{"id":114557,"date":"2017-08-30T11:00:34","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T15:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=114557"},"modified":"2017-08-30T11:36:10","modified_gmt":"2017-08-30T15:36:10","slug":"seeing-reynolds-price-through-his-art-collection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/30\/seeing-reynolds-price-through-his-art-collection\/","title":{"rendered":"Seeing Reynolds Price Through His Art Collection"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

All photographs by Alex Harris.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Reynolds Price\u2019s enthusiasms could not be contained to one form: he wrote novels and stories, poems and plays, memoirs, essays, and songs; made translations; and taught creative writing and literature at Duke University for fifty-two years. If that weren\u2019t enough, Price also collected art. Confined to a wheelchair for the last twenty-seven years of his life, he created a salon-like refuge in his Durham, North Carolina, house in which every wall, bookshelf, and piece of furniture reflected his eclectic passions and preoccupations, paid homage to his influences, and illuminated his interior life.<\/em><\/p>\n

After Price\u2019s death in 2011, his family asked the photographer Alex Harris to document the art and objects as a living collection before it was disassembled. During the winter and early spring of that year, Harris took more than seven hundred photographs of every corner, wall, and nook. A selection of the images are on view through November 5 at the Rubenstein Photography Gallery<\/a> at Duke University and have just been published in <\/em>Dream of House: The Passions and Preoccupations of Reynolds Price<\/a>, edited by Harris and the writer and photographer Margaret Sartor.<\/em><\/p>\n

Below, Harris and Sartor, both longtime friend of Price\u2019s, present photographs and excerpts from Price\u2019s writings to evoke the experience of the writer himself taking us on a guided tour of his home.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

The act of seeing was at the very heart of the language of the old, traditional South as spoken by Reynolds Price\u2019s parents, Elizabeth and Will Price, and by their relatives and friends.<\/em> Of his childhood Reynolds wrote, \u201cI was mesmerized by the visible world as deeply as any snake-spied bird.\u201d Through much of his North Carolina childhood and adolescence\u2014before he turned seriously to writing\u2014Reynolds pursued drawing and painting with fervor, making careful copies of the faces of ancient heroes from his favorite books, later sketching modern faces from Life<\/em> and Look<\/em> magazines. He continued to draw throughout his life, and drawing may have saved his life. During the first five months after the surgery to remove a cancerous tumor on his spine, when he couldn\u2019t write and could barely focus enough to read, Reynolds drew the face of Jesus repeatedly and rendered a vision of Jesus healing him from cancer. The drawings filled six spiral notebooks.<\/p>\n

Reynolds died in January of 2011. When I showed up with my camera at his house a few weeks later, I felt as if I had been training for that moment my entire working life. For more than forty years, in locations as disparate as the American South, Inuit villages in Alaska, Havana streets, and Hispanic towns in northern New Mexico, I learned to make portraits without the actual presence of people.<\/p>\n

Reynolds arranged his art in a floor-to-ceiling display, a style that originated with seventeenth-century French Royal Academy exhibitions and later migrated to the Louvre. I could not imagine a French curator of that era working with more diverse art than Reynolds had in his North Carolina home, or taking more meticulous care than Reynolds did to place works precisely where they would resonate with other pieces.<\/p>\n

Reynolds said that, for him, writing began with a visual experience. Each story, novel, or poem started with a single scene: a brief, imagined film clip unspooling through projector light and developing into a story on the screen of his brain. That unfolding scene often began years before he started to write, with an object or image Reynolds was drawn to and had collected and carefully placed on a wall, table or floor.<\/p>\n

Friends who visited Reynolds knew about the distinctive visual world he created in his home. Though his collections had begun long before, when Reynolds was confined to a wheelchair in 1984, they\u00a0took on fresh importance: books, including multiple copies of Dante\u2019s Divine Comedy<\/em>, which Reynolds purchased, or was given over the years, and a closed bookcase of his own first editions arranged in chronological order; paintings, particularly the landscapes of North Carolina and the South that provided the settings for his novels and stories; a number of sketches and formal oil portraits of Reynolds himself; two etchings\u2014of Abraham and Issac\u2014by Rembrandt, each of which inspired an essay, and more etchings by William Blake; Greek marble busts and sculptures; wooden, ceramic, and plaster masks from many cultures, including death masks of Blake, John Keats, and Marlon Brando; a large assemblage of photographs, including two printed as gifts by and from my wife, Margaret, and two from me; numerous icons; and a wide variety of miscellanea, such as a saber-toothed tiger\u2019s skull.<\/p>\n

Reynolds purchased his modest deckhouse in 1965, a brick-and-wood structure set within a pine and hardwood forest and perched above a small pond visited annually around Christmas by a lone great blue heron. He lived in a state he, at times, called \u201ca much befriended solitude.\u201d He never married or had a long-term partner, though he was assisted each year of his last twenty-five years by a different live-in Duke graduate, often a student from one of his seminars. He wrote about love in many forms but didn\u2019t discuss his own homosexuality publicly until after his memoir, Ardent Spirits<\/em>, was published in 2009. <\/em>Reynolds told Margaret and me that there were, at most, two marriages he had witnessed in his life that he truly envied. I sometimes wondered if he genuinely believed this or if he was just convincing himself that living alone was preferable to conjugal life. So many of the characters whose lives unfold on the pages of Reynolds\u2019s novels and stories struggle with the tension between a desire for love and companionship and the autonomy of an independent life. Though Reynolds proclaimed he craved his solitude \u201clike a deer craves salt licks,\u201d it is not a stretch to imagine him torn between these two ways of living. I say this not to provide psychological analysis of my old friend but as part of my effort to understand his home, the world he created for himself through the photographs, paintings, statues, and objects he collected and arranged, his constant companions in a solitary life.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2014Alex Harris<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/a>

Detail of a painting by Will Wilson.<\/p><\/div>\n

I think I\u2019ve been for whatever reasons\u2014most of them\u00a0obviously utterly unrecoverable\u2014a solitary all my life.\u00a0I was an only child; I was eight years old when my brother was born. We lived either in the country or very much on\u00a0the edges of small towns so that I had very few playmates\u00a0and had, from my earliest times, to invent my own forms of\u00a0entertainment, which took the forms of reading and painting\u00a0and the invention of imaginary games, which I played with\u00a0myself. For whatever reasons, I like to live alone. Well, I need\u2014I wouldn\u2019t say like, although I certainly wouldn\u2019t claim that\u00a0I was unhappy living alone. If I were unhappy living alone, I\u2019d do something about it; wouldn\u2019t I? (Conversations with Reynolds Price)<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I\u2019m the son of brave magnanimous parents who\u2019d have offered both legs\u00a0in hostage for mine, if they\u2019d been living when mine were required. I\u2019m\u00a0the brother of a laughing openhanded man with whom I\u2019ve never exchanged\u00a0an angry adult word nor wanted to. I\u2019m the cousin of a woman who, with her\u00a0husband, offered to see me through to the grave. I\u2019m the neighbor of a couple\u00a0who offered to share my life, however long I lasted. I\u2019m the ward of a line of\u00a0responsible assistants who\u2019ve moved into my home and life at twelve-month\u00a0intervals, taken charge of both the house and me and insured a safe and favorable\u00a0atmosphere for ongoing work. I\u2019m the friend of many more spacious and lively\u00a0souls than I\u2019ve earned. I\u2019ve had, and still have, more love\u2014in body and mind\u2014than I dreamed of in my lone boyhood. (A Whole New Life<\/em>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve lived in the same house for twenty-odd years now\u00a0which is very unusual in America. I\u2019ve lived at the same\u00a0crossroads for thirty-some years. I\u2019ve taught in the same\u00a0university for almost thirty years. I live within sixty miles\u00a0of my birthplace. I\u2019ve taken pains in my life\u2014I\u2019ve made\u00a0conscious choices to try to stay as still as I could, so that\u00a0I could have that kind of position from which to gauge\u00a0movement. Movement can only be gauged in stasis. (unpublished interview<\/em>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In the founding text of our civilization\u2014the Hebrew-Christian Bible\u2014a spot is sacred forever-after if God or an angel has deigned to touch it \u2026\u00a0For most of us, the chance of hallowing a place is through human means;\u00a0the site of intense and\/or prolonged human feeling becomes special for us. (\u201cHomeless. Home.\u201d<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Prayer has always been a very important part\u00a0of my daily life. It\u2019s so much part of my daily\u00a0life I don\u2019t even think of it as prayer. It just\u00a0seems like the same thing as making the coffee\u00a0and answering the phone and doing the work.\u00a0I don\u2019t have elaborate, ceremonial ways that\u00a0I do it. I am not a churchgoing person. But\u00a0I think I\u2019m an intensely religious person. (The Writer\u2019s Faith: 2005 Calendar<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

My work then is what all honorable work is\u2014the attempt\u00a0to control chaos. It has freed me till now from physical want,\u00a0from prolonged dependence on my fellows, and occasionally\u00a0from myself. It has freed me for the attempt to understand, if\u00a0not control, disorder in myself and in those I love. It has even\u00a0freed me at times to participate in the richest, most dangerous\u00a0mystery of all\u2014the love of what otherwise I should have feared\u00a0and fled, a few human beings. (\u201cFinding Work\u201d<\/em>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A need to tell and hear stories is essential to the species Homo\u00a0sapiens\u2014second in necessity apparently after nourishment and\u00a0before love and shelter. Millions survive without love or home,\u00a0almost none in silence; the opposite of silence leads quickly to\u00a0narrative, and the sound of the story is the dominant sound of\u00a0our lives, from the small accounts of our days\u2019 events to the vast\u00a0incommunicable constructs of psychopaths. (A Palpable God<\/em>)<\/p>\n

 <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The pictures are images of household gods, I suppose. Images of what\u00a0I have loved and love and worship\u2014worship in the sense of offering\u00a0my life and work to them. The pictures are of members of my family\u2014some of whom I never knew, who died before I was born\u2014and of friends\u00a0who have caused my life and my work. They are here, and here in such\u00a0numbers, for the sake of my present and future work, not for the sake of\u00a0nostalgia, not as souvenirs of a lifeless past. That is an aspect of my own\u00a0work, as it is of almost every artist\u2019s work, which is little understood by\u00a0people who are not themselves artists\u2014the extent to which any work\u00a0of art, especially verbal art, is a private communication between the artist\u00a0and a small audience, often as small as one. (Conversations with Reynolds Price<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Why do living creatures copy their worlds? Why have we, since\u00a0the caves at least, tried so consistently to copy, not only the visible\u00a0world but the unseen world\u2014God or the gods, the black hole we\u00a0now call evil and the ring of light that circumscribes it? The simplest\u00a0answer is that all such copies are a copy of the commonest action\u00a0on the face of the Earth. The whole organic nature is involved in\u00a0the steady physical effort to reproduce itself. (Clear Pictures<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Farewell with Photographs<\/strong><\/p>\n

Time is mainly pictures,
\nAfter a while is only pictures.<\/p>\n

Five years, for instance\u2014all but two thousand days\u2014
\nWill resolve to a few dozen pictures in time:
\nOf which, if ten give long-range pleasure to their veterans,
\nThanks are due.<\/p>\n

Thanks then for time\u2014
\nDeep-cut pictures,
\nMainly delight.<\/p>\n

(The Collected Poems<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2026 How does a newborn child learn the three indispensable human\u00a0skills he is born without? How does he learn to live, love, and die?\u00a0How do we learn to depend emotionally and spiritually on others and\u00a0to trust them with our lives? How do we learn the few but vital ways\u00a0to honor other creatures and delight in their presence? And how do we\u00a0learn to bear, use, and transmit that knowledge through the span of a life\u00a0and then to relinquish it? (Clear Pictures<\/em>)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Reynolds Price\u2019s enthusiasms could not be contained to one form: he wrote novels and stories, poems and plays, memoirs, essays, and songs; made translations; and taught creative writing and literature at Duke University for fifty-two years. If that weren\u2019t enough, Price also collected art. Confined to a wheelchair for the last twenty-seven years of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1234,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[419],"tags":[1848,11553,35,14638,8393,8892,18238,11950,30312,30311,30310,9301,30314,4324,6749,30251,30313,8850,2325,173,100,14089,1733,3725,17375,530,4035],"class_list":["post-114557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-culture","tag-alaska","tag-alex-harris","tag-art","tag-art-collectors","tag-cancer","tag-childhood","tag-dante-alighieri","tag-divine-comedy","tag-documenting","tag-duke-university","tag-durham","tag-havana","tag-inuit","tag-jesus","tag-john-keats","tag-louvre","tag-margaret-sartor","tag-marlon-brando","tag-new-mexico","tag-north-carolina","tag-photography","tag-rembrandt","tag-reynolds-price","tag-royal-academy-of-art","tag-the-american-south","tag-translation","tag-william-blake"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSeeing Reynolds Price Through His Art Collection<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Alex Harris and Margaret Sartor document the writer\u2019s art and objects as a living collection.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/30\/seeing-reynolds-price-through-his-art-collection\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Seeing Reynolds Price Through His Art Collection by Alex Harris and Margaret Sartor\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"August 30, 2017 \u2013   Reynolds Price\u2019s enthusiasms could not be contained to one form: he wrote novels and stories, poems and plays, memoirs, essays, and songs; made\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" 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