PolarBear
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"The Road 1755"
This photograph combines images from 18th and 21st C America. In the foreground are 2 military miniatures portraying the French and Indian War. They represent the opposing forces of England and France who were fighting over control of North America between 1754 and 1763. The war was part of a global conflict known as the Seven Years War that involved the clash of the British and French Empires with battles taking place in Europe, North America, India and West Africa—therefore literally a world war.
The two figures are from the Battle of Monongahela (July 9,1755) which took place near present day Pittsburgh, PA. The figure on the left represents a member of the Virginia Provincial Regiment of Foot. They were led by a very young George Washington and were part of a larger Anglo-American force under the command of Major General Edward Braddock. The figure on the right is a Canadian Marine, a member of the French forces which combined Canadian militia, marines and Indians. Although Braddock’s army was defeated in the battle, Anglo-British forces would ultimately achieve victory against France in 1763. The tree stump between the 2 figures represents the wooded area where the Battle of Monongahela was fought. It is meant to tie the foreground’s symbolic action with the background scene, a still from the 2009 motion picture The Road based on Cormac McCarthy’s novel of the same title. The story portrays a post-Apocalyptic world characterized by images of widespread ruin and destruction, the death of plants and animals and the remaining humans reduced to a nomadic existence of scavenging and in some instances cannibalism. All of this takes place in a “survival of the fittest” environment.
If the soldiers in the foreground represent the era of the 18th C Enlightenment and its belief in human progress and a view of the North American continent as a utopia for building a new civilization, the background photo of urban decay and destruction presents a postmodern dystopia. In filming The Road Australian director, John Hillcoat, used 50 locations in 4 states as backdrops for his actors. They were all selected for their scenes of man-made and natural disasters such as post-Katrina New Orleans and the volcanic destruction of Mt. St. Helens in Washington state.
Pennsylvania’s strip mining zones as well as Pittsburgh’s areas of urban decay were utilized for the film. As mentioned previously, the Battle of Monongahela was fought near modern Pittsburgh and thus the choice of that still from the film serves as a link between the 18th and 21st centuries. My title “The Road 1755” is meant to connect to McCarthy’s book and Hillcoat’s film. The transition between foreground and background in the photo suggests the larger historic “road” that America and the world have traversed over the centuries from utopia to dystopia. The tree stump in the foreground foreshadows the 21st century’s environmental crisis. In 19th C American art, as seen in landscapes painted by Hudson River School artists such as Thomas Cole, the tree stump was a symbol of both the advance of civilization in the wilderness and at the same time a critique of humanity’s destruction of the environment. As urbanization, industrialization and technology advanced rapidly in the 19th C America, the environment changed with it, often for the worse, leading to the conservation and national park movements epitomized by Henry David Thoreau’s maxim “In wilderness is the preservation of the world.”
The French & Indian War was a significant step along the road to America’s involvement in the evolution and expansion of modernity at home and across the globe. The experience gained by the American Colonials in fighting and self-governing during this war ultimately prompted their decision to seek independence from the British in 1775. America’s victory in the War for Independence led the nation to pursue its own plans for empire and territorial expansion. Already in the 1750s, just before the outbreak of the French & Indian War, the young George Washington was sent on a surveying expedition for the Ohio Company of Virginia, a land speculation group seeking land for colonizing Virginians in the western territories. The company’s activities angered the French and Indians and was in part responsible for the outbreak of the French & Indian War.
So in sum the picture “Road to 1755” is meant to capture some of this history and the issues that have led to dystopia replacing utopia, especially as seen in North America.
This photograph combines images from 18th and 21st C America. In the foreground are 2 military miniatures portraying the French and Indian War. They represent the opposing forces of England and France who were fighting over control of North America between 1754 and 1763. The war was part of a global conflict known as the Seven Years War that involved the clash of the British and French Empires with battles taking place in Europe, North America, India and West Africa—therefore literally a world war.
The two figures are from the Battle of Monongahela (July 9,1755) which took place near present day Pittsburgh, PA. The figure on the left represents a member of the Virginia Provincial Regiment of Foot. They were led by a very young George Washington and were part of a larger Anglo-American force under the command of Major General Edward Braddock. The figure on the right is a Canadian Marine, a member of the French forces which combined Canadian militia, marines and Indians. Although Braddock’s army was defeated in the battle, Anglo-British forces would ultimately achieve victory against France in 1763. The tree stump between the 2 figures represents the wooded area where the Battle of Monongahela was fought. It is meant to tie the foreground’s symbolic action with the background scene, a still from the 2009 motion picture The Road based on Cormac McCarthy’s novel of the same title. The story portrays a post-Apocalyptic world characterized by images of widespread ruin and destruction, the death of plants and animals and the remaining humans reduced to a nomadic existence of scavenging and in some instances cannibalism. All of this takes place in a “survival of the fittest” environment.
If the soldiers in the foreground represent the era of the 18th C Enlightenment and its belief in human progress and a view of the North American continent as a utopia for building a new civilization, the background photo of urban decay and destruction presents a postmodern dystopia. In filming The Road Australian director, John Hillcoat, used 50 locations in 4 states as backdrops for his actors. They were all selected for their scenes of man-made and natural disasters such as post-Katrina New Orleans and the volcanic destruction of Mt. St. Helens in Washington state.
Pennsylvania’s strip mining zones as well as Pittsburgh’s areas of urban decay were utilized for the film. As mentioned previously, the Battle of Monongahela was fought near modern Pittsburgh and thus the choice of that still from the film serves as a link between the 18th and 21st centuries. My title “The Road 1755” is meant to connect to McCarthy’s book and Hillcoat’s film. The transition between foreground and background in the photo suggests the larger historic “road” that America and the world have traversed over the centuries from utopia to dystopia. The tree stump in the foreground foreshadows the 21st century’s environmental crisis. In 19th C American art, as seen in landscapes painted by Hudson River School artists such as Thomas Cole, the tree stump was a symbol of both the advance of civilization in the wilderness and at the same time a critique of humanity’s destruction of the environment. As urbanization, industrialization and technology advanced rapidly in the 19th C America, the environment changed with it, often for the worse, leading to the conservation and national park movements epitomized by Henry David Thoreau’s maxim “In wilderness is the preservation of the world.”
The French & Indian War was a significant step along the road to America’s involvement in the evolution and expansion of modernity at home and across the globe. The experience gained by the American Colonials in fighting and self-governing during this war ultimately prompted their decision to seek independence from the British in 1775. America’s victory in the War for Independence led the nation to pursue its own plans for empire and territorial expansion. Already in the 1750s, just before the outbreak of the French & Indian War, the young George Washington was sent on a surveying expedition for the Ohio Company of Virginia, a land speculation group seeking land for colonizing Virginians in the western territories. The company’s activities angered the French and Indians and was in part responsible for the outbreak of the French & Indian War.
So in sum the picture “Road to 1755” is meant to capture some of this history and the issues that have led to dystopia replacing utopia, especially as seen in North America.
