went into another room. She returned about 15 minutes later with all the items cut out of the book, handed it to us and said here \"Merry Christmas.\" My brother and I both started crying our eyes out, and it really upset my Mom. We didn't understand the joke. That Christmas we got a ton of gifts, she was making up for it. I miss my Mom very much. Family is a sweet thing. I hope you and yours have a wonderful Christmas. Thank you all for all you have done for me.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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The other day I called a business to order some of their products. Almost everything I asked about the person had to put me on hold, apparently walk to the warehouse and come back with an answer. After several of these simple questions and holds I realized this is a byproduct of a low unemployment rate. Now, every moron that shouldn’t have a job is on the other end of the line when you call and need information. This has happened with so many business calls that I have learned to hang up, call back, and hope to get a person that actually cares and knows about the products they sell. And don’t get me started about FedEX
**Dave Hamrick is Retiring**
My dear friend David Hamrick is retiring from U T Press. Dave has been at the helm of the book department. His vision is unparalleled. He produced many first rate photography books and brought the Press to be a highly respected and sought out publisher. Always bluntly honest, and blatantly excited when he could see the vision or lack of, an idea. He donned me his photographer of Big Bend, an honor and responsibility I've never taken lightly. He is going to come out to Marathon and help me with a retrospective book of my 31 years in Big Bend. I can't wait to have him here. Good luck my brother. U T Press was very fortunate to have your talents.
**Marci Sold the Grocery Store**
After nearly 15 years Marci has sold the French Company. Meet Sam Stavinoha, a young and bright man from Spring Branch. The store has been Marci’s baby, and though she has wanted to sell it for a while, she held out for the right person. Sam will bring fresh ideas and innovation to the store and Marathon. It is perfect timing too, Marci and I have been building a house for a few years now, and we are almost ready to move in. It is no surprise that the whole Big Bend area has been discovered. Marfa has been in the headlines for over a decade. Terlingua is booming. So it stands to reason that Marathon too, is seeing new growth. All three of us are ready for a new phase of our lives, and so it begins. Please stop by, say hello, and welcome Sam to the neighborhood.
**A Christmas Story**
My Mom was a little Italian woman who grew up in South Philadelphia. She was one of the most hard headed stubborn persons I've ever known. It was her way or the highway always. Her children were everything to her. She didn't spare the rod, but she didn't use it freely either. It was a different time, but my little brother and I both agree that we don't think it damaged us in any way. We still raise our voices in argument, and I still am working on that one. My mother would go to the mat with anyone in defense of her children. We were her meaning of life. She was full of cliches. \"When one door closes another one opens\" etc. But the best thing she gave me was the confidence that I could be what ever I wanted, that no person was better than me, and I was better than no person. She had a warped sense of humor and I inherited that. One time right before Christmas she gave me and my little brother a Sears catalog, and told us to circle every thing we wanted. I was about 8 years old, my brother 6. We poured over that thick catalog for what seemed like hours. I remember I picked lots of toys, a bicycle, and even a Superman outfit. We handed her back the catalog and she went into another room. She returned about 15 minutes later with all the items cut out of the book, handed it to us and said here \"Merry Christmas.\" My brother and I both started crying our eyes out, and it really upset my Mom. We didn't understand the joke. That Christmas we got a ton of gifts, she was making up for it. I miss my Mom very much. Family is a sweet thing. I hope you and yours have a wonderful Christmas. Thank you all for all you have done for me.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**The Digital age and Cameras**
Ever since I switched from film to digital I have struggled with over shooting the subject and not making as many memorable portraits, which is what I've always thought was my strongest work. While the landscape work seemed to get better, and the ability to make beautiful panoramics was a Godsend, I couldn't say the same for my portraits. I missed the medium format. So last week I went and talked to my banker, got myself a loan, and purchased a medium format camera system. I have not yet owned it a week, but I am so excited to get in to the next phase of my life's work. It will be nice to slow down and enjoy portrait making again. See if you can feel the change.
There are a few very exciting things happening, but it is too early to mention them. Stay Tuned.
**Big Bend is Different**
The current Texas Monthly's cover story is called Big Money Small Towns. Essentially writing about how one person with deep pockets can invest in a town and make a whole lot of difference. As a resident of Marathon, and Big Bend, I have been, and am, witness to a lot of change. When Lynne and Tim Crowley moved to Marfa and opened the bookstore/coffee shop/art gallery it represented a new wave. It premiered some of the best art books I've purchased. I discovered several finds there. Artists I never heard of before. Odd Nerdrum pops in my head first. Tim Johnson carries on the tradition. The Crowley Theatre has had some amazing, intimate concerts, plays and forums. Jenny Lebermann and Fairfax Dorn (The Ballroom) continue to bring cutting edge art exhibitions. Mix that with Donald Judd's masterpieces, Dan Flavin's beautiful light sculpture buildings, Richard Chamberlain, and Robert Irwin, who I must confess, I have not even seen yet, then add Liz Lambert's El Cosmico, and you have a very unique town. Liz too, has put on some great events. Mumford and Sons played there right as their fame was starting to escalate. There is a palatable irreverence in the town, and the complaint I hear the most is nothing is ever open. I think if Donald Judd was alive, he wouldn't be hanging out at the coffee shop. Like most true artists I've met, he would be working. I can tell you personally, the more you realize that you are closer to the end of the rainbow, the more you want to work on your legacy. Thank you Tim and Lynne, and thank you Jenny and Fairfax, and thank you Liz for making Marfa our cultural outpost.
I spoke last month about JP Bryan, what he has done for the town of Marathon, and me personally. So read last month's Full Moon if you haven't.
Then there is Terlingua. It is booming. For me it has changed the most and not necessarily for the better. There are lots of VRBO's now. A young woman, Lauren Werner, is building a great looking hotel. The front porch at the Terlingua Trading Post is mostly tourists. You can barely get in the Starlight, it is so busy. I closed that bar many times in the 90's. There are two reasons I think. The Cottonwood grocery store. Rick has brought real and good food to the area. It is as fine store with a wide variety of items. Fresh food in the desert. Then when Glen, the owner of LaKiva, was beaten to death, National Geographic sponsored a series that ran on television. I watched one episode, and my bullshit meter exploded. But you have to think that if 10 million people watched it and .003 percent thought I want to live in Terlingua....... Well there you have it. A town full of wannabes.
Lajitas too is growing. They've just expanded the airport and there is a condominium project in the works.
Big Bend has twice as many visitors as when I moved here. It is still a difficult place to get to. As long as a 737 can not land in the area, tourism, hopefully, will remain relatively low. Growth is not just here - every small town I drive through on the way to Austin now has a little art community. So what is my point? None. For the record, I've never promoted tourism. The less people the better. My books are about a photographer inspired and in love with his subjects, creating a body of work that reflects the area and his time on the planet. That's it. One last thing. The mountains have not changed a bit.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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On January 17th, J P Bryan is celebrating his 80th birthday with a talk at the Gage Hotel, which I believe is his pride and joy, though he has done many other amazing things.
The Gage Hotel and my career are synonymous. Some of you may already know that in November of 1988 I stopped by the hotel with my friend Clif Ladd to visit with Phil Thomas, the cook. BC = before chefs. Phil, in passing, mentioned that the other cook was leaving, and moving to Austin. That information was stored in my mind rolodex as we left for the park. I had visited the park twice before, and was already in love with the mountains. I met and partied with some locals, Uncle Joe, Aunt Roberta, John Suffaco and Susan Bryant, and was smitten with all of them. I shot poloroids, and film. They played music and sang. I realized they were as amazing as the landscape. Unpretentious human beings. I stress those words Human Beings. On the way out from the four day trip I asked Clif to stop back by the Gage where I met the manager Giddings Brown. He too, was just like the people in Terlingua. In fact, at that time, most of the staff were campers and hikers, and knew the condition of the park and the flow of the Rio Grande. 31 years ago Marathon was a sleepy, somewhat deserted town. It was just the Gage and an antique store, in the building I am in now, run by Della and Dub Haley. Dub sold cleaned up cow skulls. They both sat on the sidewalk in school desks and sipped beer. I lived here a year and a half before I went in. I figured it was time.
In 1989, JP was the go to guy. The town savior. He had money, taste, and maybe a newfound sense of responsibility. It seemed people asked him for help, and he did help. I didn’t want to be like that with JP. I was raised that you took care of yourself. Even now, I can barely ask anybody for anything. I wanted to be the guy that didn’t ask.
That doesn’t mean JP hasn’t helped me. He has helped me more than anyone in this town, with the exception of Marci, of course. He helped me in a way we both could accept. If it wasn’t for the Gage Hotel I would not have had the opportunity to apply for a job. In a way he gave me food and money, and I worked as a cook at his hotel.
When I got my darkroom set up, I started making simple landscape images. Giddings allowed me to sell them in the lobby. I literally would make dodged and burned silver gelatin photographs and mount them onto card stock. $10.00 worth of work for $2.00. I eventually started selling so many I had to have them professionally printed. I took one of the Hotel as well, and it helped pay for the printing. Again, JP helping me indirectly.
In the mid 90’s JP added the Los Portales, a pool, the bar and a chef. It shifted the Gage from a hiking/camper resort to a destination place. More people came here to get married. With Hallie Stillwell as Justice of the Peace and me as the photographer we performed lots of weddings. That was the heyday of the hotel for me. It was still small and intimate. Bill Stevens was a great manager, and I still had a lot of energy. There were still cowboys in the bar at night.
When Los Portales was complete JP had an investor’s party and he hired me to photograph it. I can’t quote word for word, but he said that he had helped restore many structures throughout the state of Texas. With the Gage and Marathon, he wanted to restore a town. JP has built and restored the Ritchey Brother’s building, the whole block east of the Gage, adding a coffee shop, gift shop, and a bank. A micro brewery and barbeque, Captain Shepards, Gage Gardens, several houses in town, and as I write, the old Marathon coffee shop will become a workout gym and spa, and the old spa will become a mini museum of JP’s western art collection.
Two great things he did for the hotel, but benefitting the whole town, was dismantling the florospar processing plant across from the Gage. It was loud and dusty, and probably very unhealthy. Then he paid for putting in the median to make the train crossing a no blow zone. In the early days the train would start blowing their horn at the Marathon Motel all the way past 385 at all hours of the night.
Finally, over the last 15 years JP has helped me by renting me a gallery space 4 doors east of the Gage at a reasonable rate. It gives me good exposure to the public, and I can live the life I wanted and make the photographs I need to take.
I’ve always had an honest and open relationship with JP. Sometimes I thought of him as a father figure, but most of the time like an older brother. Happy birthday JP. Thank you for pursuing your vision of Marathon and the Gage Hotel. Thank you for helping me pursue my photographic vision thus giving my life purpose and meaning.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
", "thumb": "JPatHomeJan2020.jpg", "featuredImage": "JPBryan2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 910, "height": 611 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 910, "height": 910 }, "bytes": 0 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:19:06.248Z", "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2020-03-08T22:27:11.522Z" }, "13828": { "id": 13828, "label": "March 2020", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Morning Ramblings**
I don’t know what has shifted, but I find myself waking up earlier in the morning. I get up make some coffee, put on Morning Edition on whatever radio station is playing it this early, or I will listen to something that puts me in an emotional mood, like George Winston or Van Morrison. I’ve taken to writing letters, more than painting watercolors. I tried oil painting photographs on some old silver prints, but it didn’t do it for me.
I’ve always had a sense of time. Not in the small picture, I barely know what day or time of day it is, but in the bigger sense, as in what are you doing with your life. When I was in my 20’s and made the decision to be a photographer I absorbed photo books. I would study Arnold Newman’s portraits, and think \"when am I going to have a style?\" When will someone be able to look at my images and say, \"that’s an Evans\"? When Patti Smith’s album “Horses” was released in 1976, the image of her on the cover dope slapped me. I thought that’s the kind of portraits I want to make.
I find myself, even now, looking at expressions and not listening as much. It makes me seem a bit airheaded, and often I have to ask someone to repeat themselves. It is a trait I don’t have control over. I seem to feel more about the convictions of what they are saying, more than what they are saying. I listen to the notes and not the song kind of thing.
The other thing is I fall in love with whatever is in front of my camera. I get emotionally invested real fast, looking for those nuances I have observed in conversation that someone else has seen too, and defines the subject in a subtle way. If I capture it, a relative will confirm it. \"That’s what my brother looks like.”
There are other factors too. You have to make the subject forget about the camera. This used to take a roll or two. Now that everybody is a photographer, you have to get past their iPhone look. When people didn’t know what they looked like in camera, getting to a meaningful image was quicker. You can see them saying “cheese” in their heads or waiting for the 1-2-3 count.
Everything changes, that’s just the way it is. Who would have thought 20 years ago the tiniest speakers would sound as good as huge PSB analog speakers, we would have phones and the whole world of information with us at all times, or film backs would be replaced by digital sensors. I do not necessarily believe one time is better than the other. It’s great to be alive, have so many good friends, and acquaintances. To take pictures for a living, how sweet is that. Yes, Big Bend has really changed. There are so many visitors now that it is kind of sad. It has been discovered. There is a magazine article every month about our part of the world. Then there is social media, and the need to document and post every little accomplishment one makes. Also when people like Anthony Bourdain and National Geographic’s Badland series exploit the area for their own gain, what do you expect. I love Big Bend. I could not live anywhere else. It is still beautiful and inspiring and gives me creative rejuvenation. Think of this. I have hiked Lost Mine Trail with no one else on the hike, many times, the stellar jays cackling most of the way. Big Bend is still and always will be a place to gain introspection, to challenge your abilities to camp and hike, or as Doug Peacock said, indulge in solitude. Nature is the best place for you to come to terms with who you really are as a human being. For more than 25 years, I had Big Bend all to myself. What a wonderful time I’ve had, and am having. Thanks to all of you.
Outside is the side I take. Happy Full Moon.
**What Life is Like Out Here**
Marci and I are working on two new books. Our house is still moving forward, but slowly.
We are very thankful and grateful that Sam Stavinoha and the staff at the French Company is bringing food to our small town.
I am a little frightened, very cautious and a bit nervous. I am the vulnerable age, though I think I am very healthy.
Stay home. Take care of each other.
Do anything you can to help your neighbor and your loved ones. Be Safe.
Please write. Tell us how you are doing.
Marci and I miss and love you.
I hope to see you all again soon.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
It is always a challenge to photograph a subject that everyone photographs. For this series I hired Desert Sports to take me down Santa Elena Canyon two days in a row. The first day was to scout, see how much water was in the river, and to understand my boatman. I laid in the raft and made images as we went through the canyon. The first day I only took a point and shoot camera just in case we went in the water. There were clouds too, so it wasn't the best sky. With a cloudless sky, as was the next day, you don't know if you are looking up or down. The following day I brought the serious equipment laid in the raft and made images as we went through the canyon. I have a series of 40 images that are beautiful. One side is the United States and one side is Mexico.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
I have thousands of Black and White and Color images.
I've posted quite a few, but if you point me in a direction I can find a range of examples or, find a specific mountain or area.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
Sign up for my Full Moon emails by clicking on the button below.
Panoramics can be printed 40\" X 12 feet. Call for specific dimensions. I can mat and frame up to 96 inches. I produce everything in house.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
![](\"/pf-media/BigBendPicturescoverfrontandback.jpg\")
\n\n**New Version of Big Bend Pictures**\n\nThis book represents a Big Bend that is no longer. Many portraits of iconic people of the area, and my beginning life in Big Bend. It is an updated version of my first book. I changed out 11 images, and updated my notes and stories. It still includes Robert Draper's original foreword, and an additional foreword by Sterry Butcher. I reprinted every image as I would print them today. There was some cropping of images in the original book. This book is exactly how I shot them. To order signed copies go to www.jameshevans.com, and click on the book cover in the menu. \n\nYou can also call me at 512-560-8269.
\n\n
Published in 2011 this is James' second book. It is a collection of images over a twenty year span of living in the Big Bend. It has color black and white, toned, film images, digital images, panoramics and nudes. There is a wonderful essay by Rebecca Solnit. The book is sold out. If you can find them online buy them and send it to me, I will sign them for you.
On this website menu, look for notes and stories for the images.
As of May 2021, this is book is now out of print.
There are notes and stories about the photographs. Find them in this menu.**Lineaus Hooper Lorette**
Lineaus Lorette died. I swore to myself that I wouldn’t write an obit again, but I had a long history with Lineaus. We made some great photographs together. He was a true eccentric, a self described communist, which I always took with a grain of salt. He was an accountant, and was mine until we had a disagreement. The best accounting advice he gave me was the only thing you can go to jail for regarding the IRS is not claiming income. He said you can be very liberal with deductions, and if the IRS calls you on it, you simply explain it, if they don’t agree, you pay the tax, and possibly a little fine or fee. He knew tax law more than anyone I’ve ever met.
He made athletic equipment. Medicine balls and footballs. They were beautiful. I used to sell them in the early 90’s, and I believe that is how we met. Lineaus was strong and muscular. He had a book showing how to use a medicine ball. It was photographs of him and another man throwing the ball to each other. Pages full of two, inch and a half men, scantily dressed throwing a ball to each other, illustrating an exercise. I laughed out loud when he showed it to me, but I don’t think he thought it was humorous at all..
Lineaus had lots of dogs, and was never without a few of them. He asked me to do a portrait of him with his dog, Lucy Parsons, who had cancer. When I went in the gate to his house, dogs were surrounding me, and one kept trying to bite me. On the way out I asked Lineaus to sit down, and the dogs started to gather around him. I was looking through the viewfinder and I see this dog coming after me again, but I get the shot first and then put my foot up to block him. My remembrance is he bounced off my shoe and left me alone after that. But in the the image he is mid air and determined to protect Lineaus.
Hooper was an art collector. He has the most extensive collection of Patty Manning’s masks, and Abby Levine’s wood burning pieces.
I photographed Lineaus many times. I photographed his parents, and especially his Mom. She was a beautiful woman with a kind and gentle disposition. She taught art in Odessa, Texas. There is an image of her in my book Crazy From the Heat. I recall she was telling me a story of one her students. She said \"he liked to pick up things.” On the way home recalling the conversation Lineaus put a finer point on the description. He said the guy was a kleptomaniac.
Lineaus was there when the Duncan’s purchased the Paisano Hotel. I think he was their accountant too.
He told me he became a millionaire selling real estate in Marfa.
Lineaus was very vocal and political. He didn’t hesitate to speak his mind or create controversy. And if he was done with you, he was done with you. We had a falling out over a mistake he made with our taxes and Marci called him on it, and that was pretty much it for us. I did see him occasionally after, but we were never as close. He was obsessed with lamps in later years, and I think I sold him a lamp or two I had from Aaron Ristau.
Here’s the thing. Lineaus was dear to me in those times we were close. As I get older every friend I lose is another scar and nick in my heart. This is not to say that a small child or young person is exempt, because we all know that is not true. But as you get older, the nicks come faster and steadier. If you could see a picture of it, it would look like it fell out of the truck and rolled down the highway. If there is an afterlife, it’s going to be a wonderful thing to see these people again.
I have a confession to make. I openly socialized yesterday. A friend of mine called me to ask if I would photograph his daughter’s wedding on their private ranch with a dozen people. I was torn. To witness a wedding in the desert on a ranch goes to the very center of why I moved here. I have always considered myself part artist, part historian, part documentarian. To miss this would be denying my purpose. So I said yes, but I also demanded that I would wear a mask, be socially distant and very cautious. They were fine with it. At first I was distant, but as soon as I saw the bride, and people I love and care for, who were not wearing masks and gloves and distancing, I just gave in to it. It was like opening a pint of ice cream and saying to yourself, I’m only going to eat an inch down. Then you get down to the inch and think, I’ll eat a little more. You keep going, and before you know it, you’re at the bottom of the container, and it was great and tasted so good. But now I have some guilt and little anxiety, and I think I knew better. But I have to say. Seeing and touching, and hugging people I love, sitting around the table eating together, enjoying wedding cake, telling stories with my friends, and listening to theirs is something that I miss more than I even knew.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
These images are in stock and/or hanging in the gallery right now. I ship on Monday's and Tuesday's.
The frames are made of hardwoods and are biscuited together. They are not pinned or nailed. The mats are acid-free 8 ply. The glass is Optium Museum plexi.
Image sizes range from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\" on the square images, 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\" on the rectangular image. Panoramics can be framed under glass up to 90 inches. I print large canvas panoramics in editions of 5. When you are looking at my images on this site if you see images you like click the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. This sends me an email. Include your phone number so we can talk size and framing possibilities. I do not discuss prices by email. You can call me too at 512- five-six-zero-8269. A phone call is not a commitment, and I am not a high pressure salesman. This is more about finding out what exactly would work for you, as well as respect an appreciate that you are interested in my work.
Color prints are coated with a unique matte finish.
Black and White Prints are toned and printed on Photo Rag paper. It has beautiful whites and creamy blacks.
Thank you very much.
For Christmas, A signed copy of the Big Bend Pictures with every order.*Refer to site information if you need more info.
In the mid 2000's I started this series of images. It came about when I pulled up to a ranch gate and saw my headlights on it at dusk and made an image. This inspired me to set up the camera, open the shutter, \"paint\" the plant with a light and go to sleep. When I woke up in the middle of the night I would close the shutter and make another image.
Some of the images that are posted are in an unfinished state. I put them up to show a range of the work. I will slowly finish them all, but forgive the lack of a purely clean and un dodged and burned images. They will look beautiful if you order one.
Image sizes from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\" inches.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
I have started a new series I call Marathon_2020. Since we have not been straying far from home, I started to document my town in a new way. I purchased a set of lights, and have been staging these images. It’s a lot of work, even for such simple set ups, but it’s a lot of fun. Marci and I are doing them together. She is my “Art Director.” She has a great eye, better than mine, and it’s really fun working on something together.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
These Days
I am not sure what to talk about these days. We are all in the same boat waiting to see light at the end of this Covid tunnel. My buddy Dan mentioned yesterday on our bike ride that the pandemic in the 1900's lasted two years. We are just four months into this one. That was a reality check.
I wish you all well during this odd time in America and history. Your love and support of my work helps me get up in the morning. I am truly blessed.
Before digital photography simplified night work I started a series I called \"The Camera Never Sleeps.\" It was featured in Texas Monthly. I would set up the camera in the dark night, open the shutter,\"paint\" the plant with a light, and then go to sleep, leaving the shutter open for the earth's rotation to streak the film with stars. Most of the time I would wake up and close the shutter, and start again. Sometimes the sunlight woke me up and the film was overexposed. I had four cameras, and would set them up all over the park, nap a little and go recover them. I had so much fun. My photographs are likes songs for me. I can look at them and take myself back to that day, that feeling, and that emotion. It's very sweet to document my personal life and time on this planet through my images.
**Business and the view from here**
I hope this email finds you well. Here, the gallery is open, but we are strict about wearing masks and social distancing. There is always a number on the door to call, and I am just across the street. If you are visiting the area, and would like to stop by please call or email me. COVID 19 is here. I personally know five people who have it. We went from 1 to 142 cases since my last email. Big Bend Regional Hospital is not staffed or equipped to handle severe cases and they were being sent to Odessa. Odessa is not accepting those patients any longer. Brewster County is one of the riskiest counties in Texas for COVID right now. We are very vulnerable. Please adhere to social distance and masks to protect us. Big Bend National Park is closed once again.
Marci has cancelled the M2M for 2020. Here is her announcement sent to racers and Facebook.
“With a heavy heart and a lot of thought, I am cancelling M2M 2020. I am one to push through adversity, but pushing through this puts the health of my community and my racers at risk. M2M is so much more than a race. It is about helping each other and I just don’t see how having M2M 2020 would adhere to that same spirit. I am looking forward to better times in 2021. I hope you all stay healthy and safe.
**M2M – October 23, 2021**
For those of you who had reservations in Marathon, please consider transferring them to 2021 so our local businesses won’t have further financial hardships.
All the best,
Marci”
**A touchy feely guy after Me Too and Covid 19**
My mother’s birthday is July 4th. I can never look at fireworks without thinking of her. She would have been 89 yesterday. But she was never going to live that long. She died at 70. She was diabetic, a constant smoker, and didn’t take very good care of herself. When I looked back at all my images of her. I think there were two where she didn’t have a cigarette in her hand. One because she was holding her dog, and the other a bouquet of flowers at her third wedding. She was a hard headed woman from Italian descent, short fused and quick tempered, easy to raise her voice over the simplest of things. She had a warped sense of humor, and it could be difficult to understand how she could laugh in some certain situations. She didn’t suffer fools, she liked a good joke, distasteful or not.
She raised three boys on her own after she left my father who wasn’t with her at the hospital when their 4th child was stillborn. I guess that sums up the relationship. She moved us back to Philadelphia, where she was born, and we lived there and in South Jersey until I left in 1980. My mom worked very hard to raise us up. We didn’t have a lot of money, so I learned very early that I needed to earn money on my own, if I wanted anything. I had paper routes from when I was 12 till I started driving. My route was in the “projects” and most of my clients were retired women whose mates were gone. I loved those old women. They never tipped. The paper itself a luxury at 42 cents a week.
What my mom didn’t give me in piano lessons, more than one pair of shoes, or material things, she gave in love and sweet affection. I always knew I was loved. She was demonstrative that way. She gave me confidence too. She instilled that you can be anything you want, if you are willing to do the work. She adored us all. We never watched TV without one of us being in her
arms, being petted or rubbed. She was touchy feely. I have a lot of those qualities myself.
When I first moved to Texas, I went out for a drink with a friend and his sister. As we were walking in the bar she pinched my butt. No woman ever did that to me before, and I thought it must be a Texas thing, like y’all and bar b que. For years after that I pinched girl’s butts, until someone called me on it. I swear I had no clue.
Growing up like I did, hugging and expressing love for people very easily, you can’t imagine how hard it is for a guy like me in this current world. After the Me Too movement, I really had to learn to not hug a person. That they actually might be offended by it, or see it as an advance.
Marci always tells me I don’t understand boundaries. Now with this current pandemic, where it is a mandatory distance, and you have to wear a mask I feel like a flower with no water.
I wish I could hold and be held by my Mom. She would know exactly what to do.
Thank you for all your support and love during these strangest of times.
Happy Full Moon. Get outside.
**The Pandemic From Here**
Is this not the weirdest time you have ever lived? It seems to me that people are wearing masks much more, and all businesses are now requiring it. We have tourists, though the national park is not open. The gallery is open, but a mask is required, and you will need to text or call the number on the door. We are pretty cautious, though it seems easy to stand too close, or forget to sanitize our hands. Also it seems business globally has taken a chill pill. You can’t depend on anything getting done on time. I guess it’s OK, but can be a little frustrating. Commercial and magazine work made me deadline aware, and I still adhere to it, but if everyone in the chain doesn’t have the same approach, there's not much you can do about it. There are other great side effects. Marci and I seem to be getting along very well. Little things that might lead to a disagreement seemed to almost vanish, and even sticking points now, are quickly dissipated. We are enjoying our time together much more. I feel very lucky to have someone to hug and hold and share things with in this trying time. I can't imagine how difficult it would be to date right now. I hope all of you are as lucky as I am.
**Neowise Comet**
In the last month we have enjoyed seeing the comet. Here it is from our back porch.
**Happy Birthday Marci**
My sweet wife is having a birthday on the 5th. I won’t say what decade she is beginning, but she is still as beautiful as the day I met her. Hopefully we will soon be moving into this amazing house she has designed.
**Jim and Stevie (but not the Vaughan Brothers)**
I was up late at night and thinking about an old friend of mine. So, I googled him, but I didn’t find anything. So I looked for his younger brother Steve, and learned he had recently passed away. There was an obituary, and it mentioned survivors and his brother Jim was one. His wife was listed as well. There was an image of Steve with a Santa Clause beard. His eyes, I thought yes. So I called the funeral home and asked him to give my name to Steve’s wife, and asked if she would pass it on to Jim. About 20 minutes later I get a phone call, and it was Jim Kearns. Jim Kearns. WOW, I haven't spoken to or seen him in over 50 years. It was truly hard to believe. We talked for about 20 minutes, and continued emailing for the next couple of days.
I hung out and played with both of them individually. Steve was younger and a wild kid. We were always doing crazy things, but nothing criminal, just mischievous. First, let me set the scene. We lived in the “ Projects.” Low income housing. Each building had three floors with four units on each floor. It went up to a roof, where you could walk 50 to 60 feet and enter another set of units. Each building having 24 units. There was also a basement for storage and incinerators. It was completely open for us kids to roam around in. I guess they figured if they tried to lock anything, it would just get pried open. We would catch mice in the basements, then take them up to roof and try to drop them into a bucket of water we had on the ground three floors down. Believe it or not they all seem to survive, and every now and then we hit the bucket.
Then there was an old woman we called Crabapple. We teased her incessantly, and she always threatened to call the cops, but she never did. In some perverse way I think she liked the attention. We would take firecrackers and a lit cigarette and place the fuse near the burning end of the butt, and get as close as we could without being seen to the bench filled with old people. Then wait for it. It seemed funny at the time. We hopped trains and rode them till they slowed down enough for us to jump off. Sometimes it could be a long walk home. Steve called me “Mouse” because I was a small kid.
Jim, on the other hand was a genuine sweetheart. He was just good. It seemed our conversations were more serious. Our one bad thing was to walk down the railroad tracks less than 1/2 mile to a spot where we kept a pack of True cigarettes hidden. We would smoke a couple end off end, though I don’t think we were inhaling, and talk about stuff, though honestly, I can’t remember one conversation. But it seemed important. Jim was more like the older, smarter brother.
My brother Billy, Jim and I would all go swimming at a hotel pool on Saturdays. We would walk there most of the time, but Jim remembers riding bikes too. We would pay a couple of bucks and swim all day. I remember being so hungry, but not having money for food.
Jim’s mom often had a big pot of pasta sauce in the fridge, and I remember many times dipping into it with some Wonder Bread. It was so good.
We didn’t have much as kids. Nobody I grew up with was wealthy. It was very democratic. We were all poor. But I had the best childhood, and I loved being a kid. We had to be street smart, and our parents trusted us to make good decisions. We never got in real trouble because our Mom instilled in us to do the right thing. She loved us.
I went to India last year. It was an amazing experience. I met lots of children and their parents too. The kids were all so happy, entertaining, and funny. Their parents were demonstrative with their affections. So, there it is. Love is the answer.
Thank you all for your love and support of my work, and my life in this beautiful desert.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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You can click on the inquiry below as well. They are limited edition, printed by me, and are signed and numbered. Support the Ballroom. They bring great art and amazing shows to West Texas. Thank you.
To inquire about images click on the inquiry button at the bottom of the page. Fill out the form and include your phone number. You can also call me at 512-560-eight two six nine. Thank you.
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
**Advice Needed**
Dear Lawyer Friends,
I need one of you that understands the concept of a class action lawsuit to consult me. Please call me on my cell, or email me, and I will call and make an appointment.
**Digital Photography and Printing**
I was slow to warm up to the digital age, but I really love it. The papers are amazing. I finally got rid of the POS Epson printer, and purchased a Canon. Ten times a better machine, and Canon has great customer service. I get a call for an image I shot on film, scan it, then work on it for printing. In the darkroom days, dodging and burning, the process of adding and holding back light to the light sensitive paper was done with your hands and homemade tools. It's a little clumsier, and broader. Digitally, you can control a pixel, and the manipulation is not taking place during the exposure. It’s more like working on a painting. Also, say there is a distracting telephone pole coming out of a head. You can remove it. I am not heavy handed with these options, and my goal is to make the images all look like they were shot on film. I believe Ansel Adams would have loved this.
**The Pandemic From Here**
The park has partially re-opened though the backcountry roads, and Ross Maxwell scenic drive are still closed. The road to Rio Grande Village, I believe, has re-opened, including Dugout Wells. Though I write this, you might check with the park for the most current information. There’s no camping and day use only. There is no such thing as a bad day in Big Bend, but it kinda feels like going to see a good friend, but his face, arms, and a leg is missing. The weather has been hot and dry. That being said, I still look forward to going soon. Being somewhat confined to Marathon, I’ve been enjoying my rituals. The first one, coffee. I swear, I think my Mom put it in my baby bottle. I don’t ever remember not drinking it. These days, I grind just what I’m going to use, heat the water, then cool it so it’s not boiling, and use a single pour Meliita cone and filter. Pouring it just so, careful not to wash the grounds off the walls of the filter. Next, is my bike ride, the long one on the road bike one day, and to the post on the mountain bike the next day. This requires all the proper clothing, helmet, water bottles, camera, etc. Did you ever notice the difference between males and females regarding something like riding a bike. Men need every accoutrement, women, a helmet and shoes. After the ride, it’s fruit smoothie time. I mix it all up just about the same every day. After that I am ready to begin my working day. That can change according to what needs to be done. I only mention this because I have become so self-aware and thankful that my life is sweet comparatively to others I do not personally know suffering through this pandemic. This is the strangest time I’ve ever lived through in my life, and that there is no light at the end of the tunnel makes it all the more difficult. I miss hugging my friends. I miss touch, and a handshake.
I hope that all of you are doing well, and the best you can in this trying time.
** A New Book**
I am still working on a retrospective book. This concept was David Hamrick’s. Big Bend Pictures, my first book, sold out and was reprinted two times. Before David left UT Press, he suggested that I update BBP, and make it a new retrospective book. This is a brilliant idea. In the beginning of my life here my plan was to shoot a lot while I was young and had a lot of energy. Then, as I got slower and less energetic, I would print the whole body of work. I didn't expect that would be so soon. For instance, I would go to the park and shoot ten rolls of film. I would process that film, and say there were four good images to print, I might only print one or two of them and put the others in the file. I did this for years, so there are a few hundred images I’ve never printed. That is what I am editing right now. When the digital age came along it was no longer a roll of 12, but a card with hundreds of images. I didn’t name the images as I shot them, and so I am paying for it now. I was also anxious about re-using SD cards. The idea of deleting an image is frightening. So, I just kept buying cards, using them only once, as well as, saving copies on multiple external hard drives. Then, someone talked me in to just saving the images on the external hard drives and using the cards over. I did this for a short stint, but then got too nervous again. So can you see how I have created an editing nightmare for myself. I have thousands of images and possibly stored in three or more places. Happily, I am about half-way through, and it is exciting to find images I'd forgotten about and organize and title them.
** You Are In My Thoughts**
This monthly email gets to a lot of the people that have purchased my images and are following my career. I cannot thank you enough. Because of you, I’ve never had to get a real job. I've never had to teach workshops. I've never had to do anything other than take and make photographs. The luxury of deciding what to do with every minute of my self disciplined life is the greatest gift bestowed on me by you. I am aware of it, and I try not to waste it. Thank you.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**John Prine's Birthday**
Sam Stavinoha, the new owner of the French Company Grocer is putting on an evening of singing and honoring John Prine, October 10 at 6pm. in back of the store. You can message Sam to sign up.
The park has mostly re-opened, though I believe the basin rooms are still closed.
** Dan Hickle**
Dan was up against the three strike law. He had been busted for selling marijuana I believe. Dan was not a big time dealer, but still he was going to have to serve some time. To avoid facing the sentence he went to Mexico, but not deep into the country, just over the border in Boquillas were he dressed himself in a poncho and hat and played with the other musicians in town. He only stuck out like sore thumb, and from my viewpoint it was kind of funny. Robert Earl Keen took that thought and turned it into the song Gringo Honeymoon, which is very loosely based on Dan’s escape to Mexico. When I made this image Dan was in the US, but in hiding. It was hush-hush, and I had to drive to a location and wait for someone to come get me. Then I followed them to a secret location. It was a grand time. His oldest son Trevor is a musician too, and I photographed them jamming together, and also made family portrait style images of Dan and his three children. Dan did eventually come back to the U.S. I made a portrait of him at the county jail, all shaved and not nearly as happy. Dan served his time, and now walks the straight and narrow.
I hope you are all well and safe during this pandemic and sad time. I am hoping for some light at the end of the tunnel, and I look forward to laughing like Dan again.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Dancing Feet**
This image may very well be my masterpiece. I shot it at Rio Grande Village in the park. The event was good neighbor day. People from across the border and here would get together for singing and dancing. Food was available, as well as arts and crafts. There was an elevated stage so my field of vision was eye level with their legs. The girl was bigger than the boy, though they were the same age, and she seemed to lead. I followed their legs through the viewfinder and shot when I saw something interesting. I learned later that their names were Jose Brito and Katrina Portillo. I was firing on all 8 cylinders. Three images I made that day are in my first book, Big Bend Pictures. Another interesting thing is that my “normal” lens was in the shop for repair, so I only had a wide angle and a short telephoto to shoot with. It is a good idea to sometimes to get out of your comfort zone.
**Dorothy and Jan**
I didn’t acknowledge last month, the passing of one of my dear friends Jan Reid. Jan was a great writer. We first met on an assignment for Texas Monthly on the Kickapoo Indian tribe, based in Nacimiento, Mexico. We went down several times over a three month period, and during that time I got to know Dorothy and Jan. There were many memorable moments doing that story together. The ceremonial dances, Hale-Bopp comet in the sky, sleeping in a wikiup, but mostly gaining the trust of the people that let me photograph them. That is one of the most rewarding facets of doing an assignment. Later in life Jan was shot in Mexico city. He wrote a book called “The Bullet Meant for Me” It’s the harrowing story of the event. Jan walked with a cane for the rest of his life, and I believe it was the medications he had to take that made his speech jittery. We went to Italy for Robert Draper’s wedding, and watching how brave and determined Jan was to do things on his own made me admire and respect him ten fold. When we got back home he told me about the shooting, and I made photographs of him as he spoke. In his kitchen, he pulled up his shirt and showed me his scars like LBJ. As he was telling me it seemed he went right back to the moment he was shot. I made an image of him staring in to that space. It’s eerie.
Jerry Jeff Walker and Billy Jo Shaver. Ahhhh Man.
**Blue Moon Rant**
Since the Covid pandemic, I’ve found myself having discussions with friends about how weird these times are, and I have to admit it is definitely in the top five of my lifetime. But in the history that I am aware of, weird is not so abnormal. Before I was alive there was a flu epidemic that killed thousands of people. There was a civil war. There was polio, which I have a vaccine scar from. There were two world wars. The USA dropped an atomic bomb on innocent people, and then did it again three days later. There was one man with an army of followers that killed 6 million human beings. When I was 9 years old our president got his head blown off, and a couple of days later I watched Lee Harvey Oswald get killed on live TV. The 60’s were full of assassinations, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy. There was a war in Vietnam on our TV sets every night. Kent State. When John Lennon was murdered, a piece of me died too. 911, was unbelievable to watch. How could that have happened? The Black Lives Matter Movement. Young men and woman being killed because of the pigment of their skin. There are plenty of other things. Fill in your own here____________________. What makes me anxious about right now, besides the possibility of getting the Coronavirus, is that we are so divided as Americans. When did that slowly creep in to our society. How could racism and inequality still be the struggle we are in? This blue moon rant is not a political statement. I know nothing about politics, except that we are affected by the choices of our leaders. These are the United States. I love my country, but I don't understand it right now.
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This may be the oddest Thanksgiving I’ve ever lived through, with the exception of 1963. My friend Ammar was in town, and he made dinner at his house, but was anxious about sitting around the table together and eating it, so I picked it up and Marci and I ate it at our house. It was delicious. Recommendations were to be cautious about social gatherings, and so we did that. There has been so many times during this pandemic that I’ve wanted to shake a hand or hug someone, but I refrain, and when I slip, I feel guilty. By all accounts it is upticking, so we are being even more cautious. I miss my brother. He lives on the east coast. His job has him driving to locations sometimes for hours, and so it is a good time to talk. We were reminiscing about our childhood, and he reminded me how we would pour Pepsi in shot glasses, shoot it, and slam the glasses down. Then start acting drunk, slurring our speech, and saying I love you brother. That ought to give you a hint of the environment my mother eventually got us out of. We both have the “drink” gene, but I quit nearly 20 years ago. My brother still enjoys a beer, but he’s good. Our older brother, I don’t know what happened to him, but he finished with us years ago. He didn’t inherit the “drink” gene, but maybe he’s the one that needs it. I guess I am talking about this stuff because we don’t get to choose our family, or where we are born, but we do get to choose our friends. Thanksgiving kicks off the holiday season for me, and I though I feel that there is a little light at the end of the Covid tunnel we still have a ways to go. I can hardly wait to eat in a restaurant, go to the movies, visit my friends, and hug and kiss every one of them. I hope you and your family are safe and well, and the holidays are good to and for you. I can't thank you all enough for supporting my life in this desert.
**32 Years**
It was, Thanksgiving weekend, 32 years ago I came to Big Bend with my friend Clif Ladd that set the course for my life's work. This photograph, taken by Clif was the decisive moment. Partying with Aunt Roberta, Uncle Joe, John Suffaco, and Susan Bryant. I've told the story many times I don't feel the need to do it here, but to say there are times in your life, when a door of opportunity opens, and you make the decision to go through it or not. I was really scared, and at the same time felt so alive. For my work, it was the best decision I ever made in my life. To my young friends, as well my peers, I never saw this one coming, but I knew it when it was here.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**John Prine's Birthday**
Sam Stavinoha, the new owner of the French Company Grocer is putting on an evening of singing and honoring John Prine, October 10 at 6pm. in back of the store. You can message Sam to sign up.
The park has mostly re-opened, though I believe the basin rooms are still closed.
** Dan Hickle**
Dan was up against the three strike law. He had been busted for selling marijuana I believe. Dan was not a big time dealer, but still he was going to have to serve some time. To avoid facing the sentence he went to Mexico, but not deep into the country, just over the border in Boquillas were he dressed himself in a poncho and hat and played with the other musicians in town. He only stuck out like sore thumb, and from my viewpoint it was kind of funny. Robert Earl Keen took that thought and turned it into the song Gringo Honeymoon, which is very loosely based on Dan’s escape to Mexico. When I made this image Dan was in the US, but in hiding. It was hush-hush, and I had to drive to a location and wait for someone to come get me. Then I followed them to a secret location. It was a grand time. His oldest son Trevor is a musician too, and I photographed them jamming together, and also made family portrait style images of Dan and his three children. Dan did eventually come back to the U.S. I made a portrait of him at the county jail, all shaved and not nearly as happy. Dan served his time, and now walks the straight and narrow.
I hope you are all well and safe during this pandemic and sad time. I am hoping for some light at the end of the tunnel, and I look forward to laughing like Dan again.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Dancing Feet**
This image may very well be my masterpiece. I shot it at Rio Grande Village in the park. The event was good neighbor day. People from across the border and here would get together for singing and dancing. Food was available, as well as arts and crafts. There was an elevated stage so my field of vision was eye level with their legs. The girl was bigger than the boy, though they were the same age, and she seemed to lead. I followed their legs through the viewfinder and shot when I saw something interesting. I learned later that their names were Jose Brito and Katrina Portillo. I was firing on all 8 cylinders. Three images I made that day are in my first book, Big Bend Pictures. Another interesting thing is that my “normal” lens was in the shop for repair, so I only had a wide angle and a short telephoto to shoot with. It is a good idea to sometimes to get out of your comfort zone.
**John Prine's Birthday**
Sam Stavinoha, the new owner of the French Company Grocer is putting on an evening of singing and honoring John Prine, October 10 at 6pm. in back of the store. You can message Sam to sign up.
The park has mostly re-opened, though I believe the basin rooms are still closed.
** Dan Hickle**
Dan was up against the three strike law. He had been busted for selling marijuana I believe. Dan was not a big time dealer, but still he was going to have to serve some time. To avoid facing the sentence he went to Mexico, but not deep into the country, just over the border in Boquillas were he dressed himself in a poncho and hat and played with the other musicians in town. He only stuck out like sore thumb, and from my viewpoint it was kind of funny. Robert Earl Keen took that thought and turned it into the song Gringo Honeymoon, which is very loosely based on Dan’s escape to Mexico. When I made this image Dan was in the US, but in hiding. It was hush-hush, and I had to drive to a location and wait for someone to come get me. Then I followed them to a secret location. It was a grand time. His oldest son Trevor is a musician too, and I photographed them jamming together, and also made family portrait style images of Dan and his three children. Dan did eventually come back to the U.S. I made a portrait of him at the county jail, all shaved and not nearly as happy. Dan served his time, and now walks the straight and narrow.
I hope you are all well and safe during this pandemic and sad time. I am hoping for some light at the end of the tunnel, and I look forward to laughing like Dan again.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Dancing Feet**
This image may very well be my masterpiece. I shot it at Rio Grande Village in the park. The event was good neighbor day. People from across the border and here would get together for singing and dancing. Food was available, as well as arts and crafts. There was an elevated stage so my field of vision was eye level with their legs. The girl was bigger than the boy, though they were the same age, and she seemed to lead. I followed their legs through the viewfinder and shot when I saw something interesting. I learned later that their names were Jose Brito and Katrina Portillo. I was firing on all 8 cylinders. Three images I made that day are in my first book, Big Bend Pictures. Another interesting thing is that my “normal” lens was in the shop for repair, so I only had a wide angle and a short telephoto to shoot with. It is a good idea to sometimes to get out of your comfort zone.
**Christmas This Year**
Because of the pandemic, and the age of Marci's parents we did not celebrate our traditional family gathering. It was bittersweet. Marci made a Christmas decoration out of copper wire and we hung lights and ornaments from it. I called it the strangulation tree. It seemed to sum up what this year has been like. We baked and burned deserts, and overall it was a wonderful day. I did try to outnap the cat, but he won. Later we had friends over one at a time, offered up our burned deserts and sat around around a firepit on the back porch. I am glad that this year is over, though as bad as it has been, we are fortunate that so far we have not contracted the virus, we moved into our house, and I have had consistent support from my collectors, I can’t thank you all enough for keeping my head above water, and easing the struggles of getting through this difficult year. I am truly blessed and fortunate.
**Anniversary**
Yesterday was my 32nd anniversary moving to Marathon. I mentioned this last month, go to Full Moon archive on my website if you would like to read more.
**Our Sweet Home**
Marci and I moved into our new house in August, and though it is not finished, it’s done enough that we can taste what it would be like completed. Friends warned us there is danger of not completing the building once you move in, but the upside is it is giving us slow contemplation. Living in it, an idea you may have thought would work, is shadowed by a new perspective. I have six closet doors and I have only put two handles on because I am nervous that they wont be parallel, even, and straight. Each hole drilled has to be perfect. We’ve gone from a 500 sq. ft house to 1680 sq. ft. Still small, really, but it feels like a mansion comparatively, beautifully designed, and as custom made as a tailored suit. I show Marci a piece of my art, one image at a time over years on a piece of photographic paper, and now she shows me hers, as three dimensional space, you live, breathe and sleep in.
**Target, Marathon**
After a few years of vandalism “Target Marathon” was demolished by the owners of the property for fear that someone would get hurt. It was a spoof on the Prada, Marfa. It was not art, though it was very well done, and another roadside attraction for Iphone photographers and tourists. I enjoyed the sense of humor of the person that constructed it. E Dan Klepper made a good observation yesterday, that though the structure is gone, they did not destroy the steps or the pad. Now there is a stage or platform for artistic opportunity. One of a kind, here today gone tomorrow, statements. Let’s see if that happens.
**A Book Review**
Flash Of Light, Wall of Fire
There are a few books in my personal collection that are very difficult to look at. “Without Sanctuary” a collection of lynchings in America. James Nachtwey’s Inferno, which I’ve never gotten completely through. Emmet Gowin’s Changing the Earth, though it’s so beautifully photographed, that it’s only after you read what you are looking at you gasp. U T Press has produced an amazing book of a horrifying subject. The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The images were taken by itinerant photographers, some on the ground at the time. Some professional, some not. The American military and Japanese government kept close reigns on what the public saw. These images were smuggled and hidden for years, and many in this collection, now housed at the Briscoe Center for American History, have never been seen by the public. There is a softness to the images, maybe due to lens quality or that everything is smoking, but it only adds to the heaviness of the subject. In the year of the Coronavirus, it is a perfect time to be released. You realize things can always be worse, but more importantly, atomic bombs should never be used again. That man has the ability to destroy all human existence, and nuclear disarmament should be the goal of all nations. These images will get you as close to a nuclear detonation as you want to be.
I wish you all a happy and healthy new year. I look forward to the day I can safely give you a big hug, a big kiss, and a hearty handshake.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**A Sweet Snow**
Anybody that knows me well knows that I do not have much affinity for snow. However a few weeks ago we had a sweet snowfall and Marci and I headed toward the park to make images. I made a couple of nice panoramics and I will post them on my website soon. Hopefully we will get a flowery Spring.
**I've Been Cooking A Lot More**
I can hardly wait for this Coronavirus to be under control, with everyone vaccinated and not having to be so cautious and worried. However a side effect from it all is I have cooking much more, and even surprising myself when it's tasty. Meanwhile, Marci is appreciating having a personal chef. She has been making curtains. Yes curtains, who knew she had a domestic side. In spite of the virus, not being able to hug people, and kinda stuck at home, life is still good. We've lost some friends to this virus, but no family members so far. I hope you are all safe, and that there is light at the end of the tunnel. And always, thank you for your support.
**Remembering My Mom**
I've had this image on my desktop for a few months thinking to get around and make a print. In my opinion, half of the art of photography is making a fine art print. To quote the master:
“The negative is comparable to the composer’s score and the print to its performance. Each performance differs in subtle ways.” – Ansel Adams
This is an image of my mom and me hugging. Taken around 1975. ( Never mind the Peter Frampton perm. ) As I have mentioned previously, my mom had a wicked sense of humor, and I could egg her on to clown in front of the camera. This evening she came over with a bowling trophy she had won. It was tiny and insultingly pathetic really. I made images of her goofing with it, making faces, and looking at it as if to question why she hadn't thrown it in the trash already. At the end of it I said let's make a picture hugging. Cameras in those days had a manual timers. I slid it all the way and we hugged at least 30 seconds waiting for the exposure. I also thought it would give us time to make it real. I can still feel it.
If your Mom is still in your life, you are very lucky. There is nothing like unconditional love. Do me a favor, give her a big hug for me.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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After six years of not printing traditional silver gelatin photographs I’ve set up my darkroom again. Since I stopped printing I have been reluctant to sell silver prints, but I had a client that wanted one I was out of. I thought, in these pandemic times, or anytime really, I can not afford not to print it. So last weekend I got all the things not related to the darkroom out and cleaned everything from top to bottom. Tuesday I made my first print. It was like riding a bike. I was little clumsy, and things were not exactly in place, but by the time I found the right contrast and exposure, the intuitiveness was right there. In this sense, I believe I understand what a musician must feel like when she is one with her instrument and the band. In some ways it is easier than digital. Digitally, you can easily overuse all the control and option. Chemical darkroom is simply contrast, where to hold back light, and where to add more. That being said, coming from silver printing has really helped the way I approach digital printing. I’ve always tried to make my digital images look like they were shot on film. After printing, the real fun is toning. It’s very experimental, and you just never know exactly how it’s going to turn out. Each print can be very unique and one of a kind. The late great Bill Wittliff and I traded recipes before I quit, and I still have them. I was reading one and his humor came through. It said: \"Agitate, you'll be good at this\". I am waiting for fresh chemicals to arrive to start a new phase of my life’s work.
**I Am Such A Loser**
There are a few things that bother me about the aging process. One is, body parts hurt for what seems like no reason at all. Last week my arm hurt so bad I could barely sleep. Thank you Ibuprofin, my drug of choice. The other is the inherit forgetfulness. My doctor said it is normal, and losing your keys is not bad, not knowing what your keys do is. On January 27, I was at a store and paid with a credit card. That was the last time I saw my money clip that contained my credit cards, cash, driver’s license. I looked everywhere at least three times. I put ads in our local papers. I felt like I was actually going through the five stages of loss. I kept checking my credit card accounts to see if there were charges I did not make, and there wasn’t, which lead me to believe it must still be around. Then two weeks later, I was going through my new backpack, and discovered this little secret compartment. I opened it, and there’s my money clip. I was as happy as if I had gotten a big refund check from the IRS. I'd been carrying it around the whole time. Now, if I could just find that Hasselblad 50mm lens, my second pair of glasses, and who knows what else I don’t remember that I lost.
**Charles Bowden**
I woke up missing Charles Bowden the other day, so much so, that I started to listen to his audiobook “Murder City” because he narrated it and I could hear his voice. For those of you that don’t know, Charles was the authority on what was going on in Juarez in the mid 90’s. I first met his work from a story he wrote for the New Yorker called “While You Were Sleeping.” It was the first account of woman being abducted from the maquiladoras. They were being raped and killed. In the press the magic number was always 300, but it was in the thousands. I called Charles after I read it and we had a lengthy conversation. A few years later I was in my gallery at the computer and this guy came in, and was looking around. I usually just say hello and leave people alone. He looked at my images for a long time and finally he says “I’m Charles Bowden” I said why didn’t you tell me when you walked in. He came home with me and we drank and talked, and he spent the night. Charles and I remained friends, but I was never as close to him as I thought I should have been, and I regret it. I never made a good portrait of him, and in some ways I feel like I let him down by not immersing myself in what was going on in Juarez. I did go over there a few times and photographed the maquiladoras and the shanty towns, but honestly I was scared. These are self inflicted feelings, Charles never said or even implied it, in fact he paid me the biggest compliment and I keep it on my website.
\"Don't bother to take photographs in Big Bend. James Evans owns the place and frankly you should simply buy his books and save yourself some time. He not only has what it looks like, he has what it feels like and means. This is a very rare thing.\" ~ Charles Bowden”
Charles died young, only 69, and I never got to say goodbye. I think it was unexpected, but we weren’t close enough for me to really know.
Here is another great quote from him, and I don’t know if he just said this to me or it is a published one. For several years I applied for a grant:
\"The Guggenheim is a crap shoot. I won one long ago. Basically they are cowards who give awards to timid academics who should have been strangled at birth”.
It made me feel OK about not getting one.
Charles was a man’s man. He was a smoking, drinking, and to me, hard living writer. With everything he knew and published about Juarez, I thought he would eventually have his mouth shut by someone in the Juarez drug business, but he died in his own bed, and I am hoping it was a peaceful end.
Charles produced an amazing body of work, and he was truly the only writer that told the world what was going on at the border.
Here is a partial list of his books:
Murder City
Blood Orchid
Down By the River
Juarez
Blue Desert
Some of the Dead are Still Breathing
Blues for Cannibals
Desierto
Killing the Hidden Waters
The Red Caddy
The Charles Bowden Reader
Dreamland
Frog Mountain Blues
El Sicario
Dakotah
Red Line
Sonata
The Sonoran Desert
A Shadow in The City
Mezcal
Jericho
Thank you all for the support you have given me over the years and especially in these pandemic times.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside
**River Trip**
It has been a year of not much camping and hiking due to Covid, but a couple of weeks ago we got our first vaccination, and finally got out. Marci and I did a river trip with three other friends and a guide. The river was very low, and we had to drag the canoe across the rocks several times, but the low water made for the clearest Rio Grande I’ve ever witnessed. We camped three nights, and each night it got a little colder. Marci is a good camper. Unlike me, she plans it out, slowly packs all week. I, on the other hand, am throwing everything in a bag 30 minutes before we leave. OK, I do have a packing list. I am not a good boatman. I am more like dead weight with a camera, so there were a few frustrating moments between Marci and me, and fortunately they design the canoe longer than the oars or I would have been whacked on the back of the head several times. Along with our guide Matthew, was Kimery, Hawk Eye, Duda. She is a well travelled athlete that owns and operates the Expedition School in Austin. www.expeditionschool.com. She partnered with Wild Adventures Outfitters www.wildadventureoutfitters.com, so we were well taken care of by professionals. I mention this because, we ate like royalty, and all of our needs were met without asking. About 30 minutes before the end of the trip I was changing lenses and dropped the 25mm lens into the Rio Grande. The canoes are constantly moving, and me with my eyes only on what’s in front of me had no idea where it fell. Kimery, however, was so observant. She pulled her canoe off to the beach, and within minutes found it with her feet, dove down and recovered it. I could hardly believe it. I had written it off as soon as it hit the water. At dinner, I asked her how she did that, and she explained how she knew about where I was as well as the other canoes, and triangulated off the land around us, and knew basically where to start looking. When you are camping, personalities unfold as natural situations occur. Kimery teaches and oversees hundreds of children at the Expedition School. This was probably an easy gig for her just caring for the five of us. Kimery was the hawk in a tree, I knew we were being well taken care of, but I didn't know to what extent until the lens hit the water.
**Texas Country Reporter**
27 years ago Texas Country Reporter did a story on me. At that time I was making photo lampshades, an idea that Big Bend photographer W D Smithers created. (Chronicles of the Big Bend, Kenneth Ragsdale.) When I moved here I had seen a few of his shades in people’s houses, and pursued the idea. It took me about 8 months from the idea to actuality. The material made by Kodak was called Translite. About a month after I started making them I called to get another roll and they told me they no longer made it. I said, but I just bought a roll a month ago. Anyway, the material was over, but I learned they had a 100 foot roll in Chicago, and a 100 foot roll in Rochester, New York, and so I purchased them both. I made a little less than 200 lamps, all unique. I had bases made in El Paso, and the frames made in Shiner Texas. I can’t remember where the lamp parts came from. I put everything you can think of on those lampshades. My ultimate intention was to tie my name to Smithers. When I brought one to the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Roy Flukinger, said, ahhh, a Smither’s lamp. I said no Roy, an Evans’ lamp. Mission accomplished. Anyway, they did a kind of what’s he doing today kind of story, and Bob Phillips asked thoughtful questions. I will let you know when it airs.
**Finding Home**
When people ask me where I was born, and I tell them West Virginia, I add, you do not have any say in where or what state your parents conceive you in. It’s my attempt at a comedic response, but more thoughtfully, you never know how far from home you are born or how long it will take you to find it. Where I grew up, I came to know where I was raised was not where I belonged. I headed west, living in Corpus Christi, then Austin, before discovering Big Bend. I have lived here half my life, and it took me half my life to find it.
**Crazy From the Heat**
My second book has now gone out of print. I’ve been working on a retrospective book and a book of geology, and frankly I’ve been pathetically slow. I hope to finish the edits soon, as well as filling in the images I need.
**The Beginning of The End**
With our second vaccine to be administered next week I am hoping that this is the beginning of the end of Covid era. We have relaxed our concern, but not totally, and I am still sensitive when I do something that a month ago I wouldn’t have. I hope that you and your family gets through this unscathed. We have lost a few friends, but for Marci and I, no family members. We feel lucky and blessed.
As always, thank you very much for your support. Your purchases literally keep us alive in the desert and through these strange times.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Cloud Of Summer
I shot this image in the summer of 99. I just recently printed it digitally, and printed it large. It is very beautiful, with full range of tones. I shot it at the edge of town, and there were two or three local residents pulled over to view it. It was extraordinary, and stayed in the sky till the sun set. The Museum of South Texas (Corpus Christi) has it in their collection. They told me they had a show and placed it next an Ansel Adams print, and though I was extremely flattered, I jokingly told them, well no one is going to look at mine.
The Second Vaccine and a New Acceptance
Marci and I got our second vaccine, and I finally made the trip to Austin I had been putting off for months. I was cautious and wore my mask in public, but felt like I could leave my guard down when it came to giving my friends the hugs I had been longing for. Socializing felt good, though there was always a voice in the back of my head screaming NO NO NO. This pandemic has shuffled the deck of my priorities, and the first card isn’t work. Not that it isn’t at the top of the deck, and there are several things at play in this evolution. Marci has created us a space to have guests. The 500 square feet adobe cabin we’ve been living in for three decades wasn’t an inviting space for entertaining. We have upgraded to our version of a McMansion, triple the space of our jacal, with glorious views of the glass mountains from every room. We are just beginning to feel how normal people live. The sacrifices we’ve made for my career realized. Our noses slightly lifted from the grindstone, making the time to, and enjoying the pleasure of, having a meal or a drink with an old friend or new acquaintance soon to be one. Life is good in this semi retired state.
Thank you all for the support you have given me over the years and especially in these pandemic times.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside
A TALK
I am giving a talk at the Museum of the Big Bend June 12, 2021 from 10 to 11 am in the education room. It coincides with a night photography exhibition put on by the Texas Photographic Society and judged by Lance Keming, who has written a book and taught workshops on the subject. Here is a link to the selected images: https://texasphoto.org/contests/AtNight/2021/selected/
Goatskins
Years ago there use to be a burro roping contest in Marathon. The local ranchers and cowboys would round up wild burros on border ranches, transport them to town, and hold the contest at Fussy Flats Arena. I went to a ranch to witness and photograph the roundup itself, and while I was there I saw these goatskins hanging on a clothesline. I set up a camera and strobe and photographed them. I sold a print to a man in Houston, and at that time I did not have a dry mount press. He took the image to Ronnie McMurtry Gallery to get it flattened and maybe framed, and while he was there Clint Willhour happened to be at the gallery, and he and Ronnie both purchased the print for themselves. And that’s how I was introduced to Clint. He passed away a few months ago. He was a fine judge of art and artists. He is certainly missed.
As always, thank you all for the support and keeping me alive in Big Bend.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside
**Museum of the Big Bend Talk**
I gave a talk at the Museum of the Big Bend for the Texas Photographic Society. This is a link to it on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/UG8c-2NlzNI
You may have to fast forward through some ads till you get to the opening title. It says James H Evans Museum of the Big Bend Talk. This is the first time in years that I have posted anything on YouTube, and I am not sure how it all works. Email me with any issues, and I will try to resolve them.
**Melba**
When I first moved here Melba was the woman that collected the money for the water utility in Marathon. I had not met her yet, but someone told me she once owned and operated a bar in town, and that she talked like a sailor. I mentioned the latter when I made this image if her.
**The Slow Burn of the Creative Process**
When I was younger it seemed like ideas for images and/or a series of images would surface like bubbles in a champagne glass. Some were good and led to a nice body of work, while others played out in an image or two, or dissipated as fast as the bubble. My second book, Crazy from the Heat, demonstrates this well. It’s not as cohesive as my first book, Big Bend Pictures, and it is more of what ever interested me that day photographically. As I have aged, it seems like that creative process has slowed down some, but there are other factors. I do not go to the park or camp as much as I used to. Camping and sleeping under the stars, for me, had a profound effect. Ideas and concepts would come to me. Funny thoughts too, I’ve laughed out loud under the stars many times.
I spend most of my days in Marathon working on and organizing the images I’ve already shot for a new retrospective book and enjoying the house that Marci designed for us. I still make portraits and photograph in town, but I don’t feel the need to go to the park. Tourism too, has changed the Park, Terlingua, and Boquillas very much. It’s over run. I’ve hiked nearly every trail in the park by myself and been the only person on that trail. I’ve hiked at night, spent days in the back country without seeing another human being. I’ve had several cameras set up all over the park, and was the only person moving around in the night. I’ve watched clouds form, storm and flash flood and then dissipate. I’ve walked over to the rain. I’ve seen amazing animals and critters, and snakes, and birds, and watched their behavior. Not like the matter of factness of a scientist, but with the emotion of an artist. I recently watched a documentary of Paul McCartney. He was going through the Beatles music, and explaining how a song and melody came about. But he didn’t explain it technically. In fact he admitted, he does not know how to read music, which I found astonishing. He would say something like, we put a chord over top of that chord to make it sound like this. Or how he woke one morning and the song Yesterday, was all there in his head, and he asked John Lennon and George Martin where the song was from, he felt like he must have heard it somewhere, and that’s why it was in his head, and they both confirmed they never heard it before. I just love that. Ideas, sometimes, they just arrive.
I had the park all to myself for about 25 years. It was, and is, a sweet life and love affair. Don’t get me wrong, I still love the park and enjoy every minute we have together. I just don’t see it as much as I used to
Thank you all for helping me create this wonderful body of work, give my existence meaning, and live the life I wanted.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Hello My Dear Friends**
It seems like the full moon came around quickly this month, and I find myself down to the wire to get a message out. Especially this month because the skies have been covered in clouds and I didn’t get to see the moon as much and think, I got six days till full so I better get to work. A friend of mine said I sounded a bit melancholy last month talking about the park, my love for it, and how it has changed for me personally. But change is a fact of life, and reminiscing is usually romantic, and the bad parts left out. I remember being at a Texas Monthly meeting several years ago, and a speaker was telling us that the population of Texas was going to double by 2025. I guess they were correct, and that is what we are feeling. Everyone that visits the gallery tells me their Texas town is exploding with new business and buildings. So it stands to reason this area is feeling that too. I think every one would like to close the door behind them when it comes to increase in population of their town or city. Big Bend is still, for me, the most amazing place, and I am very lucky to have found it. Every one that visits here regularly has their own bond to these mountains and landscapes, and I understand that.
**Rain**
The storms in the last month have been amazing. I haven’t seen it rain like this in a long time. I was coming out of the park last Thursday and the windshield wipers were useless, there was water flashing across the road in several places, and lightning crashing all around us. I kept going forward, but I was frightened. It sure felt like I was alive.
**My Next Book**
I am happy to say I have finally gone through every image for consideration for my next book. The next task is to edit about 75% of those out. It is a daunting task. But round number one is done. Both of my books, Big Bend Pictures and Crazy From The Heat are sold out, so I am anxious to get this new one to the publisher.
I am going to post a few sneak peek images, but these are just in the running, and could end up on the cutting room floor. These have been published before. People this month, I'll show you landscapes next month.
Thank you all for all the love and support you have given, and continue to give me. You all have affected my life more than you might know.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**A Beautiful Diamondback**
Last night Marci wakes me up saying there’s something right out our bedroom window making noise and it woke her. I couldn’t figure it out, and in my drowsy state I thought crickets, or a new hatch of something. I got dressed and went outside, and the first thing I see is the reflective eyes of our cat. Then I follow the noise to a beautiful, big, very agitated diamondback rattlesnake. He had been constantly rattling for a half an hour at least, and he had a lot of rattles. It was a beautiful sound. I recorded it with my phone and some professional recording equipment. I got a big trash can and put him in it and now he lives a few miles away. I've posted him on my Instagram account, if you want to see him or hear the sound.
**Hello My Friends**
It has been a fun editing and going through all these images of 33 years of photographs in Big Bend for my retrospective book. I have a weird brain. I can meet someone and in 10 minutes forget their name, but when I go through these contact sheets and images I can remember what the day felt like, my mindset, and my emotional feelings at the time. It’s not always pleasant, but most of the time it is. After I was finished going through the first edit I thought to myself, let me dig deeper, back to the 70’s, and see if I can find images that were seedlings or hints of a future style. I know they are in there, and I know of a couple of images right off the bat. But as I started to look at those old contact sheets and see my 21 year old self, and my family and friends of that time I put them back in the box and away. I couldn’t bare going through those feelings again. There’s a young artist I follow on Instagram, and she always seems a little sad and struggling, and sometimes she reveals more than I care to know, and much more than I would personally ever say on social media. I believe she must be in her 20’s. Sometimes I would find myself rolling my eyes at her admissions, but then I think about myself at that age, and it was really difficult figuring out what I was going to do with my life, how I was going to earn an income. I had not found Big Bend, and it would be another decade before I did. My whole life and creative career in front of me. It was the emotional angst I think we all go through to get to the thing that gives our life meaning. If you are fortunate to find it, you embrace it. While I wish I still had that 20’s energy, I would rather have my fingernails pulled out with pliers than go through those emotions again.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
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Recently, I have been in an emotional spiral. It’s not from any one thing and I accept it as a normal reaction of the human condition and my personality. And as I have aged and the directions of my life have found their path and the questions answered, the orbit of these melancholy feelings is more elliptical. I think it started as I got in to watching all these shows and documentaries about the 60’s 70’s that are based in truth and help me understand historically just what was truly going on while I was innocently trying to make my car go faster, or get a member of the opposite sex interested in me. Ignorance is truly bliss. Take the Kennedy assassination. That horrific murder has made me and my little brother speculate and wonder what really happened for the last 58 years. Any one not born then may not understand the intensity of those tragic few days, but it was PTSD for the world, and especially us two kids. Other generations have had their own end of innocence, RFK, MLK, Malcolm X, Tainted Tylenol, 911, John Lennon, Selena, Iraq, global warming, rigid political correctness, and this horrendous pandemic. Fill in your own blank here_______. Then a sad epiphany. I will never get to witness world peace, and is it even possible? If Jesus Christ knocked on my door, would I believe it? Would I want some kind of miracle proof? You’re gonna have to turn this water into wine buddy, and where did you get those sandals? As I steadily move towards my 7th decade, and watch some of my friends contract illnesses and health issues that has lead to or may end up taking their lives I realize how fragile it all is, and how fortunate my short straw has not been picked yet. How lucky I still feel and am to be born in America, a country where most, but not all, can pursue their dreams. One person can change the world, but most can’t. Now I want to change my world, through my mind. To trust laying down my sword and to try and accept and love everyone I cross paths with. A new tolerance. I secretly, maybe not so secretly, fall in love with the person in the viewfinder, now I want to see if I can extend it beyond the finder. To be curious and loving towards every living thing except flies, roaches and mosquitos. Maybe this is the lesson I must learn to be prepared to leave this planet to a new world. Who knows? So that’s my internal speech I share with you this Thanksgiving, the people that have supported me, and are helping me achieve my goals. A heartfelt hug and a handshake. And look don’t worry about me, I have stopped watching those documentaries and starting watching cooking and baking shows. The future looks bright.
Happy Full Moon
Get Outside
**Leigh Going to Sleep**
Over the years I have made many images of Leigh. She was vivacious and sharp. Her son Daniel is a very good cook, and he would throw her a birthday party every year. We were over for the celebration and I made this image when she got ready for bed.
**Lauren Werner**
To me Lauren represents a new facet of Terlingua that I don't really know. She had a vision for a boutique hotel called the Willow House, and designed and built it. It is beautiful. I try not to sleep under a roof when I am in Terlingua, so I really don't know what it's like, but hats off to a young person with vision and drive.
www.willowhouse.co
As always, thank you very much for supporting me. I couldn't live here, and do what I am doing without you.
**Till Death Do Us Part**
Denise and Bill have supported my life in the desert for as long as I have been here. I've only done three photo workshops in Big Bend before realizing I didn't like doing them. Denise attended two of them. They rent one or two of the cabins built by the CCC nearly every year and I made this image on the porch. I love it for the ambiguity. I asked them to kiss, and Bill pulled Denise towards him, but his hand around her neck seems loving or threatening?. I assure you this photo is why a picture can't always be taken at face value, and why they are worth a 1000 words. I told them this image is going to be in a museum someday, and I hope in the next book for sure.
**Retrospective Book**
This month I am going to continue to show you images that are in the running for my retrospective book. They may not be completely finished in the sense of dodging and burning, and color balance, because at this point they are just in the running. They have never been published or seen before.
The banner panoramic was taken in Terlingua \"Day of the Dead\" celebration.
**Boy on the Burro**
This was taken in Marathon. Sometimes I am on my bike, and an image presents itself. I always try to carry a camera, and these days the Iphone works great. This was taken with a real camera, but I take photos every day with the Iphone, and I believe I've made images that I could not have gotten any other way.
**Tanner Klein**
Several years ago I did a story for Texas Monthly on the Klein Family. A working ranch family. The three boys were homeschooled, and worked from sun up to sun down. Sterry Butcher was the writer. We have worked together several times, and turned out some great stories together.
**Jim Carrico and Ophelia Falcon**
This was taken the opening day of Boquillas. The crossing had been closed for quite some time. Jose' Falcon, Ophelias husband, passed away quite some time ago. Jim, suffered a stroke and did not have full control over his limbs. Crystal Albright and Mike Long worked diligently to get Jim across. It was a tearful moment for all of us when they finally met again.
I have something serious I want to write about, and it is still formulating in my head. I hope to present it to you next time.
As always, thank you very much for supporting me. I couldn't live here, and do what I am doing without you.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Triptychs
I had a request to put three images together so I thought I would try it and put it on the site.
Feel free to mix and match them yourself. These are just ideas, but I am sure you will come up with some good ones.
I've always thought of myself as a portrait photographer living in a beautiful landscape. My first book Big Bend Pictures reflected that because it was more people than landscape. I really think I achieved the ability to understand landscape photography status in the late 2000's, and my landscapes are really portraits. I am showing the most recent ones first.
Print sizes are from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\" and the square images are from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\"
I also have silver gelatin prints in 10\" x 10\" and 15\" x 15\"
*Refer to site information if you need more info.
**Message to my Friends.**
I was never a very good student. In fact my first day of school ever I was boinking the kid in front of me on the head with my pencil, and I got spanked. I was the sacrificial lamb for the teacher to show she was not going to put up with any shenanigans from us little twits. Of course, now I would have been diagnosed with A-D-D and Ritalined down to an apparition of myself. And yet, I rarely missed a day of school, and never thought of cutting class until my junior year. I did enjoy the comradery of my peers. I just don’t think that was the setting for a guy like me to learn much. When I was in high school, Tom Witts seemed so smart, and I wondered how he could know so much about so many things at our age. I am fascinated by and attracted to academics and people who are masters of their passion. Years ago I was hiking with Clif, and he picked up a piece of dried poop, and told me what kind of bird it came from as well as its gender. My doctor friend, Bill has one of the most brilliant minds I know. He can explain things thoroughly and in a way to make a guy like me comprehend it, then on a molecular level and watch my eyes get little X's in them. Plus, he has the memory of multi terabyte hard drive. Alan and Dan, my two bike riding buddies and closest male friends, who live in the area, have taught me more than I ever could have learned in school. Marci, my sweet wife, is an architect. She can’t walk in to a space without redesigning it in her head. Oh, I mentioned this to her, and she said it wasn’t true, Frank Gehry’s Disney Hall in L.A. is perfect. She has built a home that is as custom as a hand made glove for us and the cats. We all can’t stop purring.
In my youth I was envious of highly intelligent individuals, but I’ve learned to embrace it, and let them help and guide me in my life. In an obscure way my friends have made me a better photographer and human being because I felt like I could compete with their intelligence on an artistic level. I can’t imagine the kind of brain to come up with E = mc2, but can you believe how beautiful this print is? So thank you my friends. Thank you for making me a better person and a master of my passion.
I hope you all and everyone you love has a great Christmas and a healthy and happy new year.
December 28th is my 33rd anniversary living in Marathon.
Feel free to contact me. I appreciate the feedback.
Follow me on Instagram, bigbendpictures or jameshevans should get you there.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.**Maise Lee**
Maise Lee was a painter and sculptor. If you've ever been to the hot springs in Big Bend National Park and viewed the murals in Maggie Smith's place, they were painted by Maise when she lived there years ago. In Marathon she sculpted the doors for all the churches. I made this image in front of one of her doors at Russ Tidwell's house.
**Klemie and Tom**
You could always see Klemie and Tom walking up Iron Mountain Ranch Road near sunset. I think the whole town was shocked when Klemie suddenly passed away. She worked for me for a while and very conscientious. She had the sweetest demeanor. Very honest and very thoughtful. She would write me emails in response to my full moon postings, and I had to really sit with them before responding. We all really miss her.
**Manual Hernandez**
Manual has always been very quiet to me. He is the sweetest man. When his father Pedro passed away he invited me to make photographs. I was truly honored. During the construction of our house we asked him to teach us how to build a rock wall. I really wanted him to build the wall because I wanted his art in my home forever.
**Image of the Month_Marathon Motel**
The big thrill of the evening was the lighting of the first neon sign in Marathon. Monte, Klemie and Tom, and a few other townsfolk went over to watch. Evan Voyles was doing the work, but it started to rain and he had to stop. So Monte gets this idea and he lays down in front, arms stretched, and the light for the cactus lighting him. I open the shutter to start the exposure and lightning strike on the left goes off, and this freaks Monte out a little bit, and he gets up. As he does the lighting strike on the right goes off and it is much closer and works like a strobe light to create this ghostly image, looking like Monte's soul is leaving his body. I couldn't have been more fortunate. Monte and I made two amazing images. This is one of them.
** A Covid Story**
On December 21st. I was scheduled to get back surgery in San Antonio. I have a pinched nerve between L3 and L4. My doctor said I could probably resolve it with exercise and care, but I am impatient, and I figured this new surgery was the fastest route to get me back on my bicycle again. I had surgery about 8 years ago by the same surgeon, and I was good as new till this. If you live in rural West Texas, here’s how health care works. You schedule an MRI from the traveling machine for Monday at the local hospital, and in a day or two you get the results. You send it to your doctor in a city, mine being San Antonio, and they tell you what’s wrong and your choices. Actually, if you remember last month, I mentioned my doctor friend Bill, well he gives me more researched and thoroughly explained options than any other doctor I know. Not only that, but he has had the same type surgeries, so he can speak from experience. We drove up on the 20th, stayed at our friends house, and made our appointment on time.
Before you know it I am in a nursing gown, and doctor and anesthesiologist are telling me what’s going to happen. I also get a Covid test, actually two covid tests while I’m waiting. They wheel me in the operating room, and give me my first dose of medication, and the nurse comes in and says I tested positive for covid. They stop everything, wheel me out, and send me home. We take a home covid test in the car, results negative, then go to an independent clinic that gives a PCR test, and we both get tested. We do the same thing the next day at another clinic that has a 24 hour turnaround time. Meanwhile, I have to get out of my friends house, isolate myself from Marci in case I have it and she doesn’t. This required two hotel rooms and staying separated till we got the results. Now I think I am in the position of spreading the virus. I wear my mask, make sure I don’t get close to people, and yet don’t tell anyone. Then I kept going back through what I did in the last week to figure out where I might have gotten it. I’ve played it really safe with covid. We’ve both been double vaccinated and boosted. I require and wear a mask in the gallery, and everywhere I go publicly, so I was bewildered that I could get it. I had no symptoms. The results from PCR tests came back negative, and we were so relieved. No more than 10 minutes passed, and my Uncle called to tell me his daughter, my cousin, died from covid. My first family member. She was not vaccinated, and as far as I know it wasn’t because of her religious beliefs or politics. I think she was just apathetic, and thought she would be ok. She was 53.
I am not a religious man. I do believe there is a higher power. I witness it in these mountains and in nature I live in every day. I believe that if I was in the operating room, sedated and called out for two false positive covid tests, that’s Devine Intervention. Marci bought me the McKenzie method book and has ordered me an inversion machine that turns you upside down to relieve your back. I am going to start there and see how it goes.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Feel free to contact me. I appreciate the feedback.
Follow me on Instagram, bigbendpictures or jameshevans should get you there.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Ocotillo and Fog**
This image is from a ranch project I did several years ago. It was near the Pecos river, and some mornings the fog wouldn't burn off till 11 am or better. I used it to make soft spoken images.
**Sue Roberts**
It pains me to continually post images and memories of friends who pass away. There is a part of me that feels like it is my civic duty, but as I age it is more and more, so much so, that this email could just be just an obituary column. I've known Sue and the Roberts family since I've lived here. She had the sweetest disposition and was mostly always upbeat. Years ago when I was going through a divorce, she was the first person to acknowledge that it was all going to be OK. . She said \"these things happen, come out to the ranch. We made art together too. The \"Hawk\" image (see below) was a collaboration with Sue. She had raised it from a fledgling, and she could call it up by putting a piece of meat on the fencepost. The hawk would swoop and grab it. You can see it in its right talon. In her selfless way she brought most of the town together the last day of 2021 to seal the lid on the jar of a miserable year. She was truly a special woman. She is already very much missed.
I received a lot of emails last month about my attempted back surgery. I truly appreciate your concerns and kind words, and thank you Bill for the book. I am slowly working on a back stretching regiment and workout. Marci purchased me an inversion table and I am using it. My back still has some pain, but I am learning how to deal with it, and accept this is the way life is going to be at this age. Sunday I did my first long bike ride, and it made me very happy.
We went to see David Hamrick who worked tirelessly on the concept, layout and structure of what my retrospective book might become. He went through thousands of contact sheets, made xerox’s, and pasted together all the possible chapters. It was a lot of work and his ability to edit shined through. He has given me good direction on which to build on.
Texas Country Reporter did a segement on me that aired last Sunday. I received several calls and emails, and it sounds like I didn’t come off like the dork I can be. In the early 90’s TCR did a story featuring the photo lampshades I made. There was a photographer named W D Smithers, who made them 40 years prior, and I wanted to revive his idea. At that time Smithers was the most recognized photographer of the Big Bend. The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas purchased Smithers life's work, and so I went there to show the shade to Roy Flukinger, the curator at that time. As I presented he said “Oh a Smither’s lampshade. I said no Roy, an Evans' lampshade. I made less than 200 lamps before I ran out of material.
It was good to meet Bob Phillips. He is an institution, and what an accomplishment he has done with TCR for 50 years.
**The Texas Country Reporter feature will air again nationwide on RFD-TV Friday, February 18, at 8 p.m. CST.**
**Javelina**
I have seen iconic images of Bison that makes my mind imagine what their role was to the American Indian. And how they were decimated to make way for the onslaught of western civilization. I can still see that image of the huge pile of carcasses, bones and skulls. Thinking of the seriousness of that, I wanted to add a little humor and make a portrait of a Javelina in the same vein.
**Image of the Month_Kickapoo Boy Swinging**
I shot this image on assignment for Texas Monthly. I worked with the late great Jan Reid on this story, and we did it over a three month period traveling to Nacimiento, Mexico where the Kickapoo tribe have a reservation granted by the Mexican government in 1852. It was an amazing experience for me. We were allowed to witness from a distance, but not photograph a ceremonial dance for the woman. It was magical. The Hale-Bopp comet was blazing in the sky, Dorothy and Jan were still alive and healthy. (Jan was shot while on assignment in Mexico City in April 1998.) I have had the pleasure and good fortune to work with some great writers and fellow photographers. They have made my life more meaningful.
I received a lot of emails last month about my attempted back surgery. I truly appreciate your concerns and kind words, and thank you Bill for the book. I am slowly working on a back stretching regiment and workout. Marci purchased me an inversion table and I am using it. My back still has some pain, but I am learning how to deal with it, and accept this is the way life is going to be at this age. Sunday I did my first long bike ride, and it made me very happy.
We went to see David Hamrick who worked tirelessly on the concept, layout and structure of what my retrospective book might become. He went through thousands of contact sheets, made xerox’s, and pasted together all the possible chapters. It was a lot of work and his ability to edit shined through. He has given me good direction on which to build on.
Texas Country Reporter did a segement on me that aired last Sunday. I received several calls and emails, and it sounds like I didn’t come off like the dork I can be. In the early 90’s TCR did a story featuring the photo lampshades I made. There was a photographer named W D Smithers, who made them 40 years prior, and I wanted to revive his idea. At that time Smithers was the most recognized photographer of the Big Bend. The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas purchased Smithers life's work, and so I went there to show the shade to Roy Flukinger, the curator at that time. As I presented he said “Oh a Smither’s lampshade. I said no Roy, an Evans' lampshade. I made less than 200 lamps before I ran out of material.
It was good to meet Bob Phillips. He is an institution, and what an accomplishment he has done with TCR for 50 years.
**The Texas Country Reporter feature will air again nationwide on RFD-TV Friday, February 18, at 8 p.m. CST.**
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Thank you for listening to the complaints about my back. I only posted them to tell the story of divine intervention. I do appreciate the feedback, helpful suggestions, and books. But enough venting about my health stuff. There are people out there with a lot more problems than me, and I am still a fortunate man.
**Texas Country Reporter**
In the early 90's Texas Country Reporter did a segment on me about the photo lampshades I had revived from inventor W D Smithers. They came back last year, and picked up a kind of what's he doing now story. It aired February 18th. I've uploaded it to my website. Go to www.jameshevans.com and look for it in the menu on the left.
**Hallie and Dadie Stillwell**
When Dadie opened the Hallie's Hall of Fame Museum I made this portrait of the two of them for Texas Monthly to announce the celebration. I can't tell you how much I loved these woman, and what they meant to me. Hallie was a justice of the peace, and we were \"THE\" wedding team of the area for a decade or so. Hallie was quick witted and direct. She was naturally funny. Dadie was my surrogate mother. She was warm and nurturing. There was a documentary about Hallie, and it premiered at the Ritchey Brother's building in Marathon. Dadie and I sat together hand in hand through the whole event. As so many of my friends, I never expected them to die. Though, through my images and remembrances they remain a part of my heartbeat.
**Back In The Kitchen**
As you may know, when I first moved to Marathon I cooked at the Gage Hotel. I was not a chef by any means. They had several different plates, so all I had to do was learn the menu. I did enjoy it, but my heart was always with making photographs, so for me it was just a job, though I did care how it tasted, was presented and delivered in 15 minutes. And I really liked my fellow workers. Phil Thomas, the real cook made brisket on the weekends. He was an excellent barbecuer. He would cut away all the fat. It was lean, tender and very tasty. I only wish I had asked him to teach me how he prepared it. In the kitchen I liked learning how to use the different heat sources, and I would use my darkroom timers to learn how long things took to cook. Marci and I prepare meals a lot, but recently I set up the kitchen in my little house to cook and bake. Of course, I have to have every kitchen tool. I think this might be a boy thing. Enamel coated cast iron pots, an array of skillets and every attachment for the tabletop mixer. And my personal favorite, a Bernzomatic TS8000 - High Intensity Trigger Start Torch. Man is that fun! There are several gadgets too. In my purchases I bought an egg timer for Marci, and she handed it back pointing to her watch saying, I already have one. Woman are so practical, and by far the best thing on the planet.
Feel free to contact me. I appreciate the feedback.
Follow me on Instagram, bigbendpictures or jameshevans should get you there.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**Mary Ellen Mark_Photographer**
One time when I was in Wildwood I saw Mary Ellen Mark. I think I had met her one time before, because I knew immediately that it was her. She had an entourage of assistants, and it is beautiful how her images look off the cuff. I've always loved her work. We talked briefly, because I know how I hate being bothered, especially by photographers, when I am working. She asked me if I had seen anything interesting, and I told her there were about a half a dozen \"Jersey girls\" walking down the boardwalk, and pointed the direction. I wonder if she found them, and felt like I did about them.
Going through all these old and images, some that I have not seen in years has pushed my emotional feelings to the surface. Nostalgia I guess. I find myself tearing up over nothing. I've always ran on emotion more than logic, so it's not unusual, just heightened. My 15 year old cat Critter hobbles across the floor to his bowl, and he is the cat version of my own gait making it to the coffee machine in the morning.
On a sweeter note, I started reading Rebecca Solnit's book on the photographer Edweard Muybridge. I am embarrassed that I did not fully understand, and still don't really, just how brilliant she is. I am grateful for David Hamrick to put us together for my book \"Crazy from the Heat.\" A stroke of genius on his part.
**Happy Anniversary to Us**
Marci and I are celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary on the 22nd. I can't tell you how lucky I am to have met such a kind, beautiful, and smart woman. A woman who has seen at my worst, and has made me my best. I'm not joking when I tell you I fall in love with her more everyday. Happy Anniversary my life mate.
Feel free to contact me. I appreciate the feedback.
Follow me on Instagram, bigbendpictures or jameshevans should get you there.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
**My Mom and Gene**
In the early 90's Gene, my wife at that time, and I visited my family in New Jersey. We went to Wildwood, and kind of relived part of my childhood. For vacation my mom would take us to Atlantic City, Wildwood, or a place called Reed's Beach. We didn't go anywhere else. The weather was balmy and windy. My mom, lights her ever present cigarette and combined with Gene's expression and the piece of trash on boardwalk seems to sum up my whole childhood vacation experience. When I look back at the images I have made of my mom, it is pretty rare that she does not have a cigarette in her hand. She died young.
**First Rain**
I was listening to the radio and they were saying Panther Junction was getting some rain as well as 20 miles south of Marathon so I headed out to see it. On the way back I saw the coachwhip, and pulled over to check him out. I thought he might be road killed. When I got up to him though he was alive and well. Normally coachwhips are fast and gone. They are very hard to get close to, and though they are not venomous, they are as Alan Tennant describes in his book \"Agile Biters.\" This one was moving real slow, enjoying the wet pavement. I photographed him and he started to move off the highway. I made images of him in the grass too. It's the first time in 34 years I've gotten this close enough to have a coachwhip model for me. Patience is a virtue. Which I don't have by the way. Crystal Albright has the best image I've seen of one. Now I finally have one of my own.
**The Texas Country Reporter**
Texas Monthly picked up the story: The Man Known as the “Big Bend Photographer” Reflects on His Life’s Work: https://www.texasmonthly.com/texas-country-reporter/james-h-evans-big-bend-photographer/?utm_source=texasmonthly.com&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=sharebutton. You can also go to my website and watch the full 7 minute piece.
**Random Thoughts**
I watched a documentary on John Coltrane. He went to Nagasaki and visited ground zero. He played concerts in Tokyo, and I swear you can hear the screams of 75,000 people dying through his horn. He is Mozart of the Saxophone.
Marci and I have changed our morning routine. We make our morning tea and coffee, a ritual in itself, then do some of the WSJ crossword. Then sit on the front porch, watch the sun rise, the birds sing, and contemplate the day. What's missing you ask? The news. No news. We are happier.
Thank you all for helping me to have a good life. Time is precious and sweet for Marci and me right now. Your support plays a big role.
I don't want to ever serve or eat hamburger again. No reason. Just don't.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside. Don't miss the eclipse.
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Evans", "caption": "Manuel Teaching Us Rock Work", "type": "image", "content": "ManuelTeachingusRockWork_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1200, "height": 1200 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 159432 }, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2022-05-24T23:42:19.910Z", "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:49:32.123Z", "searchable": true }, "14137": { "id": 14137, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ocotillo and Moon_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Ocotillo and Moon", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandMoon20x30_.50lightsharpenedcopy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1050, "height": 703 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 65871 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "filters": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2022-05-24T23:43:36.898Z" }, "14138": { "id": 14138, "label": "© James H. Evans_Maise Lee_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Maise Lee", "type": "image", "content": "MaiseLee.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1040, "height": 778 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 130138 }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:20:26.135Z", "dateAdded": "2022-05-24T23:49:38.802Z", "searchable": true, "overrides": {} }, "14139": { "id": 14139, "label": "© James H. Evans_Kathryn Love_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Kathryn Love", "type": "image", "content": "KathrynLove1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1050, "height": 1006 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 150234, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:35:11.629Z", "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2022-05-24T23:52:47.410Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [] }, "14140": { "id": 14140, "label": "© James H. Evans_Jeff Fort_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Jeff Fort", "type": "image", "content": "JeffFort11x14_20light_Sepia2117copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 902, "height": 613 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 67826, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:19:24.432Z", "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2022-05-24T23:55:16.825Z", "keywords": [] }, "14141": { "id": 14141, "label": "Coachwhip_© James H. Evans", "caption": "Coachwhip", "type": "image", "content": "Coachwhip4.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 600, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 654949 }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-12-13T04:24:27.186Z", "dateAdded": "2022-05-25T00:03:18.095Z", "keywords": [] }, "14142": { "id": 14142, "label": "New Work", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "I am calling this new work though some images may have been shot a while ago. I have thousands of images that have never been published, and I am starting to process them for my upcoming book. Some are contenders and some are not.
Internal Clock
I was born in Princeton West Virginia. I lived in Bluefield till I was seven. My Grandparents had land there. My father built a house that was 1000 feet from theirs. My mother was from South Phila, and so when they split we moved back to Phila and eventually New Jersey. In 1963 we moved back to West Virginia. I was nine. My parents weren’t getting back together or anything, it was my older brother that wanted to be closer to Dad. My younger brother and I didn’t care one way or the other. Dad was strict with us. Unecessarily so. Anyway, we lived close to a cemetery, and there was little church. Kinda clapboard, not fancy, but clean. I used to ride my bike all around, and every now and then in the early evening I would hear singing and foot stomping and a real commotion going on. I would sit outside and listen, but I never had the courage to go in. I asked my mom what is was about? She told me they were “Holy Rollers” Those words Holy Rollers made my imagination run. It sounded exciting. Now, my inside clock did not start ticking towards the alarm bell of what are you going to do with your life until I was about 19. I was working in a machine shop, at the dishwasher stage of that vocation, before I discovered photography. It was at the machine shop too. Jim Stanton, a fellow employee sold me his 35mm Yashica camera. My jobs were to cut steel on a band saw, mill steel on a bridgeport, prep and paint the machinery, and overall lackey. Cutting steel is pretty boring. You just measure the length of steel, vice it in, and the weight of the band chews through the steel. I would read photo books in between the cuts. One of the first ones I read was Andrea Feininger’s The Complete Photographer. I still remember it. I eventually quit that job and decided I was going to be a photographer. There’s a little more to it than that, but the point is by then I was struggling to figure out what I was going to do with my life. I had no control over that internal clock. Maybe it is similar to the biological clock that ticks for a woman to become a mother. If that makes sense? Not every soul has it either. I have always been a frustrated musician. I could never spend the time it requires to get good with the violin or the viola. I have music in me, but I can’t get it out. What if my internal clock had started at age eight or nine. Maybe I wouldn’t have been as shy, or afraid to open the door to that church. My life would have been completely different. I would have been introduced to live music, musicians, and singing while still in my single digits. Who knows I might have been a cracker Michael Jackson.
Please Don't Confront Me With My Failures, I’ve Not Forgotten Them
Thank you all for wishing me a happy birthday. At 68 it’s not the celebratory event it was when you got a cake with candles and cards with money in them. These days I am keenly aware of things I get wrong or right in a day. I am a mechanical person. I can take things apart, and fix them most of the time. Out here, you kinda have to be. If you need a plumber, the best ones are busy, and expensive. The others are inferior, busy and expensive. Plus there are not pages of them in the phone book. It’s John or Joe or do it yourself. Marci and I ran a sewer line from our house to the alley to get our house off the septic system. It wasn’t difficult and we were proud of the accomplishment.
I used to pride myself on these abilities. I’ve made plenty of mistakes, and had plenty of failures. It just seems like these days even simple things are harder to accomplish. I was trying to put string on the weed whacker the other day, and took me forever, and was so frustrating. It’s not the big things you attempt and mess up, say like overhauling an engine, but the small things like adjusting the hinges on a door, and having the door fall off and ruin the hinge. Or as simple as hanging clothes on a line and not having any part touch the dirt ground. I went to dinner with Betty and Elise the other day, and when I got home I realized I had put on two different shoes. They are exactly the same color, and I grabbed the the right of one and the left of the other. I didn’t even notice when I put them on. Lucille French Clark, was my landlady and friend. She was THE French Company, originally. She was 88 when I met her. Small and frail, her fingers bent up with arthritis, she told me that the hardest thing about aging was not being able to do things for your self. She had a two story house, and had not been upstairs in several years. She asked me to go up and look around. Of course unless you have some kind of disease or traumatic event that prevents you from doing things then it’s losing your abilities by a 1000 paper cuts. And I just want to say these are just personal observations, and I am very fortunate. I am healthy and happy, and lucky, and I know there are people with much worse problems. These are just aging man blues. Big Hugs.
Happy Full Moon. Get Outside.
Weddings and Anniversaries
Last week I got an email from Julie Speed asking me if I would consider photographing a couple getting married. It was small and private, just the two of them with Terry Allen being the officiator, Jo Harvey and Bale the only witness’s. I called Terry and told him I would do it if while he was in preacher mode he would absolve me of all my sins. Terry said he would try, but he was not a miracle worker. It was a beautiful wedding, was over quickly and celebrated. I feel lucky and blessed sometimes when I get considered to photograph such an event. I rarely shoot weddings but I am open minded to whatever gets my eye on the viewfinder Behind the camera I am the happiest.
I made a portrait of Jo Harvey and Terry too. They were in town celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary.
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Marci’s mom died the other day. At my age I thought I knew about death. It's been right there, in my periphery, the whole time.
Drag racing photography introduced me to it first hand. A driver would cut a light and seconds later get killed in a wreck. A simple mechanical or human error.
Sometimes they would go out in a blaze of glory, the stands filled with spectators, setting the low ET of the meet. Other times the stands empty, and the driver, just testing the car, the track and the weather conditions. Fine tuning it all.
Those were the sadder ones for me.
Vietnam was over by the time I graduated high school. It is just rabbit foot luck that I didn’t have to risk my life for my country.
My mentor, Joe Vancho wasn’t as fortunate, and though not shot or physically wounded, he was emotionally scarred for life.
Can you imagine what war must do to an artist's mind, or anybody’s for that matter.
For years he had severe migraines. He said it was from agent orange.
I’ve lost a lot of friends, of course we all have or will, but Ruby was different. On the outside at the beginning of her demise she was talking, not always making sense, but the eye contact went right through you.
The sounds were very hard to listen to, but easy to interpret. The moaning. The relief of a cold compress on her face. The difficult breaths.
Hospice care gave us pamphlets to tell us what to expect in days, hours and minutes of life left, and we referred to it.
Then the beauty of it all. To see Larry, her husband of 56 years tend to her every need, and come away with tears in his eyes.
To watch Teresa and Marci, her two daughters tend to her 24/7 with selfless love, compassion. and knowledge.
It was the purest love I’ve ever seen. They did everything so perfectly.
I am sad that Ruby is gone. She was one of the kindest human beings I've ever met. I never saw her angry. She made sure your were comfortable in her home. She wrote down her prayers and wishes and kept them in a little tin in her nightstand.
For the person dying there is not much dignity in death. For those helping the one leaving this world, the true essence of a person, and what is good in a person, surfaces.
Tonight, when you look up at the full moon, toast someone you love. Toast Ruby. Toast your fortunate precious life.
I really enjoyed this assignment. I have worked with Robert Draper since the mid 90’s on several important stories including the killing of Ezequiel Hernandez, Boquillas, Mexico, and Terlingua.
Robert wrote the introduction to my first book, Big Bend Pictures.
Borger is a very interesting town. It is north of Amarillo, in the panhandle I guess. It is a working and production community. There are cotton farms, wind farms, cow farms, and oil.
All of the Texas essentials.
It seemed to me that it is a hardworking class community of people who live modestly.
Outside of the town there were beautiful vistas.
Flat land.
I pursued the Munn family to let me make a formal portrait.
I sent them letters, my book, and emails, and though Mr. Munn was cordial, he never did grant me a sitting. I told him I did not care what his political beliefs were, my job was only to show that they were a close knit family.
I wish I had gotten to do that because my only images of the family were taken in Washington DC as they were arriving at the courthouse.
About an hour before, courthouse security had cordoned off the press, barricading us back about 30 feet from the door.
It was two TV crews, and myself the only still photographer.
When I saw the family, I went around the blockade and got my shots. I was Ron Galella and they were Jackie O.
After sentencing Tom Munn came out of the courthouse and was waiting for the other family members, again I asked if we could do a family portrait, and again he said no.
Later that evening in DC we were invited to attend a vigil at the Washington DC jail. It was insightful. I came away thinking that these people have drank all the Kool-Aid, and there is no discussion about it.
I believe in their eyes, we were the liberal press, and the enemy.
When Robert told a participant there he was from the New York Times, I thought it might come to blows. I kept my eyes on the situation, and had his back. Fortunately, it deescalated.
I also came away with the belief that I do not understand politics. That, us against them mentality does nothing to help our country. I propose that all the Democrats and all the Republicans lay down their swords and daggers toward each other, and put our country first.
James Evans
To read Robert's story copy and paste the url below.
\"https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/the-untold-story-of-the-insular-texas-family-that-invaded-the-u-s-capitol/
**Dispelling The Myth**
I hear it a lot. \"Digital is easier.”
It is if you use an Iphone or auto everything camera, and do not use photoshop or lightroom to post produce and/or print your own images.
You never have to think about f/stops, depth of field, developing film and printing it. I think this is what Kodak was trying to achieve all along, and once it was, it ended their dominance in the industry.
Kodak still makes film and chemistry, but Kodachrome, the best film I ever used, has been gone a long time.
I think for the people that started with film, the transition may have been more difficult.
I have always been a slow learner.
Photoshop is not intuitive, and there is ten ways to achieve the same result. There are still many things I don’t know, but that’s a great thing too. You have a problem image and there is a way to resolve it.
In the film days, I practiced the zone system of exposure and developing. Ansel Adams created it, but Paul Caponigro had a unique version too. I practiced both. In a nutshell, expose for the shadows develop for the highlights.
You read the light with a meter, made the exposure, process the film, print it, tone it, flatten it, spot it, frame it.
When printing, you dodged and burned during the exposure of the negative onto the light sensitive paper. Dodging, is holding back light from hitting the paper, and burning is adding light to parts of the paper.
Dodging is done with handmade tools. I used different size circles taped to the end of a thin bicycle spoke.
Burning was done by forming your hands to the shape you need, to add light. Think of a projector casting light onto a wall and you are in between the two trying to form your hands to look like a rabbit.
I've experimented with different chemicals, toners, and bleaches. There is a lot of mystery and discovery to it.
When I was younger I spent 8 10 12 and sometimes 14 hour days in the darkroom. Loud music and something to drink was part of the process. A laboratory of fun. It is truly magic to see an image come up in the tray.
Digital is also fun once you have a decent knowledge of photoshop. With traditional darkroom printing, you dodge and burned during the exposure , and that was it.
Digitally, you can change a single pixel, and there are thousands of them in an image. That is a lot of control.
Working on an image now is more like painting. You can dodge and burn leisurely, take out something that might be bothersome in the image, make facial features more delicate. You can work on it for days, variate to black and white, add tone.
Digital papers are beautiful and theoretically the image should last as long as a properly fixed and washed silver print.
I think Ansel Adam’s would have loved the progression of the medium.
Here are the pros and cons:
Film.
1. Exposures have to be pretty accurate
2. You can’t look at the image you just shot.
3. You have to process the film
4. It can be sensitive to heat.
5. Film was limited to 12 exposures per roll.
6. You have a physical negative and something substantial for archiving.
7. Darkroom prints vary a little from print to print. I would always work on an image till I got it the way I wanted, and then make six.
Digital
1. It is more about capture than exposure. If you over or underexpose, you can correct it. This is also applies to color balance, and every concern.
2. You can shoot hundreds of images on a card.
3. No spending a day developing film, you simply download it.
4. Panoramics
5. You can work on an image as if it were a painting, saving it and coming back to it.
6. You can make many versions of the same image.
7. Once you get it the way you like it there is no variation from print to print.
8. You can make them very large, and they are as beautiful as a small print.
9. It is all electronic and you can easily delete a whole shooting session by hitting the wrong button. (I never use an sd card twice. I think of it as the cost of film and store the cards archivally.)
10. Electroncially you can lose everything.
11. I can not sit at the computer more than two hours.
Ok, that's all I got about. Questions?
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I have been editing for my retrospective book nearly every day, and I am steeped in my series called Bloom. I shot it in 2015. It was one of the prettiest springs I’ve ever witnessed in the Big Bend area.
Up till now I've produced about 25 to 35 percent of that work, and now I going through it with a fine tooth comb.
This whole retrospective book is just that. Revisiting all this work and culling the images I said to myself that I would print later.
Photographs age well and quickly at times, so an image you may have passed over originally may seem very good now. When I find an image that I shot years ago and think this is very good, is it my realistic mind finally catching up to my artistic intuitive sense that drove me to make the image in the first place, or is it time that ripened it to an image worth printing? Probably a little of both.
Bloom has a special place for me photographically. I had just finished the Ranch Project where I was hired to photograph a ranch for a private citizen to fill a 12,000 sq. ft home the family was building on that ranch.
It was a great assignment. I spent a week a month for a year, so I could be in every season on the ranch. I was given free reign to do anything I wanted, and there were no guidelines. The ranch itself was just land and sky, there were no mountains to get to know like the national park.
But the clear Pecos river runs parallel to the land. Flowing water creates and sustains life in the desert.
I explored every acre of that property I could get to. I found beauty and photographs in places where you might not think an image could be made, as well as sharpening my awareness of the subtleties of light.
It fully fleshed me out as a landscape photographer.
I approached the ranch in the same way I have with Big Bend. Try to know the landscape as intimately as possible, be in a good place for the light. Be aware that the sun may hit a mountain in a way that is more sculptural in November than is does in June. In a nutshell, fall in love.
It is good for me to know a landscape to photograph it. That doesn’t mean you can’t make a very good landscape image if you don’t because nature is a beautiful and happenstance subject. Constantly changing images present themselves for seconds and if you are lucky, minutes.
Sometimes I don’t look up when I am setting up the camera because I don’t want to see what I've missed.
Back to the point. The ranch project honed my skills, and this 100 year spring bloom happened next. I returned to the park with a keener eye and sensitivity that I hadn’t had before.
I would leave Sunday evening from Marathon, and return on Friday pretty much throughout the spring. I had an Airstream trailer parked at Angie and Rob’s and base camped out of it.
It was glorious. There is a succession to the flowering plant life. It starts with the bluebonnets, then the dagger yucas, the ocotillos, prickly pear and so on. The bluebonnets start to go to seed, and the yuccas start. In 2015 it didn’t do that. The bluebonnets never went to seed, and nothing else did either. Instead it just kept building into a symphony of flowers.
Big Bend was covered in little yellow flowers.
Flowers, I’ve never seen before.
Not only flowers, wildlife too. Every living creature seemed in abundance and happy. Twice I witnessed a swarm of honeybees fly by me. I photographed them too.
I would wake up with dew on my sleeping bag.
Being outside is the best.
Oh yeah, I played over and over again Townes Van Zandt singing Don't You Take It So Bad. It's those last two lines \"And the sweetness of springtime, and the sound of the rain.\"
**Snakes, Birds and Critters**
A great aspect of Big Bend, besides the beautiful wide open spaces, mountains and people, is the birds, animals, snakes and all kinds of critters.
It is literally a live reference book of discovery. You see a bird, you identify it, and add it to your knowledge. You learn their calls, and you can identify them without seeing them. In 1989 and 90 I would buy a reference book every time I visited Panther Junction. Finding whatever I was trying to identify in a book formed a bonding experience with the park and the critters.
Now there is an app for everything, and that sense of discovery seems diminished.
I have not had many encounters with bears, mountain lions or bobcats, only to see them crossing the road. I am always envious when someone tells me this is their first time to the park and they saw a mountain lion and or a mama bear with cubs, but then that is how big bend is, full of surprises.
If you watch the roads closely, which you should at all times, you can find snakes, turtles, tarantulas, horned lizards, and other critters crossing or warming themselves on the roads. We always stop, identify them, and safely remove them from the road. You learn quickly what snakes will, might, or won’t bite. For venomous snakes I use a snake stick to gently nudge or pick up the beautiful, misunderstood and feared creature, disrupting its basking in the sun moment for the possibility of another day of life.
I warn them about the dangers of the highway, but I do not think they listen.
One time I was driving through a storm on 385, and I saw a snake which I identified as a milk snake. When I picked it up it bit me, and I’m thinking Ok, is black and yellow kill a fellow, white on black venom lack? How does that go?
So I drive straight to Rob Dean and he confirms that it is a milk snake. The only one I have ever seen.
We made great photographs of and with him, and I returned him to the exact location I found him a couple of days later.
Marci has no fear of any kind of critter, and she is very helpful with keeping snakes on the white backdrop.
Can you imagine the story he had to tell his wife? How he had been abducted by aliens and was forced on a white examining table and a constantly bright flash of light would pop every few seconds.
Yeah right. You’re such a snake sometimes.
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Nightwork and Time Exposures:
In the early 2000’s I started experimenting with time exposures and light painting.
It began when I pulled up to a ranch gate a little after dusk with my headlights on. The lights lit the gate, and the last light of day was still visible in the background.
I liked the way it looked, so I got out of my truck and made an image.
That stewed in my mind for a while, and sparked the series I called the camera never sleeps.
I had recently rented a house on a ranch 12 miles south of Marathon. Talk about dark skies, when there was no moon, you couldn't walk outside without a headlamp.
There was a stand of agave and yucca plants in the front yard and one night I set up the camera, opened the shutter and “painted” the plants with a light, and closed the shutter. When I processed the film I was quite surprised by the results. Too much painting the light for one thing, but still the image was pretty sweet. One of the wonderful things about shooting film was when I was making portraits I knew when I got it, but for landscapes, and especially this work it was mystery and learning curve. I started to set up the camera at my campsite, paint the plant with a light and go to sleep leaving the shutter open to record star trails. If I woke up in the middle of the night, I would close the shutter and start again. Sometimes I overslept and the film was burned white. I lost a lot that way.
I started to experiment much more. I would change f/stops, lenses, locations, film backs. I did a few where I made the star trails on the negative and then made portraits double exposing the piece of film.
I had four film cameras at that time, and I would set them up all over the park. One night I had one set up at Sotol Vista, one at at Santa Elena Canyon, and one on Maverick road. I put reflective tape on the tripod legs so I could find them.
But the best one for me personally is “Sleeping Pattern”
Marci says when I sleep, I am a jumping bean, twitching and jerking, and she, who wakes up in the same position she fell asleep in, says I disrupt her.
I have a rack built above my camper shell, and I sleep there under the stars. One night I set my camera on the rail of the rack pointing to the stars, got in my sleeping bag and opened the shutter and settled down for the night. The result was great. Every time I moved in my sleep it jiggled the camera and recorded my sleep through the stars, making it not only a biographical image, but proving my bride right.
Train Wreck
There was a train derailment 20 miles west of Marathon. It was not bad and no one was hurt, but there were 9 cars turned on their sides, their wheels taken off and piled up. Several people called me to say go check it out and I did. I was fascinated with it and started making images. I made a few good images on several visits, but after looking at all of them, I felt I was trying too hard. Sometimes a series begins, with or without thought, and can last for years (The Camera Never Sleeps) or play out in three images. Southern Pacific started dismantling them and they were getting even better. They were can opener, opened up. Then I thought of the metaphor of people I know that are a train wreck, and started calling them. Unfortunately I only made one portrait before they were totally dismantled. And the one that got away might have been the best. I asked Ike Roberts if he would meet there on his way back from Alpine. I drove out and they were all gone. I can only imagine what that image would have been. Ike has always been a great model.
My friend and brother from a different mother Robert Draper and I started working on this story last January. Robert and I paired up on stories in the mid 90's, including the killing of Ezequiel Hernandez, a story on Boquillas, and a story on Terlingua.
Robert has recently released a book called \"Weapons of Mass Delusion. He is a great writer who has travelled all over the world for National Geographic and the New York Times.
Here is a link to the Texas Monthly article.
\"https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/the-untold-story-of-the-insular-texas-family-that-invaded-the-u-s-capitol/
**What A Month**
Hey You all,
Marci suffered with Covid for the last two months, and finally got home this Wednesday. I thought it was going to kill her, and though she is weak, it seems like every day is a little better.
Me and the cats are glad she is home.
It is a lonely virus.
I felt so hopeless.
Life without my mate would be unbearable.
I think our love for each other has taken a new direction.
Better.
I wish you all the best New Year.
Thank you for 34 years of love and support.
Happy Full Moon.
Get Outside.
Feel free to email me. I enjoy the feedback.
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Thank you very much for supporting my life in the desert.
**TRAINS AND CHANGE**
I haven’t photographed trains much. It is a subject that can fall to cliche’ quite easy, hence my reluctance.
When I first moved to Marathon, Shumake Hardware was still open. It’s the building in town that now has a rabbit painted on it.
I asked him how many trains come through a day?
He said “If you count them it means you're crazy.”
Then he said \"13”
Brides and Grooms, musicians and bands pose walking one way or the other down the tracks to absolute corniness.
Every imaginable thing is transported on trains. I've seen military equipment and tank, those wind generators, new automobiles.
On the west side of town there is no train arms or even lights at the crossing to warn you that a train is coming. One day I was driving towards it and was mesmerized by the light on the glass mountains, and I drove right through it. A train was on the horn. Three seconds later, and I may have been history.
That’s how life is. It changes in a second. Getting used to the always changing times is something that is difficult for me. Especially when several big ones come at you at once.
My Mom used to say that bad things come in threes. But sometimes it’s more.
Marci is still dealing with the after effects of Covid, but I think finally there is light at the end of the tunnel. The last couple of days she has had more energy.
In the past I have mentioned the \"Ranch Project.\" I was hired to photograph a private ranch to make photographs for the 12,000 sq. ft. home looking down on the Pecos River that was being built. It was one of the greatest assignments I've ever had. The icing on the cake was getting to know, spend time with and photograph the family. Three beautiful daughters, a handsome son, and all of their children and husbands. Well, the ranch was sold and last weekend the family and I spent the weekend celebrating, reminiscing and crying. I am really going to miss it. I can't wait to see what Ted does next.
Last month I mentioned the derailment west of town, and how I had asked Ike Roberts to pose for me in front of those trains, and when I drove out they were all gone except for a pile of rubble and so I didn't get to do it.
Driving home from the celebrating the ranch Tim, Ike's son called to tell me Ike had passed away. This was just too much. Sally, Sue and Ike, now all gone just breaks my heart. They have always treated me like family. Ike was good natured and had a good sense of humor. I loved them all. Photography has opened doors for me that other business could.
I am so thankful I got to know and make portraits of all these people.
Love is the King.
Happy Full Moon.
Get Outside.
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Banner Image Panoramic from the Ranch Project.
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I recently attended the 50 year anniversary of Texas Monthly. I reunited with some of my longtime fellow photographers, old friends and D J Stout, my primary art director at the magazine. As it turns out I missed several people that were there that I would have liked to have seen.
It made me want to write about my love affair with the magazine and expound on its importance in my career.
My first two assignments photographically never came to fruition. The first story was about Ted Segal, a man waiting for a heart transplant.
My concept was to live with him so I could be there the moment he received the call. I was in that Eugene Smith state of mind about the assignment. To be honest I vaguely remember all the circumstances, but hospital politics, and a photographer there 24/7 was rejected by higher powers. In a way I get it, there is no guarantee of a successful transplant. Though honestly, no matter what the outcome the images could have been amazing. I did photograph Ted at the beginning, but never in the Smith “Family Doctor” sort of way.
Sadly, Ted died waiting for a transplant. I remember too that they had a heart for him, and for some reason he passed it up. I do not remember the details.
D J ran a controversial cover that illustrated a man lying on an operating table with a hand coming out of his chest. This was before Photoshop.
The second assignment was Hurricane Gilbert. My friend Alan Tennant pitched the story and within a few hours we were on our way to Brownsville.
The hurricane landed in Mexico, so that story too was a bust.
I first met Alan on a hunt for snakes in Cotulla with the artist Bill Montgomery. Alan is really smart and quirky. He handed me 20 dollars and said go get us some rain gear. I said Alan, I’m not dying in a Hefty bag. I went to Whole Earth Provisions, and got properly outfitted for the assignment. I surgically taped my galoshes to my rain suit, taped my wrists. My thought was if I was in water, I was going to float. This cautious attitude was because Alan had frightened me with stories of his hurricane adventures and the inevitable storm surge that we were likely to encounter.
Alan wore cutoff shorts and a T shirt.
I love Alan. I have many good memories with him. He helped me move to Marathon, and eventually moved here himself. He, Dan Klepper, and myself rode bikes all over Big Bend for years. He now lives in Fort Davis with his wife Amie.
You have heard the saying that behind every good man is a good woman.
In D J ’s case is was two good woman, Kathy Marcus and Nancy McMillan.
They both began to give me simple assignments. Mostly portraits of people that the magazine scours the state writing about in three to five hundred words.
They would also suggest me to other magazines.
Then there was Scott Dadich, T J Tucker, Leslie Baldwin, and presently, Claire Hogan, Emily Kimbro, and JK Nickell.
The great thing about assignment work is that it gets you out of your routine, you get to travel, meet new people, meet a deadline, get a check, and see your work in a prestigious magazine.
It’s good on the ego.
I didn’t do any assignments to promote tourism. I probably would have done them early in my life here, but I simply didn’t get those kinds of assignments. I did one promotional type piece about visiting Lake Amistad. It was one of my two covers for the Magazine.
The other cover was of the writer Robert Waller who wrote \"The Bridges of Madison County.” It was a fine portrait of the man, but the story was anything but flattering, and frankly I was a little embarrassed by it.
No matter what you thought about the novel or the writing, it was timely and touched a nerve for millions of people.
I came to accept that I was not a cover type photographer.
I called DJ and asked him what was the first story he assigned me for TM, and neither of us could remember. He did say that he remembered calling me for a rattlesnake image, and of course I had one.
The other great thing about TM was getting assigned with a writer. The writers I've worked with are longtime friends, brothers and sisters from different mothers.
Mimi Swartz, Jan Reid, John Spong, Robert Draper, and Sterry Butcher.
Jan and I did story on the Kickapoo Indian tribe. We went to Nacimiento, Mexico where the tribe lives, several times over a few months.
We were invited to listen to but not attend a ceremonial dance for the woman. The Hale Bopp comet was in the sky, the tribal music and the fire is imprinted in my memory like it was yesterday. It was before Jan was shot, and he and Dorothy were beautiful and healthy
I did a story with John Spong on Lajitas when Steve Smith bought the resort and was spending millions to try and make it a destination for the jet set. Smith was about 36 million dollars into the project at that time. I asked him how much would be too much, and he didn’t have an answer. I believe he spent close to another 50 million before he threw the towel in. In all my visits I never met anyone that seemed to have a clear direction. I think Smith himself wasn’t clear either. It hemorrhaged money.
I feel a big mistake made by entrepreneurs is that the desert always wants to be desert. You stop watering and grass eventually returns to sand.
I was in Terlingua yesterday and someone is trying to grow grapes.
What a rabbit out of hat trick that would be.
Wine from Terlingua.
I predict they might get raisins.
Robert Draper and I did a story on Terlingua, and the eccentrics that were drawn to the area.
Apparently they are still here.
It was killing of Ezequiel Hernandez that was my most important work. Again, Robert was the writer
Enrique Madrid, the Sage of Redford, opened doors for us with the family of the victim. Ezequiel was gunned down by the Marine Clemente Banuelos while he was out goat herding. I understood the mindset. May is really one of the hottest months in this area. The Marines were dressed in Ghillie suits, eating rations, and living like they were in a war zone. A young man with a pea shooter snake rifle registered as the enemy. It is said that Ezequiel fired the rifle at something, and the 18 year old Marine fired back killing the boy. It is a sad and tragic story.
I didn’t know what a Ghillie suit was, but my assistant Mike Howard did, and he knew where we could borrow one. I made images of Mike wearing that suit.
Enrique Madrid took my photographs to Washington DC and effectively had the Marines removed from the border.
Needless to say, I am still very proud.
As my career progressed, My photography became the subject of interest.
John Spong wrote four stories about my photographic journeys.
Chasing Shadows when my first book was released, Light In The Darkness, about night work I did. This work was shot on film and before digital photography made Milky Way images simple and cliche’. The Ranch Project, where I photographed a private ranch for a year, and Bloom of The Century, the best Spring Bloom I witnessed and photographed in Big Bend. These articles helped my career tremendously. It established me as “The” photographer of the Big Bend.
Two of my favorite stories though were with Sterry Butcher. Our stars align perfectly because she lives in Marfa and I Marathon.
The Boys of the Dipper Ranch. A family with three hard working young cowboys.
The other was called Cheatgrass.
Holly and Teryn Muench entered a contest to train a wild Mustang horse over a 90 day period and then enter it in to a competition in Fort Worth.
The amazing thing was that they won and earned $50,000. I loved these assignments because not only were they fun, but I learned so much.
The most recent assignment I did was again with Robert Draper, and it was about a family from Borger Texas that stormed the capital on January 6. It may seem like it is out of my wheelhouse. I spent a week in Borger photographing the town. I tried very hard to get the family to sit for a formal portrait, but they never did. Politics aside, I wanted to photograph what I perceived as a close knit family. I could not seem to gain their trust.
Mike Levy, Greg Curtis, Bill Broyles, Evan Smith, Jake Silverstein, Mike Hall, David Courtney, the late greats Jan Reid, Gary Cartwright, and Paul Burka. All the people that work behind the scenes, and everybody that I have mentioned in this letter. You all have helped me become a better photographer. You have supported and promoted my life and my work. You have given me challenging assignments, and helped mold me and my career. I am very fortunate to have you in my corner for nearly 40 years.
A heart felt handshake and a hug. Thank you for believing in me. Thank you for believing in the work.
**Big Bend Pictures**
Last month I wrote a lengthy Full Moon email about my love affair with Texas Monthly. In the final hours Marci read it and felt like it was too long.
For those of you that would like to read the whole piece it is posted on my website. www.jameshevans.com
Log on and on the menu on left click on Full Moon Emails_2023.
I am excited to talk about the revision and republication of my first book Big Bend Pictures. The original was published by UT Press, designed by DJ Stout. It was reprinted twice and sold out. The book was released April 1 2004, 20 years ago.
This republication was the brainchild of Marci, because currently I do not have a book in print, and the retrospective is still in the works.
As we went through the original book there were images cropped like I would not do today. There are also 18 images we felt like we could trade out and make the book stronger.
When the original was printed I sent 11 x 14 prints on resin coated paper. This new book has all been scanned in house, so the images should be sharper. I also did not like the tone of the original book and we are going to change that too.
With about a third of the book I had already made tried and true prints. Another third are images I had already scanned, but not worked on or felt like I wanted to work on a little more.
The last third is new scans. Mostly they are portraits.
One of the greatest advantages of the digital age is the ability to manipulate a pixel. It is a lot of control, so say I want to lighten the petals on a flower I could do that.
Ansel Adams would have loved this.
SIDE NOTE:
A few years ago we met and became friends with Jeanne and Michael Adams. Ansel’s son and his wife. We spent a couple of days with them in Carmel California. Michael gave Marci and I a tour of Ansel’s darkroom. He had traditional enlargers, but he also had an enlarger turned on its side to make large prints. He would project the image on a wall. This enlarger had a bank of lights that lit the negative, instead of the normal one light to illuminate it. It was at least 6 rows across and 6 rows down. The bank of lights had an off an on switch on each light so if he did not want any light on a part of the negative he could switch that light off. It’s brilliant. It also had a big fan to draw off heat.
** A Tearful Goodbye**
After 17 years of being on the main street we have moved back to our original gallery.
It has been on the Gage agenda for years, so it was no surprise to us. JP held off as long as he could.
At first I was a little upset about it, but in retrospect, it has given Marci and I the opportunity to freshen up and make our original gallery on the south side of the tracks viable again. I have been using the front half for a shooting space, and the back half for coating my prints.
I still need to use the back for print coating till I can make a new spot to do it. So our showroom is a bit smaller.
Marci too has had to create a new office space. She operated the Marathon Foundation, M2M, and her personal work from that space. She remodeled a structure on French Company property, so she will be there.
We removed the chicken head house, painted the building inside and out, put in new glass and had my name painted on the front. We still need to do some landscaping, and Marci has designed a sculpture to put on the west side.
Evans Gallery is the oldest established art gallery in the area. I opened it as Lovegene’s in 1990, and then changed it to Evans Gallery in 1996.
I have never run the storefront in a conventional manner. I’ve tried having employees over the years, but most of the time it didn’t work out.
I always had a sign on the door to text or call me and I would come right over.
I liked doing it this way because it filtered out browsers or people that want to know more about real estate or what it is like living in Marathon, than was interested in my work, the pottery or desert critter wear.
So, that being said, now my friends and customers will come to my work space and gallery.
I am going to try real hard to be neater. (My biggest challenge.)
I will not have as much on the walls, but I have hundreds of photographs in stock, and can spend quality time finding just the right image.
Still, I will have a door bell that rings me in my shop.
It is all exciting. I think we both needed it.
When we rented the building on main street, Marci literally turned it in to this beautiful gallery overnight. She painted the back wall this undefinable maroonish color, got furniture and a Nelson light, then later added a baby grand piano. The space was very classy, and raised the bar for people to view my photographs. I was very proud of the gallery.
After we scraped our names off the doors and windows Marci and I tearfully laid on the floor of the gallery and reminisced all the good times we had there. M2M registrations, several piano concerts, our wedding reception party.
We said goodbye to that sweet space and walked across the street to our new sweet space.
Come see us.
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The new old gallery is coming along. I finally got the outdoor lights correct on the building, and I am slowly doing the landscaping, and sprucing it up. It feels really good to be in my original space. For those of you that don’t remember me being in this space, it was my original gallery I opened in September of 1990. I am the oldest art gallery open to the public in West Texas. I guess Donald Judd was the first. Come see us, we are across the railroad tracks, first building on the left. I have installed one of those “Ring” doorbells so it lets me know when people approach. There is also a number on the door to call or text. I am also putting notes up “On a bike ride.” “Had to go to Alpine.” etc. I am usually a few minutes away or in the silver building directly in back of the gallery.
The retrospective book has slowed down a bit, but the new Big Bend Pictures is coming along great. I have a few more original images to finish up, and then maybe 18 or 19 images we are going to change. I believe it’s going to be beautiful.
I forgot to mention that Sterry Butcher is writing the forward. She and I have done some great stories for Texas Monthly, and I love working with her. Also, she lives in Marfa, and knows most of the people I have photographed, and has a West Texas sensibility. She is a great emotional writer.
**Answer your Letter**
I got a lot of responses last month, some I really need to sit with and respond to. If I have not answered you yet, hang in there. I will.
**Critter**
Our sweet cat Critter died last week. It breaks my heart to write about it, but writing has started to become a way for me to assist my photography and put my feelings and images in a ring box. These monthly emails too, have forced a discipline to write.
17 years ago Danielle Gallo brought us a little black kitten. His hips were sore, and he looked like he had changed the oil on a car, and got some on him. Marci cleaned him up, and he became a member of the family.
We named him Pete Critter, but mostly called him Critter. I called him Itty Bitty too.
He was a fun kitten.
We played hard.
I would form my hand like a claw and put it right above his head and say he’s an itty bitty kitty. Then he would jump at my hand and give me hell.
I had scratches all over my arms.
He was full of himself.
When he was old enough we decided to have him neutered, and I swear he must have sensed it because he was gone for two days, and smelled like alcohol and sex when he came home.
We’ve always let our cats go outside, and in this environment that can be life threatening, but is seems cruel to keep them inside.
In the early days we took him everywhere. He has stayed at the Driskill, The Westin, The Hyatt Regency and travelled the state with us, even to a wedding. He seemed to love going places with us, riding on the dash or in between us on a pillow.
We gave him double love.
Marci would cradle him in her arms and we would pet and rub on him with four hands.
He would purr and purr and purr.
He also would get enough, and want down.
Critter had such a mind of his own. He wouldn’t lay next to you, and if he did, he didn’t stay long. When we would lay on the couch watching TV, he would be at the end of it, taunting us, for it was us that wanted him closer.
This last year he would lay next to me on the pillow. It was so unlike him, and I felt honored.
We both made stairsteps for him so he could climb on the beds.
I think he truly liked seeing us together.
He rarely meeeowed. He would just walk in a direction and we would follow to accommodate his wants or needs.
He drank out of the sink, and would get his head soaked with water. He did this every day.
Critter had all these hidden sleeping nooks. In Marci’s clothes closet, her shoe drawer, my drawer, a basket in the living room, and obvious places, the beds and the couch. I put Lucille’s old chenille bedspread in my drawer for him to sleep on.
He loved being brushed and had a beautiful coat, even at the end. He would raise his head up to the brush and purr. However you could not touch him past the middle of his back. He would growl or scratch you. I guess it was the wound he had as a kitten.
In the last few years we gave pills in the morning with hip joint medicine, and blend soft cat food into a puree'. You could hear him slurp it down.
The end came suddenly and quick.
I was sitting on the back porch watching the sunset. He strolled out and I put him on the table to make his photograph. I was actually photographing him as he started to have a seizure. I was freaked out and didn’t know what to do. I called my vet, and Marci who was visiting her Dad.
I brought him into my bedroom and wrapped him in a towel and blanket. He started seizing every few minutes.
Marci got a hold of the vet, and I took him. It is 60 miles away, and by the time I was half way there he was constantly seizing. I just kept petting him.
The doc put him down and Marci was with me by Facetime. We both could not stop crying.
I petted him all the way home. He was still warm and seemed like he was sleeping.
I drove slow because I didn’t want that drive to end. I wanted to pet him forever.
I buried him so we could see him from our bedroom windows.
It just so happened that the site was where a vein of rock was, so I had to rent a demo drill to break through 3 feet of rock.
Marci and I facetimed the funeral, and put him to rest.
Pets are family members, and so hard to watch them age. It is said that a dog or cat ages 7 to 1 to a human. That means every day is a week to a pet.
Now every day he’s been gone seems like a week.
**Cormac McCarthy**
I was saddened to hear about the writer Cormac McCarthy’s passing. I was sitting around the table with some friends and the consensus was that he was the greatest American writer of our time. We agreed that he ranked with Melville and Faulkner and surpassed Hemingway and Fitzgerald.
I had the honor to meet and photograph Cormac, and I want to share that story.
It was Kay Burnett that introduced him to me. We met at the Santa Fe Institute where he often hung out.
Kay had prepped me to be subdued and calm. She said you never know what kind of mood he might be in. He might be outgoing and fun or quiet and composed. I think she was nervous about introducing me. I had my book Big Bend Pictures as a gift.
We pulled in the parking lot at the same time, meeting right there.
As soon as Kay introduced me I just went on and on how much I loved his writing and his work and I handed him my book. I spilled all my guts in the first minute and I think Kay was annoyed with me, but we all went inside and visited and it was good.
Cormac was sweet, telling us stories.
I finally asked if I could make his portrait and he said yes.
I found a spot on the back porch with soft light and set up there. I made images of Kay and Cormac and of Cormac.
As I was finishing up he said “I don’t want to see these everywhere.”
It confused me, but I didn’t ask questions.
As I went through the Institute I met Murray Gell Mann and several other scientists. I made portraits of them too.
I was so excited.
I printed up images for Cormac and Kay and sent them.
I had an exhibit in El Paso at the Adair Margo Gallery and because Cormac once lived there I put his image in the show. Adair used it on the mailer, and when Kay saw it she got very upset with me because of the I don’t want to see it everywhere comment.
I had written to Cormac several times asking permission to use and display the images, but never got one response.
I was respectful, but at the end of the day, he gave me permission to make his portrait, and legally I can do whatever I want with it.
Still, his comment haunted his image.
I gave one to Bill Wittliff for his collection and one to Adam Muhlig, a close friend.
I’ve never sold it.
Wittliff lobbied hard to get the image in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC, because he thought mine was better than the one they had.
Now that he has passed I feel free the sell the image as I do with all my images.
Kay, I don’t know if you read my newsletter, but if you do, thank you for introducing me to Cormac, and giving me the opportunity to photograph this amazing writer and man. I could not have done it without you. I do feel like I followed his wish. I took the image in 2004, and there are only two prints out there.
It is now for sale.
**Tom Lea**
The Museum of the Big Bend had a grand opening last weekend. It is a beautiful building. At the opening there was a room full of Tom Lea paintings so I thought I would write the story of how I got to photograph him.
It was in the summer of 1999. Sarah Wilson who currently has a show of her work in Marfa at Wrong Gallery was assisting me at that time. We were coming back from New Mexico from an assignment, and decided to stay in El Paso for the evening.
I looked in the phone book (remember those) and there was his name so I called.
His wife answered and I asked if this was \"THE\" Tom Lea.
The woman confirmed it was, and I told her I was a professional photographer and that I would like to make a portrait of Tom.
She said “For what.”
I said “Posterity.”
She said “How much does it cost.”
I said “It’s free.”
She said “Hold on.”
A few minutes passed and she came back on the line and gave me instructions to meet him at his studio around back at 2 O’clock.
I thanked her and asked what was her name.
She asked “What for.”
I said “Respect.”
She said “It’s Mrs. Lea.”
I said \"Thank you Mrs. Lea and hung up.
Next day we met Tom, and he was a little standoffish at first, but by the end of it he was pretty sweet.
I didn’t bring any lighting, and there was just this little desk light he had to provide a catch light.
It was funny.
The light is just outside the frame and pretty much stuck in his face.
He said \"You’re late.\"
I said, \"No we were right on time.\"
But what he meant was he was old and not painting any longer.
**Big Bend is Unforgiving**
With the explosion of social media, the ongoing push of magazine articles, and covid there has been a significant increase in tourism. There has also been an increase of fatalities in the area.
On Instagram there was young woman talking about hiking Dog Canyon on the \"visit big bend\" site. She reads aloud the trail guide rules at the beginning, and it clearly states wear a hat, long sleeves and plenty of water. She had no hat, a sleeveless black shirt and a quart of water. She says \"I forgot a hat, my bad.\" And starts hiking.
It made me angry. This hiker blatantly disregarded the advice the park was stating, and that she was reading.
Big Bend National park is rated #3 for deaths in parks. That rating should not be taken lightly.
If you get in trouble here, a simple problem can become a serious one. You can bleed out waiting for an ambulance or help.
Several years ago Marci had a bike wreck in Lajitas and suffered a concussion. She wrecked approximately at 2:30 pm. The had to walk a stretcher 2 miles in the desert to get her. By the time she was in a hospital it was 9 pm. If she was bleeding she might not have made it.
And we were lucky because my good friend and Doctor, Bill Shea was with us and oversaw everything.
Treat hiking in Big Bend like you would if you were an airplane pilot. Be cautious, make sure you have the equipment it takes, knowledge of where you are going, as maps, and that it all works properly. If you have health issues this park is probably not for you.
Talk to the Park employees, they know current conditions.
It is rare that an airplane just falls out of the sky. It is usually a series of bad decisions and mistakes.
Same for hiking here. Like no hat, little water and exposed skin.
It is a great, beautiful park, but it is also a desert. Treat it with respect.
Happy hiking.
I sent him prints, and he wrote me a sweet letter. I cherish it.
New and Improved Big Bend Pictures
I finally finished up the prints for the new and improved Big Bend Pictures. It has 100 images with 22 new or updated pieces.
Because all my books are sold out, and the retrospective book is coming together slowly, Marci suggested to reprint Big Bend Pictures. Sounded simple, but once we started, it was a bit more complicated.
20 years ago the book printer scanned the images from resin coated darkroom prints. They are not as sharp as the scans we can do today. I had about a third of the images already scanned from a Nikon 9000 scanner. These were tried and true images that people have ordered prints from.
Then fellow photographer and friend Sean Perry and his crew helped me tremendously with a state of the art copy machine.
It produces 150 megapixel copy negs from a cold light source and very clean.
The Nikon is a condenser scanner, and while you start out with a negative with more contrast, the cleanup of the negative would take usually an hour or more.
Sean’s scans would take about 5 minutes.
For those of you that understand the difference between cold light versus condenser enlargers, the concept is the same.
Not to get too technical, but think of it like this. Sunlight coming directly through a window would be like condenser light and sunlight coming through the same window with a thin white curtain in front of it would be like a cold light. One is harsh and sharp the other soft and forgiving.
The great thing for me was understanding that Sean’s $100,000 machine is basically a very beautiful and precise copy stand.
I figured I could make my own 100 megapixel copystand with my Hasselblad digital camera. I purchased an enlarger stand and a 2 1/4 negative carrier on Ebay for 50 bucks, and a light source and slide holder from a company called Negative Supply for about $500, Then I purchased an extension tube from B&H Photo for the 100 mm macro lens.
So for about a 1000 bucks, less the 35,000. dollar camera, I made my own.
After some rigorous testing I got very clean negatives at slightly less megapixel size than Sean’s, but bigger and better than the Nikon 9000.
So look photographers, if want to make a copy stand out of your 35mm Canon or Nikon to shoot negatives, it is possible.
One of these days, I will make a Youtube video to teach you step by step how to get a clean, perfectly square copy.
I learned how to do perfect copywork years ago when I worked for Tomas’ Pantin.
Tomas’ you were the best teacher ever. You were so patient, especially with a hardhead like me.
The wonderful thing about the digital age is the control. The ability to work on the image, save it, go another direction if you choose, but for me staying in the traditional darkroom techniques of mostly dodging and burning.
It is easy to get heavy handed in photoshop. A mistake with some of the new generation of photographers, in my opinion.
The only thing I do that is not traditional is I might remove a facial blemish or if there is a stain on a shirt, or maybe something like a mark on a wall.
All to say very little.
I will soon be sending out an email to pre-order my new book. Please order many for your friends and family.
Here are a few updated or new images that will be in the book.
**Big Bend Pictures**
The new Big Bend Pictures is nearly complete.
I am still working on the words, but that shouldn't take too much longer.
**Catfish**
My friend Catfish passed away the other day. He was a good guy. John Waters, Catfish, and myself were scheduled speakers at an Old Timers Reunion at Panther Junction several years ago. He was really good. “Pay Attention.” that was his theme. I will surely miss him.
**Once In A Blue Moon**
My younger brother called me and told me he had two tickets to go see Jackson Browne at the Beacon Theatre in New York City and did I want to go.
You bet!
I had not seen Billy in a few years, and this was a perfect way to reunite. I came up the Monday before the Friday event. This way I could spend some quality time with him.
My brother repairs and installs the equipment that distributes medication in hospitals. He was on call, so I just hung out in the cafeterias and lobbies until he finished his work. Most of the time it was driving and talking.
I wanted to be with him as much as possible.
I did have one request. I wanted to find my old friend and mentor Joe Vancho.
I had lost contact with him a couple of years ago and I wasn't sure if he was alive or dead.
Billy lives in the same town as Joe, so we drove over to his house.
I knocked on the door, and his sister came out. She had remembered me from times past, and we sat on the porch and talked. She told me that Joe went to live with another sister, and that he was slipping a bit with dementia.
So we went over to that sister's house, knocked on that door, and there was Joe at the kitchen table coloring, in an adult coloring book, if you will.
He didn't remember me right away, and kept calling me, Kevin, but the more we talked, the more he seemed to come around.
I met Joe when I was 20 years old. We worked in a factory that custom built machinery for the dense foam industry.
They were highly specialized machines.
Joe was a welder.
I was a lackey of sorts, and did whatever was needed, but my specialty was painting the machinery.
I learned that Joe was an artist.
He was a Vietnam vet that came home, disillusioned by the war.
He suffered intense headaches he felt was caused by agent orange.
I would go over to Joe's house, we would smoke a little pot, listen to music, and talk about art.
I do believe what Bill Wittliff said, “What you're looking for is looking for you.\"
Joe was just what I needed at that time in my life. He convinced me that I could pursue an artistic career.
I tried painting, but I just wasn't that talented, and so I purchased a camera from another guy that worked at that factory.
To be honest, I thought it would be easier.
It isn't.
Once, in a blue moon, someone comes into your life that totally changes your direction.
Andrew Eccles, Brenda and Clif Ladd, Alan Tennant, Bill Shea, Giddings Brown, D J Stout, Robert Draper, Dave Hamrick and my beautiful wife Marci, to name a few.
It's having the sense and good fortune to follow the opportunities they help present to you.
To be open minded.
You don't get a heads up, or even know who, when or how that opportunity suddenly enters your life.
Joe helped me make up my mind and gave me the confidence to follow my dream of being a photographer.
I quit that job, and found my way to the local dragstrip. I photographed race cars for about five years.
Then I moved to Texas.
Once, in a blue moon, someone comes into your life and totally changes your direction.
**Once In A Blue Moon**
My younger brother called me and told me he had two tickets to go see Jackson Browne at the Beacon Theatre in New York City and did I want to go.
You bet!
I had not seen Billy in a few years, and this was a perfect way to reunite. I came up the Monday before the Friday event. This way I could spend some quality time with him.
My brother repairs and installs the equipment that distributes medication in hospitals. He was on call, so I just hung out in the cafeterias and lobbies until he finished his work. Most of the time it was driving and talking.
I wanted to be with him as much as possible.
I did have one request. I wanted to find my old friend and mentor Joe Vancho.
I had lost contact with him a couple of years ago and I wasn't sure if he was alive or dead.
Billy lives in the same town as Joe, so we drove over to his house.
I knocked on the door, and his sister came out. She had remembered me from times past, and we sat on the porch and talked. She told me that Joe went to live with another sister, and that he was slipping a bit with dementia.
So we went over to that sister's house, knocked on that door, and there was Joe at the kitchen table coloring, in an adult coloring book, if you will.
He didn't remember me right away, and kept calling me, Kevin, but the more we talked, the more he seemed to come around.
I met Joe when I was 20 years old. We worked in a factory that custom built machinery for the dense foam industry.
They were highly specialized machines.
Joe was a welder.
I was a lackey of sorts, and did whatever was needed, but my specialty was painting the machinery.
I learned that Joe was an artist.
He was a Vietnam vet that came home, disillusioned by the war.
He suffered intense headaches he felt was caused by agent orange.
I would go over to Joe's house, we would smoke a little pot, listen to music, and talk about art.
I do believe what Bill Wittliff said, “What you're looking for is looking for you.\"
Joe was just what I needed at that time in my life. He convinced me that I could pursue an artistic career.
I tried painting, but I just wasn't that talented, and so I purchased a camera from another guy that worked at that factory.
To be honest, I thought it would be easier.
It isn't.
Once, in a blue moon, someone comes into your life that totally changes your direction.
Andrew Eccles, Brenda and Clif Ladd, Alan Tennant, Bill Shea, Giddings Brown, D J Stout, Robert Draper, Dave Hamrick and my beautiful wife Marci, to name a few.
It's having the sense and good fortune to follow the opportunities they help present to you.
To be open minded.
You don't get a heads up, or even know who, when or how that opportunity suddenly enters your life.
Joe helped me make up my mind and gave me the confidence to follow my dream of being a photographer.
I quit that job, and found my way to the local dragstrip. I photographed race cars for about five years.
Then I moved to Texas.
Once, in a blue moon, someone comes into your life and totally changes your direction.
**Big Bend Pictures**
The new and improved Big Bend Pictures is complete.
All the words have been edited, and I am just going over it one more time before I send it off.
If there is any news about it before the next full moon I may send out an email. I am very excited.
**Once In A Blue Moon**
Last month I wrote a story about meeting my mentor at just the right time in my life, and how it changed my direction.
I spoke of how these moments are rare, and you don't know when they might happen.
I got an email from a young man who said he was in a job that he did not like, and though it paid well, it was not what he wanted to do with his life.
He said that after reading my email he felt like he wanted to quit that job.
I encouraged him to do it and follow his dream. If he ever writes back I will let you know how it shakes out. It made me proud to possibly be the Once In A Blue Moon person that changed his direction.
** A D (Buff) Mannion and Lighting**
I met A.D. Mannion in 1980.
He was a jazz drummer from New York that played with a lot of great musicians.
I met him in Corpus Christi, but he moved to Austin as quite a few of my friends did in the mid 80’s. We reconnected when I moved there too.
I had purchased a generator so I could light things on location. It is a great freedom to have the world as a backdrop.
I asked A D if I could make his portrait, and he agreed. I chose a road-cut on Highway 360 because I wanted a sky background.
A D broke his back when he was a teenager, and suffered with it his whole life.
I can’t imagine what I put him through, climbing up the road-cut with his snare drum, and then jumping to make this image.
He never complained at all.
When I moved to Big Bend I incorporated this lighting technique in a lot of the images that are in the book, and to this day I still like to light things.
If you use lighting you can separate F/stops from shutter speeds.
Let me briefly explain this.
Say you take a light meter reading and the existing light exposure is 125/F11.
If you use lighting and get the flash to match F/11, then you are simply filling the light, and it may barely show that you are using lighting.
If you increase the shutter speed to 250 the F/11 flash reading does not change, but you are underexposing the existing light. This separates the background more from the subject, making the subject more pronounced.
The images posted are all lit.
", "thumb": "ADBuffMannion2_September2023.jpg", "featuredImage": "ADMannionJumping.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1014, "height": 1024 }, "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 1131, "height": 1152 } }, "dateAdded": "2023-10-18T02:59:38.291Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14259": { "id": 14259, "label": "October 2023", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**The Camera Never Sleeps**
In the mid-2000s I started a series I called the camera never sleeps.
It began simply.
I pulled up to a ranch gate with my headlights on and after the sun had just set.
**Sleeping Pattern**
Marci says I am a jumping bean when I go to sleep. Always twisting and turning and waking her up. I sleep on a rack I had built on the top of my truck. It has a rail around it so I don't fall off. I aimed the camera at the stars, opened the shutter and went to sleep. As I moved it jiggled the camera and recorded my movement in the stars. You can see how interrupted the star trails are. It makes the image biographical as well as proving Marci right.
**Marathon Motel**
If I do say so myself, this is an amazing image. Danny Self, the owner of the hotel was having the sign rewired and a few of us went over to watch the re-lighting. Monte, a local artist was there, and we decided to make an image. He laid down arms spread next to the light and I opened the shutter. The lightning bolt on the left fired, and he started to get up. As he did the bolt on the right went off. It was much closer, and worked liked a strobe to ghost Monte rising. I could not have predicted the outcome.
I liked the way my headlights were lighting the ranch gate.
I got my camera out and made an image. I really like the way it looked.
It gave me the idea to open up the camera paint a plant with a light and then do a time exposure.
At that time I lived on a 2000 acre ranch. So I set up a camera in the front yard painted a yucca with light, left the camera shutter open went back inside and went to sleep.
I woke up a few hours later and closed the shutter.
When I processed the film I loved the image, but I did “paint\" too much.
So began a 4 or 5 year series.
I had four film cameras and a digital. I would bring them all to the park. Setting them up, painting the subject then going to sleep.
I changed film backs, F/stops, focus, lenses, and even locations. It was so much fun and experimental.
If the sun woke me up, it was too late, the film would be overexposed.
Other times I would wake up before the sun was about to rise and make images. These exposures are much shorter.
Some of the images are very sophisticated and technical, some are pure luck.
In August 2006 John Spong wrote an article on the work for Texas Monthly titled \"Light In The Darkness.\" It doesn't allow you to link it, but if you go to TexasMonthly.com and search my name, it should come up.
**Tres Ocotillos**
This image is a blend of luck and intuition. I opened the shutter in pitch black darkness and painted the Ocotillos. You can see the wave of light on my head as I am walking around with a headlamp on, as well as the light itself. Then I closed the shutter, took the camera to a different location and reopened the shutter and did a time exposure. The landscape in the background is from the second location. I had a show in Sante Fe several years ago, and there was a man there who identified all the constellations by the star trails. I just remember the one near the center as Orion. It is interesting too, how the trails veer left and right in this image.
**Sotols In The Morning**
As the sun was rising, I opened the shutter and painted quickly, then closed the shutter. It was darker than this, but film collects light, and it worked out beautifully.
**Sotols**
When you have a full moon the mountains do not go away. I painted the stalks, the moon painted the mountains.
**Pock Rock**
This is opening the shutter on a cloudy but moonlit night. It lights the rock in an inverse kind of way, but because of the clouds, there are no star trails.
\n11\"x11\"x3/4\"
\nShipped in Box and Signed by James
\n**Talk at Acc**\nMarci and I had such a great time in Austin with Sean Perry, Bryan Schutmaat, and Virginia Swanson. I loved being interviewed by Bryan and meeting some of the students. I also got to see Jace Graf and Roy Flukinger who I haven't seen in a long time. We plan to do it again. I'll let you know.\n
\n**Book Signing and Exhibit in March** \nIn March we will have an exhibit and book signing at Sarah Foltz Gallery, 2413 Westheimer, Houston.\n\nIt will be the largest show I have had in years.\nIt opens March 9 till and ends April 13. \n\nArtist talk/Booksigning Saturday March 9, 3-4pm. Opening reception 4 to 6pm. \n\nPlease mark your calendars and come see us.\n\n**Alice Neel_Portraits**\nI just discovered the work of Alice Neel.\n\nShe is an amazing portrait painter.\n\nIf I could paint, I would paint like her.\n\nPortraits has been my forte'; My ace in the hole.\n\nWhen I moved here I knew the portrait work would sustain me till I learned how to interpret landscapes.\n\nA couple of months back I mentioned how one person could change your direction. I feel like studying Alice's work could do that for me. \n\n**A Final Note**\nIt has been a tough year for Marci and me.\n\nMarci getting long covid, moving back to our original location after 17 years, losing our favorite pet and several good friends.\n\nWe had you though, the friends and supporters of my work, and our lives in Big Bend.\n\nI continue to photograph and work on the retrospective book.\n\nMarci continues with M2M, the health clinic, and our beautiful house.\n\nYou can not imagine how much you mean to us.\n\nOn the 28th of December, I celebrate my 35th year in Big Bend.\n\n I could not have done it without you.\n\nThank you.\n\nFor the end of the year I am posting portraits that you have never seen before.\n\nHappy New Year\n\nI post images on Instagram. Follow me at_bigbendpictures.\n\nIf you do not want to receive these emails, let me know, and please accept my apologies.\n\nI appreciate the responses and conversations I have with you.\nEmail me at jamesh@jameshevans dot com.\n\nIf you would like to sign up for my emails please send a request to jamesh@jameshevans.com \n\nEvans Gallery is the longest, open, independent photo art gallery in the Big Bend area. 35 years strong.\n\nLove is the King.\n\nHappy Full Moon. \n\nGet Outside.\n\nPast Full Moon emails are archived on my website. Click on the banner image to go to it.\n\n\n\nBanner Image Panoramic_ Caballos Novaculite in Snow.\n", "thumb": "KathyMarcu_Nov.2023_.jpg", "featuredImage": "MikeHoward_BigBendPictures_1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1200, "height": 1200 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "MikeHoward_BigBendPictures_1.jpg", "width": 1500, "height": 1500 } ] }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-01-30T04:30:03.826Z", "filters": [], "key": "14271", "overrides": {} }, "14272": { "id": 14272, "label": "December 2023", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Talk at Acc**\nMarci and I had such a great time in Austin with Sean Perry, Bryan Schutmaat, and Virginia Swanson. I loved being interviewed by Bryan and meeting some of the students. I also got to see Jace Graf and Roy Flukinger who I haven't seen in a long time. We plan to do it again. I'll let you know.\n
\n**Book Signing and Exhibit in March** \nIn March we will have an exhibit and book signing at Sarah Foltz Gallery, 2413 Westheimer, Houston.\n\nIt will be the largest show I have had in years.\nIt opens March 9 till and ends April 13. \n\nArtist talk/Booksigning Saturday March 9, 3-4pm. Opening reception 4 to 6pm. \n\nPlease mark your calendars and come see us.\n\n**Alice Neel_Portraits**\nI just discovered the work of Alice Neel.\n\nShe is an amazing portrait painter.\n\nIf I could paint, I would paint like her.\n\nPortraits has been my forte'; My ace in the hole.\n\nWhen I moved here I knew the portrait work would sustain me till I learned how to interpret landscapes.\n\nA couple of months back I mentioned how one person could change your direction. I feel like studying Alice's work could do that for me. \n\n**A Final Note**\nIt has been a tough year for Marci and me.\n\nMarci getting long covid, moving back to our original location after 17 years, losing our favorite pet and several good friends.\n\nWe had you though, the friends and supporters of my work, and our lives in Big Bend.\n\nI continue to photograph and work on the retrospective book.\n\nMarci continues with M2M, the health clinic, and our beautiful house.\n\nYou can not imagine how much you mean to us.\n\nOn the 28th of December, I celebrate my 35th year in Big Bend.\n\n I could not have done it without you.\n\nThank you.\n\nFor the end of the year I am posting portraits that you have never seen before.\n\nHappy New Year\n\nI post images on Instagram. Follow me at_bigbendpictures.\n\nIf you do not want to receive these emails, let me know, and please accept my apologies.\n\nI appreciate the responses and conversations I have with you.\nEmail me at jamesh@jameshevans dot com.\n\nIf you would like to sign up for my emails please send a request to jamesh@jameshevans.com \n\nEvans Gallery is the longest, open, independent photo art gallery in the Big Bend area. 35 years strong.\n\nLove is the King.\n\nHappy Full Moon. \n\nGet Outside.\n\nPast Full Moon emails are archived on my website. Click on the banner image to go to it.\n\n\n\nBanner Image Panoramic_ Caballos Novaculite in Snow.\n", "thumb": "Critter_2023.jpg", "featuredImage": "KenBarnes.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 765, "height": 768 }, "pageImages": [], "featuredImage": { "width": 886, "height": 886 }, "bytes": 0 }, "key": "14272", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-01-30T04:41:52.356Z", "filters": [] }, "14273": { "id": 14273, "label": "", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Big Bend Pictures**\nThe new and improved Big Bend Pictures should be here any minute. Marci is working on setting up an online purchase site, but you can always call or email me.\nI will send out an email as soon as the book is here and everything is in place.\nI am very excited.\n\n**Book Signing and Exhibit in March** \nWe will have an exhibit and book signing at Sarah Foltz Gallery, 2413 Westheimer, Houston.\n\nIt will be the largest show I have had in years.\nIt opens March 9 till and ends April 13. \n\nArtist talk/Booksigning Saturday March 9, 3-4pm. Opening reception 4 to 6pm. \n\nPlease mark your calendars and come see us.\n\n**Last Month's Letter**\nLast month I mentioned that it had been a tough year for Marci and me. I got a lot of well wishes and empathetic responses. I apologize for that because despite the long covid Marci and I are still dealing with, we are very fortunate and lucky, living our dream in West Texas. I didn't mean to sound complaining.\n\n**Andrew and Annie**\nOn the last \"Blue\" moon email I mentioned how one person can change your life. \n\nI first met Andrew Eccles in Corpus Christi, Texas. We were introduced by another photographer Peter Waddell. \n\nAndrew was leaving for New York in a month and we were inseparable until the day he left. \n\nIn the short time he relocated to New York he got a job assisting Annie Liebovitz. They travelled the globe together for three years, and Andrew has many great stories about it. \n\nOne day he called me to say that Annie was photographing Henry Cisneros, then the mayor of San Antonio for Vanity Fair and could I assist?\n\nI didn’t hesitate for a second.\n\n My friend Barbara Craig loaned me her dependable car and I drove up. \n\nWatching how Annie worked completely transformed my photographic direction.\n\nI don’t have the kind of brain that can read something and quickly absorb it, but if you show me I get it quick.\n\nAs soon as I got home I called Danny O’ Dowdy an artist friend and asked if I could make his portrait. \n\nThis image is the first one I made after Annie.\n\nRecently I spent the day with Deborah Fullerton, the curator of the Museum of South Texas. I showed her this image, and asked if she would accept a print as a donation to the museum, and she said yes. The museum has my image “Cloud of Summer” already in their collection, but I am very proud that this one will be there too. The museum has several of Danny’s pieces so it is fitting.\n\nI am proud because of what it represents as a portrait and as the beginning of a new direction for me.\n\nDeborah sent me a picture of Becky, Danny’s mate and the woman sitting on his lap. 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Evans_Rio Grande From Big Hill_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Rio Grande From Big Hill", "type": "image", "content": "Rio-Grande-From-Big-Hill_Big-Bend-Pictures-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 890, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 273942 }, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:18.944Z", "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "keywords": [], "key": "14389" }, "14390": { "id": 14390, "label": "© James H. Evans_Road To Candelaria_Big Bend Pictures_", "caption": "The Road To Candelaria", "type": "image", "content": "Road-to-Candelaria_Big-Bend-Pictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 200609, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:19.978Z", "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14390" }, "14391": { "id": 14391, "label": "© James H. Evans_Rope-O-Matic_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Rope - O - Matic", "type": "image", "content": "Rope-O-Matic_Big-Bend-Pictures_--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 110717, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:20.900Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "key": "14391" }, "14392": { "id": 14392, "label": "Ross-Maxwell_Big-Bend-Pictures_", "caption": "Ross Maxwell", "type": "image", "content": "Ross-Maxwell_Big-Bend-Pictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 614 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 39841, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:22.161Z", "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14393": { "id": 14393, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sally Roberts_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Sally Roberts", "type": "image", "content": "Sally-Roberts_Big-Bend-Pictures_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 130290, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:23.135Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14393" }, "14394": { "id": 14394, "label": "© James H. Evans_Santa Elena Canyon_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Santa Elena Canyon", "type": "image", "content": "Santa-Elena-Canyon_Big-Bend-Pictures_1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 273097 }, "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:24.711Z", "key": "14394" }, "14395": { "id": 14395, "label": "Shirley-and-Joaquin-Jackson_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Shirley-and-Joaquin-Jackson_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 206727, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:26.226Z", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ] }, "14396": { "id": 14396, "label": "Shirley-and-Mom_Big-Bend-Pictures--", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Shirley-and-Mom_Big-Bend-Pictures--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 241179, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:29.248Z", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:22:56.654Z", "keywords": [] }, "14397": { "id": 14397, "label": "© James H. Evans_Shirley's New Knees_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Shirley's New Knees", "type": "image", "content": "Shirleys-New-Knees_Big-Bend-Pictures_--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 241325 }, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:31.027Z", "key": "14397" }, "14398": { "id": 14398, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sierra Del Carmen From River Road_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Sierra Del Carmens From River Road", "type": "image", "content": "Sierra-Del-Carmen-River-Rd_Big-Bend-Pictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 264471 }, "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:05.970Z", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:32.196Z", "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "key": "14398" }, "14399": { "id": 14399, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sisters_Boquillas_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Sisters", "type": "image", "content": "Sisters-Boquillas_Big-Bend-Pictures-_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 129292 }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:33.133Z", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:05.970Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14399" }, "14400": { "id": 14400, "label": "© James H. Evans_Small Town Funeral_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Small Town Funeral", "type": "image", "content": "Small-Town-Funeral_-Big-Bend-Pictures---.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 142291, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:34.346Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "keywords": [], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "key": "14400" }, "14401": { "id": 14401, "label": "© James H. Evans_Snake_And Jesus_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Snake And Jesus", "type": "image", "content": "Snake-and-Jesus_Big-Bend-Pictures_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 825, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 152976 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:10.665Z", "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:35.602Z", "key": "14401" }, "14402": { "id": 14402, "label": "© James H. Evans_South Rim With Agave_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "South Rim With Agave", "type": "image", "content": "South-Rim--With-Agave_Big-Bend-Pictures_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 773, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 188697, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:37.395Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "key": "14402" }, "14403": { "id": 14403, "label": "Storm-From-Dugout-Wells_-James-H.-Evans", "caption": "Storm From Dugout Wells", "type": "image", "content": "Storm-From-Dugout-Wells_-James-H.-Evans.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 216, "height": 216 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 8385 }, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:16.966Z", "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:38.517Z" }, "14404": { "id": 14404, "label": "© James H. Evans_Storm From Dugout Wells_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Storm From Dugout Wells", "type": "image", "content": "Storm-From-Dugout-Wells_B--W-_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 121612, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:39.734Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "searchable": true, "key": "14404" }, "14405": { "id": 14405, "label": "© James H. Evans_Storm From Jewel's Camp_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Storm From Jewel's Camp", "type": "image", "content": "Storm-from-Jewels-Camp_Big-Bend-Pictures_--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 68496 }, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:37.318Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:40.834Z", "overrides": {}, "key": "14405" }, "14406": { "id": 14406, "label": "© James H. Evans_Superman And Champ_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Superman And Champ", "type": "image", "content": "Superman-and-Champ_Big-Bend-Pictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 182617, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:37.318Z", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:42.191Z", "linkTarget": "", "key": "14406" }, "14407": { "id": 14407, "label": "© James H. Evans_Tarantula And Tablecloth_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Tarantula And Tablecloth", "type": "image", "content": "Tarantula-and-Tablecloth_Big-Bend-Pictures_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 150549, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:23:37.318Z", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:43.576Z", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "key": "14407" }, "14408": { "id": 14408, "label": "© James H. Evans_The Eyes Of The Chisos_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "The Eyes Of The Chisos", "type": "image", "content": "The-Eyes-of-the-Chisos-_Big-Bend-Pictures-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 68034 }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:44.607Z", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "key": "14408" }, "14409": { "id": 14409, "label": "Tom-Alex-_-Big-Bend-Pictures--", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Tom-Alex-_-Big-Bend-Pictures--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 169252, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2024-04-23T00:02:26.218Z", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:45.795Z" }, "14410": { "id": 14410, "label": "© James H. Evans_Toy Story_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Toy Story", "type": "image", "content": "Toy-Story-_-Big-Bend-Pictures_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 155999 }, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:46.980Z", "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "key": "14410" }, "14411": { "id": 14411, "label": "© James H. Evans_Train And Isolated Rain_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Train And Isolated Rain", "type": "image", "content": "Train-and-Rain_Big-Bend-Pictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 148708, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:48.355Z", "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "key": "14411" }, "14412": { "id": 14412, "label": "© James H. Evans_Uh-Clem_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Uh - Clem", "type": "image", "content": "Uh-Clem_Big-Bend-Pictures_-2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 798, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 133606, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:49.787Z", "key": "14412" }, "14413": { "id": 14413, "label": "© James H. Evans_Under A Dark Cloud_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Under A Dark Cloud", "type": "image", "content": "Under-a-Dark-Cloud-_-Big-Bend-Pictures-_--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 158484 }, "filters": [ "Big Bend Pictures" ], "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:35:29.748Z", "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:51.259Z", "key": "14413" }, "14414": { "id": 14414, "label": "Zero_Big-Bend-Pictures_--copy", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Zero_Big-Bend-Pictures_--copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 608 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 83202, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-04-22T23:45:52.250Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "postDate": "2024-04-23T00:02:26.218Z" }, "14415": { "id": 14415, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ross Maxwell_Big Bend Pictures", "caption": "Ross Maxwell", "type": "image", "content": "RossMaxwellweb.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 604 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 54518, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:30:43.319Z", "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-25T12:39:52.852Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "key": "14415" }, "14416": { "id": 14416, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ross Maxwell", "caption": "Ross Maxwell", "type": "image", "content": "RossMaxwellweb.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 604 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 54518, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-04-25T12:41:07.512Z", "overrides": {}, "key": "14416" }, "14417": { "id": 14417, "label": "© James H. Evans_Big Bend Pictures_2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Big Bend Pictures_2024 Edition.\n\nThe book size is 11 x 11. The first one was 12 x 12.\n\n In this new edition there are 11 new images. Some I replaced completely and some I chose a different image from the same shoot.\n\nThe first edition was printed from scanned RC darkroom prints. In this new edition Sean Perry and I scanned my negatives, and I printed the image as I would now. They have a lot more depth and subtlety in the dodging and burning. \n\nThe tone is different. In the original the tone was very sepia. In this new version the tone is deeper and the printing is deeper too. The images are very rich.\n\nThe images are not cropped at all, but exactly how I shot and printed them. \n\nThe notes and stories about the images are updated.\n\nRobert Draper's foreword was left untouched. It was perfect.\n\nSterry Butcher also wrote a beautiful foreword. That is icing on the cake.\n\nIt was printed in the United States.\n\nOverall this is a better version of a great book.\n\nThe book is $70. not including shipping and tax.", "thumb": "BigBendPictures_Cover_2024Editioncopy.jpg", "featuredImage": "BigBendPictures_Cover_2024Editioncopy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "attachmentBytes": 55350, "pageImages": [ { "src": "BigBendPictures_Cover_2024Editioncopy.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 900 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "key": "14417", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:32:49.972Z", "attachment": "BettyMoore_BigBendPictures.jpg", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-05-03T04:45:28.945Z", "filters": [] }, "14418": { "id": 14418, "label": "February 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Congratulations to Robert Draper**\nRobert told me the other day that Texas Monthly submitted his work on the Munn family for Pulitzer consideration. This was the family that went in to the capital building on January 6. \n\nThe article ran in the January 2023 Issue of Texas Monthly.\n\nRobert and I have done meaningful stories together in the 90's on Boquillas, Terlingua, and most importantly, the Killing of Ezequiel Hernandez by the Marines.\n\nHe is one of my brothers from a different mother in life. \n\nCongratulations Robert. \n\n**Museum of South Texas**\nI was elated to see my image Cloud of Summer included at the Museum of South Texas last month.\n\n John Rohrbach gave an interesting talk on photography. \n\nI always learn a new perspective when I hear scholars talk about art. It is so different than my own.\n\nIt's like living through something and then seeing a documentary about it. You get so much more depth and insight.\n\nI was extremely proud to hear Mr. Rohrbach talk about my image and to see me quoted on the wall at the museum next to it.\n\n\"Outside is the side I take.\"\n\n**Some Things Are Meant To Be**\n\nThere was a gathering at the Big Bend Museum to honor the life and work of Jim Bones the fine landscape photographer.\n\nI told the story about how scared I was leaving Austin, and my commercial business to move to Marathon, set up a darkroom, gallery and workshop and dedicate my photographic life to working here.\n\nAlan Tennant, Brenda and Clif Ladd and myself caravanned here with their trucks loaded with all my stuff. \n\nOn the passenger window of my truck I taped a piece of paper with a Dylan quote:\n\n \"I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.\"\n\nWhen I got to the Gage Hotel to tell Giddings I had arrived, Jim Bones was in the lobby and welcomed me to West Texas.\n\nI'd never met him, but he was famous to me.\n\nThat compassionate gesture made me realize I had made the right decision.\n\n**Final Note**\nI mentioned last month to send you, if you asked, my response to the Wall Street Journal article as well as Mike Levy's story about the photographers of Texas Monthly. I sent out a few, and got feedback that they were having problems with them. I am still going to try and fix that. My technical genius buddy, Ammar, is coming in this weekend, and I am gonna ask him to help me.", "thumb": "TheMunns_WashingtonDC_feb2024230.jpg", "featuredImage": "OutsideisthesideItake1copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 749 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "OutsideisthesideItake1copy.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 675 } ] }, "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "key": "14418", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-05-26T03:00:10.101Z" }, "14419": { "id": 14419, "label": "March 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**What's Next**\nNow that the new Big Bend Pictures is complete, I have started to edit for the retrospective book. We are in that creative idea stage about what it will be, but at this point nothing is cast in stone, so I can not elaborate. I am going to work from my earliest images in the 1970's till now.\n\nThere is not a lot of great images from that time, mostly family, some drag racing, and quite a few hokey things from a young man struggling to make art. \n\nI am never going to show these.\n\nThen every now and then there was a hint of what was to eventually become a style.\n\nIn those early years I was influenced by Diane Arbus, Arnold Newman, Duane Michals, William Eggleston, and John Szarkowski's book Mirrors and Windows. \n\nIn 1976 Patti Smith's album Horses came out, and I remember looking at the portrait of her on the album cover and thinking, that's the kind of portraits I want to make.\n\nI feel very fortunate to at least know at 20 years old what I wanted to do with my life\n. \nI hit the lottery to be born in America, and dare I say it, the right skin color. \n\nThe prejudice and bias going on in our country is very sad to me.\n\nWe are all immigrants. \n\nIt's two steps forward and one step back.\n\nFor those of you that were not born in the 60's, there were so many tragedies. \n\nPolitical leaders and peace makers were murdered.\n\nThen miraculously we land men on the moon with a computer not as powerful as your iPhone.\n\nThe whole world, mankind itself, was proud. \n\nI hope before I die, something as amazing as that happens again.\n\nSay a cure for cancer. \n\nThe Beatles were right. All you need is love.\n\nI struggle with injustice.\n\nIt makes me angry, and I find it difficult to keep it out of my body and my thoughts.\n\nThe love I have for my work, this landscape, Marci, my friends and family, and the people that keep me alive in this desert sustains me.\n\nI am forever grateful.\n\nThank you.\n \n**Marfa Public Radio**\nMitch Borden from Marfa Public Radio did an interview about the new book.\n* Click on the book to go to it.\n\n", "thumb": "NewBook_March2024.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 903 }, "pageImages": [], "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 0 }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14419", "dateAdded": "2024-05-26T03:30:46.101Z", "overrides": {} }, "14420": { "id": 14420, "label": "April 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Lucille French Clark**\n\nLucille French Clark was my friend, my landlady, and essential to my photographic life in West Texas.\n\nWhen I came out to Big Bend in November of 1988 we stopped by the Gage Hotel. I ended up applying for a job there, and moved to Marathon a month later.\n\nI had set up by phone and made arrangements with Bill Donnell to rent a space in his building which was actually the last French Company store. It is the space next to the post office. Lucille sold it to Donnell when she retired in 1972. I believe he kept it open for a couple of years, but then closed it for good. The name was revived by Marci in 2006.\n\nI wanted a place where I could build a darkroom and have a storefront.\n\nOn December 28th, 1988 I pulled up to the hotel with three truckloads of my belongings. Brenda and Clif Ladd and Alan Tennant and Margaret Campbell drove the other two.\n\nGiddings put us up for the night and I called Bill the next day to pick up the key and give him a rent check, only to learn he had changed his mind and decided not to rent the space.\n\nI panicked and told Giddings I really needed a building. He offered me what is now the V6 coffee shop, but I would have only the downstairs, because the upstairs was the Gage office.\n\nThat wasn’t going to work for me so we drove around and Giddings pointed out the first building across the railroad tracks on the left. It looked like it could use some TLC, but was a good size, stood alone, and had a storefront.\n\nLucille lived in the two story house next door to the building.\n\nGiddings, in his wisdom, said take off that full length wool coat, he thought it looked mafia, comb your hair, and let’s both meet Lucille.\n\nShe was in the back room of the house, in bed, in pajamas with a crocheted sweater. She was small and frail, and her fingers were bent like wings from arthritis. She could still use them, but it looked painful.\n\nI explained my situation, and she told me where the key to the building was, and while she and Giddings talked I checked it out\n\nIt was perfect, with high ceilings, a wall that divided the front in two spaces, and a large back room with a bathroom, ie:running water.\n\nIt was the original French Company building that her dad, W M French opened in 1900. At one time it was attached to the two story Lucille lived in, but was moved over. \n\nIt’s last use was a truck weigh station, and the huge scale was still in the ground and there was a little building attached on the west side where the money end of the scale was.\n\nIt weighed the trucks hauling fluorspar from La Linda to the processing plant that was directly in front of the Gage Hotel.\n\n It was still active when I moved here.\n\n I asked how much to rent. She said $100. a month.\n\n Deal.\n\nLucille asked where I was going to live, and I said in the building, but she said there is a little rent house on the property, and that I should check it out. It was about 500 sq. ft., also needed some TLC, but I thought it would work beautifully for me and asked what the rent was for that. She said that would be $50 a month.\n\nI hugged her so hard she crunched, and our friendship began.\n\nThose beginning days were glorious for me. The groundwork was done. I was learning how to cook, I was remodeling the building, and I was going to the park as much as possible. I never took a picture for 6 months. I would just hike and watch the light. I’ll save that story for another time, because I want to stay on Lucille.\n\nMy understanding was that she wasn’t always liked. In those days the ranchers and families ran tabs at the store until they sold their herds. She was insistent on being paid, and my experience of loaning and borrowing money, without a banker involved, leaves a bad taste in everyone's mouth.\n\nI tried to visit with her often, but sometimes days would go by and I realized I had not seen her. Whenever storms would come, I would go sit with her. She was frightened by them. She taught me to unplug everything, and I still do to this day. In 35 years I’ve only lost one TV set to lightning.\n\nShe told me stories about her sister, and her brother Palmer, who died very young.\n\nLucille was real serious, but she also had a sense of humor. When I first moved in and turned the water on to the little house and studio, my first water bill was over $350. There was a leak and I didn’t know where it was.\n\nI found it by butterflies. They were flying all around the damp ground. The break was actually under the concrete that led to her door. She said James, you just do what you have to do to fix it. I tore up the concrete, and temporarily repaired it by wrapping a automobile water hose around it hose clamps right next to each other. I thought it worked.\n\nNext month Lucille calls me over when the water bill came in. I thought, oh no, I can’t afford another high water bill. She’s holding the bill in her hand, and she says look at this, and hands it to me. It was the normal fee, and she had this grin on her face like she had pulled one over on me. I can still see it. \n\nWhen she began to need more doctor care I would drive her to Alpine. Not all the time, she had caregivers. One time we were coming back from the doctor’s and she said let’s get an ice cream, I’ll buy. We stopped at the DQ and ordered two cones, and she pulls out her checkbook to write a 1.49 check. I said, oh Lucille let me get it.\n\nShe died April 4th, 1991. I remember it well. The morning started out sunny, then a cold front blew in and ripped my flag off the pole, and it ended up in her driveway. She died that morning with her nieces present. It hailed and covered the glass mountains completely, and stayed there for three days. It was as if it was her parting gift.\n\nLucille did not have children, and her nieces lived in other parts of the state. They made it very easy for me to purchase the properties, and I did.\n\nI didn’t do much with her house. I would just check on it, make sure everything was OK. \n\nI documented each room as it was after she died.\n\nIt didn’t move me at all.\n\nThen one day I picked up a tarantula a placed it on the tableclothed dining room table and made a photograph.\n\nI loved it.\n\nI began to find a critter for each room.\n\nThat is what became my Lucille series.\n\nIt was the first time that I used photography in an artistic way to express the loss I felt for a dear friend.\n\nHere is the series in it's entirety.\n
", "thumb": "LucillesLastStore_April2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "Bull-Snake-on-Sofa-_-James-H.-Evans_--.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 708 }, "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 752, "height": 900 } }, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2024-05-26T03:48:54.792Z", "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "" }, "14421": { "id": 14421, "label": "May 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Chisos Is Bliss**\nI am proud to announce that Lisa and Mark Bliss have added my image to their restaurant, Bliss in San Antonio.\n\nIt is the banner image above. It is 40 inches tall and 14.5 feet wide. The frame is 400-600 year old reclaimed cottonwood.\n\nLisa and Mark's restaurant is in San Antonio at 926 South Presa St. 78210\nPhone: 210-225-2547 for reservations.\n\nThis is best way to see the Chisos in a restaurant setting as opposed to the 150 seat restaurant that they planning to build in the Chisos Basin.\n\n **The Killing of Ezequiel Hernandez.**\n\nOn May 20, 1997 Ezequiel Hernandez was shot and killed by Marines on the Texas border in Redford, Texas.\n\nRobert Draper and I were the first, and only, press on the scene, and with the help of Enrique Madrid got access to the Hernandez family and their home. \n\nWe learned that the Marines were wearing Ghillie suits. I didn’t know what that was, but my assistant Mike Howard did, and called a guy that had one.\nI photographed Mike in that suit. It is the most important image I ever took. \n\nEnrique Madrid brought my photographs to Washington DC, and effectively had the Marines removed the border. It is my proudest moment, and my saddest assignment.\n\nThere should never be Marines on the border again, no matter politics push for it. Marines are for war.\n\nTo read the original article, go to: www.texasmonthly.com, then type in Ezequiel Hernandez, that should take you the story titled \"Soldiers Of Misfortune.\"\n\nHere are some of the images from that assignment.\n", "thumb": "Ghillie-Suit_Mqay2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "EsequielsBedroom_BigBendPictures_copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1077, "height": 1140 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "EsequielsBedroom_BigBendPictures_copy.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 900 } ], "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "key": "14421", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-05-26T03:50:57.512Z" }, "14422": { "id": 14422, "label": "© James H. Evans_River Road With Lightning", "caption": "River Road with Lightning", "type": "image", "content": "RiverRoadandLightning_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 112643 }, "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-06-05T22:45:22.260Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "" }, "14423": { "id": 14423, "label": "RiverRoadandLightning_", "caption": "River Road with Lightning", "type": "image", "content": "RiverRoadandLightning_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 112643 }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "dateAdded": "2024-06-05T22:46:33.747Z", "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14424": { "id": 14424, "label": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900", "caption": "Big Bend Pictures_2024 Edition.\n\nThe book size is 11 x 11. The first one was 12 x 12.\n\n In this new edition there are 11 new images. Some I replaced completely and some I chose a different image from the same shoot.\n\nThe first edition was printed from scanned RC darkroom prints. In this new edition Sean Perry and I scanned my negatives, and I printed the image as I would now. They have a lot more depth and subtlety in the dodging and burning. \n\nThe tone is different. In the original the tone was very sepia. In this new version the tone is deeper and the printing is deeper too. The images are very rich.\n\nThe images are not cropped at all, but exactly how I shot and printed them. \n\nThe notes and stories about the images are updated.\n\nRobert Draper's foreword was left untouched. It was perfect.\n\nSterry Butcher also wrote a beautiful foreword. That is icing on the cake.\n\nIt was printed in the United States.\n\nOverall this is a better version of a great book.\n\nThe book is $70. not including shipping and tax.\n\n", "type": "image", "content": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "thumb": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "attachmentBytes": 119764, "bytes": 119764, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2024-06-07T04:33:16.377Z", "attachment": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14425": { "id": 14425, "label": "© James H. Evans_Big Bend Pictures_20 Year Edition", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Big Bend Pictures_20 Year Edition.\n\nThe book size is 11 x 11. The first one was 12 x 12.\n\n In this new edition there are 11 new images. Some I replaced completely and some I chose a different image from the same shoot.\n\nThe first edition was printed from scanned RC darkroom prints. In this new edition Sean Perry and I scanned my negatives, and I printed the image as I would now. They have a lot more depth and subtlety in the dodging and burning. \n\nThe tone is different. In the original the tone was very sepia. In this new version the tone is deeper and the printing is deeper too. The images are very rich.\n\nThe images are not cropped at all, but exactly how I shot and printed them. \n\nThe notes and stories about the images are updated.\n\nRobert Draper's foreword was left untouched. It was perfect.\n\nSterry Butcher also wrote a beautiful foreword. That is icing on the cake.\n\nIt was printed in the United States.\n\nOverall this is a better version of a great book.\n\nThe book is $70. not including shipping and tax.\n\n", "thumb": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "featuredImage": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "BigBendPictures_2024Edition_900.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 900 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:40:31.668Z", "filters": [], "key": "14425", "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-06-07T04:37:58.990Z" }, "14426": { "id": 14426, "label": "Strawberry Moon_June 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**IPhone Photography**\nI replaced my point and shoot camera with an Iphone a few years ago, and I wanted to show you all a few images I have taken with them that are pretty great, and possibly I wouldn't have gotten them any other way. Mostly when I am riding my bike and around the neighborhood.\n\nI encourage you to use it seriously.\n\nI have not made really big prints, but 11 x 14's looked OK. You can tell the lens does not the depth of the Zeiss lenses I use, but it's not bad.\n\nAnsel Adams would have loved the digital age.\n\nI use an app called Snapseed. It allows more controls over the image that some of the standard edit features don't. You can dodge and burn, control the temperature, vignette, them and add a border. \n\nThis month's emails is lighthearted.\nI had something I really wanted to talk about this month, but some things came up these last ten days, and I was unable to spend enough time to post it. I will next month. \n\n\nI post images on Instagram. Follow me at_bigbendpictures.\n\nIf you do not want to receive these emails, let me know, and please accept my apologies.\n\nI appreciate the responses and conversations I have with you.\nEmail me at jamesh@jameshevans dot com.\n\nIf you would like to sign up for my emails please send a request to jamesh@jameshevans.com \n\nEvans Gallery is the longest running, open, independent photo art gallery in the Big Bend area. 35 years strong.\n\nLove is the King.\n\nHappy Full Moon. \n\nGet Outside.\n\nPast Full Moon emails are archived on my website. Click on the banner image to go to it.\n\nBanner Image Panoramic_ Ocotillo Pamoramic\n\n", "thumb": "PromDateJune2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "Hawk_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 722, "height": 962 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "Hawk_.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 675 } ] }, "key": "14426", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-06-24T04:36:30.246Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14427": { "id": 14427, "label": "SnakeandPiano2_50sepia_", "caption": "Snake and Piano 2", "type": "image", "content": "SnakeandPiano2_50sepia_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 911 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 136109 }, "dateAdded": "2024-06-25T03:53:04.411Z", "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "overrides": {} }, "14428": { "id": 14428, "label": "", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Life Is Good**\nIn May I turned 70. It freaks me out a little to even see the number on the page, as I know genetically this will be a difficult decade to get through. I feel healthy though. I exercise every day, and I am pretty sure I have hiked a thousand miles more than most people and with a tripod on my shoulder. As I enter this septuagenarian era, I am also organizing and cataloging every negative, transparency, and print I have by decade. These images I made in my early 20's. I have not seen them for years. I thought I would share a few with you.\n\nI started taking photographs when I was 21 years old. I didn’t know much about photography, but felt it would be important to learn the history of the medium and learn about the masters past and present. I was a voracious reader, and a slave to anyone that could teach me anything. The first book I ever read was Andre Feininger’s The Complete Photographer. I loved Diane Arbus, Arnold Newman, William Eggleston, Edward Weston in these early days. John Szarkowski’s books Mirrors and Windows and Looking at Photographs were bibles.\n \nI was a free lance drag racing photographer for income, but mostly I photographed family and friends. I struggled as every young photographer does to develop a style.\n\nWhen I saw the photograph of Patty Smith on the cover of her album \"Horses\", I thought that's the kind of portraits I want to make. I believe these early images are glimpses of the photographer I became. \n\nTechnically, they are a little challenging because I had not yet learned Ansel Adam's Zone system. Also this was an old box of prints I found and they were not in great shape.\n\nThese were hand to mouth years for me. I struggled financially, and honestly had very little technical knowledge and equipment. However, I was young, eager, and an American. It is the land of opportunity. For many years I didn't have to pay taxes. I am happy to pay them now. I feel sad that our country is so divided at this time, but it is still the best place in the world to pursue your dreams. I am living proof.", "thumb": "MomandGrandmomjuly2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "DadandPeggy900.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 3130, "height": 2514 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 710 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "DadandPeggy900.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 710 } ] }, "key": "14428", "dateAdded": "2024-07-22T10:05:14.204Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14429": { "id": 14429, "label": "© James H. Evans_Bear Box", "caption": "Bear Box\n", "type": "image", "content": "BearBox.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 902, "height": 904 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 175042 }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-08-22T18:39:27.953Z", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:53:04.068Z", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14430": { "id": 14430, "label": "Sturgeon Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Less is More**\nI don’t know how much the public knows about the new 150 seat restaurant that is going to be built in the Chisos Basin to replace the \"beyond repair\" building that is currently there.\n\nI spoke with Bob Krumenaker, the last superintendent, before he left and under whose watch this started, asking questions and making suggestions.\n\nIf we could think out of the box, and get out of the mindset that bigger and more is better, it could possibly open a new door.\n\nI welcome your knowledge, facts and enlightenment. If you know something I do not, and can help me understand I would appreciate it.\n\nAnd of course my ideas and thoughts are just that. I don't have to repeat what my Mama told me about opinions do I?\n\nI am sure there are archictects and designers, and planners that could figure out a more ecological and less impactful solution.\n\nThe restaurant and hotel rooms are run by Aramark Corporation. They pay a percentage of their profits to the park. Our government, me and you, the taxpayers, are essentially building Aramark an originally proposed 22 million dollar 150 seat restaurant. Another estimate was 45 million dollars that was to include updating infrastructure and the water system.\n\nMy experience living in Marathon, is construction, rarely comes in at or under budget.\n\nIt is my understanding that because they are buliding in the same footprint of the original building they circumvent having to have an enviromental impact statement.\n\nBut don’t you think we should have at least one?\n\nI believe the Chisos Basin is the most enviromentally sensitive part of the park. Construction will take months, if not years. Peregrine Falcons, migrating birds, bears, mountain lions all reside in this sky island ecosystem. Shouldn’t we be building elsewhere? Right now the basin is so busy, cars have to wait to replace one leaving. Should we encourage more cars to come for a bigger restaurant?\n\nWhy not build outside of the basin or level the restaurant and put food trucks in it’s place. Giving other small businesses a chance. \n\nKeep the basin as wild as possible. By providing more and more amenities you are making it easy and comfortable. Big Bend National Park is wild and it should not be for everybody. \n\nIf you are unhealthy, not able to hike a few miles you do not belong here.\n\nBig Bend ranks #3 for deaths in National Parks. People die here every year. Even healthy people. That should not be taken lightly. You can bleed out or die waiting for medical attention.\n\nBig Bend is not for, and should never be for the Disney World crowd.\n\nI fell in love with Big Bend in 1986. In 1988 I moved here and have spent the last 35 years hiking and photographing the landscape, the people, the critters, and whatever found it’s way in front of my lens. Camping, being by yourself, being quiet. You learn the kind of person you are or want to become. Being outside, in nature, learning about animals, and plants. It's priceless.\n\nSeeing land undisturbed by human touch. This is what we should protect.\n\nI have been all alone in the park for more than a week, never seeing another human being. It changes you profoundly. You feel like you are living on a planet. You are one with nature.\n\nYou are Adam.\n\nYou are Eve.\n
", "featuredImage": "JuneStormMarathon.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 1145, "height": 765 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-08-30T03:59:38.532Z", "filters": [], "overrides": {} }, "14431": { "id": 14431, "label": "August 2024", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Less is More**\nI don’t know how much the public knows about the new 150 seat restaurant that is going to be built in the Chisos Basin to replace the \"beyond repair\" building that is currently there.\n\nI spoke with Bob Krumenaker, the last superintendent, before he left and under whose watch this started, asking questions and making suggestions.\n\nIf we could think out of the box, and get out of the mindset that bigger and more is better, it could possibly open a new door.\n\nI welcome your knowledge, facts and enlightenment. If you know something I do not, and can help me understand I would appreciate it.\n\nAnd of course my ideas and thoughts are just that. I don't have to repeat what my Mama told me about opinions do I?\n\nI am sure there are archictects and designers, and planners that could figure out a more ecological and less impactful solution.\n\nThe restaurant and hotel rooms are run by Aramark Corporation. They pay a percentage of their profits to the park. Our government, me and you, the taxpayers, are essentially building Aramark an originally proposed 22 million dollar 150 seat restaurant. Another estimate was 45 million dollars that was to include updating infrastructure and the water system.\n\nMy experience living in Marathon, is construction, rarely comes in at or under budget.\n\nIt is my understanding that because they are buliding in the same footprint of the original building they circumvent having to have an enviromental impact statement.\n\nBut don’t you think we should have at least one?\n\nI believe the Chisos Basin is the most enviromentally sensitive part of the park. Construction will take months, if not years. Peregrine Falcons, migrating birds, bears, mountain lions all reside in this sky island ecosystem. Shouldn’t we be building elsewhere? Right now the basin is so busy, cars have to wait to replace one leaving. Should we encourage more cars to come for a bigger restaurant?\n\nWhy not build outside of the basin or level the restaurant and put food trucks in it’s place. Giving other small businesses a chance. \n\nKeep the basin as wild as possible. By providing more and more amenities you are making it easy and comfortable. Big Bend National Park is wild and it should not be for everybody. \n\nIf you are unhealthy, not able to hike a few miles you do not belong here.\n\nBig Bend ranks #3 for deaths in National Parks. People die here every year. Even healthy people. That should not be taken lightly. You can bleed out or die waiting for medical attention.\n\nBig Bend is not for, and should never be for the Disney World crowd.\n\nI fell in love with Big Bend in 1986. In 1988 I moved here and have spent the last 35 years hiking and photographing the landscape, the people, the critters, and whatever found it’s way in front of my lens. Camping, being by yourself, being quiet. You learn the kind of person you are or want to become. Being outside, in nature, learning about animals, and plants. It's priceless.\n\nSeeing land undisturbed by human touch. This is what we should protect.\n\nI have been all alone in the park for more than a week, never seeing another human being. It changes you profoundly. You feel like you are living on a planet. You are one with nature.\n\nYou are Adam.\n\nYou are Eve.\n", "thumb": "JamesHEvans_ChisosFromOldOreRoad_Bloom_August2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "StormFromDugoutWells.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1400, "height": 318 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "StormFromDugoutWells.jpg", "width": 1024, "height": 1024 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 1024, "height": 1024 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2024-08-30T04:14:17.280Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14432": { "id": 14432, "label": "© James H. Evans_Rain in the Chisos", "caption": "Rain in the Chisos", "type": "image", "content": "RainintheChisos.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1708, "height": 1140 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 143883 }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2024-08-31T22:17:49.165Z", "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "filters": [] }, "14433": { "id": 14433, "label": "© James H. 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Evans_Rain With Silver Ocotillos", "caption": "Rain With Silver Ocotillos", "type": "image", "content": "RainwithSilverOcotillos.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 124195, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:26:50.218Z", "key": "14440", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:09:41.560Z" }, "14441": { "id": 14441, "label": "RainwithSilverOcotillos", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "RainwithSilverOcotillos.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 124195 }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:11:14.860Z", "filters": [], "key": "14441", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "keywords": [] }, "14442": { "id": 14442, "label": "RainwithSilverOcotillos", "caption": "Rain With Silver Ocotillos_20\" x 30\"", "type": "image", "content": "RainwithSilverOcotillos.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 124195 }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:12:37.277Z", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14443": { "id": 14443, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sentinel Mountain", "caption": "Sentinel Mountain", "type": "image", "content": "SentinelMountain.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 76386 }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:15:51.860Z" }, "14444": { "id": 14444, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sentinel Mountain", "caption": "Sentinel Mountain", "type": "image", "content": "SentinelMountain.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 76386, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "key": "14444", "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:16:51.606Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "postDate": "2025-12-10T19:49:13.778Z" }, "14445": { "id": 14445, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ansel's Bluff", "caption": "Ansel's Bluff", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluff.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 184635 }, "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:24:58.655Z", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:25:18.168Z", "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14446": { "id": 14446, "label": "AnselsBluff", "caption": "Ansel's Bluff_20\" x 30\"", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluff.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 184635 }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2024-10-08T15:26:04.738Z", "linkTarget": "", "key": "14446", "overrides": {} }, "14447": { "id": 14447, "label": "© James H. Evans_Rain From Sotol Vista", "caption": "Rain From Sotol Vista", "type": "image", "content": "RainFromSotolVista_Panoramic_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 3000, "height": 864 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 97147 }, "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2024-10-09T00:48:14.110Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14448": { "id": 14448, "label": "", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Photography**\nI recently watched a few documentries on photographers Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, and Henri Cartier Bresson. All great photographers, and always inspiring. You see their individuality, and hard work. It made me start looking at my work and dividing it in to two categories. One is anybody could have taken this image, the other only I could have taken this image. Portraits are particularly special when you know the back story, and spent years getting to know your subjects. Other images are being in the right place at the right time, timing and still others are educated guesses. My early drag racing photography career, truly taught me timing. They way the car hooked up on the starting line, what the tires looked like, and other factors, helped the drivers to learn about what their cars were doing.", "thumb": "HawkSept2024.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 910, "height": 910 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [] }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "key": "14448", "dateAdded": "2025-01-16T13:09:33.975Z", "filters": [] }, "14449": { "id": 14449, "label": "Rebecca Solnit Foreward", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "This is Rebecca's Forward\n\n\nW I S H B O O K\n\nWhen I was teetering on the brink of my teens, we had\ntwo Sears catalogues in the house. One was the current\nedition, in which I looked at clothes idly since I couldn't\nafford to order them. The other Sears catalogue was a re-\nprint of the book as it had existed in its heyday, around the\nend of the nineteenth century, when you could order mule\nharnesses and hand drills, bustles, coal scuttles, pianos,\nbutton-up boots, stoves, baseballs, and guitars, to say\nnothing of whiskey flavoring extracts, patent medicines,\npaper collars, and mandolins. At the turn of the twentieth\ncentury, the Sears mail-order catalogue generally made\nit possible for rural people to reap the benefits of the\nIndustrial Revolution, in the forms of mass-manufactured\nharrows, handguns, gramophones, and hats. They could\nhave choice and access the way city dwellers did, rather\nthan relying on the limited inventory and sometimes-in-\nflated prices of the town supplier. Anyone could use the\nSears catalogue, and did, but the book was particularly\nimportant for people in the remote places that I think of\nas the American outback .\n\nIt was later that Sears began issuing its famous Wish\nBook, as the Christmas catalogue was christened, but all\nretail catalogues are essentially wish books, inventories\nof the intersection between desire and purchasing power.\n\nThe name \"wish book\" makes clear that the reading was\naccompanied by daydreaming, or that daydreaming was\nincited by reading. Before they supplied people with\ngoods, these catalogues supplied them with a particu-\nlar kind of reading material. You turned the pages while\nimagining your life augmented by the inventory of goods,\ninventorying your life as well, for what it lacked and for\nwhat it might become if you had the funds.\n\nThe things in Crazy from the Heat can't be bought, and\none of the book's pleasures is how far the world it shows\nis from commerce, but in its structure it is also a wish\nbook, a catalogue. The word catalogue comes straight\nfrom the Greek: The Iliad has a katalogos neon, a cata-\nlogue of ships, and the word was assembled from earlier\nwords, from cata- and legein, to say, to count. The word\nlegein is also where we get legend, as in the legend of\nPecos Bill or Pancho Villa but also the legend that is the\ninscription on a tombstone or a coin or a map. There are\nlegends in both senses, of the West as a dreamspace and\nof lists of things that make up that West, in this book that\nis a catalogue.\n\nIf catalogue carries commercial overtones, it's worth remembering that science also has its catalogues. A star catalogue is a standard reference in astronomy-and there are a lot of photographs here that would qualify this book as a star catalogue—while art history has its catalogues raisonnes, its comprehensive muster roll of an artist's creations. But I think of Crazy from the Heat as particular kind of catalogue, a wish book. If most wish books and catalogues travel from thje center outward, pumping out commodities like some commercial industrial heart, then this is a counter-wish book, a collection of images sent back from the edge of the United States that can fill the viewer up with desires for things that money can't buy. Inventory and invention have the same root in finding.\nMaybe for the artist it's an inventory of fulfilled wishes, of things already found, a catalogue of home.\n\nJ A C K R A B B I T L I G H T\n\nPacking for the trip to the desert, I remembered the headlamp, the tea, the sunscreen, the rain jacket, and the hats, but I forgot the hiking maps, the phone number for the old friends in June Lake, and the galleys of this book. I found, however, that many of the images and, more than that, the categories of images-insects and reptiles, a hulking arachnid, portraits, environmental portraits, panoramic landscapes, starry nights, clouds, weather-had stayed in my head after the first journey through the big\nunbound pages. I riffled through them in memory, playing them against the actual landscape unfolding before me, as familiar as the lyrics of a song, though the drive of 260 miles up over the to the high desert would have to be one of those ballads with a hundred stanzas. \n\nEven the names past Tracy began to be a pleasure, the orchards and farming towns of Manteca, Escalon and Oakdale where the road is lined with cornfields, farm stands, and small houses shaded by big trees, and then the thrilling stretch where the buildings thin out and the countryside opens up, as though the land has shaken itself free of clutter and stripped down to its own skin, ready to move with full power, the way a racehorse opens up its stride. First came pure gold grassland that rolls up to an escarpment, and then oak woodland, and then the temperature dropped a degree or so every half dozen miles and pines began to mix with the oaks and then to dominate. The familiar names rolled by, the saloon whose name I remembered before I read it, Whiskey River, which had added a Cowboy Church on Sundays since l'd last been by, the turnoffs for Copperopolis and Chinese Camp, Soulsbyville, Confidence, Sugar Pine, MiWuk, Long Barn, and as the dusty, humid air got thin and cool and clear, Pine Crest and Spring Gap. Afterward, on \nthe other side of the mountain pass, the world is different: things are further apart, there are fewer people, and a subtly and not so subtly different set of assumptions prevail. I was west. (Where I come from you get there by going east.)\n\nPerusing the galleys had made me feel a little chagrinedabout my own path, for I might've being going to the country but in the big picture I had stayed in the city. I remembered a dozen times when, for a moment-passing by like this in a car-or for months or years , I had wanted to move to the American outback. I remembered particular places that drew me: Ely and Baker, Nevada: Lone Pine and Cedarville, California; a few places in the high countryof Northern New Mexico, and once, on a trip to Carlsbad Cavernsin 1997, one of the small towns in the center of the state, Vaughn or Duran or Encino maybe. I made annual pilgrimages to Galisteo, New Mexico, and Baker, Nevada, and I remember falling in love at first sight with West Texas, a place that seemed more majestic in scale, the three times I'd passed through than anyplace else I'd ever been.\n\nThe lure of each of these places was not just the spectacle of the surrounding landscape, but some faintly heard music, slower and simpler than the turbulent orchestra of urban life , an imitation of the the life that might be lived there, less varied, less hurried, maybe a little less distracted, with the quality of time that sometimes gets called boring and is otherwise known as quiet. I never moved to the country, bit I've been a visitor there the last twenty years, stopping in on cattleranches and small towns and public land, camping in most of the deserts of the West, spending a week here, a month there, driving from San Francisco to Albuquerque or Denver and all the places in between, floating down its two main rivers, the Colorado and the Rio Grande, the former flowing to the Pacific, the latter to the Gulf and the Atlantic, making the rounds of the larger region that feels like home. But that's not the same thing.\n\nAs you get older, you leave behind you countless forks in the road, paths that led to lives you decided not to lead, and however wise your choices, there's always a pang for more beautiful or romantic might-have-beens.\nJames Evans's photographs remind me of all the rural and backwater lives I never lived. A lot of people in these remote places are born into them, the choice made generations before, or washed up in them for some reason or other, but few choose them consciously over anyplace else (except when the remote plsces become art colonies or retirement or resort locations, and thereby become someplace else.) You choose limits, maybe isolation, possibly failure, because you don't get a second chance if you screw up; the supply of people and their tolerance for you is finite. Those small towns and hamlets and outposts that called to me-maybe they're what Odysseus was tied to the mast to resist, all the fishing villages on the way bacck to Ithaca. The sirens who called out their yoo-hoos with the bobby pins still in their spit curls and their engines idling. \n\nA few days later I stopped in a Mexican carneceria in the San Joaquin Valley. I couldn't find any chipotles or enamel spoons and ended up with a big bag of rosa de jamaica for tea and canela, or stick cinnamon. The cashier was a young man with a clear, strady gaze and guileess voice who wanted to talk. What was is it like to live in cities, he wanted to know, with people stacked up on top of each other? And I wanted to ask him what was it like to live in a small town with a finite number of options, but he had known no other life, besides early childhood somewhere in Michoacan, and could not answer. We each had our own normal, though his was modulated by all he had leared from the druggies and other troubled characters who came up to him at the register and revealed the depth of human suffering, the complexity of their ethics and psyches, and the difficulty of judging anyone. So he told me, and he also wanted to be an aeronautical engineer. My heart filled up with hopefor his future, and I wondered would it be fulfilled there or whether he might migrate again, or what might trap him or dim his light.\n\nHere and there on this road trip, I was reading a memoir by a gay poet whose parents were from the kind of rural south that bred country music with all its resourcefulness and vernacular charm. It's easy to romanticize the rural, and most of the English-speaking world does. I sometimes think the reason we don't make many good cities is that we consider them unpleasant necessities and imagine, most of us, that we're in them temporarily, except for those people for whom cities are refuges because their small town or backwater wants to kill them. Eccentrics\nare often tolerated, but categorical differences are not necessarily. The poet's parents were also mute about much that counted, miserable, and murderous.\n\nThere's something in the remote places that's almost a texture, a proximity to weather, animals, space, silence, and physical work. If you wanted to shorten the list, you could sum up most of the arid West as dirt and light. I arrived in my remote place as the light was going down and raking across the lake and the dirt before the stars came out. There are different kinds of poverty and different kinds of wealth in the far reaches of this country, and the Milky Way is one major form of the latter. So is\nthe company of animals. The next morning I wrote to a friend, \"Possibly there is something lovelier than early morning sunlight through the ears of a jackrabbit, but the pink glow is lovely enough.\" I wouldn't argue that rustic life is simpler or better-only different, very different. The very textures in James Evans's pictures speak: the cases of soda and th e old hot wate r tank boiler on the back veranda with the boys on the trampoline, the way skin ages in the dry broil of the air as though people over time become closer to reptiles, the ubiquitous dust, and the spectacular space.\n\nG R O U P P O R T R A I T\nThe photographs in this book are as varied as a close up of a king snake and a mountain range in the distance, and the range of subjects constitutes two things. One is a wish book. The other is a portrait. In fact there'sv a dearth of human artifacts here: some petroglyphs, some roads and railroad tracks, a few interiors behind the people that tell us something about them - the stained glass and heavy wooden chair with Ritchey Lorette, the Rangra Theatre with the attyendant in her pearl choker looking in one direction, John Travolta in an ancient poster gazing in the other. Mostly the people are out-of-doors, or the out-of-doors is shown without people, or the portraits are of animals. You could itemize what's not here, all the pictures a Dorothea Lange or Walker Evans might've taken of houses, interiors, workplaces, ways of life, and economic reality that isn't on display here-the reality of making a living,\nmaking a home, making the world, the world of labor. History isn't here, either: the old unfinished war with Mexico; the Odyssean migrations on foot north; the border that, when you actually get to the Rio Grande in Big Bend, turns out to be just a fictitious line down the middle of a real river, which even cows and cactus wrens ignore daily; the old economy of cows that's been dying out for at least six decades; the new economies that passed by places like this; the wars and politics far away; and the\npeculiar identities that are Texan. Some of the people are Latino notably an intense young man with bracelets and ear studs—but the book isn't a disquisition on whose land it is; it just accepts everyone here. The land itself tells us we are looking at a particular place, the West, but there's no emphasis on ranchers and cattle and the open range; there's just arid spaciousness, and luscious skies that seem to exist in some sort of inverse ratio to the dryness of the land. Most of what is here was not made by man, if some of it was born of woman; there are living creatures and the spaces they inhabit, and the spaces beyond them. Zoology and biology, geology and meteorology, with some astronomy mixed in. The book as a whole is a portrait of a world, and it tends toward a more aesthetic and affectionate apprehension than the social-economic comprehension of documentary. It understands the world in other ways.\nOne mode is affinity, and so we have pretty female bodies in a swimming hole and then, a few pages later, a dead deer or other animal afloat in that hole. We have the line of boys on the roof above the trampoline, and then the line of goats looking through a wire fence—as cheerful, if not as self-conscious. More formally, there's the dark rock with a hole opening onto pale sky that echoes the pale bottom of another swimmer. There's a more mystical sense of affinity, sometimes directly, between people and\nanimals, such as the man with the collar of iguanas and the nude standing with her horse. The fried pie glistens yellow; the woman on the flowered couch in front of the peeling wall laughs; the flash flood rushes through the wash. The man with the collar of iguanas is just across from the cemetery with the newly dug grave, as though life faces death, is folded in on it when the book is closed. \n\nThe photographer describes himself as a portraitist, and all the pictures in the book constitue a single portrait a place, not apprehended objectively , but inventoried in a wishes and discoveries and affections, a list of what matters. This is a portrait of home, the home that one longs for, idiosyncratic and affectionate. On my long drive away from the city and up over the mountains to where the West Coast ends and the arid West begins, I thought first of the landscape passing as a song, then of particular songs, and then of a long poem like one of those songs, Nazim Hikmet's \"Things I Didn't Know I Loved.\" It was written on a train, in\nexile. The poet provides a long list of things-\"night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain,\" rivers, the sky, roads, the stars, flowers, rain, each prompting a reverie. He writes, \"I didn't know I loved so many things and I had to wait until sixty\" to find it out. It's also a catalogue, one that makes clear what kind of catalogue this is.\n\nR O U N D U P\nPeople talk about landscape as place, but in photography it's also always about time: about the various cycles of geology and meteorology, the million years it took to make this mountain range and the few seconds during which the light broke through the clouds that way. The rural runs on these other clockss of weather and seasons, and the rocks always remind you that you're just a tiny fragment of time, you with your hopes, your prime, your marriages, your decline, your offspring, your secret\nfailures, your slow erosion, all the things that seem interminable, expressible as some tiny fraction of what the indifferent rocks endure. And the seasons serve to remind you that time is cyclical-that the sense in which you're not alone is due less to the people around you than to the countless iterations of the small dramas, the flash floods, the brief bloomings, the calvings and the cold and the snow on the peaks and tax day. On my way back from Mono Lake, I saw some action in the rodeo ring in Bridgeport, made a U-turn on Highway 395, and pulled in to watch the locals do some Sunday calf-cutting. Full-size 4 x 4 pickup trucks and horse trailers surrounded the arena on three sides, and the contestants\nwere lined up on the fourth on their shining work animals, going in four riders at a time to cut herd. Imagine playing billiards with three partners, only instead of a cue you have a stock horse who reads your every wish and turns on a dime, which is the good news, and the bad news is that instead of billiard balls you have nine yearling steers with numbers on them, wheeling, balking, frisking, dodging, and making a run for it, which you have to move in numerical order from one side of the ring to the other, through the barrels and not around them. The black calf\nwith the zero on his back acted a lot like an eight ball. Even so, one team actually did it. There was desultory applause from the small, scattered audience. I suspect that the whole scene would have seemed deeply anach-\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n- curls and their engines idlingo t h e r ? A n d I w a n t e d to a s k h i m w h a t it w a s like to live\nin a small town with a finite number of options, but he\nhad known no other life, besides early childhood some-\nwhere in Michoacán, and could not answer. We each had\nour own normal, though his was modulated by all he had\nlearned from the druggies and other troubled charac-\nters who came up to him at the register and revealed the\ndepth of human suffering, the complexity of their ethics\nand psyches, and the difficulty of judging anyone. So he\ntold me, and he also told m e he w a n t e d to be an aero-\nnautical engineer. My heart filled up with hope for his\nfuture, and I wondered whether it would be fulfilled there\nor whether he'd need to migrate again, and what might\ntrap him or dim his light.\nHere and there on this road trip, I was reading a memoir\nby a gay poet whose parents were from the kind of rural\nsouth that bred country music with all its resourcefulness\nand vernacular charm. It's easy to romanticize the rural,\nand most of the English-speaking world does. I some-\ntimes think the reason we don't make many good cities is\nthat we consider them unpleasant necessities and imag-\nine, most of us, that we're in them temporarily, except for\nthose people for whom cities are refuges because their\nsmall town or backwater wants to kill them. Eccentrics\nare often tolerated, but categorical differences are not,\nnecessarily. The poet's parents were also mute about\nmuch that counted, miserable, and murderous.\nThere's something in the remote places that's almost a\ntexture, a proximity to weather, animals, space, silence,\nand physical work. If you wanted to shorten the list, you\ncould sum up most of the arid West as dirt and light. I\narrived in my remote place as the light was going down\nand raking across the lake and the dirt before the stars\ncame out. There are different kinds of poverty and dif-\nferent kinds of wealth in the far reaches of this country,\nand the Milky Way is one major form of the latter. So is\nthe company of animals. The next morning I wrote to a\nfriend, \"Possibly there is something lovelier than early\nmorning sunlight through the ears of a jackrabbit, but the\npink glow is lovely enough.\" I wouldn't argue that rustic\nlife is simpler or better-only different, very different.\nThe very textures in James Evans's pictures speak: the\nc a s e s of s o d a and t h e old h o t - w a t e r - t a n k boiler on the\nback veranda with the boys on the trampoline, the way\nskin ages in the dry broil of the air as though people over\ntime become closer to reptiles, the ubiquitous dust, and\nthe spectacular space.\nG R O U P P O R T R A I T\nThe photographs in this book are as varied as a close-o t h e r ? A n d I w a n t e d to a s k h i m w h a t it w a s like to live\nin a small town with a finite number of options, but he\nhad known no other life, besides early childhood some-\nwhere in Michoacán, and could not answer. We each had\nour own normal, though his was modulated by all he had\nlearned from the druggies and other troubled charac-\nters who came up to him at the register and revealed the\ndepth of human suffering, the complexity of their ethics\nand psyches, and the difficulty of judging anyone. So he\ntold me, and he also told m e he w a n t e d to be an aero-\nnautical engineer. My heart filled up with hope for his\nfuture, and I wondered whether it would be fulfilled there\nor whether he'd need to migrate again, and what might\ntrap him or dim his light.\nHere and there on this road trip, I was reading a memoir\nby a gay poet whose parents were from the kind of rural\nsouth that bred country music with all its resourcefulness\nand vernacular charm. It's easy to romanticize the rural,\nand most of the English-speaking world does. I some-\ntimes think the reason we don't make many good cities is\nthat we consider them unpleasant necessities and imag-\nine, most of us, that we're in them temporarily, except for\nthose people for whom cities are refuges because their\nsmall town or backwater wants to kill them. Eccentrics\nare often tolerated, but categorical differences are not,\nnecessarily. The poet's parents were also mute about\nmuch that counted, miserable, and murderous.\nThere's something in the remote places that's almost a\ntexture, a proximity to weather, animals, space, silence,\nand physical work. If you wanted to shorten the list, you\ncould sum up most of the arid West as dirt and light. I\narrived in my remote place as the light was going down\nand raking across the lake and the dirt before the stars\ncame out. There are different kinds of poverty and dif-\nferent kinds of wealth in the far reaches of this country,\nand the Milky Way is one major form of the latter. So is\nthe company of animals. The next morning I wrote to a\nfriend, \"Possibly there is something lovelier than early\nmorning sunlight through the ears of a jackrabbit, but the\npink glow is lovely enough.\" I wouldn't argue that rustic\nlife is simpler or better-only different, very different.\nThe very textures in James Evans's pictures speak: the\nc a s e s of s o d a and t h e old h o t - w a t e r - t a n k boiler on the\nback veranda with the boys on the trampoline, the way\nskin ages in the dry broil of the air as though people over\ntime become closer to reptiles, the ubiquitous dust, and\nthe spectacular space.\n\nG R O U P P O R T R A I T\n\nThe photographs in this book are as varied as a close-o t h e r ? A n d I w a n t e d to a s k h i m w h a t it w a s like to live\nin a small town with a finite number of options, but he\nhad known no other life, besides early childhood some-\nwhere in Michoacán, and could not answer. We each had\nour own normal, though his was modulated by all he had\nlearned from the druggies and other troubled charac-\nters who came up to him at the register and revealed the\ndepth of human suffering, the complexity of their ethics\nand psyches, and the difficulty of judging anyone. So he\ntold me, and he also told m e he w a n t e d to be an aero-\nnautical engineer. My heart filled up with hope for his\nfuture, and I wondered whether it would be fulfilled there\nor whether he'd need to migrate again, and what might\ntrap him or dim his light.\nHere and there on this road trip, I was reading a memoir\nby a gay poet whose parents were from the kind of rural\nsouth that bred country music with all its resourcefulness\nand vernacular charm. It's easy to romanticize the rural,\nand most of the English-speaking world does. I some-\ntimes think the reason we don't make many good cities is\nthat we consider them unpleasant necessities and imag-\nine, most of us, that we're in them temporarily, except for\nthose people for whom cities are refuges because their\nsmall town or backwater wants to kill them. Eccentrics\nare often tolerated, but categorical differences are not,\nnecessarily. The poet's parents were also mute about\nmuch that counted, miserable, and murderous.\nThere's something in the remote places that's almost a\ntexture, a proximity to weather, animals, space, silence,\nand physical work. If you wanted to shorten the list, you\ncould sum up most of the arid West as dirt and light. I\narrived in my remote place as the light was going down\nand raking across the lake and the dirt before the stars\ncame out. There are different kinds of poverty and dif-\nferent kinds of wealth in the far reaches of this country,\nand the Milky Way is one major form of the latter. So is\nthe company of animals. The next morning I wrote to a\nfriend, \"Possibly there is something lovelier than early\nmorning sunlight through the ears of a jackrabbit, but the\npink glow is lovely enough.\" I wouldn't argue that rustic\nlife is simpler or better-only different, very different.\nThe very textures in James Evans's pictures speak: the\nc a s e s of s o d a and t h e old h o t - w a t e r - t a n k boiler on the\nback veranda with the boys on the trampoline, the way\nskin ages in the dry broil of the air as though people over\ntime become closer to reptiles, the ubiquitous dust, and\nthe spectacular space.\nG R O U P P O R T R A I T\nThe photographs in this book are as varied as a close-up of a king snake and a mountain range in the distance and the range of subjects constitutes two things. One is a wish book. The other is a portrait. In fact there’s a dearth of human artifacts heresome petroglyphs,some roads and railroad tracks, a few interiors behind the people that tell us something about them-the stained glass and heavy wooden chair with Ritchey Lorette,the Rangra Theatre with the attendant in her pearl choker looking in one direction, John Travolta in an ancient poster gazing in the other. Mostly the people are out-\nof-doors, or the out-of-doors is shown without people,\nor the portraits are of animals.\nYou could itemize what's not here, all the pictures a Dor-\nothea Lange or Walker Evans might've taken of houses,\ninteriors, workplaces, ways of life, an economic reality\nthat isn't on display here-the reality of making a living,\nmaking a home, making the world, the world of labor. His-\ntory isn't here, either: the old unfinished war with Mexico;\nthe Odyssean migrations on foot north; the border that,\nwhen you actually get to the Rio Grande in Big Bend,\nturns out to be just a fictitious line down the middle of\nof a real river, which even cows and cactus wrens ignore\ndaily; the old economy of cows that's been dying out for\nat least six decades; the new economies that passed by\nplaces like this; the wars and politics far away; and the\npeculiar identities that are Texan. Some of the people\nare Latino—notably an intense young man with brace-\nlets and ear studs—but the book isn't a disquisition on\nwhose land it is; it just accepts everyone here.\nThe land itself tells us we are looking at a particular place,\nthe West, but there's no emphasis on ranchers and cattle\nand the open range; there's just arid spaciousness, and\nluscious skies that seem to exist in some sort of inverse\nratio to the dryness of the land. Most of what is here was\nnot made by man, if some of it was born of woman; there\nare living creatures and the spaces they inhabit, and the\nspaces beyond them. Zoology and biology, geology and\nmeteorology, with some astronomy mixed in. The book\nas a whole is a portrait of a world, and it tends toward a\nmore aesthetic and affectionate apprehension than the\nsocial-economic comprehension of documentary. It un-\nderstands the world in other ways.\nOne mode is affinity, and so we have pretty female bodies\nin a swimming hole and then, a few pages later, a dead\ndeer or other animal afloat in that hole. We have the line\nof boys on the roof above the trampoline, and then the\nline of goats looking through a wire fence—as cheerful,\nif not as self-conscious. More formally, there's the dark\nrock with a hole opening onto pale sky that echoes the\npale bottom of another swimmer. There's a more mystical\nsense of affinity, sometimes directly, between people and\nanimals, such as the man with the collar of iguanas and\nthe nude standing with her horse. The fried pie glistens\nyellow; the woman on the flowered couch in front of the\npeeling wall laughs; the flash flood rushes through the\nwash. The man with the collar of iguanas is just across\nfrom the cemetery with the newly dug grave, as though life faces death is folded in on it when the book is closed.\n\nThe photographer describes himself as a portraitist, and all the pictures in the book constitue a single portrait of a place, not apprehended objectively, but inventoried in wishes and discoveries and affections, a list of what matters. This is portrait of a home, the home that one longs for, idiosyncratic and affectionate. On my long drive away from the city and up over the mountains to where the West Coast\nends and the arid West begins, I thought first of the land-\nscape passing as a song, then of particular songs, and then\nof a long poem like one of those songs, Nazim Hikmet's\n\"Things I Didn't Know I Loved.\" It was written on a train, in\nexile. The poet provides a long list of things-\"night de-\nscending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain,\" rivers, the\nsky, roads, the stars, flowers, rain, each prompting a reverie.\nHe writes, \"I didn't know I loved so many things and I had to\nwait until sixty\" to find it out. It's also a catalogue, one that\nmakes clear what kind of catalogue this is.\n\nR O U N D U P\n\nPeople talk about landscape as place, but in photography it's also always about time: about the various cycles of geology and meteorology, the million years it took to make this mountain range and the few seconds during which the light broke through the clouds that way. The rural runs on these other clocks of weather and seasons, and the rocks always remind you that you're just a tiny fragment of time, you with your hopes, your prime, your marriages, your decline, your offspring, your secret\nfailures, your slow erosion, all the things that seem interminable, expressible as some tiny fraction of what the indifferent rocks endure. And the seasons serve to remind you that time is cyclical-that the sense in which you're not alone is due less to the people around you than to the countless iterations of the small dramas, the flash floods, the brief bloomings, the calvings and the cold and the snow on the peaks and tax day. On my way back from Mono Lake, I saw some action in the rodeo ring in Bridgeport, made a U-turn on Highway 395, and pulled in to watch the locals do some Sunday calf-cutting. Full-size 4 x 4 pickup trucks and horse trailers surrounded the arena on three sides, and the contestants\nwere lined up on the fourth on their shining work animals, going in four riders at a time to cut herd. Imagine playing billiards with three partners, only instead of a cue you have a stock horse who reads your every wish and turns on a dime, which is the good news, and the bad news is that instead of billiard balls you have nine yearling steers with numbers on them, wheeling, balking, frisking, dodging, and making a run for it, which you have to move in numerical order from one side of the ring to the other, through the barrels and not around them. The black calf\nwith the zero on his back acted a lot like an eight ball. Even so, one team actually did it. There was desultory applause from the small, scattered audience. I suspect that the whole scene would have seemed deeply anachronistic to some city dwellers; country people, in politics and everyday practices, often hang fiercely onto the past. But it wasn't the past; and horses are still a good way to manage cows on the open range, maybe the only way; and time itself is different in different places; information, styles, beliefs, technologies, and commodities move outward from their usually central, usually urban places of development like ripples from a rock thrown into water, sometimes not reaching the rural regions until much later, if at all. \"I've been everywhere, man,\" opens Johnny Cash's great catalogue of place-names that begins with Winnemucca. I've been to New Orleans a lot the last five years, and\nthere I learned about the idea that musicians belong to their neighborhood, that they should stay where they started, keep playing for parties and funerals, teach the next generation, and not move away even if they get rich or famous. We say \"belong to\" to mean both property and orientation: these musicians belong to the neighborhood, which raises the question of where most artists belong, what place or community could claim them. For most writers and artists, the answer is large\nand vague-Alaska, or the Sonoran Desert, or the West; they serve ideas of place, but not particular communities. There are writers who belong to their cities; earlier there were regionalists, like Steinbeck and Faulkner; there are photographers who take on a region, like the\nSouth for William Eggleston or the Arctic for Subhankar Banerjee, or a subject, like the border for David Taylor or water for Robert Dawson; there are city photographers from Atget to Weegee to Helen Levitt; and there are other photographers who take on a person or group,\nlike Harry Callahan photographing his stately wife for decades, or Nicholas Nixon documenting his wife and her sisters; but artists overall tend to be kind of like migrant workers.\n\nNot all of us, though. Part of the reason why I never moved to the country is that I came to belong to San Francisco and San Franciscans; what l'd acquired meant more here than anywhere else. Similarly, James\nEvans belongs to this place that he used to get by in by photographing weddings and selling gift cards of Big Bend. In those actions there's a sense of local service, as well as the scurrying for survival. There's a way in which children sometimes like to address letters—or did back when children addressed envelopes at all: with their street and then their town and their state and their nation and then the e a r t h and the cosmos.\nThere's a way of establishing location, under a desert sky with its stars wheeling at night and its clouds and colors at work by day, in proximity to those ancient shoulders of the e a r t h that are the various mountain\nranges, and then the swimming holes and the fragments of town and then, closest in, the creatures, particularly the small ones, the snakes anc the tarantula and the vinegaroon.\n\nAt the not-quite-rodeo, in the foreground were these tough young women with a few tots asleep in strollers and their powerful thighs sheathed in denim, teasing each other in some laid-back small-town version of hard-boiled. In the middle ground was the epic struggle\nof the control of nature, done as recreation in the ring. In the distance behind the corral and the announcer's booth and more parked pickups was the sublime, first a great swath of grassland and then the high jagged\npeaks of the Sierra with a little of last season's snow still on them. Comedy, drama, sublimity. It was a nice set of layers. You have it here, too, in this book.\n\n", "thumb": "RebeccaSolnit_50sepia_2.jpg", "featuredImage": "RebeccaSolnit_50sepia_2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 852 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "RebeccaSolnit_50sepia_2.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 852 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 852 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "key": "14449", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-01-27T12:40:41.994Z", "postDate": "2025-12-15T13:29:30.930Z" }, "14450": { "id": 14450, "label": "© James H. 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Evans_Tarantula And Tablecloth", "caption": "Tarantula And Tablecloth", "type": "image", "content": "TarantulaandTablecloth_Sepia50_ForPortfolio.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 886, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 80102 }, "postDate": "2025-12-10T20:31:34.795Z", "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:25:56.085Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "key": "14452", "overrides": {} }, "14453": { "id": 14453, "label": "TarantulaandTablecloth_Sepia50_ForPortfolio", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "TarantulaandTablecloth_Sepia50_ForPortfolio.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 886, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 80102, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:15.834Z", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "" }, "14454": { "id": 14454, "label": "© James H. Evans_Snake And Piano 2", "caption": "Snake and Piano_2", "type": "image", "content": "SnakeandPiano2_14x14_50Sepia_Portfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 121838, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:17.731Z", "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:06.213Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "key": "14454" }, "14455": { "id": 14455, "label": "© James H. Evans_Snake And Jesus", "caption": "Snake And Jesus", "type": "image", "content": "SnakeandJesus_50Sepia_forPortfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 798, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 90816, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:19.792Z", "searchable": true, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:32.240Z", "linkTarget": "", "key": "14455" }, "14456": { "id": 14456, "label": "© James H. Evans_Kingsnake On Headboard", "caption": "Kingsnake On Headboard\n", "type": "image", "content": "KingsnakeonHeadboard_Cropped_50Sepia_Sharpened.5_PortfolioPrint_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 123203 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:21.390Z", "key": "14456", "keywords": [], "filters": [], "searchable": true, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:59.437Z" }, "14457": { "id": 14457, "label": "© James H. Evans_Kingsnake On Cheniile Bedspread", "caption": "Kingsnake On Chenille Bedspread", "type": "image", "content": "KingsnakeonCheniileBedspread_14x15_50SepiaA_ForPortfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 825, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 178998, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "key": "14457", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:23.245Z", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:50:16.708Z", "searchable": true }, "14458": { "id": 14458, "label": "© James H. Evans_Horned Lizard And Basket", "caption": "Horned Lizard And Basket", "type": "image", "content": "HornedLizardandBasket_Portfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 780, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 64390, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "key": "14458", "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:24.825Z", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:39.372Z", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14459": { "id": 14459, "label": "© James H. Evans_Horned Lizard And Basket_Monster Shadow", "caption": "Horned Lizard and Basket_Monster Shadow", "type": "image", "content": "HornedLizardandBasket2_14x14.2_50Sepia_ForPortfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 880, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 60812, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "key": "14459", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:26.067Z", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:06.213Z", "keywords": [], "filters": [] }, "14460": { "id": 14460, "label": "© James H. Evans_Empty Frames", "caption": "Empty Frames", "type": "image", "content": "EmptyFrames_50Sepia_ForPortfolio.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 880, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 110367, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:31.809Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:20.456Z", "key": "14460" }, "14461": { "id": 14461, "label": "© James H. Evans_Copperhead In Bathroom ", "caption": "Copperhead In Bathroom", "type": "image", "content": "CopperheadinBathroomforPortfolio_14x14.3_50Sepia_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 880, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 91269 }, "keywords": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:49:44.920Z", "key": "14461", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:33.256Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14462": { "id": 14462, "label": "© James H. Evans_Copperhead On Linoleum", "caption": "Copperhead On Linoleum", "type": "image", "content": "CopperheadOnLinoleum_14x14.2_50Sepia_Portfolio_sharpened.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 880, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 185671, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:35.530Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14463": { "id": 14463, "label": "© James H. Evans_Bull Snake On Sofa", "caption": "Bull Snake On Sofa", "type": "image", "content": "BullSnakeonSofa_14x14.7_50Sepia_ForPortfolio_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 752, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 236529 }, "postDate": "2025-03-22T11:39:44.757Z", "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:37.997Z", "keywords": [], "key": "14463", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14464": { "id": 14464, "label": "© James H. Evans_Bull Snake On Sofa_Hissing", "caption": "Bull Snake On Sofa_Hissing\n", "type": "image", "content": "BullSnakeonSofaStriking_Sepia_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 227772, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-02-04T18:26:40.305Z", "keywords": [], "key": "14464", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:50:16.708Z" }, "14465": { "id": 14465, "label": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1000", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 383 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 598634, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:33:57.806Z", "key": "14465", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14466": { "id": 14466, "label": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_1000", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 273 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 354978 }, "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:36:02.831Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14467": { "id": 14467, "label": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_1000", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 273 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 354978 }, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:36:53.175Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14468": { "id": 14468, "label": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_900", "caption": "Ansel's Bluff Panoramic_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_900.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 246 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 295046 }, "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "key": "14468", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:38:20.756Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14469": { "id": 14469, "label": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1000", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 383 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 598634 }, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14469", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:40:50.707Z", "keywords": [] }, "14470": { "id": 14470, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ocotillo and Lechuguilla", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 383 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 598634, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:43:25.908Z", "searchable": true, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14471": { "id": 14471, "label": "Ansels-Bluff-Panoramic_", "caption": "Ansel's Bluff Panoramic", "type": "image", "content": "Ansels-Bluff-Panoramic_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1406, "height": 384 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 182214 }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "searchable": true, "key": "14471", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:49:08.682Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14472": { "id": 14472, "label": "Ocotillo-and-Lechuguilla-Panoramic_Bloom_1000", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic_Bloom_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "Ocotillo-and-Lechuguilla-Panoramic_Bloom_1000.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 700, "height": 268 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 81847 }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:51:14.778Z", "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "key": "14472" }, "14473": { "id": 14473, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ocotillo And Lechuguilla Panoramic", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_Bloom_1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1000, "height": 383 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 601026 }, "keywords": [], "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-02-27T00:55:42.981Z", "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true }, "14474": { "id": 14474, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic", "caption": "Ocotillo and Lechuguilla Panoramic_New", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandLechuguillaPanoramic_New.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 2000, "height": 766 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 265371, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-03-01T21:23:13.318Z", "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "key": "14474" }, "14475": { "id": 14475, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ansel's Bluff Panoramic", "caption": "Ansel's Bluff Panoramic_NEW", "type": "image", "content": "AnselsBluffPanoramic_1_.5Sharpened_2copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 2500, "height": 683 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 295434, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-03-01T21:28:54.406Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-05-15T03:04:19.193Z", "keywords": [] }, "14476": { "id": 14476, "label": "© James H Evans_River Road Panoramic With Elephant Tusk", "caption": "River Road Panoramic With Elephant Tusk", "type": "image", "content": "-James-H.-Evans_River-Road-Panoramic-with-Elephant-Tusk-2_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 2500, "height": 999 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 862054 }, "postDate": "2025-03-23T14:46:36.226Z", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-03-23T14:44:38.825Z", "keywords": [] }, "14477": { "id": 14477, "label": "October_2024_Hunter's Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Panoramics**\nWhen I first starting photographing the landscape I mostly made 2 1/4 square and 4 x 5 film. I wanted to make panoramics, but the only cameras I knew about at that time was a widelux, and Fuji made a model 617 that made a 2 1/4 x 10 inch negative. The negative of the widelux was too small to make a significant size panoramic and the 617 produced a negative 5 inches longer than my enlarger could fit in the negative carrier. My resolve at that time was to shoot 4 x 5 and crop it panoramic. Otherwise I was out of luck.\n\nThe digital age resolved that. Now you take pieces of a scene and photoshop will splice them together. I recently made a 14.5 foot wide image, and it is beautiful.\n\n
\n\n\n**Digital And Low Light**\n\nI don’t know if you have noticed, but there is a lot of milky way images these days. It’s become cliche'.\n\nWhen I first purchased a digital camera, but was still primarily shooting film, I was out one night in the park making images and noticed when I made long exposures with the digital, the image that showed up on the viewing screen showed many more stars than I saw. This night just happened to be the peak of the Perseid Meteor showers and so I was able to photograph them. There is an image in my book “Crazy From The Heat.\"\n\nThe best lowlight digital image I made was photographing fireflies. I tried many times on film with no success.\n\nMy friend Keith Carter has an iconic image of boys holding a jar full of them. Individually though it seemed impossible.\n\nOne night on the Pecos river I saw a bunch of them in the high grass and was finally able to photograph them.\n\n**A Film Mistake Resolved**\n\nWhen I was shooting film. I had different film backs. Film backs are separate from the camera, and you can have as many as you want and load them with different types of film. I used two different types of black and white film, color transparency and color negative film. With black and white film I had a variety of filters for contrast, and I often shot with a deep yellow filter. When I shot the Dust Devil I grabbed a film back and started shooting. In the excitement of the moment, I didn’t realize I was shooting color transparency film with the Yellow filter. The image sat in my files till scanners became available.\n I scanned it as a was able to print it as a B & W image.\n\n**Bill, Wilburn and Macky.**\n\nBig Bend Natural History Association has the Old Timer’s Reunion usually in February. I missed it last year, but I’ve gone several times and set up a light to make portraits.\n\nI have photographed all these men individually and at different times, but this was the first time I photographed them together.\n\nBill Dodson, the man on the left is Sheriff Ronny Dodson’s dad. Willburn Elliot was the “Honey Man” and was a beekeeper. I don’t how he managed to brand each one of them. It was amazing. Macky is a cowboy and rancher. Bill is from Alpine, Wilburn is from Marfa, and Macky is from Marathon. I was very happy to photograph these good men together.\n\n\n**Shameless Commerce/Prints for Christmas**\n\n If your thinking about a framed print for Christmas, you can choose from the framed and ready on my website. I ship on Mondays and Tuesdays. It is good to order early, not only because you are guaranteed the image before Christmas, but shippers are so busy during the season, that it can be hard on the packages. Unframed work is easier to ship and less worry. I don’t really have a cutoff time, but earlier is always better. I print everything myself, so I can usually get it done reasonably fast. My framer uses all hardwoods, biscuits them together (No nails) and uses 8 ply mats and museum plexiglass. It's the best of everything. \n\nI post images on Instagram. Follow me at_bigbendpictures.\n\nIf you do not want to receive these emails, let me know, and please accept my apologies.\n\nI appreciate the responses and conversations I have with you.\nEmail me at jamesh@jameshevans dot com.\n\nIf you would like to sign up for my emails please send a request to jamesh@jameshevans.com \n\nEvans Gallery is the longest running, open, independent photo art gallery in the Big Bend area. 35 years strong.\n\nLove is the King.\n\nHappy Full Moon. \n\nGet Outside.\n\nPast Full Moon emails are archived on my website. Click on the banner image to go to it.\n\nBanner Image Panoramic_ Chalk Draw Panoramic\n\n\n", "thumb": "BillWilburnMacky_October2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "BillWilburnMacky.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1135, "height": 760 }, "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 1135, "height": 760 } }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:15:01.307Z" }, "14478": { "id": 14478, "label": "November_2024_Beaver Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**M2M**\nThe 2024 Marathon to Marathon went off without a hitch. 450 runners from 27 states and 6 countries were represented. It was a great time. There was about 100 volunteers from the area as well as our friends from San Antonio and Austin, Audrey Mangold, Lori Evans, Julie and Bert Whitaker, Linda and Bill McCarley, Danielle Gallo is Marci’s right hand person for M2M and is an amazing woman. She is the Marathon Health Center’s manager. I don't know what this community would do without her. \nM2M was thrilled to have the Catholic Church cook and serve the Pasta dinner this year. It gave the runners a peek into the local life of Marathon and experience the kindness of this congregation. I have only mentioned a few people, but there are many to thank. So thank you all for helping Marci and me put on another great event. All the proceeds go to fund the health clinic. The Marathon Health Clinic is the one and only prototype TeleMed clinic in Texas. \nSign up for next years race at marathon2marathon.com.
\n\n**The Santa Elena Canyon Series**\n\nOne of the challenges of photographing in a national park is taking images that no one has done before. A friend of mine told me early on that there are 30 pictures of the park that everyone takes. It has always stuck with me, and though 35 years of knowing and living in these mountains has given me an edge like no other photographer, I too have taken those 30 images.\n\nOriginality prevails.\n\nI took a river trip through Santa Elena Canyon, to see how the water was, how my guide was, and all the conditions. I didn’t take any expensive equipment just in case. The next day I did it again, but knowing all the factors took my equipment. I laid in the raft as we went through the canyon and shot up. There were no clouds, as the day before. It is a beautiful abstract series of the canyon walls. One side being the U S, the other Mexico. ", "thumb": "6445_7_November2024.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 990, "height": 990 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 0 }, "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:26:12.176Z", "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "filters": [] }, "14479": { "id": 14479, "label": "December 2024_Cold Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Selling My Archive**\n\nLast May I turned 70 years old. I have been a photographer for 50 years. It made me reflective. It made me want to stop working 12 hour days and spend the next decade as close to and as in love with Marci as I can. It wasn’t the only factor. Marci’s ongoing struggle with long Covid too, has made me rethink what I want to do in the next decade. I don’t come from a family of long living people. My parents died in their early 70’s and my older brother passed away 2 years ago. That being said, I am very healthy. I don’t smoke. I drink a sip occasionally, and I exercise nearly every day.\n\nI have a true friend who is a very respected estate appraiser. He has appraised the works of very famous people, and I am fortunate that he has taken on my photographic archive.\n\nIt’s not like I am going to stop working. It’s the only thing I know. I want to shoot like I used to. Go to the park or make portraits and landscapes on film, come home develop and print it, but not have to hang it on the wall and wait for it to sell. In fact, probably the only thing will change is I won’t have a store front gallery.\n\nI want to travel more. I want to play with watercolors. I want to make podcast type stories. I have recorded a lot of sound over the years, but have not done anything with it.\n\nI want to work in the yard, learn how to bake, cook for my family and friends. \n\nSocialize.\n\nHow this goes about is the appraiser will come up with a figure, then I will look for a buyer who would purchase the archive for the tax break and donate it to a museum or collection. There are a few other possibilities and nothing is off the table at this point. Also, none of the details have been worked out, and there would be many things to consider. I don’t plan on stopping my photographic work, and hopefully keep building on and promoting the collection.\n\nTo date there are 84,000 negatives and 30,000 digitals file and hundreds of 11 x 14 and 16 x 20 silver gelatin prints.\n\nMy plan which I followed was to shoot as much as I could while I was young and healthy, and then come back and print the work in my older age. I shot more than I can print. There is at least a book or two of unseen images, and I would still like to work with the buyer behind the scenes on producing a retrospective book, and a hands on geology book that has been brewing for years.\n\nIf you are interested in purchasing or maybe being an investor in this collection please call or email me and let's talk. Once the appraisal is complete, I will send you the prospectus.\n\nI followed the Ansel Adams playbook. He owns Yosemite, and always will. Even photographers that followed him will never express the beauty of a place Ansel hadn’t already shown us.\n\nI did that with Big Bend.\n\nAnsel had Yosemite all to himself, and I too, had Big Bend all to myself for more than 25 years. No one will ever have that again. \n\nAll the art directors and writers at Texas Monthly over the last 36 years gave me rich, fulfilling assignments. Assignments that helped build my career and voice in the Big Bend. Not tourism assignments. Esequiel Hernandez, The Kickapoo Indians, Boquillas, Terlingua, to name a few. \n\nMost of you that are reading this email have kept me alive and shooting in this beautiful desert for three dozen years. I remained independent, and did exactly what I wanted to do because of you. Because of you I never had to get a job. Because of you I got to wake up every day and decide what I wanted to do. I have had and still have so much fun in this desert. Learning about plants, animals, the earth and light. I’ve slept outside for years. Laying on my roof rack bed, looking at the stars and moon through binoculars, laughing out loud at my own jokes, coming up with new ideas for photographs, and learning what kind of man I am. \n\nYour support gave me the privilege to do the work, and I didn’t squander it. For every one of you that has one (or several) of my photographs, my books or a notecard. When you look at them please know that you contributed to my well being and my happy life. \n\nMerry Christmas and Happy New Year.\n\nLove,\n\nMarci and James\n
", "thumb": "James_2024.jpg", "featuredImage": "BearBox_50Sepia_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 800, "height": 1024 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 915, "height": 918 }, "bytes": 0 }, "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:33:57.740Z" }, "14480": { "id": 14480, "label": "January 2025", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "I received a lot of emails from all of you regarding my announcement to sell my archive and somewhat retire. All positive, and some telling me they have retired and how great it is. In my mind I am almost there. \n\nI’ve also had a few people interested in investing in the archive. As soon as I get the results of the appraisal I will contact you. If you are interested contact me by email.\n\n\n\nRecenty I had a friend and customer (they are one and the same) who wanted to purchase a photograph. They are first time buyers and had a difficult time picking the one. It’s a sweet problem to have as opposed there is not one I want. The image they chose was one I have never sold before, and though I personally love it, the public doesn’t. \nPhotographing the Big Bend area for 36 years as a body of work meant trying to photograph every facet. Like puzzle pieces adding up to the big picture. It doesn’t mean they are not beautiful images, and I didn’t take a picture just to take a picture. Here are some of my favorites.\n
", "thumb": "JamesHEvans_PockRock_.jpg", "featuredImage": "JamesHEvans_DioniciaMonclova_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1024, "height": 1011 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 886, "height": 886 }, "bytes": 0 }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:36:32.023Z" }, "14481": { "id": 14481, "label": "February 2025_Snow Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Hello Friends,\nAs you read this Marci and I are in Iceland. She has always wanted to see the Aurora Borelalis and so prompted the trip. I am still anxiously awaiting the appraisal of my archive to be completed, but until it is I am still working and printing as normal. I have always wanted to do limited edition portfolios of my work, and so I spoke with Jace Graf at Cloverleaf Studio, who is the master of this endeavor. We are starting two projects. One is the Lucille Series.\n\nIn the portfolio will be 12 - 14 inch wide prints on a 17 x 21 inch piece of paper. Image sizes vary a little bit in height. They are printed on Hahnemuele Photo Rag each signed and editioned. This size is unique to the portfolio edition. I will have all of the information in my next full moon email.\n\nThe story of how this series began is this:\n\n When my landlady, Lucille French Clark passed away on April 4th 1991, I became the keeper and eventually purchaser of her house and property. I documented each room in her house as it was when she died, but it was purely documentary. Then one day I picked up a tarantula and photographed it on her tableclothed dining room table. I loved that, and so I found a critter for each room in her house and made an image. The result was the first time I used a camera and images to express the loss of a friend. Lucille helped me tremendously in my life in Big Bend. She owned and operated the French Company Grocery from about 1919 to 1972. Her father, William French started the business in 1900. When he passed away Lucille took over and ran the business. My gallery building is the original French Company Store. Marci revived the name in 2006 when she purchased the Trip Saver Grocery from Judy and Andy Curry. \n\nI have two masterpieces in my archive. Dancing Feet and Bull Snake on Sofa, the latter from the Lucille series. I have never sold the whole set, or even shown the whole set, so here it is.
\n\n**Reminiscings**\n\nI went to see the movie \"A Complete Unknown\" the portrayal of Dylan in his early years. I loved every minute of it. It made me reflect on my own life. I was 20 years old when I quit my job and decided I was going to be a photographer. I had no money, no real equipment, just the passion and desire to learn everything I could about the vocation. I read photo books, and there was a photo gallery in Philadelphia that I went to meet photographers and see their work. I met George Tice, Harry Calahan, and Duane Michals, and perused their framed prints for inspiration. I was also inspired by my mentor, an artist named Joe Vancho. He was a Vietnam vet, a welder and painted and sculpted. Joe was just what I needed at the time. I would not not have quit my job and taken the leap if not for him. When you're young and have your whole life in front of you, it is so exciting. The painful struggles I had trying to earn a living, while learning and improving the craft of photography. \n\nI never did anything else. I worked in photo labs and for a couple of photographers, and one year at the Gage Hotel, but in my adult life, I have worked less than 5 years for other people.\nFinding Big Bend was it for me. I knew it the first time I visited, and the third time I moved to Marathon. \nNow, I feel like I am more at the end of my photographic career, though I still shoot. I had so much fun camping, hiking and making photographs of the people and landscape of the area. But the bulk of my work is done, and now I am ready to explore other types of image making and art.\n\nI watch a lot of documentaries. The Beatles, Muhammad Ali, Woodstock are examples, and while I was alive during their heydays, the documentaries provide me with the back story and gave me the perspective I didn't have at the time it was happening. I guess every generation and lifetime has its own amazing moments. For me, to be witness to, or maybe be alive to witness, the Kennedy, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy, and John Lennon assassinations all were painful realities that good people get killed. At the same time to witness man land on the moon, grow up with the segregated south and see a black man become president, was so astonishing to me. To see rock and roll music in its infancy to what it has become today. To have an operater assisted phone call to an encyclopedia of knowledge in your hand, a computer. Isn't it amazing. I don't want to sound resigned or like life is over, because I am still active and making artistic work. I think it is more that I realize my heyday has peaked, and I am enjoying the fruits of my labor, and how fortunate I was to be born in a country that allowed, encouraged, and at times supported me through my endeavors.", "thumb": "JamesHEvans_BullSnakeOnSofa_Febraury2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "LizardonVenetian_February2025.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 810, "height": 910 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "LizardonVenetian_February2025.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 1090 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 1090 }, "bytes": 0 }, "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:39:08.804Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14481", "overrides": {} }, "14482": { "id": 14482, "label": "March 2025_Worm Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Hello Friends,**\n\nMarci and I are back from vacation. It was an exciting trip. We went to New York, then Iceland, then Paris. There were good days and bad days. I got sick, Marci got sick, but all in all we had a great time. Iceland was beautiful, but very windy. At one point we were holding on to each other, bent over walking forcefully into the wind to the building. If I revisit it would be in better weather, and I would rent a car and driver, and be driven around the country. \n\nParis, too was a first for me. Unlike the past according to Marci, the people were friendly and cordial to us. Still even in February it was packed with tourists, and we were two of them. The highlights for me were museums and the food, and a couple of shops we went to. My take away was the pride people took in their displays of everything. The store layouts and windows, for example, were beautiful. The food on the plate was photographable. Outside of my photographs, that attention to detail I wish would rub off on me.\n\n**Lucille Series Portfolio**\n\nI mentioned last month that I am making a special edition portfolio of the Lucille Series. Jace Graf of Cloverleaf Studios in Austin and I met last week and came up with a plan of what it will look like. When it is complete I will send out a special email to take orders. I posted all the images in the portfolio in last months email, but I forgot this one. Go to my website or last month's email to see the complete series.
\n\n\n**Archive Appraisal**\n\nI mentioned last month that I was having my archive appraised, and it is complete. If you are interested in acquiring or learning more about this, please email me, and I will set up a time to talk to you about it. It is all very exciting.\n\nI made four new images from my archive. The banner image and these three.", "thumb": "ButchJolly_LaLinda_March2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "JamesH.Evans_AnselsBluffPanoramic_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1406, "height": 384 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "JamesH.Evans_AnselsBluffPanoramic_.jpg", "width": 1406, "height": 384 } ], "bytes": 0 }, "key": "14482", "dateAdded": "2025-03-25T10:41:57.137Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "" }, "14483": { "id": 14483, "label": "ChisosPanoramic_2_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "ChisosPanoramic_2_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 269 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 252901 }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-03-26T00:42:42.702Z", "keywords": [] }, "14484": { "id": 14484, "label": "Ocotillo-and-Lechuguilla-Panoramic_Bloom_-2500.-jpg", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Ocotillo-and-Lechuguilla-Panoramic_Bloom_-2500.-jpg.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1400, "height": 537 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 1122813, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-03-26T00:54:43.890Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14485": { "id": 14485, "label": "BullSnakeOnSofa", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "BullSnakeOnSofa.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 1011 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 273062, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-03-29T14:17:09.138Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14486": { "id": 14486, "label": "Bull-Snake-On-Sofa", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "Bull-Snake-On-Sofa.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 720, "height": 809 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 532736, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-03-29T14:18:58.212Z", "overrides": {}, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "filters": [] }, "14487": { "id": 14487, "label": "© James H EvansBull Snake On Sofa", "caption": "Bull Snake On Sofa", "type": "image", "content": "BullSnakeOnSofa.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 1011 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 273062 }, "postDate": "2025-12-10T19:59:22.815Z", "dateAdded": "2025-03-29T14:19:48.871Z", "key": "14487", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "overrides": {} }, "14488": { "id": 14488, "label": "April 2025_Pink Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**A Movie in Marathon**\n\nFor the last 6 to 8 weeks they have been making a movie in and around Marathon. I met and had dinner with Rachel and Adrian, the production director, and immediately fell in love with them. At my age that is rare, but they are magnetic personalities. Adrian gave me complete access to the sets and scenes, and everybody treated me like royalty. I have been on a few movie sets before, but not like this. What is interesting about movie making is right on the edge of every scene you see is a whole crew of people making it happen. It’s fascinating, but also hurry up and wait, as they make the take to their liking.\n\nI also met Julio Decillo, a great actor. He has had prominent roles in a lot of movies, including the Three Burials, a Tommy Lee Jones movie. He told me good stories. I have never met TLJ, our paths just missed each other. He did purchase one of my photo lampshades years ago. Julio was also in the series Narcos and I have been watching it again. Julio is into photography, and he told me that Tommy Lee gave him my book, Big Bend Pictures, and that’s how he knew of me. \n
\n\n**Hello Friends,**\n\nI woke up early this morning, got my coffee, started to listen to NPR, but then opted for George Winston. The early albums, Autumn, Winter into Spring, and December remind me of my old friend Pat Van Geem. I lived with Pat when I first moved to Austin to work for Tomas’ Pantin', one of the best commercial photographers, at that time.\n\nAnother one of my best friends, and brother from a different mother Andrew Eccles, assisted Annie Liebovitz for three years. I met Andrew, and Pat, in Corpus Christi, where I lived for four years.\n\nAnnie was photographing Henry Cisneros in San Antonio, and Andrew hired me to be second assistant.\n\nWatching Annie literally changed my life. It was a whole new approach to photography and I got it. \n\nKen Burns, in the series Jazz, talks about when Charles L. Black Jr. saw Louis Armstrong play he knew he had witnessed genius. He went on to become a noted Civil Rights attorney, who taught constitutional law at Columbia and then Yale for nearly 50 years. In 1954, he helped Thurgood Marshall draft the brief for the Supreme Court case known as Brown vs. Board of Education. \n\nThat’s what Annie did for me.\n\nAndrew saved me.\n\nNever underestimate the power of genius.\n\nWhen I got home from that, I purchased a book called American Showcase. It's a book of portfolios of photographers you might hire in any town in the US. There were about four photographers that I thought I would like to work with, and could live where they were. Tomas’ was one of them, and the only one that responded.\n\nIt happened fast. I mailed the letter on Wednesday, and Tomas called me the next day. On Monday, I was at his studio. A week later, I was moving to Austin.\n\nThe one question I remember from the interview was “what do you want to be when you grow up?” I responded “Eugene Smith.” Maybe that influenced me getting hired, but I was serious.\n\nTomas taught me how to print, and I loved watching him work. Not only his set building and lighting, but how he dealt with clients and art directors. Tomas was brilliant.\n\n I loved watching his hands do things, and he was such a good teacher. I so wish I had that ability.\n\nIt was boot camp for photography. Tomas really had to break my spirit and hardheadedness, and that took nearly a full year. \n\nI was his darkroom film developer and printer. In the beginning, when making a print for him, I would first get the exposure and contrast right. Then he would instruct me to dodge this, I would do that and show him the print, then he would say dodge this too, and I would show him again. He would walk me through every step like that. He didn’t care about how many steps there were or how much paper I consumed. When I got the print to his liking, he would say, now make six prints, and make love to it. Still, to this day, when I am printing, I make six. He was very patient with me.\n\nHe was trying to make me Eugene Smith, and I eventually didn’t need him to tell me what to do.\n\nSometimes people come into your life, for better or worse. You get it, and go through that door or miss the opportunity.\n\nAnd, I am still a strong believer in Bill Wittliff’s motto of “What you are looking for is looking for you.”\n\nWhen I was about 20 and struggling to become a photographer another piece of advice I got from a drag racer Paul Withers, is that the system takes care of itself, and this too has proven true for me. I always had enough money to pay the bills, even when I didn’t have very much income or money in the bank.\n\nMaybe, if you believe in something, then it exists for you. \n\n**Millennials?/ After Thoughts**\n\nThere is a respect that comes with age. Of course, my mother taught me manners too. But I feel it, if not for me, for the work I have accomplished, and It feels good. Respect, is something most of the millennial generation seems to have missed out on. I am really trying, but I don’t get them. Am I just an old fart I ask myself? I think I am still mostly with it. \n\nAs I was trying to learn my craft, anybody that could teach me anything, I was a slave to. Every photographer I assisted, I anticipated their next move, or what they needed. I used to count the frames they shot, so I had the next film back ready for them. Sometimes I was too ebullient on a shoot, and had to be reeled in.\n\nTaking and Making photographs always makes me happy.\n\nStill.\n\nMy best assistant Mike Howard once asked me “do you think you’ve taken your best shot.” At the time he asked I thought maybe not yet, but now I can definitely say yes, I have. There is this great interview of Bob Dylan by Ed Bradley of 60 minutes, where Dylan confesses he didn’t know where those early songs came from, and recited some words of \"It’s Alright, Ma.\" He said he couldn’t write like that anymore. \"I did it once, but I can’t do it now.” He hasn’t stopped writing, just not like that. I feel that way about my photographs. For 25 years I was on fire. I’m still making good photographs, just not like that.", "thumb": "April2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "TomasPantin.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 656, "height": 645 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 1321 }, "bytes": 0 }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-04-15T00:41:54.938Z", "filters": [] }, "14489": { "id": 14489, "label": "© James H. Evans_Walt Whitman's Grave", "caption": "Walt Whitman's Grave", "type": "image", "content": "WaltWhitmansGrave.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 304305, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-06-05T02:05:19.293Z", "overrides": {} }, "14490": { "id": 14490, "label": "May 2025_Flower Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Hello Friends,**\n\nLast month I messed up on the spelling of Julio Decillo’s name. I got it mixed up with his email address and wrote it wrong.\n\nLast week I went to the park and hung out with frends who were staying at a group campsite in the basin. It’s a sweet place with Casa Grande in the back and the window in front. After dinner we sat out watching the night sky for shooting stars, constellations, and planets. I do this at home as well. Our night sky is great. What I saw in addition to these things were satellites. Lot’s of them in all directions. Then there was a line of them, and made me think that this is a new world and I don’t know it.\n\nI got a taste of what retirement is going to look like for me. I hiked the South Rim with my friend Bert Whitaker. We spread the ashes of another friend of mine. Then I went to San Antonio for doctor stuff and to visit with some more friends and be there for his birthday. Then I attended Jimmie Dale Gilmore’s 80th birthday celebration at the Paramount Theater in Austin. Then I drove to Mason for what I thought was going to be an all girl midget band. The poster intrigued me enough to make the drive, but it turned out to be a lip synched rodeo show. I did get to visit my friend Spider Johnson, see his artwork and make his portrait. Then it was back to Austin to visit my 101 year old friend, and to visit a couple of other dear friends. Evan Voyles made me a beautiful neon sign that reads “LOVE IS THE KING” because I say that in my news letter. It is from Jeff Tweedy and Wilco who I was going to see in San Antonio. We got through the gate with my camera and the neon sign, but then got caught on the premises, and no matter how much I tried to convince them it was all harmless they made me take it back to the truck. It was a real disappointment because it was innocent and respectful, and I was hoping it would get a rise out of the band. Sad time we are living in when you can’t promote love.\n\nSo I hope you can see the common theme. Seeing friends!
\n\n**Finally**\n\nI watched that Dylan movie again. In 1965 I was 11 so I missed the moment he came into the spotlight. I got it a few years later. I think it is a great movie, and I imagine they took some liberties, but the musicians and promoters, and agents all seemed to get that this guy is special, and I got that they wanted to claim him and direct him for their own causes and agendas, and he just wanted to be himself. I can’t imagine the pressure to be on the world stage, and to be able to touch so many lives with your work. But I do get what it's like to find your art and vocation and follow it through despite every one else’s opinion. When I found Big Bend, I knew that I belonged here. I knew I could make a body of work that would mean something. When I loaded up my truck and headed for Marathon, I taped a sign in the passenger door window that read “I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more.” ", "thumb": "SpreadingAlex_May2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "JimmieDaleGilmore_80thBirthdayCelebration_ParamountTheatre_Portraits417-22025JamesH.Evans.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-06-15T17:20:16.081Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "key": "14490" }, "14491": { "id": 14491, "label": "June 2025_Strawberry Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Dear Friends and the people who love Big Bend National Park**\n\nAs you may or may not know, there is a plan to demolish and build a new restaurant as well as rebuilding the water infrastucture in the Chisos basin. The proposed cost is 22 million plus dollars for the restaurant and another 20 million plus for the water. The project shuts down the basin and campgrounds for a minimum of two years. \n\nMy knee jerk reaction is don’t do it, and so I felt like what I needed to do was explore the details more. So I called Bob Krumenaker, the park superintendant who is the face of this proposal, but not the sole decider.\n\nThere has not been much public forum or discussion or opposition about it. \n\nThere will be no visitor traffic or basin camping while the construction happens. I was opposed to that, but it make sense. There is potential for accidents.\n\nYou can still hike the basin trails, but you would have to start from Blue Creek or Juniper Canyon. A more difficult hike. \n\nThe order of things as I understand it would be to deconstruct the building, and start the water line replacement in the campground about the same time. Getting that done first could allow for re-opening the campground while the new building is being built. \n\nMr. Krumenaker explained to me that the building is beyond repair and we would be spending good money on a bad building, so much so, that it is better to replace it.\n\nA thinking out of the box idea. Level the old restaurant and remove it. Build a pad or site to facilitate a space for food trucks and picnic benches. With some phone calls and coordination you could begin a cycle of five food trucks per week. This would give visitors the opportunity for diverse food every week. The food truck owners would get to spend a week in the park. Best of all, it would not cost very much compared to the 22 million dollar proposal.\nThen I think out how difficult that would actually be. Food trucks travelling hundreds of miles, and getting into the basin with only what they have in their truck. They could get supplies in Study Butte if needed, but is it really practical?\n\nThe best of idea is to remove all the buildings. No hotel rooms. No restaurant in the basin with the exception of the CC built cottages and employee housing. But is that a possibility? It is nearly impossible to put the genie back in the bottle. Aramark corporation, the biggest winner in this reconstruction pays from 2 to 10 percent of their earnings to the park.\n\nThe new restaurant has slightly more capacity than the restaurant now, which contributes to one of the main issues that the basin has had since the pandemic, and that is parking. Already one car has to leave before another is admitted. There is no resolution to this at the moment.\n\nWhat about the wildlife? Every year they close off Casa Grande for nesting Peregrine Falcons and other wildlife. Do we not care about their lives and habitat for a few years? \n\nMaybe closing the basin for a minimum of two years will make visitation drop off dramatically. It may be the quietest time ever until the basin re-opens.\n\nI learned also, that while the funds had been allocated years ago, the Trump administration has everything at a standstill. A construction company has not been acquired. It may be in a holding pattern for a long time. I just heard on the news as I was writing this how the administration is cutting park budgets dramatically.\n\nPark employees work hard, live in basic housing and do not earn a whole lot of money. To take any funds away from them and the national parks seems criminal. In fact If I had my say, I would rebuild the necessary water lines in the basin campground, and spend the rest on employee raises and housing.\n\nBig Bend should remain rugged and difficult. Hotel rooms and restaurants in the park water down the true spirit of the connection humans have with nature. Big Bend should not be easy and not be for everybody. Learning how to the take care of your needs, hiking in a desert, seeing and identifying animals, flowers and sleeping under the stars set up an opportunity to soul search and learn more about the kind of person you are. The majesty of being one with the earth can be achieved here. \n\nNo matter how it plays out, it is going to be a difficult time for the park, and surrounding towns.\n\nRick Lobello, a former park employee has a grass roots organization, that opposes the closing of the basin. You can learn more at www.oneearthonetime.com.\n\nYou can also learn what the park is saying: https://www.nps.gov/bibe/planyourvisit/chisos-basin-construction-timelines.htm
\n\n**It's Not Dark Yet**\nI am working on a series. Digital cameras are extremely sensitive to low light. Film was never that sensitive. I am exploring the differences. I don't know where it is going to lead me, but the title itself from a Bob Dylan song is revealing.\n\nI am proud to say that this image is currently on display at the Museum of South Texas in Corpus Christi. I wrote about this image in the April Full Moon. You can access it on my website.", "thumb": "BillyThomandSpinner_June2025_.jpg", "featuredImage": "Ocotillo_ItsNotDarkYet_Series.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "bytes": 0 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-06-15T17:27:59.329Z", "key": "14491" }, "14492": { "id": 14492, "label": "© James H. Evans_Danielle Bobby and Daisy© James H. Evans", "caption": "Danielle, Daisy anb Bobby", "type": "image", "content": "DanielleBobbyandDaisyGallo_Portraits.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 134043 }, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-08-10T01:04:05.126Z", "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:47:38.833Z", "searchable": true, "filters": [] }, "14493": { "id": 14493, "label": "© James H. Evans_SpiderJohnson_ © James H. Evans", "caption": "Spider Johnson_Artist", "type": "image", "content": "SpiderJohnson_Portraits_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 194382, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:48:52.689Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14494": { "id": 14494, "label": "BillyThomandSpinner_June2025_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "BillyThomandSpinner_June2025_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 137622 }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:49:41.523Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14495": { "id": 14495, "label": "© James H. Evans_Hope Dickens_©James H. Evans", "caption": "Hope Dickens", "type": "image", "content": "HopeDickens_Pregnant_Portraits61copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 101711 }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:50:18.158Z", "filters": [], "key": "14495", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:09:37.899Z" }, "14496": { "id": 14496, "label": "© James H. Evans_Mark Huston ", "caption": "Mark Huston_Musician", "type": "image", "content": "MarkHuston_Portraits1copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 96981 }, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:50:50.762Z", "filters": [], "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:21:43.666Z" }, "14497": { "id": 14497, "label": "© James H. Evans_Rachel Neel © James H. Evans", "caption": "Rachel Neel", "type": "image", "content": "RachelNeel_Portraits_PhotoRag11.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 102984, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:51:07.344Z", "filters": [ "In The Gallery" ], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "keywords": [] }, "14498": { "id": 14498, "label": "© James H. Evans_Billy Tom and Spinner", "caption": "Billy Tom and Spinner", "type": "image", "content": "BillyThomandSpinner_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 136594 }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:02:02.968Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "key": "14498", "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T03:51:32.342Z" }, "14499": { "id": 14499, "label": "© James H. Evans_4th of July ", "caption": "4th of July", "type": "image", "content": "4thofJulyDanceatthePost_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 146822 }, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-07-10T11:34:50.983Z", "filters": [ "Landing Media" ] }, "14500": { "id": 14500, "label": "July 2025_Buck Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Dear Friends and the people who love Big Bend National Park**\n\nI want to clarify a couple of things from last months email regarding the proposed new restaurant and the closing of the Chisos basin.\n\n1. Bob Krumenaker is not the current park superintendent. That wasn’t clear. Bob has been very helpful in me understanding the current state of the matter.\n\n2. Rick Lobello, a former park employee has a grass roots organization, that is seeking alternatives to closing the basin. You can learn more at www.oneearthonetime.com.\n\n3. This is a note from Rick Lobello:\n\"I strongly suggest that you and others also send your comments to the Acting Superintendent with the subject line - Please come up with a plan to keep the Chisos Basin Open. I have been told by park insiders that he can do it with a stroke of his pen. Here is his name and email - John_R_Gupman@nps.gov. He goes by Rick.\"\n\nCopy and Paste this:\n\nhttps://chng.it/pzqytMdQp6\n\nYou can also learn what the park is saying currently: https://www.nps.gov/bibe/planyourvisit/chisos-basin-construction-timelines.htm\n\nAlso this is another organization to understand and possibly be a part of:\n\nwww.keepbigbendwild.org**Siblings**\n\nA couple of weeks ago I went to see my younger brother who lives in New Jersey, and about 5 miles from the neighborhoods we grew up in.\n\nBilly was diagnosed with non-hodgkins lymphoma nearly 20 years ago. They chemo him down as needed, and even did some treatments while I visited. \n\nHis doctors say it is a miracle he is still alive.\n\nFor the most part, he lives a normal life. He works overtime, still plays hockey, and is the wiseass he has always been.\n\nI believe he is alive by the power of love. \n\nI came from humble beginnings. Let me re-phrase that. We were poor. My whole neighborhood was poor. It was democratic that way. The playing field was even. The major difference was parenting and parents. A lot of the people I grew up with were hooligans. Whenever the gang wanted to do things that could get us arrested or in serious trouble I went home. I was streetwise. I had to be, especially being small and mouthy. My mom raised three boys on her own working factory jobs. While she couldn’t afford to give us tennis or piano lessons, there was not a day that went by that she didn’t hug us or tell us that she loved us. She taught us respect and manners. She would defend us like a mountain lion with cubs if she perceived an injustice or threat.\n\n This demonstrative show of love worked on me and my younger brother, but my older brother was angry from the womb to the tomb. Even love couldn’t change him. But it made me and Billy good. We were mischievous, but not criminal. We never wanted to disappoint Mom. \n\nMy brother installs, repairs, and maintains the machines that distribute medications in hospitals. He works in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. He is a dedicated, hard worker, a real troubleshooter, not just a parts changer. He drives to the locations, so while I was there he drove the rental car. I concluded, he thought most drivers were idiots, and he would prefer no one use the highways but him. He yells at them and calls them names, but only in the car and never at the person. \n\nHe never blew the horn.\n\nThe sweetest moment for me was going to my mother’s grave. We sat there on each side of her headstone talking and reminiscing. And though I didn’t take a photograph, the image I imagined will always be with me.\n\nI love my brother. We are close as we can be, whatever that means.\n\nIf you have siblings, call them right now and tell them that you love them.\n\nLife changes fast.
", "thumb": "BillyandHockeyTeam_August2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "Billy_BillyandMe_Portraits_023copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "Billy_BillyandMe_Portraits_023copy.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 900 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "key": "14501", "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T01:01:10.625Z", "filters": [] }, "14502": { "id": 14502, "label": "© James H Evans_Broken", "caption": "Broken", "type": "image", "content": "Marci_BrokenGlass_Portraits_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 898 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 128178, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "key": "14502", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T04:08:08.737Z", "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:52:28.229Z" }, "14503": { "id": 14503, "label": "© James H Evans_Hockey Mask", "caption": "Hockey Mask", "type": "image", "content": "Billy_Hockey_CloseUp_Portraits_136copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 112740, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:02:57.419Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "key": "14503", "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T04:10:17.856Z", "searchable": true, "keywords": [] }, "14504": { "id": 14504, "label": "© James H Evans_Billy", "caption": "Billy\n", "type": "image", "content": "Billy_Thefaceofawiseasscomment_Portraits.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 131262, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:31:01.817Z", "searchable": true, "key": "14504", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T04:10:35.072Z" }, "14505": { "id": 14505, "label": "4thofJulyDanceatthePost_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "4thofJulyDanceatthePost_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 146822 }, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2025-12-20T04:59:05.167Z", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T04:11:22.487Z" }, "14506": { "id": 14506, "label": "© James H Evans_Billy in Goalie Gear", "caption": "Billy in Goalie Gear", "type": "image", "content": "BillyandHockeyTeam_Portraits_128copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 182906, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "key": "14506", "dateAdded": "2025-08-10T04:12:18.023Z", "keywords": [], "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:02:57.419Z", "filters": [], "searchable": true }, "14507": { "id": 14507, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sierra Del Carmens 1 _ It's Not Dark Yet", "caption": "Sierra Del Carmens 1_It's Not Dark Yet Series", "type": "image", "content": "SierraDelCarmens1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1800, "height": 693 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 146255, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "key": "14507", "dateAdded": "2025-09-07T19:25:39.224Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14508": { "id": 14508, "label": "© James H. Evans_Sierra Del Carmens 1", "caption": "Sierra Del Carmens 1_It's Not Dark Yet_Series", "type": "image", "content": "SierraDelCarmens1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1800, "height": 693 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 146255, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "dateAdded": "2025-09-07T19:28:08.804Z", "key": "14508", "linkTarget": "" }, "14509": { "id": 14509, "label": "September 2025", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Selling My Archive_Part One**\n\nAfter 36 years of photographing and documenting the Big Bend region and running my own art gallery, I am ready to change pace by selling my archive. \n\nI have asked myself what does that look like and mean?\n\nI would like to attempt landscaping and detailing this beautiful house we’ve built. I would like to learn how to sit on my back porch, maybe all day, and read a book. The reality is I would just phase out the gallery and not be open to the public. I love taking and making pictures and that is never going to stop, unless there is a physical reason I couldn’t do it. But it would be more like when I started out. Go to the park for several days, shoot a bunch of film, come home and process it, and make prints. It was a simpler time, not as many images to print. I was building this archive of work. \n\nI figured out when I was about 20 years old that I wanted to be a photographer. I was working in a machine shop at that time, and a fellow employee, Jim Stanton, sold me his 35mm camera. Soon after, I quit my job and was literally off to the races, photographing race cars at the local drag strip. I worked up and down the east coast selling photos to drivers. I didn’t earn very much money. The crown achievement was that I was the official photographer for the United Bracket Racing Association. That organization grew strong enough that NHRA introduced bracket racing classes in their program. That is still going on today.\n\nNevertheless, it was a dead end career and the most that would come of it was features in race car publications like Super Stock and Hot Rod. I did get assignments from them occasionally, but not enough to make a career of it.\n\nThe other lessons I learned from the race track was photographic timing, that every emotion is at a race track, and people get killed doing it.\n\nThe winter of 1979 was so cold, I thought I am not spending another winter on the East Coast. It sounds simple, but I would lay on the roof of my house and watch geese fly south. I thought even they are smart enough to leave, and so I did. It was late October, and the Phillies won the world series. On the roll of film in the camera it shows people partying in the streets of Philadelphia and at the end of the roll is me on the beach in Galveston.\n\nI was so scared and yet so excited. It was the first time I was on my own, not having to consider any one else’s feelings or opinions.\n\nI ended up in Corpus Christi, and lived there for four years. I mostly did odd jobs, and worked in a photo lab. I met good people there. Friends I still have. One being Andrew Eccles. We met a month before he moved to New York, and was immediately hired as Annie Leibovitz's assistant. For three years he travelled the world with her. He called me to ask if I would be second assistant for a shoot Annie was doing in San Antonio.\n\n Of course I did, and we spent three days scouting and photographing Henry Cisneros. Watching Annie, watching genius, transformed me. I returned to Corpus and changed every thing about how I lit a subject, the attention I paid to location and expressions in my portraiture. I knew too, I had to leave this town. I purchased a book called American Showcase. It is a book of photographers and their work. So say an Art Director wants to hire a food photographer in Arizona, he might be able to find one in this book. I found 4 or 5 photographers whose work I liked and location I would consider moving to, and wrote them letters to be an assistant. Only one responded. Tomas’ Pantin in Austin. It seemed like I mailed the letter on Tuesday, he called me on Thursday and on Friday I interviewed and got the job. \n\nI was Tomas’ darkroom printer, and it is there I learned how to print and to understand the Zone system. Tomas' was an excellent teacher. He was really tough on me, but I was so stubborn and hard headed, I don’t know how he did it. \n\nAfter two years with Tomas' I opened my own studio with Cindy Goin. She was Tomas’s studio manager, and we were both ready to strike out on our own. I did pretty good there, but still there was a knawing inside of me of what was going to be my life’s work. I knew that this wasn’t it.\n\nThen my girlfriend at the time introduced me to Big Bend. I loved it. I went back two more times, and on that third visit with Clif Ladd, we stopped at the Gage Hotel, because he knew the cook. I learned that they were looking for a cook to replace one that was leaving. With that in my head we went to the park. I met and partied with Uncle Joe, Aunt Roberta, John Suffaco, and Susan Bryant. It was right there in that restaurant, in that moment, shooting Polaroids, I knew I had found home. I loved these people.\n\nThey were educated dropouts.\n\n Misfits. \n\nWe stopped back by the Gage on the way home, and I applied for the job. Giddings Brown was the manager, and he asked me if I ever cooked before? I believe I said something like \"no, but I know what taste good.\" Either Giddings saw something in me or he was desperate, but I got the job.\n\nI moved to Marathon on December 28, 1988. \n\nI had arranged by phone a studio space, but when I arrived with three truckfuls of furnishings and equipment, my would be landlord decided he did not want to rent. I told Giddings I really needed a building to set up shop. He offered me what is now the V6, but it was JP Bryan’s building, and I could never own it. We went across the railroad tracks and there it was. A building with a big barn in the back. It belonged to Lucille French Clark. She lived in the two story next to it. I was wearing a full length wool coat, and Giddings suggested I take it off, so we didn’t look like gangsters.\n\nInside, in the back bedroom, in bed, was this frail little woman with arthritic, bent like wings, fingers. I explained my situation to Lucille and she told me where to find the key to her building to go look around. It was rough, but it was big enough, and I saw potential. I went back inside and told her I would like to rent it. She asked where was I going to live? I figured in the building, but she also had a little house down the walk, so I went at looked at that too. It’s about 500 square feet, but would work. She rented me the building for $100. a month, and the little house for $50. \n\nI hugged her so hard she crunched. \n\nMy photographic career and life’s work was at it’s beginning. After 34 years and 215 days I finally found it. \n\n\nPart two, next month.\n\nThe images in this email were taken when I was in my early 20's. I didn't know the *Zone System or much about photography. I was reading as much as I could, going to photo exhibits in Philadelphia, studying photographers like Diane Arbus, Arnold Newman, Andre Kertesz, Duane Michals and Andrea Feininger to name a few. I think you can see a budding style emerging, but certainly not realized. I was mostly photographing my family and friends.\n\n\n*Ansel Adams theory of exposure and development.
", "thumb": "SecondGearWheelstandSept2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "Bwling_Mom_Billy_Richard.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 547 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 599 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "Bwling_Mom_Billy_Richard.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 599 } ] }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-09-08T01:43:45.702Z" }, "14510": { "id": 14510, "label": "© James H Evans_Ken Barnes_.jpg", "caption": "Ken Barnes", "type": "image", "content": "KenBarnes_BW_tif.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 60377 }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-10-02T01:20:30.322Z", "searchable": true, "key": "14510", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:29:38.044Z" }, "14511": { "id": 14511, "label": "October_2025", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Selling My Archive_Part Two**\n\nWhen I pulled up to the Gage Hotel on December 28th 1988 with three trucks of my belongings and a sign in my driver’s side window that read “I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more.” I walked in to the Gage lobby to be met by Jim Bones, who welcomed me to west Texas. Jim was a famous photographer, and his gesture felt like an omen. Like I had made the right decision. Still my mind fought my heart that was telling me this was where I belonged. \n\nThrough the week till the new year, the Gage was full of people and celebration. The morning of January 2, as I was standing in the middle of Highway 90 waving goodbye to all my friends, and it was quiet again, the insecurities I kept at bay flashed and I thought, what have I done? \n\nIt felt very lonely. But I had a new set of friends to get to know. Giddings Brown and the staff and crew were all good to and for me.\n\nBack then it was crickets till spring break. There were days with not one room was occupied. This gave me the opportunity to learn how to cook the menu. The weekdays were slow, and on the weekends Phil Thomas, the true chef of the place, made brisket and served a buffet. The dining room was to the left of the entrance and there was only a small kitchen. Shirley Rooney baked downstairs where there was also a walk-in refrigerator.\n\nI treated the kitchen like the darkroom, timing how long things took to cook. For example if a steak took seven minutes and broccoli took 5, then the steak went on two minutes ahead. The menu included a chicken fried steak, a fish entree, steaks, a chicken entree and enchiladas. Learning how to use all the heat sources, and paying attention to the orders, you could get into a rhythm with your helpers and chef. It was quite fun. Waitresses control the flow of orders, and I remember once giving my waitress Rose a hard time about something, and she came in with a stack of orders. I never did that again.\n\nOn my days off, I would go to the park, or work on the building a darkroom. Floating, taping, and painting. I think I slept outside more than inside the first few years here. I still sleep outside.\n\nI was overwhelmed with the concept of photographing Big Bend and the area. I would hike to a location and stay there all day watching the light. I never took the camera out of the bag for the first six months. I didn’t know how to start. \n\nWhen I did start I began to make the 30 pictures that everyone takes of the park. Santa Elena, Mule Ears, Grapevine Hills. Giddings allowed me to sell notecards in the Gage lobby. I bought notecard stock, and I would print real darkroom prints, dodging and burning each one, ironing them on to the card stock and selling them for 2 or 3 dollars. It was 10 dollars worth of work for a 2 dollar card. I took a set to Whole Earth Provisions and Jack Jones ordered 300. I printed and mounted each one. Then I took a set to Big Bend Natural History Association and Sarah Bourbon. She said she would sell them, but a park requirement was they had to be informational. Sarah wrote that for me. With her order, and an image card of the Gage Hotel I had them professionally printed. That’s how the notecard business started. I still sell them and have about 50 different images.\n\nOnce I got the gallery space completed, I started calling my artist friends to see if I could sell their work in my gallery. I unofficially opened the gallery September 1st 1989. I was still working at the Gage, but my commitment of a year was almost up. I sold pottery from Austin, and artists Bill Montgomery, Margie Crisp, Jeanne Norsworthy, Ken Wilson, Paul Graybeal, Paul Wiggins, Dan Burkholder, Billy Ray Mangham, later George Zupp, Mary Baxter, Bill Wittliff and some I can’t remember.\n\nI started to get assignments from Texas Monthly. Kathy Marcus, Nancy McMillan and D J Stout helped me a lot.\n\nI was really hoping to finish this up, but I procrastinated and there is much more to tell.\n\nI'll finish next month, promise.
\n\n\n**Bess and Mary**\n\nI learned about two beautiful young girls that survived the flood at Camp Mystic, and so I called their parents and asked if I could meet and photograph these amazing people. There are layers and layers of tragedy about this event, and I am truly saddened and sorry for everybody who lost a child or their home or whatever. No one close to it is unaffected. There were also miracles, and this story is two of those. \n\n Bess was swept out of her cabin around 4 in the morning, and washed down the flooding river. She floated by putting logs and pieces of wood under her arms. She would get sucked down, pop up and do it again. She floated for six miles only being able to see by lightning. She floated to a debris pile and was so tired and cold she fell asleep. When she woke up she called for help and was fetched out of the mess by two young woman. \n\nMary Margot's cabin had almost filled to the top with water. She dove down to a hole in the screen door and swam out. She popped up to land on the back of a camp employee who had one other little girl. They made it to a tree and were there for several hours.\n\n Every time I tell the story I easily well up about it. These two brave, smart and very lucky children survived. I have met and photographed several of my heroes. Dan Rather, Emmett Gowin, Cormac McCarthy, Arnold Newman, to name only a few. None of them compare to meeting these girls for me. I hope I live long enough to see what they accomplish in their lives. It seems they have already passed such a test. It’s not without tragedy. These girls lost close friends. I asked Bess if she felt like she was spared. She seemed acutely aware, and agreed that she felt like God saved her for a reason. \n\nI could never go to the aftermath of a scene like Camp Mystic. I am not the kind of photographer. But to meet these girls and make their image allows me to make a connection and statement about the event. Several years ago there was a bad fire that started in Marfa and burned nearly to Wild Rose Pass near Balmorea. My rancher friend Bobby McKnight suffered terribly. His childhood home burned down, several of his horses were killed and the home he currently lived in burned to the doorstep. I called him and said Bobby this is probably one of the worst weeks of your life, may I document it? He said C’mon. First, I was honored that he would trust me and let me in to his life, and second it was how I could tell a story about what happened.", "thumb": "BessandMaryMargo.jpg", "featuredImage": "ErnstTinaja.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 768, "height": 996 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 886, "height": 886 }, "bytes": 0 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-10-08T23:57:52.424Z", "filters": [], "key": "14511" }, "14512": { "id": 14512, "label": "November _2025", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**A New Book**\n\nI am proud to announce that U T Press is going to do a retrospective book of my work. We are still in negotiation, but I can say in this email that it will be coffee table size, and about 300 hundred images. I will include stories about the work and my life in Big Bend, and I have asked Terry Tempest Williams if she will write a forward and she has said yes. At this time it will come out in the fall of 2027.\n\n\n\n**Selling My Archive_Part Three**\n\nOK, so I am settled in, I have a crude darkroom and gallery, I’m starting to get assignments, and beginning a life of total artistic endeavor.\nI also did weddings, portraits, copywork, and anything I could do to make money with my camera. I processed film for a photographer that was staying here for a few months. This was a great time. I was very happy. I wasn’t making much money, but somehow the bills always got paid.\n\nWhen I was a young, struggling, drag racing photographer, I was friends with Paul Withers and his wife Sandy, who quit their teaching jobs to be drag racers, and run their own machine shop. We were talking survival tips one day and he told me that the “system” takes care of itself, and you always have the money you need. I swear that has always been true for me. \n\nMaybe, whatever you believe is true for you.\n\nI teamed up with Hallie Stillwell for weddings, and what a team we were. My first wedding in the park with Hallie was Susan and David Pampe. I picked Hallie up at her store, and we drove to Grapevine Hills for the ceremony. It came off without a hitch. (well, I guess one, pun intended.) We were all drinking champagne and celebrating, when Hallie had to go to the bathroom. She went over behind my truck and squatted. I fell in love with her right then and there. She was unpretentious, full of wit, and common sense. A true desert woman, who ran and held on to the ranch after her husband Roy died in a car accident in 1948. She was the iconic West Texas ranching woman. A diminishing breed, but there are still some great ones here. \n\nI had this old Chevy Luv pickup truck, and while driving Hallie home from the wedding, the headlights stopped working. I had a Q-beam in the car, and so I rolled down the window, and with my left hand spotted the road, steering with my right. What an impression I must have made on Hallie.\n\nOne day, I was walking past Della and Dub Haley’s shop on main street where I had my own gallery for 17 years, and is now the V6 art gallery. I noticed a lampshade with images on it. I inquired about it and learned it was made by a photographer named W D Smithers. I called Kodak to try and learn what it was. After several attempts, I learned the material was called translite, and so I got an 8 x 10 sheet box of it to test. Yes that was it, so I called and ordered a roll of it. I found a place in Shiner, Texas that advertised “we can make anything in wire.” They made the lampshade frames. For the base I went to El Paso Imports, and made some adjustments to bases they had in stock. I got the string from Tandy leather, and so began the lampshade business. \n\nUnfortunately, when I went to order the next roll, Kodak told me they no longer make it. They had two 100’ rolls left, one in Rochester, New York and one in Chicago. I purchased both of them. I made less than 200 hundred lampshades. I stamped a number on the ring, but not every one.\n\n I put everything you can imagine on the shades. People, plants, and landscapes. I even made a couple with dead rabbits, and a rabbit foot pull chain. I still have a warped sense of humor. \n\nTwo wonderful things to come out of this was the Hill Country Reporter did a story on me and them, and when I took my shade to the Harry Ransom Center and showed Roy Flukinger, the first thing he said was “Ahh, a Smither’s lampshade, and I said, no Roy, an Evans’ lampshade. \n\nI tied my name to Smither’s name, which was my true intention.\n\nIn the 90’s and 2000’s I shot for every magazine and newspaper. My personal work was featured in a lot of them too. John Spong and Texas Monthly wrote two or three stories on my work, and Richard Grant wrote about my work for the London Times Sunday Magazine, equivalent to our New York Times version.\n\n It was getting known that I was “the” photographer of the Big Bend. I never did promotional tourism pieces. Honestly, maybe one or two in the very early, hungry days. There were a few itinerant photographers doing saturated color, pretty picture books for tourists.\n\nI didn’t want to be that. \n\nMy work is more about photography. More about documenting a place with all it had to offer. To spend my life documenting my neighbor’s lives. The good parts and the bad. The joys and the tragedies. To do it with grace and dignity. \n\nIt is still my mantra. \n\nI have photographs of Ike Roberts when he was young and healthy, to his last days confined to his room and in diapers, taking off his oxygen mask to smoke a cigarette. Hallie from the sharp witty rancher, to a nursing home, completely unaware of her surroundings. Lucia Madrid of Redford, proudly in her lending library, and then next to Hallie in the nursing home. Two amazing woman, totally unaware of each other’s presence.\n\nD J Stout, Kathy Marcus, and Nancy McMillan gave me career building assignments. The killing of Esequiel Hernandez, Boquillas before it got electricity, Terlingua before it turned into what it is today, Steve Smith's Lajitas, and Kickapoo Indians on their reservation in Nacimiento Mexico. With the exception of the Lajitas story, images I made on these assignments ended up in my books and in museum collections.\n\nI have a strong work ethic and an acute awareness of my time on the planet. I hiked and shot more than I could possibly print while I was young and healthy with the thought that I would print them as my body slowed down.\n\nI have explored every genre of photography I could think of, and after all these years, I still have not seen anything purely photographic, that I have not done on film. That was my intention. I wanted the next photographer that tried to fill my shoes, to think, damn he already explored that.\n\nRecently, I had my archive appraised, and I want to sell it to someone that can produce what I haven’t printed, and keep my work alive after I’m not. \n\nAn investor could purchase this work for a gallery or museum. This would set me financially free. I would still go to the park, shoot and print like always. I would still be building the archive. The only thing that would change is that I would not have a gallery, and depend on print sales for survival. \n\nIn closing, I have been fortunate to live the life I wanted to live. To make photographing the people and landscapes of Big Bend my life’s work. \n\nEvery one of you that is reading this has supported that endeavor, and I am grateful.\n\nBecause of your support I have created a body of work that will live on in Texas and photographic history. Now, I am looking for an investor or investors to take me through till the end.\n\nBill Wittliff’s quote of “What you are looking for is looking for you.” Is as true to me as Paul Wither’s “the system takes care of itself.” quote 50 years ago. Please contact me, and I will send you the appraisal archive information and how it can all work.\n ", "thumb": "PernySheaNovember2025.jpg", "featuredImage": "Starlighttif.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "Starlighttif.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 931 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 931 } }, "key": "14512", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-11-05T22:20:07.337Z", "filters": [], "overrides": {} }, "14513": { "id": 14513, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ocotillo and Blue Sky", "caption": "Ocotillo and Blue Sky", "type": "image", "content": "OcotilloandBlueSky.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 912 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 246926, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "key": "14513", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-11-12T01:26:38.866Z", "postDate": "2025-12-10T20:33:22.364Z", "filters": [], "searchable": true }, "14514": { "id": 14514, "label": "© 2025 James H Evans Perny Shea", "caption": "Perny Shea", "type": "image", "content": "PernyShea.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 857103, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-12-05T01:14:05.604Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "keywords": [] }, "14515": { "id": 14515, "label": "© 2025 james H. Evans_Perny and Lucy", "caption": "Perny and Lucy", "type": "image", "content": "PernyatTavowedding_1.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 3000, "height": 2002 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 289646, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "key": "14515", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "dateAdded": "2025-12-05T01:16:04.649Z", "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:27:03.351Z" }, "14516": { "id": 14516, "label": "December 2025", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "**Dear Friends and Supporters**\n\nThis is our Christmas and New Years card.\n\nThanksgiving week in Marathon and Big Bend holds a special sentiment for me because it was on this weekend I stopped by the Gage Hotel, met Giddings Brown and applied for the job as a cook. A month later, December 28, 1988 I moved to Marathon. That was 37 years ago. \n\nThere are several things to tell you.\n\nOn the Archive. I have a couple of serious inquiries and will be meeting after the new year. I am looking forward to the work that has never been seen to make it to walls in galleries and museums. And for my work to carry on and be seen in its entirety. \n\nI mentioned last month that UT Press is going to do a retrospective book, so after the new year I will have my nose to the grindstone. This too will have many images that have never been in a book, but also new images I've never printed.\n\nJace Graf is designing a custom made Crazy from the Heat book in a custom slipcase that will include a print. \n\nJace is also designing a small edition portfolio of the Lucille series. These have been in queue for a while, but you know how these artists types are, the more you push them the slower they go.\n\n\n**Photographic Style**\n\nYears ago when I first moved here, a woman that worked in the park told me there are 30 pictures of the park that everybody takes, and that always stuck with me to do them, but also get beyond them. Actually I thinks it's more like 18 that everybody takes.\n\nAt the same time even doing those 18 is a sort of rite of passage.\n\nLandscape photography is much more difficult than it seems. Photography too, is a deceptive trade, because right place, right time, right light, right composition, almost everybody can make a beautiful photograph. Doing it consistently, printing your own work, that narrows the field sharply.\n\nWhen I look at photographs taken by my heros and peers, I know it's an Avedon, Penn, Weston, Adams, Caponigro, Newman, Gowin to name a few. When I see images posted on social media, I ask myself, could anybody have taken that image? There are lots of photo \"traps.\" Abandon buildings, signs, rusty old cars, it makes me roll my eyes. It says nothing about the photographer. This led me to look at my own photographs, and think, which ones could anybody have taken, and which ones only I could have taken.\n\nI am not going to run a bunch of them, but here are some are distinctly mine.\n\nThank you all for everything you have done for me. I made hiking and taking photographs my life’s work, and every one of you that is reading this has supported, in some way, that vocation.\n\nAm I lucky or what?\n\nMerry Christmas and Happy New Year\n\nLove,\nMarci and James \n\n\n**Marci's New Venture**\n\nShe's done it again! As soon as Marci got her building back, she totally renovated it into a gallery with a bakery / deli. Remodeling the storage rooms out back into four art studios and creating a beautiful outdoor space in the yard where her architectural and design studio has resided. For 13 years Marci brought organic food, fresh produce, meals to go, camping supplies, unique gifts and joy to our town. She plans to do that again with \"Local\" A bakery and art establishment. She's just getting it going, but if you know Marci, it will be great. And she did it all without whining or a Go Fund Me account.\n\nThe website isn't up yet, but soon. **www.LocalArtFood.com**\n", "thumb": "MarciinSantasuit.jpg", "featuredImage": "BurroLady_BigBendPictures.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "BurroLady_BigBendPictures.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 900 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-12-09T23:55:14.421Z", "key": "14516", "filters": [] }, "14517": { "id": 14517, "label": "ErnstTinaja", "caption": "I have many 11 x 14 and 16 x 20 Silver Gelatin Photographs. Silver Gelatin photographs are printed in a chemical darkroom. I printed these all myself, and they are what's left in the edition. My editions went to 50, but many never made it to the end. For example, I may have printed only 6 or 12. My work ethic for darkroom printing was to get the photograph the way I liked it, and then make 6.\n\nThis usually took all day.
\n\nWhat I'll be posting is the actual print you would be purchasing. Most are toned. I usually shot on Tri-X film, developed in D-76, printed on Agfa Portriga, and toned in Kodak brown toner. When Agfa stopped making paper, I used Ilford Galerie.\n\n When Kodak stopped making brown toner I started making my own toners. Some prints because of the tone, are one of a kind. I experimented quite a bit.
\n\n I don't want to down play the beauty of digital prints. I print on Hahnemuele papers are so beautiful that the difference is barely discernible.
\n\nIwatch or a Rolex, both show you what time it is. \n\n Darkroom prints are lot more hands on work.
\n\n Imagine all day in a beautiful darkroom, with a great analog sound system, and The Allman Brothers up so loud if I didn't turn it down during exposures the print would be soft. . It was SO hard!!!! \n\nAfter printing they're toned, washed again, then flattened and spotted. ", "type": "image", "content": "ErnstTinaja.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 886, "height": 886 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 217565, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T04:53:38.914Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {} }, "14518": { "id": 14518, "label": "ChristmasDayFromTheAir_BigBendPictures_", "caption": "Christmas Day From The Air\n", "type": "image", "content": "ChristmasDayFromTheAir_BigBendPictures_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 894, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 58182, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-12-10T19:46:38.713Z", "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T19:44:30.564Z", "key": "14518", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14519": { "id": 14519, "label": "RedRainWorkingDFlatA", "caption": "Red Rain", "type": "image", "content": "RedRainWorkingDFlatA.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 3000, "height": 2000 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 361777 }, "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2025-12-10T19:52:30.165Z", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T19:51:44.214Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true }, "14520": { "id": 14520, "label": "Telephone Canyon", "caption": "Telephone Canyon", "type": "image", "content": "TelephoneCanyon_4inch_sepia75percent_copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 601 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 94776, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:25:34.314Z", "filters": [], "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T19:57:26.649Z" }, "14521": { "id": 14521, "label": "OnGlennSpringsRoadBloom", "caption": "On Glenn Springs Road\n", "type": "image", "content": "OnGlennSpringsRoadBloom.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1140, "height": 1140 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 332827, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "key": "14521", "postDate": "2025-12-10T20:07:41.782Z", "searchable": true, "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T20:06:59.320Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14522": { "id": 14522, "label": "Red Ocotillo", "caption": "Red Ocotillo", "type": "image", "content": "RedOcotillo.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 899 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 180039, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T20:18:39.689Z", "postDate": "2025-12-10T20:19:42.567Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "filters": [] }, "14523": { "id": 14523, "label": "WildwoodNewJersey", "caption": "Wildwood, New Jersey", "type": "image", "content": "WildwoodNewJersey.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 911 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 203316, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "postDate": "2025-12-20T05:35:31.178Z", "key": "14523", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-12-10T21:29:57.995Z", "keywords": [], "overrides": {} }, "14524": { "id": 14524, "label": "PaintingtheRock", "caption": "Painting The Rock", "type": "image", "content": "PaintingtheRock.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 128973 }, "searchable": true, "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:53:56.661Z", "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2025-12-11T15:24:58.936Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {} }, "14525": { "id": 14525, "label": "© James H. Evans_Subjects", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Subjects are essentially images that are everything but landscapes and portraits, though some have a tinge of both in them. \n\n\nPrint sizes are from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\" and the square images are from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\"\n\nI also have silver gelatin prints in 10\" x 10\" and 15\" x 15\"\n\n*Refer to site information if you need more info. \n\nCell: 512-five six zero-8269", "thumb": "WaltWhitmansGrave.jpg", "featuredImage": "Swimmers.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 1024, "height": 1013 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "Swimmers.jpg", "width": 1024, "height": 1013 } ] }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-12-16T03:20:36.212Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "key": "14525" }, "14526": { "id": 14526, "label": "© James H. Evans_Ranch Project", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "I was commissioned to photograph a private. ranch. I spent a week a month for a year. I learned so much about landscape photography on this project. Unlike Big Bend, I didn't have mountains to fall back on, but I did have the beautiful, clear Pecos River. It was my best assignment.\n\nIf you have a ranch, and would like to have it photographed , call me.\n\nCell: 512-five-six-zero 8269\n\n\nPrint sizes are from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\" and the square images are from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\"\n\n*Refer to site information if you need more info.", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 1140, "height": 761 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 0 }, "overrides": {}, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2025-12-16T03:31:41.746Z", "filters": [], "key": "14526" }, "14527": { "id": 14527, "label": "© James H. Evans_New Book_All images", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "
Big Bend Pictures_This is the book in it's entirety. \n\n\nPrint sizes are from 13\" x 20\" to 40\" x 60\" and the square images are from 12\" x 12\" to 40\" x 40\"\n\nI also have silver gelatin prints in 10\" x 10\" and 15\" x 15\"\n\n*Refer to site information if you need more info.\n\nCall me on my cell: 512-five - six- zero- 8269
", "thumb": "ErnstTinaja.jpg", "featuredImage": "LineausLoretteJamesHEvans.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 886, "height": 886 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "LineausLoretteJamesHEvans.jpg", "width": 1400, "height": 1400 } ], "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 1400, "height": 1400 } }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14527", "dateAdded": "2025-12-16T03:50:32.278Z", "overrides": {} }, "14528": { "id": 14528, "label": "TigieLancastersFuneral_7x10DickDeguerincopy", "caption": "Dick Giving a Toast at Tigie's Funeral", "type": "image", "content": "TigieLancastersFuneral_7x10DickDeguerincopy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 146470, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2025-12-24T01:30:10.401Z", "filters": [], "searchable": true, "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14529": { "id": 14529, "label": "HundredsofOcotillosPanoramic2copy", "caption": "Hundreds Of Ocotillos", "type": "image", "content": "HundredsofOcotillosPanoramic2copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 2000, "height": 896 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 500273 }, "dateAdded": "2025-12-24T01:33:28.096Z", "filters": [], "postDate": "2026-01-29T06:11:58.509Z", "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "key": "14529" }, "14530": { "id": 14530, "label": "January_2026", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "** A True Approach To Conserve Big Bend National Park_New Year's Rant **\n\nIt makes the hair stand up on my neck when groups use the word “Conservancy” or “Friends” in their group titles, but barely do they stand for the meaning of the words. It seems more like a fund raising title used to give the impression they actually believe and work towards conserving the environment and natural things.\n\nTake the new renovation of the Chisos Basin. Outside of Rick Lobello, not one person or group has stood up and said, this may not be a good idea.\n\nTo really conserve the Chisos Basin, Big Bend National Park should tear down the bad restaurant building, and all those hotel rooms, and turn it in to a primitive camping area, like they have just below this area. It would end the traffic issues in the basin, and a lot less water usage.\n\nThere is no reason the park service needs to provide people with food and lodging. 61 years ago when it was built, a place to eat and sleep may have been a good idea, but now there are hundreds of places to sleep, and lots of places to eat just outside the park boundaries. Give that business to them. I live 45 miles from the park entrance, and never would I go to the park without food, water, fire, and way to sleep. Who would travel hundreds of miles without these necessities? Unprepared is Disney world mentality. The premise of Big Bend is to hike, camp, and explore the natural beauty and wonder of this national park.\n\nMany national parks do not provide food and lodging. I recently visited Joshua Tree National Park. Over 500,000 acres. No restaurant. No lodging. But just outside the boundaries there were plenty.\n\nKeep Big Bend rugged. Keep it natural. Keep it a place for healthy and fit people. If you can’t hike lost mine trail, you don’t belong here.\n\n People die here.\n\nIf you have ever had anything built in this area, it usually takes twice as long, and cost way more than you budgeted. 2 years and 22 million dollars is what they are proposing, Is it really the best way to spend that money?\n\nMy understanding is the money can not be reallocated, but if it could, better housing, substantial raises for park employees, and maintaining the park itself. They deserve it.\n\nI will be exploring what the past superintendent was trying to put in place, declaring the park as a wilderness area. I will keep you posted on what I find out.\n\nI wish I knew how to get a groundswell of people to make the decision makers reconsider what we are doing here, and in that I understand the frustration of the groups that love and care about Big Bend. The people that make these decisions are very hard to sway. Money rules everything. The more, more, more mentality is the American way and very difficult to change.\n\nMy next task would be to get the park designated as a quiet park. No more loud motorcycles.\n\nThese goals are achievable if there are enough people to get politicians to listen.\n\n\n**Joe Ely**\n\nLou Ann Barton and Joe Ely_ I shot this for Louis Black’s, Austin Chronicle in the late 80’s. They were going to a restaurant on 1st Street and Lou Ann said you have 15 minutes after we get done eating. I needed electricity to power my strobe so I knocked on the door of the house next to the restaurant and asked if I could run an extension cord from her house. The woman was elderly and she said yes, if I could change a burned out light bulb for her, which I happily did. I was ready when they came out and made this image, using my 15 minutes well._ Joe was a great man and fabulous musician. The first time I heard Joe was in Corpus Christi in the early 80's He burned the walls down of that club. I was new to Texas, and I wondered who is this guy. I photographed him with Joel Guzman too. Another time Joe was hired to play a private gig at Cibolo Creek Ranch. After the event, Joe and Marci and I sat on a porch talking. He was kind and sweet. Another time the Flatlander's played the Starlight in Terlingua, and that night a storm came in and knocked out the power. With Coleman lamps and candles the band played on. It was a magical night. Between Joe's passing and a few other close friends lately, my mood has been somber.\n\n**Highlights of the Year**\n\n1. Without a doubt the best thing that happened to me this year was to meet and photograph Bess and Margo. Two survivors of the 4th of July Camp Mystic flood. These two young people showed courage, remarkable survival skills, good sense, and a whole lot of luck to survive.\n\n2. Jimmie Dale's 80th Birthday Party. I surprised Jimmie and made portraits backstage at the Paramount. It was so much fun. The Flatlanders are responsible for creating a magical night in Terlingua. How magical you ask? Marci said she fell in love me that night. I am eternally grateful to Butch, Joe and Jimmie.\n\n3. Hanging out on the Movie set \"Bethesda\" filmed in Marathon.\n\n4. I had several other highlights, but I am keeping it to photographs, otherwise it's going to sound like a diary.\n\nThank all of you for helping to make my life special. I really mean that.\n\nHappy New Year,\nLove Marci and James\n\n", "thumb": "MarciandJames_HappyNewYear_copy.jpg", "featuredImage": "JoeEly_LouAnnBarton_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 921 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "JoeEly_LouAnnBarton_.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 921 } ] }, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "overrides": {}, "key": "14530", "dateAdded": "2026-01-05T03:02:14.034Z" }, "14531": { "id": 14531, "label": "© James H Evans_Burro Mesa Panoramic", "caption": "Burro Mesa Panoramic", "type": "image", "content": "BurroMesaPanoramic_BloomNewSky_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1500, "height": 442 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 626406 }, "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "filters": [], "dateAdded": "2026-01-09T19:51:18.442Z", "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "key": "14531" }, "14532": { "id": 14532, "label": "© James H. 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Evans_ Santa Elena Canyon Aerial_", "caption": "Santa Elena Canyon_Aerial ", "type": "image", "content": "SantaElenaCanyonAeriel_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 600 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 117674, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "postDate": "2026-01-30T18:56:32.066Z", "keywords": [], "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2026-01-30T18:53:54.821Z", "overrides": {}, "key": "14557", "filters": [] }, "14558": { "id": 14558, "label": "LostMineTrailPanoramic_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "LostMineTrailPanoramic_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1500, "height": 495 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 104052 }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2026-01-30T18:57:19.816Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "keywords": [] }, "14559": { "id": 14559, "label": "February 1_Snow Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "** My Own Rebuttal Of New Year's Rant **\n\nIt is very easy for me to stand on my soapbox and quarterback what I think NPS, Big Bend Conservancy, Rick Lobello, and Keep Big Bend Wild, and any other organizations should do. Knowledge is power, and so I have spoken with Rick, Bob, and Leo Tynan. I plan to talk to all of them much more to understand what we are all up against, and how I can get involved to hopefully move the ball towards the goal. \n\nWhile I received a couple of negative responses, I got many positive ones. There is a groundswell, however small, to restore the Chisos Basin area as a primitive camp site.\n\nMy take away at this time is that you can’t put the Genie back in the bottle, and there is not enough individual or political support to achieve something like removing all the hotel rooms and restaurant. That goes for having the whole national park designated as a wilderness area as well.\n\nI also perceived that NPS is keeping their heads down from the current administration.\n\nThe goal at the moment is to keep what we have.\n\nI must confess that I am not pro tourism, and never was. National parks are government funded. They are not required to make money. Social media, all the magazine articles, BBNHA, Visit Big Bend, Friends of Big Bend, Visit Marathon, Visit Alpine, the list goes on, contributes to watering down what I love about the park. For me less is more, but that's a difficult concept to sink in to the mindset. I have had the good fortune to hike every trail in this park without another soul on it. Many times. There are secret places I have found, and petrified wood, and bones I’ve discovered. I've had many intimate moments where I was in coexistence with this land. With this Earth. I am not trying to be dramatic, but that bond and love pours through me, and surfaces in the images I produce. It's a deep love that I can only share with you through the images I make. \n\nI have two big projects on my plate right now. The retrospective book, and finding a place for my archive. Once these are complete I will work towards my goals of getting the park designated as a wilderness area, and getting it designated as a quiet park. \n\nI believe getting the quiet park designation could happen rather quickly if the organizations would get behind it.\n\nI appreciate all the letters I’ve received pro and con, and if you can educate me in any way, I am very open to it. At the end of the day all of us love Big Bend National Park. If the goal was only to preserve its natural beauty, and take out the drive to keep promoting tourism, the natural wonder of the park could become the priority. \n\nThank you for hearing me out.\n\n\n**Herb Kelleher**\n\nIn the early 90’s I had the pleasure and privilege of photographing Herb Kelleher, the CEO of Southwest Airlines for the New York Times magazine. Arrangements were made that I would have 30 minutes to do it.\n\nI chose to photograph him on the observation deck, standing on a table, so I had a sky background and to make a portrait as a plane lifted off the runway. It was quite a shot to pull off.\n\nTo complicate matters Herb was 13 minutes late, and I asked him if I got it on the other end, and the answer was no, so I only had 17 minutes. I was set up and ready and made a few shots, then hurried with camera and lighting to do a portrait in his office. \n\nHerb was quite a leader. He knew everyone’s name that worked for him, and when I mentioned I was photographing him to Southwest employees, they always had good things to say about him. Just last week a long time employee of his stopped by the gallery. I showed her the image and she too remembered him with such fondness,\n\nI learned on Wikipedia that he was from Camden, New Jersey, and grew up in Haddon Heights. I knew these areas well, because I grew up there too. I can tell you, even as a kid, it was a rough neighborhood. It seems even rougher now. I wish I knew this about him prior to the photo shoot, maybe I would have gotten my 13 minutes back. These days when I visit my younger brother who lives in Maple Shade New Jersey, I always visit Walt Whitman’s grave, to me the only good thing about Camden. Learning that Herb was from Haddon Heights gave me a new sense of pride because he proves even if you come from humble beginnings, if you are committed and work hard, the sky’s the limit.\n\n**Images From The Archive**\n\nI am editing and editing and editing for this new book. Every image in this email has never been seen or printed, including the banner panoramic. I am having blast going through them. I just don't know how I am going to whittle it down to 300.", "thumb": "HerbKelleher_Feb2026.jpg", "featuredImage": "IndianHead.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 900, "height": 879 }, "bytes": 0, "pageImages": [ { "src": "IndianHead.jpg", "width": 900, "height": 600 } ], "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 600 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "key": "14559", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2026-02-04T03:42:46.901Z" }, "14560": { "id": 14560, "label": "© 2026 James H. Evans_E Dan Klepper", "caption": "E Dan Klepper", "type": "image", "content": "Klepper.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 900, "height": 675 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 110729, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2026-02-13T05:09:46.153Z", "key": "14560", "linkTarget": "" }, "14561": { "id": 14561, "label": "JackSpencer_", "caption": "", "type": "image", "content": "JackSpencer_.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 1024, "height": 768 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 164316, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2026-02-13T05:17:17.665Z", "linkTarget": "" }, "14562": { "id": 14562, "label": "© James H. 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Evans_Tommy Moore", "caption": "Tommy Moore", "type": "image", "content": "Tommy-Moore_-.gif", "size": { "content": { "width": 630, "height": 630 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 254601, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2026-02-19T17:04:48.037Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [] }, "14568": { "id": 14568, "label": "© James H. Evans_Storm South 385", "caption": "Storm South of 385", "type": "image", "content": "Storm-South-385_-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 630, "height": 473 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 29356 }, "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "dateAdded": "2026-02-19T17:09:28.127Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Landscapes" ], "overrides": {} }, "14569": { "id": 14569, "label": "© James H. Evans_Storm South 385_1-", "caption": "Storm South 385", "type": "image", "content": "StormSouth385_1-.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 630, "height": 473 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 29356, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "overrides": {}, "searchable": true, "dateAdded": "2026-02-19T19:38:03.900Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [] }, "14570": { "id": 14570, "label": "March 2026_Worm Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "\n**A Bigger Issue**\n\nThis administration is threatening to build a wall that will run through our Big Bend border. \n\nIt’s all over social media, and there is much public outrage.\n\nStatistically we have very little illegal crossings here. The border in Big Bend is an impractical point of entry, because there is still a hundred miles of desert in front of you.\n\nIn my 38 years of living here, I can tell you we have an enormous buildup of every law enforcement agency available. There are border checkpoints all over the area, and even in the park. At the Marathon checkpoint, there use to be one person in a trailer. Now, there's a permanent structure, and at least three border patrol agents and sniffer dogs. It's a big waste of money.\n\nAll these law enforcement agencies do not have much to do. State Troopers have pulled me over more than once for going a mile or two over the speed limit. It's ridiculous how oppressive it is. In this beautiful part of the country where you can feel so free, and one with nature, is swarming, like hungry bees, with law enforcement.\n\nAnimals do not know borders. Cutting off their ability to roam across the Rio Grande will be devastating for wildlife.\n\nIf you never experienced the days of Boquillas and Jose’ Falcon’, you don’t know what you've missed.\n\nA border wall will cut off the Rio Grande from the United States. That doesn't make a bit of sense. Both countries rely on it. It's the blood flow of Big Bend.\n\nIf you fear Mexican people as a race, as this administration wants you to, it’s because you do not know them or their culture. Donald Trump is flat out lying about them all being criminal.\n\nI’ve lived in an equally mixed community of Mexican and Anglos all these years. The Mexican people are religious, hard working, and very family oriented. If you go to the local cemetery that was segregated many years ago, and observe; the Anglo side is rarely tended to. You’re dead, you’re gone. The Mexican side, is celebrated with solar lights, and pin wheels, flowers, and maintenance. A visual love for their dead.\n\nIt is time we unite, not as Democrats and Republicans, but as Americans.\n\nStop letting this administration divide us. It is what's keeping us from moving forward and keeping Donald Trump sucking up all the oxygen in the room.\n\n It is way past time to stop thinking of each party as the enemy to the other. \n\nIt is time to stop demonizing a whole race of people.\n\nIt is time to return to a true democracy. The \"United\" States.\n\nThe only voice you have is your vote. Please use it.\n\n PLEASE VOTE TODAY.\n\nThank you, all my friends who have supported my free life in Big Bend. I know how fortunate I am to have lived here all these years, and create a body of work of a Big Bend that no longer exists, and at the moment is extremely threatened. Thank you for letting me rant and speak honestly to you.\n\nPlease do what you can to preserve this most beautiful national park. \n\nhttps://nobigbendborderwall.com/
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Evans_Empty-Streets_Corona-Virus__Spring-Break", "caption": "Spring Break_Corona Virus Year", "type": "image", "content": "Empty-Streets_Corona-Virus__Spring-Break.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 630, "height": 473 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 34138 }, "overrides": {}, "dateAdded": "2026-03-08T21:03:37.359Z", "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "searchable": true }, "14573": { "id": 14573, "label": "NoWallSantaElenaCanyon", "caption": "Santa Elena 3", "type": "image", "content": "NoWallSantaElenaCanyon.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 910, "height": 913 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 227696, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2026-03-09T11:33:19.879Z", "linkTarget": "", "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ] }, "14574": { "id": 14574, "label": "Standup", "caption": "Santa Elena Canyon", "type": "image", "content": "Standup.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 910, "height": 913 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 248601 }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2026-03-17T04:20:51.914Z", "searchable": true, "keywords": [], "overrides": {}, "key": "14574", "filters": [ "Landing Media" ] }, "14575": { "id": 14575, "label": "April 2026_Pink Moon", "caption": "", "type": "html", "content": "Fairfax Dorn_Big Bend Pictures\n\n\n\n\n\n**The Border Wall Issue**\n\nMarci and I had a meeting at our house with Bob Krumenaker the previous park superintendant, Rick Harris, former NPS, Trey Hermann, graphic designer, and former board member of BBC, Ronny Dodson, our Sheriff, Clif Ladd, Wildlife Biologist, Lynn Shackelford, Ranch owner, and Tara and Joe Shackelford, Hidden Dagger Adventures. I (we) wanted to learn about what is really happening on our border. \n\nBob was in Washington DC all week, doing the thankless task of meeting with politicians and people that can possibly move the needle.\n\nBut it was Ronny Dodson, who has boots on the ground, and really knows the most about what’s going on. He said the border is actually already secure. They have 240 working cameras and if there is an illegal entry they are picked up on heat sensing cameras and drones. Law enforcement just waits for them. The Trump Administration has actually already secured our border. Lynn, who has a ranch very close to the river, said he used to get about one illegal a month, but has not had one in 4 years.\n\nWhile the Big Bend region makes up about 25% of the border, there are 0.32 of 1% apprehensions.\n\nHere are some real facts: \n\n1. There is not enough man power to maintain and support a border wall.\n\n2. We will no longer have dark skies.\n\n3. It will have devastating consequences for the people who depend on tourism.\n\n4. Bears and other migrating animals would no longer be in our national park.\n\n5. The New York Times reported that in 510 miles that makes up our border, there are 6 apprehensions a day. A DHS estimate says it cost a very conservative 17 million dollars a mile to build a wall. For the the 510 miles the cost would be $8,670,000,000. That's 8 Billion 670 million dollars. For six illegal entries a day, 2190 a year. The cost of the wall for each illegal caught over a 20 year period would be $197,945 dollars. That is just for the wall itself. Not taking in maintainance, or manpower to sustain it.\n\n6. We would be losing the Rio Grande river to Mexico. That more than anything is the true battle.\n\nFight for the Rio Grande, to keep our American rights intact, and the wall goes away. It is the lifeblood for hundreds of Americans. We need and depend on it. \n\nRonny said if he had a helicopter and pilot, and a Border Patrol station in Terlingua, that would best money spent, cost comparitively very little, and it's done. If the Sheriff's department had its own helicopter, it could potentially save lives, if it could also be used in emergency situations. \n\nFrom Candelaria to Del Rio, we do not need a border wall here.\nIt is waste of money, manpower, and will ruin the Big Bend region.\n\nPlease do what you can to preserve this most beautiful national park. \n\nhttps://nobigbendborderwall.com/\n\nEmail: greg.abbott@gov.texas.gov (no - you don’t have to use their online form) \nTelephone (Office of the Governor): (512) 463-1782 or (800) 843-5789.\nMailing Address: Office of the Governor, P.O. Box 12428, Austin, Texas 78711-2428.\n\nCalls are much more effective than emails or letters.\n\n**One More Thing**\n\nWhat has fallen off the radar is the building of the new Chisos Restaurant. Another terrible idea that is not needed and the primary benefactor Aramark Corporation. I wish the support we are getting for no border wall would extend to no restaurant and only the CC rooms in the basin. It goes against environmental impact statements.\nBREAKING NEWS:\nI just saw this on Instagram minutes ago, so it is unconfirmed. They are not going to build the new restaurant in the basin. I don't know if this a rumor, if it's on hold, or fact. I hope it is true, and at least one environmental disaster is avoided for the moment.\n\n**A Personal Note**\n\nI have lived in Marathon for 38 years. I fell in love with area the first time I visited. The third time I came out, I knew this was where I could do my life's work. I could create a body of work that would actually mean something. There was always a Border Patrol presence, and law enforcement, but it wasn't so oppressive. In the last month, I have been stopped by the police three times for less than two miles over the speed limit, and failure to use a blinker while I was changing lanes, which I did abruptly, because the car I went around was going dangerously slow. \n\nThere was a sense of freedom and anonymity.\n\n My doors were always unlocked.\n\nI had the park all to myself, photographically, for about 25 years. No one will ever have that luxury again. \n\nIn small communities you are aware of your neighbor's lives. Their struggles and highlights. The human condition. In the past if you had a disagreement with your neighbor, you might say some harsh words, not talk to each other for a while, and then go have a beer together, shake hands, hug, and laugh. Now, if you have words or disagreements, lawsuits are in the mix. \n\nI guess I am like every generation that thinks the way it was, was better, but I resent this new era.\n\n\n\n**A Gratitude To The Better Half Of Our Species**\n\nMarch was Woman History Month, Woman are one of my most favorite things on the planet. When I was 5 years old, I was riding on the back of a horse and fell off. I didn’t get hurt bad, but my Aunt Phyllis came to my rescue. She took me to her room, and laid me on the bed, nurturing me until I felt better.\n\nIn her room I remember her vanity and the smell of perfume and girly things. She was the first woman I fell in love with.\n\nI still easily melt around intelligent and beautiful woman. After all these years, I can’t say I understand them at all. I am trying. \n\nMy friend Iris, says Woman are crazy and Men are stupid. I think that sums it up rather well.\n\nSo, hats off to woman, the best thing on the planet. I wish I could post an image of every woman I love. Here's a few. Marci, you are the true light of my life, and I am a very fortunate man.\n\n\nArchived emails available.", "thumb": "standtheriogrande_April_NotNecessarycopy.jpg", "featuredImage": "FairfaxDorn_Closeup_BigBendPictures2.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 910, "height": 913 }, "pageImages": [ { "src": "FairfaxDorn_Closeup_BigBendPictures2.jpg", "width": 1500, "height": 1500 } ], "bytes": 0, "featuredImage": { "width": 1500, "height": 1500 } }, "dateAdded": "2026-04-12T04:31:59.927Z", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "linkTarget": "", "key": "14575" }, "14576": { "id": 14576, "label": "standtheriogrande_NotNecessarycopy", "caption": "Santa Elena 3", "type": "image", "content": "standtheriogrande_NotNecessarycopy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 910, "height": 913 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 239563, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2026-04-12T05:27:35.174Z", "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "keywords": [], "overrides": {} }, "14577": { "id": 14577, "label": "stand-the-rio-grande_Not-Necessary--copy", "caption": "Fight For The Rio Grande", "type": "image", "content": "stand-the-rio-grande_Not-Necessary--copy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 637, "height": 639 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 390978, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 } }, "dateAdded": "2026-04-12T05:30:55.476Z", "linkTarget": "", "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "searchable": true, "overrides": {}, "keywords": [] }, "14578": { "id": 14578, "label": "standtheriogrande_Kingston_NotNecessarycopy", "caption": "No Wall or Wire", "type": "image", "content": "standtheriogrande_Kingston_NotNecessarycopy.jpg", "size": { "content": { "width": 910, "height": 913 }, "thumb": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "bytes": 239570 }, "dateAdded": "2026-04-14T15:12:29.686Z", "keywords": [], "linkTarget": "", "searchable": true, "filters": [ "Landing Media" ], "overrides": {}, "key": "14578" }, "14579": { "id": 14579, "size": { "content": { "width": 0, "height": 0 }, "thumb": { "width": 519, "height": 420 }, "featuredImage": { "width": 900, "height": 900 }, "bytes": 0 }, "label": "", "type": "html", "content": "**An Open Letter To President Donald Trump**\n\nDear President Trump\n\nI commend you on doing the excellent job of securing our border. In the 510 mile stretch, the average of 6 illegal entries a day is a true feat. Less than 1% of total illegal crossings. Through the stationed Border Patrol Agents, and our own outstanding sheriff Ronnie Dodson, and his department, our border is essentially closed. Ranch owners that used to get at least one illegal entry a month have reported to me they have not had an illegal on their property for 4 years. Mr. Dodson says that with the heat sensing camera and drone technology any illegal movement is located, and they just wait for them to make it to the highway.\n\n This has all been successfully accomplished without a physical wall.\n\nI saw your interview on 60 Minutes and you told the reporter you resolved the border issue, and in Texas, you really did.\n\nYour administration is still threatening to build a wall all along the Rio Grande, but I beg you to please reconsider. The Rio Grande river is essential to every Texan's way of life that is near it, and the one size fits all mentality of a proposed wall doesn't work here.\n\nTexas fought a war for this river.\n\nCeding it to Mexico would destroy our local economy, our wildlife, and our dramatic night sky. Bears, mountain lions, and many other animal species migrate from one side of the river to the other. It will kill them.\n\nThe class one dark sky that the McDonald Observatory depends on would be threatened. \n\nI realize you grew up in cities, and may be far removed from the natural beauty of the American west. But I would urge you to please come to Big Bend and spend a week with us on the river. You will learn why even before you installed all the border patrol reinforcement, how inhospitable the terrain is for illegal entry. Once you cross the Rio Grande, there is still a hundred miles of desert. In the summer months temperatures can reach 115 degrees. \n\nAlso, you would learn that the villages and people close to the banks of the Rio Grande in Mexico are our friends. We love them, and they are an essential part of the Big Bend experience. \n\nCalculating the modest price of 17 million dollars a mile to build a wall, divided by the current amount of illegal apprehensions, the cost per person would be over $195,000. for the next 20 years. That doesn't include maintainance and staff to patrol it.\n\nI have a proposal. Buy our police force their own helicopter and pilot. In fact, buy us two. Build a border patrol facility in Terlingua or Lajitas, so agents won't need to drive two hours to reach the border, and monitor us for a year. \nEvery person that relies on the Rio Grande will gladly join in to dissuade any illegal entries, especially if you promise not to take our river and livlihood away from us.\n\nIf entries go up, let's have a meeting and discuss what we can do next. If they stay the same or go down, we can all declare a victory. \n\nOn a personal note, I can't imagine what your life is like, and I would venture to say, you can not imagine what mine is like. But, I want you to know there is good in the world. It's here in the Big Bend region. Come see for yourself.\n\nDear Reader, Please feel free to copy and paste this letter for social media or to send to someone you think should read it. Please credit James H. Evans_Marathon, Texas\n\n\n**Jon Dee Graham**\n\nI used to go see Jon when he played at the Railroad Blues. I loved the banter that he had with Richard Fallon, one of the owners. A great songwriter and musician. It was obvious to me that he had his demons. We had an \"on the road friendship.\" He was very easy to talk to and be around. I sure miss him.\n\n\n**Ten Year Anniversary**\n\nMarci and I celebrated our 10th anniversary. We took some lunch and a tiny bottle of champagne and went to a friend's ranch, and then to our special spot in the park. \n\nYou know, I asked Marci to marry me, she said yes, and 10 years later we did. You have to respect a woman that keeps her options open.\n\n I can't tell you how many bad decisions I've made. Hundreds, thousands.\n\nThis was a good one. I love you Punkin.\n\n\n**New Version of Big Bend Pictures**\n\nThis book represents a Big Bend that is no longer. Many portraits of iconic people of the area, and my beginning life in Big Bend. It is an updated version of my first book. I changed out 11 images, and updated my notes and stories. It still includes Robert Draper's original foreword, and an additional foreword by Sterry Butcher. I reprinted every image as I would print them today. There was some cropping of images in the original book. This book is exactly how I shot them. To order signed copies go to www.jameshevans.com, and click on the book cover in the menu. \n\nYou can also call me at 512-560-8269.", "thumb": "Jon-D-Graham_May-2026_.jpg", "linkTarget": "", "dateAdded": "2026-05-06T03:37:53.492Z", "caption": "", "featuredImage": "SistersBoquillas.jpg", "overrides": {}, "filters": [], "key": "14579" } }