And One Day We Will Die, page 2
-Take some self-care shut up stupid gray therapist I don’t have time to make time-
She was loved by people whose love should be worth something, but it did not matter in the end. It only felt like hunger to her. Like an inverted eyelash, she could not seem to extract it without maximum damage to delicate parts.
A kindly nurse had once told her, as she dozed, tender fleshy parts of her still aching from labor, swollen and bruised, “Just keep ‘em alive, honey, that’s all you got to do. The rest will come natural.”
The rest. All the calcium from her teeth and the milk from her breasts and all the love left in her heart; given willingly, given easily. Nobody had warned her she was a finite resource. That she would wither up and petrify.
the first “I hate you,” oh, that was funny, I knew it was coming but—sike—joke’s on you kid, cause I hated me first
It wasn't her fault. All of the guts of her, the soft parts, were gone; gone with her grown-up babies. All that remained was the outside, skin and bones and pastel pantsuits, and a hardened stone of a heart with teeth that could not unlock.
That's why she wanted to become a ghost—to shed the old dead skin like a snake and slither to some new reality where bodies were not needed and the void beckoned like a lover. Rise into vapor and dissipate into the ether.
what would it feel like to drift through a person just a breeze that ruffled their hair a gentle salty spray on their skin or a pinch, I won’t pinch them hard
She cupped a dirty palm over her eyes and stared out at the horizon, looking for what she did not know. The air was turning cold. Was that a plane? The silver glint of something, a brief spasm of shine in the sun's rays. She watched, waiting for it to appear again, and after a moment, it did, brighter this time, flashing gunmetal and chrome, at a reasonable speed. Was it a private plane? A military plane? It seemed too sleek and clunky to be a jet, no, it was something from an older time, a relic. Moving history. It was flying low. Flying slow.
well damn it might just be a time traveler like that fella from the sci-fi program or maybe it’s a figment of my
She felt a drop fall on her hand; cool. Plop. Wet. A light drizzle was starting. The plane was drawing nearer; she could almost make out the pilot through the thick pane of glass, but not quite. The cockpit seemed tiny, and the sun gave a glare off the glass. The engine was loud, like music. Rain while the sun shined. It seemed an omen of a kind.
what was that saying, the devil’s beating his
She watched the plane grow closer. It was flying incredibly low, she could see that now. Too low—it would fly right over her head, she would have to duck. The force of it might throw her off the cliff.
why would a plane fly so low is he drunk passed out hijack cabin depressurized I watch the news
The plane was only yards away now. Suddenly, she realized. It was coming for her. She waited for the fear, but it did not arrive. It was time to rise; meet the challenge. She felt the chatter of her ground-down teeth.
Plop. Another drop. She moved to wipe it away, and felt a momentary shock; a tiny pinprick. Her hand came away smeared with black. A glint of light, then gone into the smear.
A lightning bug. In the middle of the day.
I’m sorry I didn’t know I thought you were a raindrop come back firefly please you’re not meant to be the ghost
She took a step forward, staring straight down the cliff at the water, still glittering, little circles appearing, disappearing and reappearing where the drizzle landed. Something wasn't right. It was glittering orange, instead of turquoise blue. She wrinkled her brow, and a whiff of smoke hit her nose. A fire! There in the water. But how was that possible?
Lightning bugs everywhere, now. Fireflies, dancing.
I could chase them
A glowing ball of orange and red flame had risen from the depths, right in the center of the water, burning bright, so hot she could feel it where she stood. As she watched, a line appeared, a trail to the shore, and the flame licked out over the trail and crept up the shore and onto the rocks with lightning quickness. She barely blinked, and the flame shot up to the face of the cliff, and was climbing upwards, to her. It was moving so fast she had no way to escape it. In mere seconds the flames would be licking her feet. The fireflies circled; they had met their queen.
The plane was so close to her that she could feel the ground rumbling, could make out the letters on the side of it, the pilot’s pale profile visible inside. His face was obscured, his helmet a whited-out circle. It didn't matter.
I love you no-face please save me let’s chase fireflies
The ground was on fire all around her, flames shooting up, licking at her skirt, skin-meltingly hot. She jumped, stretching her limbs out as far as she could, propelling herself forward with all her might, grabbing in front of her, hoping she would be caught. The bag fell from the waistband of her skirt and tumbled below, into nothing.
fuck I wanted to leave nothing behind
Time froze for a split second, as she was suspended in air, midway between land and plane, lightning bugs still circling around her face like a Met-Ball headpiece, and she was able to catch the quickest, puzzling glimpse of what lay below her.
fuck where’s the water where’s the water
The city she'd fled lay below her, all asphalt and smog and stupid grayness, people milling about on the sidewalk below, gawking. One woman’s mouth screamed a perfect, silent “o.” Behind her, the clean green grass and craggy rocks were gone; it was all steel beams and metal. The stupid gray fourteenth floor balcony had a broken railing. She flailed at the air with her manicured nails. Only the fire was real.
She stretched out her hands, reaching to the heavens, to the bright, beautiful fireflies, and waited for the plane to swoop down with perfect, graceful precision and catch her. She’d never doubted it would.
it will I know it will
Only the waiting crowd below. Only the licking flames behind.
It didn't matter now. She had already jumped.
Later, they identified her by her teeth. And the puzzling lone brown hiking boot, at odds with her fancy blue silk suit. A fact that puzzled her husband for years afterward.
She was a Ghost.
who cares, anyway
Argyria (Progress Review)
INSPIRED BY “WHERE YOU'LL FIND ME NOW”
HELEN VICTORIA MURRAY
ABSTRACT
The photographic firm Armezzo & Drawer has received significantly less critical attention than their contemporaries. This is partly due to the sensationalism of Ward Drawer’s public trial in 1888, and the explosion at 42 Gantt Street in 1890, which was thought to have destroyed almost all the firm’s originals. The anonymous bequest of newfound plates and prints to the Armezzo & Drawer collection marks an exciting rediscovery. This research project seeks, for the first time, to surface their photographic innovations through queer historiography.
RESEARCH NOTES
Tintype: two men’s hands, touching, c.1860s–1880s.
A long-fingered, pale hand, its fingertips distinctly blackened; a sturdier hand, broad palms and shorter fingers, veins standing out. The uppermost hand presses down hard—to diminish the perceptible blur of subtle movement, which normally cannot hide from the lens.
Ambrotype of Mr. Ward Drawer performing plate sensitization, c. 1865.
Drawer holds the plate “waiter-style,” balancing it on the points of his fingertips. It takes a precision of motion and thought to enable the chemistry to spread fluidly across the glass or tin. The young Ward Drawer is tall and fair, a long streak of a man upon the glass. Light hair, light eyes of the sort that read so icy clear under the UV index. Lips colorless even in monochrome. He performs a dumbshow of his trade, but its conditions are ever-present.
This is one of the earliest photographic portraits in the A&D collection.
Chalk and Pencil Sketch of Davide Armezzo - “Revelation!” – 1865.
Interesting that Drawer, who was well underway in his photographic business by 1865, opted to draw Armezzo, rather than photograph him.
The rusty chalk compliments the visionary scene of Armezzo in the red of the darkroom. Drawer playfully includes a caricature of himself, reflected in a convex mirror. A fanciful addition—no purpose for a mirror in there, surely? Drawer’s gaunt self-portrait predates the works of Edvard Munch by decades, but has something of that austere expressionism—the artist is not kind to himself. It is hard to reconcile his gaunt stare with the vivid youth in the photograph. Perhaps he intends to juxtapose his own rigid, Presbyterian physiognomy with the beauty of Armezzo's features?
The portrait is intimate, even sensual. Armezzo’s shirt hangs open at the throat, his waistcoat misbuttoned. A curling lock falls gently against the breadth of his neck. Tilting his exposed glass plate between his fingertips, his features all concentrated intensity. His lip lifts at one corner, a soft upturn that might have appeared as a sneer, were it not for points of fascinated light Drawer captures in Armezzo’s downturned, melancholy eyes. Drawer captions the other man as a revelation, and through Drawer’s illustrating hand, we see him thus.
Note: a smudge of brown black in the lower left corner. I like to think this is a collodion mark, hinting at the challenges of co-creation in the studio space—hard to prove without chemical analysis?
Albumen Print of Davide Armezzo lying in Grass. Caption: “Our First Success,” 1870.
The caption, in Drawer’s handwriting, seems to reference the declaration of Julia Margaret Cameron upon her own first successful glass plate. If this is the intended reference, it is a strange one. Armezzo and Drawer were far from beginners by 1870. It is famously rare, in collodion photography, for the model to be able to hold a smile for the entire duration of the exposure. Yet here he lies in the tall grass, arms spread wide with cigarette just visible in the corner of his mouth, as he laughs upwards to the sky.
Armezzo arises from the margins: notes and diaries, partial character sketches, recorded in passing. Little of his history in Italy is known. Like many immigrants and entrepreneurs of the nineteenth century, he seems to be born fully formed in the Saltmarket, the day he opened his shop with Drawer.
Street Photograph – Exterior View of the Premises of 42 Gantt Street, c.1870.
The photographer has stationed themself facing the entrance of the tenement. On the stairs, fast-moving shapes of two figures are only partially recorded in the exposure: one presumably a woman from the trail of pale skirt, the other, more clearly delineated, his body semi-opaque, pauses in the doorway to scrape his boot.
Side note—perhaps only relevant to me: my flat is directly opposite the site of the former studio. When I look out from my desk, I see the gable end, still gray-black with smoke-discoloration, and the wall, marked with the ghostly former structures of the collapsed building.
If Armezzo can be called a bohemian at all, he wasn’t very good at it. Although some diarists wishfully recount hints of European romance around his character, he seems, fundamentally, to have lived the reclusive life of a workaholic. The photographers leased the top floor of the tenement, keeping it as living quarters, studio, and dark room. Accounts of the 1860s and ‘70s find Armezzo holed up in the dark room, particularly at night. Pouring and rinsing and buffing and scraping. Copyright records repeatedly register his rights to A&D images. This prolific outpouring enhanced the fortunes of both partners, enabling them to build the bespoke glass-paneled studio structure that adorns the roof of 42 Gantt Street by the time of this photograph.
By day, social networks and photographers’ flattery were Drawer’s domain. Perhaps the “Revelation” portrait was necessity as much as art. Armezzo, habitually insomniac, turning night into day, could not very well pose for his partner in the sun. Wetplate collodion is an impossibility at night—no UV light to react against. The conditions of their craft would not allow it. And so, Ward Drawer—craving a portrait of his partner, wrought with the same care Armezzo devoted to their trade—drew him by hand.
Album, Handbound and Hand-lettered: Albumen Prints, Social Photographs – Saltmarket, c.1880s.
I think in these photographs, that A&D are following the better-known Thomas Annan, in attempting to capture the social life of the city of Glasgow in all its sprawl and squalor. Where Annan’s are taxonomic, sociological, there is more of a Hill and Adamson artistry about what A&D do in the Saltmarket. Their partially-bodied prints are a curiosity of this series. Bare feet sticking out from under bushes on Glasgow Green, or an arm, dangling from a shadowed window opening. Extreme close up of curled, dirty fingers against stone. Were they intended to be a joke (I have read jokes of this period about drunks mistaken for spectres)?
The two inject themselves into the space of their subjects—one partner frequently photographs the other, interacting with motion-blurred street children, dirty faced workers, or skeptical wifeys. In the decade since “Our First Success,” Armezzo’s comfort in front of the camera appears only to have increased. Fortunate for him, since the two photographers were going out evermore into the world. It is around this time that the pair branch out toward mediumship.
Anonymous, “Astralism and Psychic Sun-Projection: A Lecture by Signore Davide Armezzo,” Glasgow Athenaeum, July 1880.
In the account, Armezzo begins the session with the standard cold-reading techniques of the psychic charlatan. Then, he ramps up to his particular manifestation.
‘It is by the intercession of the sun,’ Armezzo called, ‘that a photographer may fix the afterimage of a face. And by that same sun’s intercession, I now call down the shade of my beloved spirit.’ Then, as upon a ray of light, a tall fair woman coalesced alongside him, and moved, and seemed to bend to whisper in his ear.
Adept with light and plate and lens, a glass projection trick of this kind would have been easily achievable for Armezzo and Drawer. Naturally, these forays into the realms of spiritualism were accompanied by the monetary sale of cartes de visites, spiritualist cabinet portraits, and bespoke photographic sessions with credulous audience members.
Yet who was this spectral feminine influence? A shade, I argue, of a very different sort.
Two Photographs of the Drawer Siblings, c.1880s.
Araminta Drawer—doubtless the named “shade of spirit”—starts showing up in the photographs in the late 1870s. I have not found her in any census record, and there is scant evidence of a birth or baptism for either Drawer. Odd but not unheard of for the late nineteenth century, this fact speaks to Drawer’s probable working-class roots. The most reputable scholarly works on A&D (Botham, 1997; Tubb, 2002) opt not to question the attributive, fragmentary accounts of Araminta. All due respect to these scholars; I’m not convinced she exists. At the risk of waxing theoretical, I think she’s a double exposure. Or, more literally, Ward’s parallel self.
There are any number of ways the photograph of Ward and Araminta could have been doctored. Likely a spliced composite, re-photographed and copied to eliminate the traces. Image manipulation is stereotypically considered a contemporary phenomenon. Not so.
The second photograph is the playful shot. A long exposure, intended to play off their (apparent) twinning. Araminta first before the camera, and then at length, Ward in the same spot—their bodies blended. Brother-sister conjoinment. It disproves nothing, for Drawer could have covered his lens, thrown off one gendered suit of clothes for another, jumped back into shot. If anything, their merging bodies rather prove the theme.
Marriage photograph of Davide Armezzo and Mrs Armezzo (formerly Miss Araminta Drawer), 1885.
The Armezzo wedding portrait both frustrates and proves my case. As I have argued thus far, the images Armezzo and Drawer captured of one another speak to a particular tenderness, a sensuality, almost a fascination. This portrait has the same look. Armezzo’s small, broad palm cradles Araminta’s long, slender one. The bride wears lace gloves, thwarting my attempt to identify photographers’ marks. She is taller than he, and leans her long neck modestly towards his shoulder, as he looks at her intently.
A lavender marriage? Could be. Yet I have often seen queer- / feminine-presenting wedding portraits of this kind in photographic collections. Accounts do surface in the periodical press, of married heterosexual couples in which one or both were found to present a different gender to the one assigned at birth.
A marriage photograph is always already a document of legitimacy, visualizing the claims of each spouse upon the other. Distanced by history, are we to fall into the same corroboration traps?
Double Exposure Photograph – Armezzo & Drawer, 1885.
As with the photograph which merges Araminta and Ward, this photograph merges the bodies of the two photographers. It is not so mirthful as the twinning portrait. The men sit in the same chair—the taller Drawer upright and ghostly white, seeming to look down on the head of the shorter Armezzo. Drawer holds his hands in the approximate position of an embrace, but, as if he hesitates to commit to a position, they blur. A resting haze settles on Armezzo’s shoulders and chest. Between the fanning white, Armezzo’s face is strained. The ghost of stubble coating chin and neck, and black rims beneath his eyes. A weary, wary portrait.
