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This image was made, with the intent to impose a feeling of mystery on my reader; what the heck could he have made a photo of? That it is ‘for real’, may be deduced from the tips of my shoes and from the bit of tired green which I brought in the picture, to not become a photographer of ‘the abstract.’
The image is a dire symbol of the disaster that struck me, and many others who live in a house on the river Gartempe. More than a week ago, there it was: an almost record-breaking flood, which sent a gurgling avalanche of muddy river-water into my cellars, this to a height of 1.65 centimetres on the inside walls. No warning from city hall, which is legally obliged to sound a loud siren; the thing did not work, they told us later…
I have a huge, complicated and very old house. Before going to bed, I had inspected the right one of my three cellars at 02.15 o’clock, having found but a little trickle of water entering the pipe. I had opened the door to the balcony, to prevent it from getting stuck if the water might come higher. Not expecting much more, this insomniac went to bed, to be disturbed by terrible sounds, about 05.00 o’clock. By that time, I could not go down any longer, to close the door; the water stood already one meter high, flooding the staircase in the hallway…
The open balcony-door was leading the wild river straight into my house, overturning and ruining big pieces of furniture; destroying the contents of the prepared clothes-shop for Easter, set up in the next two cellars; terminating precious 18th-century porcelain and glassware, which were stocked in one of the ruined cupboards; making glue of a collection of stored books; pushing magnificent plant pots from the balcony wall into the river, taking away lavender, hortensia et cetera. What was left, was of the ‘tired green’ mentioned, and of the muddy green seen in the picture.
It was only days later, after long and hard cleaning work, merely making silly pictures for insurance-sake (not a good cause, as they do no insure high for property at such risk…), I took the above shot, as one of a series of three. From the second one, you might divine the reason for making the series:
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However, turning it around, all becomes clear.
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Saved between two miraculously intact glass plates was this image of an idol, once adored by a people on one of the Pacific islands – only to prove, that such idols are useless. This one managed to protect itself, or rather its image, but not the property of the one who reverently brought it into his home. The idol did not even save its little brothers – my collection of beautiful reproductions of Toulouse Lautrec’s circus drawings…
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Sierksma, Montmorillon 10.4/2024
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