Young, Cynthia - Ralph Eugene Meatyard

"The photographs of R.E.Meatyard defy convention: they have been called visionary, surrealistic, and meditative. Whatever the label, these evocative images of friends and family and the natural world around his home illustrate a delicate psychology of human interaction. Meatyard only bought a camera in 1950 to photograph his first-born son. But soon he joined the Lexington Camera Club and developed a friendship with his photography teacher Van Deren Coke. Family and friends freely participated in Meatyard’s mysterious staged images, which often involved masks and abandoned spaces, and obliquely reference social, political, and cultural issues.
A key subject in Meatyard’s work is the natural environment, which is featured in his 'Light on Water' series, in which long exposures seem to create calligraphic texts, and his 'No-Focus' series, in which he deliberately photographed stems and twigs out of focus. In one of his last series titled 'Motion-Soun", the pictures were made by moving the camera gently, creating multiple exposures of the woodland scenes that suggest abstract sound patterns. The book which includes an exhibition history, chronology, and bibliography accompanies an exhibition organized by ICP Assistant Curator Cynthia Young with acclaimed writer and Meatyard friend Guy Davenport.