Emotional Healing - Deepwater Horizon Revisited

Bradford. as a painter of birds, marsh and wildlife estuaries- not to mention living in a coastal area, much of my work reflects the "healing" of the land, animals and humans. That was a stressful time without remedy so it seemed. I know still, that if you visit the sandy shores, dig a few feet, there is a blackish layer of sand and we all know what that is! Also, when the oil killed much of the marsh grass and reeds, the barrier island eroded at a rapid rate without the root systems holding the land together.
No matter how much "cleaning" is done, the damage is irreversible.

Thanks Phyliss. I witnessed the worst of it first hand. Dolphins, turtles, birds. I was in Grand Isle when the first oil hit the beach and then returned when they were digging out the oil. I went to work with NOAA after the spill and did damage assessment from Houma to Biloxi. I never went offshore in the Gulf again. I wanted to work with bird island recovery team but was not hired.
I could not bring myself to photograph the worst that my eyes saw.

Yes, Grand Isle used to be my husband and my favorite fishing town, used to be! I take my camera every week to the beach when I am not out on our boat, "tar balls" still wash up on the shore. We did not take our boat out during the worst of it because the oil was ruining too many boats but the damage even in Gulfport, only a few miles from Pass Christian where I live, was horrid! The beaches were sad enough! There were massive amounts of beautiful loggerhead sea turtles washed up on shore dead along with birds and fish. That was the most shocking scene that I have ever witnessed first hand.
I know as an avid fisherwoman, the fishing has yet to fully recover and the oyster industry remains devastated. I only hope that big oil companies have learned from this as they helplessly watched death cover the coast lands.

A camera can capture beauty and destruction. Its the photographer who chooses which version of the truth they want to show. By only showing a beautifully lit oil rig you are only showing a half truth.

Edward, I think you might have missed Bradford's point. The piece wasn't meant to tell the entire story, he only related what releasing it "in the wild" means to him.

Every photo is only part of any story.

That said pretty much everything I shoot is a form of healing. An escape from a high stress job and day to day life and everything that goes with it. But it's the ones I shot on hikes in back country areas that provide the most healing. I can't even begin to describe how I feel when I'm on a trail. My avatar was shot while hiking on the Mist Trail in Yosemite. Standing on that rock in the Merced river and working my camera was an exhilarating experience to say the least.

Photography is communication. I think the missed opportunity was to bear witness the aftermath and let the viewer feel the emotion for themselves.

Edward, I did snap a few shots of dead turtles and such but basically, the beaches were closed off to clean-up crews for a long time. The few photos that I did get, I deleted because they were just too morbid. I wish now that I had saved them though.

I shot this picture on 9/9 we were still in NY on 9/11 and had a double ticket for the South Tower. We had been up the Tower on the 9th in the evening and were going back up on the 11th in the morning but were held upwhilst I waited for a battery to charge.
On the original photograph there are clouds which spookily look like smoke coming off the towers (Not on this re-worked image)




I took pictures on 9/11, they are un published and will remain so.

When we arrived back in the UK we managed to get return tickets for $99 as no one was booking to to travel to the USA by air.

We returned in March 2002, six months after the attack and I took this shot in Inwood Park...
The atmosphere in the park was cathartic.

Edward. I made a pre-decision not to be a disaster photographer. A decision I sometimes regret and have given second thought to. I walked away from the beach when flight 800 crashed in the 90's. I was closer than any person on land could be. I could have scooped that story. I could have stayed in Grand Isle and shot the tarred birds. I would have made a lot of money. I took the opening shot because I was there and because I could. We were assured that nothing like the spill occurred could ever happen. I was in endangered species protection, but I was not paid by BP and my reports could not be seen by them til long after.
I regret the decision to leave and go back to Florida. And keep in mind it would have been on my own money. I took photos of Dolphins in the slick but they were too blurry. I was very distraught and could not think right.

The one shot I did have from Grand Isle has been up on FAA for a long time now. Not everything I put up is necessarily for decor. There are other uses for prints.
I sat on theabove photo for 5 years. I could have cloned out the Deep Water Horizon on it and sold it as an oil rig beauty shot. I didn't. Chuck got it right. But remember it was still someones home for 6 months out of every year and there maybe some that want to see it as they remember. I have had it in the archives long enough and It is there uncloned and with an honest title.
Here is the other side. I put it up over a year ago. It is also part of my healing. There was a time i sought shots like this out and I was belittled for that too.

This was my image in response to Sandy Hook. I have a hard time looking at it without remembering that terrible event and the realization that nothing has changed since.

Mick, thanks for the photo and the story. I am originally from NY. Both disasters struck very close to home. I have only one photo of NY with the towers. It is a slide and I have been meaning to scan it. It's not that good but it is my personal memory.

You're welcome Bradford.
We were over visiting relatives (we'd been before) and everything was surreal, we went to Wave Hill the day after and sitting on the grassy banks we could hear laughter from the cafe, whilst just a few miles away there were over 5,000 people missing, feared dead (as far as we knew, that was the number at that time). We tried to give blood, but it wasn't required, and I even got into a fight (verbal) with a bar owner in the Bronx at an Irish bar which had pictures on the walls of 'Freedom Fighters' from Northern Ireland, whilst he was watching TV and calling for retaliation on terrorists.

I was also upset to see fellow Brits whinging at JFK because they had been stranded for two days!

They were lucky to be alive, but never mentioned the poor people who weren't.

Sad times.

I put a towers picture up the other day from the water, it was an old 6meg shot so I had to 'paint' it to make it wall friendly.

Our news of the Deepwater Horizon disaster was mainly of local people trying to make money from the oil company.

Mick, I can imagine being at Wave Hill. A quiet refuge a world away from the hustle and bustle of NYC. I have not set foot in Manhattan since that day. I have not really dealt with all the emotion of that.

Edward, my brother in MA wrote a song about Sandy Hook and performed it Newtown. It was very well received.