Hi—my name is J. F. Newman and I’m proud to be part of the Covert Collection Photography Co-Op.

When I was a kid, there was a poster of a pink seascape hung in our bathroom. Below the seascape appeared a few lines from Lord Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. They read:

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,

there is a rapture on the lonely shore,

there is society where none intrudes,

By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:

I love not Man the less, but Nature more.

Eventually I learned that lots of folks grew up with this fragment scattered somewhere in their childhood—on a kitchen towel, needlepointed on a pillow, printed on the cover of a purple Trapper Keeper. In a world before cell phones, what else could we do but read it and read it and read it, until it became part of our identity, however much we might not want to admit it.

In the end, I don’t think the Byronic hero is much of a hero. There is little to admire in someone who, as Lord Macaulay—Bryon’s contemporary—would later write, is “proud, moody, cynical, with defiance on his brow, and misery in his heart, a scorner of his kind, implacable in revenge, yet capable of deep and strong affection.” To me, that last bit doesn’t redeem what comes before. And yet, I can’t help but feel a kinship with such a person. As I often say to my wife, “everything is terrible. But I love you very much.”

In my regular life, I work with rare books and manuscripts, and the occasional American painting. So when I look at the world I see compositions, and then I wonder about their history. And then I wonder about how I feel about such places, and then I wonder why I feel that way. I guess when I look at the world what I’m really doing is wondering about myself and hoping there might be some answers out there. 

I hope you enjoy the photographs. 

See Joe’s work here