Archive Page 107

A Refuge in Arkansas

On our cross-country road trip we stumbled upon the nonprofit Arkansas Native Plant and Wildlife Center in Queen Wilhemena State Park in Mena, Arkansas.

In its mission to rehab and provide education about native animals, they house a mountain lion, poisonous snakes, birds of prey, deer, a coyote, wolf, alligator and numerous other small mammals. The oftentimes ill or maimed animals are given to them by the Game & Fish department or just regular people who’ve come across them.

Run by Tom Young (above), an ornithologist and master falconer, they are in the process of renovating their land and building new pens for the animals, but in its current state, it’s ad hoc and very personal. Visitors can now experience a one-of-a-kind tour of the grounds (ours with the very affable and knowledgeable Wendell Thomas, below), even getting to enter the mountain lion’s cage and handle the snakes.

Once they are more established and turn it into a full-fledged animal zoo (which is what they intend), it’s certain it’ll be more formal and they’ll be less access and personal attention.

So now is the time to go if you ever find yourself in western Arkansas.

To see more of discarted’s photos of the center, go here.

We Live In Confusing Times

Of the things we learned on our cross-country road trip, and there were many, one was that one can freely and openly photograph the White House — arguably one of the most at-risk targets in the world — but the same can’t be said of office buildings in downtown Los Angeles.

Sikhs with a Camera at the White House. They Must be terrorists

To see more of discarted’s photos from this day, go here.

The ACLU Needs Your Help

Photo by discarted

We were contacted by a staff attorney at the ACLU of Southern California, and apparently they are looking into the harassment of photographers by law enforcement, specifically “incidents involving LAPD or other local agencies detaining or arresting people solely for photographing, seizing cameras, or ordering people to delete pictures.” If you’ve had an unpleasant experience with law enforcement in the LA area, please email us and we will give you his contact information.

The ACLU is a staunch defender of individuals’ rights and the First Amendment, and it could mean good things for photographers if they took this on.

Law & Disorder at RNC

More rumblings from the Republican Convention: Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, was arrested in St. Paul today when she stepped in to help two of her producers who were being detained by Twin Cities police. AP photographer Matt Rourke was also arrested. They were both covering anti-war protests outside the convention.

While the crowd of more than 10,000 was mostly peaceful, there were pockets of aggressive demonstrators who vandalized windows and harassed law enforcement, which is apparently where Goodman and Rourke got caught up. The 51-year-old Goodman can be heard on the video pleading with police not to arrest her, but the cops, in full riot mode, weren’t in the mood to distinguish between journalists and protesters.

Read the Democracy Now! statement here.

Article from the AP via TwinCities.com.

Harrassing Photographers a Nonpartisan Effort

It’s not surprising that the political conventions have proved to be hostile venues for some photographers. Politicans and media types don’t always mix well.

At the Democratic Convention in Denver last week, an ABC News producer was arrested for trying to shoot film of some Democratic senators and bigwig donors leaving a private meeting at a hotel. Asa Eslocker was manhandled by the Denver police, one who couldn’t even be bothered to put down his cigar before handcuffing him. He was told by one officer that he was “lucky I didn’t knock the f–k out of you.” See footage of the arrest here.

And in Minneapolis this week at the Republican convention, three New York filmmakers from the Glass Bead Collective were detained by police for filming in the Shoreham Rail Yard. Fittingly, they were in town to document police brutality. Confiscating the trio’s belongings, including cell phones, cameras and hard drives, the police justified the search and seizure as a homeland security matter.

Also in Minneapolis, though not relating to the convention, photographer Guy Still was handcuffed and detained for taking photos of a police special operations center. Through a chain link fence, Still photographed some officers getting into a van, which triggered the requisite terrorist accusations. One officer told him he remembered “the good old days [when] we used to take people like you in a van.”

Whatever that means.

Articles via ABC NewsMy Fox Twin Cities and My Fox Twin Cities.

New Orleans Post-Katrina

In one sense, New Orleans is back to business as usual. In the French Quarter, there was the regular mix of drunken frat guys, distinctive oddballs and run-of-the-mill tourists. And in the Garden District, the most striking site was street after street of gorgeous Victorian houses. 

But then it was also surprising that driving through some of the worst-hit areas in St. Bernard Parish and the Lower Ninth Ward how many houses and businesses were so dilapidated and boarded up, still bearing the spray paint markings from the search and rescue teams. Inside, the houses were completely stripped bare of anything — furniture, toilets, fixtures — of value. It was pretty eerie to think of the people trapped in those homes three years ago and what a mess it must have been.

Wildlife Report

Photo by discarted

We’re keeping a tally of the wildlife we see on the road, and oddly enough, while we’ve been through some pretty remote, and even desolate, areas, not one rattlesnake or coyote. So far the list includes: deer, jackrabbits, cottontails, owls, lizards, a grey fox, one cottonmouth, skunks, spiders, turtles, vultures, eagles, wild turkeys, one black bear with two cubs, a giant millipede, tarantula-like water spiders, alligators, salamanders, skinks and horned lizards. And then there was the endangered Comanche Springs pupfish and the Pecos gambusia in the Balmorhea State Park in Toyhavale, Texas, the only place they’re found in the world.

Unfortunately we’ve come across some dead ones, too (both in New Mexico).

Photo by discarted

Truck Stop Blues


Photo by discarted

Something’s wrong when you start to think $3.85 is cheap.

Divine Inspiration

Our first stop out of LA was Niland, CA, to see Salvation Mountain, Leonard Knight’s 50-foot high, 150-foot wide mound of religious folk art. Located in the Salton Sea area, it was really, really hot (like blistering), but Leonard still showed us around the place, saying he was absolutely “tickled” we had come for a visit. Leonard is funny and quirky and one of a kind. He also loves visitors, and traffic has spiked considerably there since it was featured in the movie Into the Wild.

Now in his 70s, Leonard created the site almost entirely himself out of red clay, except for the occasional help of some teenagers, driven by his unparalleled passion for God. He said he wasn’t much of a believer until he hit 35, when he was compelled to say, “Jesus, I’m a sinner, please come upon my body and into my heart” … and Salvation Mountain is the result.

Highways, Byways and Much, Much More

Photo by let ‘er rip

Today we set out on a cross-country road trip to see some of the great sights the USA has to offer. From Los Angeles to Boston and back again, we’ll get to see this real America everyone talks about, and we’ll be posting some updates from the road. 

In light of that, this piece from NPR seemed especially fitting: Photographer Stephen Shore took a similar journey in 1973, documenting everything from meals to hotel rooms and keeping detailed records in the form of receipts and postcards. His journal was so impressive that it is now being published in book form, called A Road Trip Journal.

Among many notable things about Shore, he sold his first photo to the Museum of Modern Art at 14, published a universally acclaimed book called Uncommon Places, and is widely credited as one of the pioneers of color photography.

Check out a sampling of his very cool photos here.

Listen to NPR’s “Weekend Edition” interview with Shore here.


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