81. Coos County, Oregon.
Who is alive? The woods are dead. Emily Dickinson, a letter, 1858
From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Artist Robert Adams (American, born 1937)

Date1999–2003

Period20th-21st century

MediumGelatin silver print on paper

DimensionsMat Size: 14 x 18 inches

Credit LinePurchase with funds provided by Kathy and Richard S. Fuld, Jr.

Object number2006.026.081

Curatorial DepartmentModern & Contemporary Art

_Place of OriginUnited States

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22. In an industrial forest, a decaying remnant from the ancient woods, Clatsop County, Oregon. From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.022

33. Kerstin reading by the Elk River, in undisturbed woods mostly of Douglas fir, in the Siskiyou National Forest, Curry County, Oregon. From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.033

62. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.062

63. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.063

64. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.064

65. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.065

66. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.066

61. Clatsop County, Oregon. Photographs are silent but the destruction of a forest is not. Pablo Neruda remembered that his “homeland of wood . . . died in the screeching of sawmills.” Barry Lopez, in describing a stranding of whales on the Oregon coast, likened the cry of a whale to “the sound a big fir makes breaking off the stump just as the saw is pulled away. A thin screech.” Landscape painter Emily Carr referred to stumps, which she painted with compassion, as “screamers.” From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.061

93. Curry County, Oregon. . . . the poor joiner, working at his wood, Knew not the tree from which the planks were taken, Knew not the glade from which the trunk was brought, Knew not the soil in which the roots were fast, Nor by what centuries of gales the boughs were shaken, But holds them all beneath his hands at last V. Sackville-West How much more difficult it is to imagine the origin of a sheet of chip board. As John Hay has written, we are “destroyers who are incapable of identifying our victims.”From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.093

55. Coos County, Oregon. From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.055

67. Coos County, Oregon. From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.067

68. Coos County, Oregon. From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

Robert Adams

1999–2003

Object number: 2006.026.068

81. Coos County, Oregon. Who is alive? The woods are dead. Emily Dickinson, a letter, 1858 From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration

81. Coos County, Oregon.
Who is alive? The woods are dead. Emily Dickinson, a letter, 1858
From Turning Back, A Photographic Journal of Re-exploration