Untitled (Menz’s Fort Apache Camp Grounds)
Artist
Walker Evans
(American, 1903 - 1975)
Date1974
Mediuminternal dye diffusion transfer print (Polaroid SX-70)
DimensionsImage: 3 1/8 × 3 1/16 in. (7.9 × 7.8 cm)
Support: 4 1/4 × 3 1/2 in. (10.8 × 8.9 cm)
Support: 4 1/4 × 3 1/2 in. (10.8 × 8.9 cm)
ClassificationsPhotograph
Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Ezra Hubbard, 2016
Object number2016.19.2
DescriptionOutdoor view with red carriage with white-spoked wheels at center on grass, bearing stacked signs reading: PEPSI/Menz’s FORT APACHE/CAMP GROUNDS/CHILDREN’S ZOO.Text Entries
Best
known for his influential black-and-white photographs of mid-century American
vernacular architecture and signage – as well as the powerful photographs he
made in the southern U.S. during his short stint with the Farm Security
Administration – Evans began making color pictures with the Polaroid SX-70
camera in 1972 and used it for two years, creating more than 2,400 images. His
lifelong love of text, signs, home-made objects, and things that bear evidence
of time or heavy use are evident in this piece.
This is a unique Polaroid print
but Evans made more than one photograph of this sign. Another is in the print
of the J. Paul Getty Museum (accession number 93.XM15.2) in which the orange
paint under the white surface is more visible and only one hole is seen (to the
right of the word “DEAD”). That
collection includes approximately 14 Polaroid prints by Evans. The largest
holding of Polaroids is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which
also holds the copyright for the artist’s work.
Restauranteurs Franklin and Marie Menz moved their family from Milville to Rio Grande, New Jersey (near Cape May) and purchased Fort Apache, an existing imitation Old West town that they turned into a campground. The family continues to operate the highly rated Menz Restaurant & Bar in the area. Information taken from Menz Restaurant website, November 2016 (http://www.menzrestaurant.com/)
On View
Not on view
