Finding Freedom in the Parting of the WaysMain MenuThe Parting of the WaysIntroductionPaths by Julie ShaferJulie Shafer essayDiverging Paths Audio GalleryDenise Johnson Interviews Julie Shafer Pt. 1Works CitedInformation pageBiographiesInformation pageGratitudeAcknowledgementsDenise M. Johnson4ac969f411f8ab69a8061d019e5b50c846dc43d8
Julie Shafer, Plains, 2018
1media/plains_thumb.jpg2020-04-09T22:49:27+00:00Denise M. Johnson4ac969f411f8ab69a8061d019e5b50c846dc43d83376Silver Gelatin photograph, 15 X 24 inchesplain2020-05-07T04:04:35+00:0042.2471822,-109.5025167Denise M. Johnson4ac969f411f8ab69a8061d019e5b50c846dc43d8
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1media/plains.jpg2020-04-09T22:39:46+00:00Plains46Denise Johnson essayplain119442020-05-27T23:11:37+00:00In The Parting of the Ways series, Julie Shafer works to deconstruct the mythic status and lore surrounding the Oregon Trail through an appropriation of the compositional and signifying strategies of the very images that were used to persuade and lure white Americans to move west of the Mississippi after the Civil War. Shafer’s photographs of this part of the Oregon Trail, taken with a convenient 35mm camera and black and white film, intend to capture the traveler’s perspective. Works such as Plains, 2018 easily conjure the sets of classic Hollywood westerns, while also reaching further back to images by William Henry Jackson made while traveling in the 1870s with the Hayden Expedition and U.S. Geological Survey. In the historical photographs, as well as in Shafer’s, the land itself claims two-thirds or more of the picture frame. Fixed on a tripod, the camera occupies a neutral center, not too close to the ground, while avoiding bird’s eye views. The skies are often blank and flat, and the natural realm fills the picture plane with little evidence of human occupation. In their familiar setup, openness, and formulation of quintessentially American sites, the photographs question the very idea of “freedom.”
