Happy Thanksgiving... a day late

I spent quite a lot of time on the Internet searching for a photo that says something about Thanksgiving that isn't maudlin or hackneyed. I saw hundreds of images of food, people at table-- every last one looking deleriously happy, lots of turkeys-- both in their natural state (ie. alive) or cooked, but nothing that I found the least bit interesting or meaningful. There were 2 paintings scattered among the images, this one by an artist named Farley, and another by I can't remember who.

Thanksgiving has always been a favorite holiday for our family, just not one that has any particular profound meaning. I don't want to seem cynical, but the commericial aspects and the forced and phony sentimentality do annoy me.

About the images I posted last week: The first is part of a series taken at the Los Angeles Airport by a renowned "street photographer" Gary Winogrand. The photo was seen in a NY Times slide show about the wonderful Arts scene in LA-- this image was used to hype the permanent photo collection at the Getty Museum. Hmm... I thought,  I bet that if it is the the Getty's permanent collection it must be very valuable and although I didn't see a dollar value when, on the Internet, it is obviously a well known and highly regarded picture. I certainly have no idea why. To my untutored eye it is a not very well composed snapshot and it really doesn't say anything about the Los Angeles Airport that I'd like to know. I suspect that there are plenty of similar pictures taken by regular folks with the Kodak Hawkeye cameras that were predominant during the 1950s.

The 2nd image is Rhine II by Andreas Gursky. It has the distinction of selling at auction for the highest amount ever paid for a photograph: $4,338,500! This image is from a video made by Gursky admirer (sycophant) and was made at the site where the 4+million dollar photo was taken. Gursky mentioned that he did a bit of cleanup with Photoshop.

Finally I want to thank Phyllis and Jamie for commenting. I really do appreciate knowing that this blog  is being read.
Byron