STORIES IN CIGAR BOXES

Today, while looking for something else, I came across the photograph above. I haven't seen it since I took it almost five years ago. Perhaps Birney Imes was still swimming around in my head. Or maybe it was just a cigar box.

Imes's book Whispering Pines, which I mentioned in yesterday's post, is a document of the now defunct roadhouse of the same name. What's more, though, is that it's a document of a man's life and the relics he left behind.

Blume Triplett didn't throw anything away, and most of the things he kept were small enough to fit in cigar boxes. Hundreds of cigar boxes. So among the photographs Imes took of Triplett laughing at the bar, eating lunch, and shooting pistols, are haunting images of his many collections--little still lifes of objects.

The still life above is a photograph I took while documenting the Cotton Row Club in Greenwood, MS. I'm not entirely sure I even knew about Whispering Pines back then, but three's certainly a connection there. A while later, I did this painting, which was, obviously, inspired by the photograph. It's kind of hard for me to look at it now (painting on particle board, what was I thinking?!), but I do still love the memories it evokes of that time and place--and those objects.

I have no idea what was in the cigar box.