WHALLONSBURG — Facets of Nathan Farb’s oeuvre will be revealed in “An Afternoon with Photographer Nathan Farb,” 3 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 19, presented by the Grange Lyceum Series.
The event will be held at Whallonsburg Grange Hall at 1610 NYS Route 22. Suggested donation is $5.
Farb is best known here for his Adirondack nature photography, but this talk will include his photographs, short film pieces, interviews, all intertwined with his remembrances of a long and interesting career and life.
His topics are:
– The Summer of Love, Tompkins Square Park (1966-67)
– Romania (1969, 1975 and 1989)
– The Russians (1977)
– The Galapagos (1986)
– The Adirondacks (1985-2005)
“I’m going to try some things that I haven’t done before,” Farb, a Jay resident, said. “I’m going to show sections from different periods of my life and show how I changed. You are not the same person you were when you were 25. I’m not. and I’m not the same person that I was when I was 35. I have these different periods of my life where I’ve done different things.”
Growing up in Lake Placid gave Farb a unique lens to ponder his work in sports terms.
“I see an open running field. I see an opportunity here. That has shaped my life. I used to think I was so great, but really I realized one of the things that got me a lot of work over the years was the fact that I listened to editors and listened to what they needed and they helped me develop a story that I would be working on.”
A year after the fact, Farb photographed the Exxon Valdez oil spill, which occurred in Alaska’s Prince William Sound on March 24, 1989.
“The editor at the Times really helped state the story by telling me what she thought. They sent me all over Alaska to see how it affected things. My instincts were pretty good. I felt like this was not going to be changed by turning the soil over and everything. This is a thousand-year process, a long, long, term project. This stuff is going on in our own times whether it’s our human doing that’s making it all happen or it’s just something that has happened over and over to the Earth. Things have changed a lot over a period of time.”
Farb embarked on his multimedia explorations for friends he thought would like to see them.
“The Summer of Love” is early work created in 1966 when Farb lived in the East Village.
“I think a lot of people are interested in that work now. I will show some of that work and how it changed people,” he said.
In his 85th year, Farb still picks up cameras, a tenacious practice he attributes to his mother, Bertha Eisen Farb Kahn.
“You know, my mother was a musician. I learned sitting at my mother’s feet as she taught private lessons. My mother had been a band leader when the men were drafted all during the war. My first memory of my mother is of her leading the band in front of our little house that was right next to the school. Me standing on a table with either a Native American woman or woman who was married to a Native American guy; she would hold me next to the window to watch my mom,” he said.
How to put emotions in an inanimate object is what he gleaned from his mother.
“A musical instrument is really an inanimate object, and you’re trying to put your feelings through that thing. That’s the same thing with a camera,” he said. “I realized later in life that that’s what I had learned from watching her was something that has been valuable to me in my life. I have this idea that your destiny is pulling you forward a much as your past is pushing you forward. That’s an idea that I don’t where it came from, but that’s the way I feel.”
KEENE ARTS
The award-winning documentary, “Nathan Farb and the Cold War,” will screen at 2:30 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 11, at Keene Arts, 10881 Route 73, Keene. Admission is $20 at the door.
Andrei Filimonov, a Russian-born poet and fiction writer, thought Farb would be a good documentary subject. Filimonov’s idea was made reality by director Nathaniel Knop in “Nathan Farb and the Cold War,” which had its North American premiere last year at the Lake Placid Film Festival.
“That’s cool and gave me a new lease on life, so to speak,” Farb said.
“Most people do not remember me. It’s surprising. But, there are some people who do.”
About the film, Knop writes:
“I attempt to carefully immerse the viewer in an enchanting exploration of an artist’s life. As the focus shifts between the external subjects and the photographer himself, the layers of Nathan Farb’s being are gradually peeled away, revealing the profound impact of his interactions with people and nature. Influences from other photographers, such as Diane Arbus, Berenice Abbott, and August Sander, become apparent, enriching Farb’s perspective.
“Blurring conventional documentary genres, from road movie to portrait to political thriller (considering the war Putin’s Russia will launch shortly after the second photo shoot in Siberia), the film project defies categorization.”
The documentary aroused interest in Farb’s work again.
“I sold a few things since then. I’m happier having the film be recognized. It’s not my film. It’s their view of me. But it doesn’t matter. People are going to see you the way they want to see you. That’s what I’ve really found out,” he said.