Memory.
This week in honor of the city of my residence and my daughter's home town, I have been featuring Pawtucket, Rhode Island, aka the 'Bucket'. This is this the last installment in this series.
Memory, Pawtucket 1994
I made this picture in 1994 on Sabin Street in Pawtucket. A sales yard for grave markers and headstones sits back from the corner, separated from the entrance to the Oak Grove Cemetery by a used car lot. With a large-format camera, knowing it can pick up lots of detail, I like to compose busy pictures and filling the frame from corner to corner. Here, I'm looking across an assortment of used cars to the monument yard and the old fashioned billboard for this family business. Oddly, even though the Grahams are no longer authorized dealers for Rock of Ages, they left the sign and just made an attempt to paint out the name.
I often place a key detail at or near the very center, but I keep it small. It might be a word, a bit of text, or some other element that functions as a visual joke or pun. I did so here: the painted headstone with the word "Memory" on it is likely what prompted me to stop and get the camera set up in the first place. Here lies memory. It has to be buried somewhere, and where better than in a photograph.
Below is an image I made 20 years later, in 2014. I wasn't attempting to recreate the scene, but many of the elements repeat. The family monument business continues as does the used car lot. The banners are gone, as is the Rock of Ages sign. The central billboard has been renewed and done over in reverse typography. The headstone of memory remains, now in a stylish and contemporary black granite. The lot is emptier, and the vines are overtaking the crane, but the scene continues. Perpetually, the telephone poles run akimbo down Sabin Street.
Memory, 2014