Another Summer Photographs by Terri Weifenbach. Published by The Thunderstorm Press, 2009.
Terri Weifenbach's
Another Summer is a delicate and unassuming book, even before one opens it. Her ninth volume of photographs and her first with The Thunderstorm Press, the 5"x7.25" hardbound volume appears to contain a small collection of poems or slim novella. Such an outward guise is highly appropriate, reflecting the loosely narrative, lyrical series of images contained within.
Printed full-bleed and given no more textual introduction than the title page, Weifenbach's images present an at-first seemingly standard summer: children, toys, food and drink, silhouettes and shorelines. The muted palette and soft focus of most images create a sense of moments slowly slipping on, a nostalgia for the present as much as the past. Some of the images certainly reflect a sense of summery escape from the 'real-time' of urban or suburban life; Weifenbach offers views of the vacation home, the Sprite on the table, the SUV ready to disembark for the canoeing trip. However,
Another Summer seems to refer to more than just one summer in a series of summers, additionally suggesting a secondary, parallel view of a season already well-laden with images.
Another Summer, by Terri Weifenbach. Published by The Thunderstorm Press, 2009.
Another Summer, by Terri Weifenbach. Published by The Thunderstorm Press, 2009.
Another Summer, by Terri Weifenbach. Published by The Thunderstorm Press, 2009.
The second-to-last image does away with all implicit explorations of merely passing time. A child crouches on the bed, one book laying open before him, another set of pages opened in his hands. His gaze appears deep, yet only possibly pensive. It is unclear whether his consideration is elsewhere or on the images in the book he holds, neither does the image make clear what is on the pages. Similarly, a two-page spread earlier in the book shows a man in shadow at a waterfront window, gazing through binoculars at a horizon that the photograph reveals only dimly. These images suggest that Weifenbach's concern is not solely a photography of looking at, the suspension of a single subject in a frame of time. Instead,
Another Summer posits looking at itself as subject, a manner of seeing in which each photograph compiles slowly and hazily, gathering in the stretch of days and glow of afternoon light.
—Nicholas Chiarella
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