Why He Chose to Accent the Dark
I remained unpersuaded that the tragedy of Mr. Fee’s odd odyssey was his penchant for concentrating, practically exulting, on the darker side, down to his final exhibit, presently showing at the Krull Gallery. Nearly everyone called him a genius of a photographic artist, while conceding he was far less deft at confining his life to the highways you and I travel. Because Mr. Fee seems to have led his unorthodox life about 3 miles west of the Bell curve, this was an evening for authentic but pastry-based imaginations to gallop into the small, square, white-walled gallery room on adventurous vanilla-flavored steeds. Their affection was so obviously genuine. The stories were as true as they were entertaining. Oh, the stories they told of this artist whom you may have wished you had known in life. A therapist probably could have predicted Mr. Fee would grow up wide of the norm since his GI father, as you shall shortly see, used to awaken James the child that would have knocked a sane person off his moorings. When Mr. Fee the Younger was old enough, he ran away as far from Iowa as he could, which, of course, placed him in Southern California. It should not surprise you to learn that Mr. Fee the Elder died by his own hand.
Thanks for Making Memories
For perhaps the only two of us in the large crowd unfamiliar with Mr. Fee’s photography or life, Mr. Krull, the gallery owner, was helpful. He summed up the artist’s wanderings at the entryway to a room containing 8 dark, bizarre representations, curiously sepia-shaded:
“These are the last photographs James Fee created before his passing on Labor Day of this year. During the past 16 years, Fee’s work was marked by a darkness and obsession with the detritus of decaying America, abandoned factories, rusting machinery and sinking ships. Although his perspective was seemingly pessimistic, Fee was actually reflecting disappointment in the erosion of what he believed to be the true meaning of America. His convictions partially were instilled by his father, a World War II veteran, who eventually committed suicide (in 1972), due to a lingering post-war trauma. He would occasionally awaken his young son with the phrase, ‘Up and at ‘em,’ while pointing a gun at him. When James decided not to enlist during the Vietnam War, it created the classic ‘60s generational rift between father and son. The artist once said of his father, he believed that any show of weakness on the part of America would change the fabric of American society. ‘Most Americans of my father’s age didn’t debate or question the country like we do today.’ Fee confronted these demons of his past with his remarkable Peleliu Project, revisiting the South Pacific island of his father’s great war scars. In his last 3 bodies of work, ‘Odesangel,’ ‘Isochrome,’ and last photographs, Fee seems to have come to terms with his dark side through an immersion in pensive landscape imagery. Typically throughout the years, Fee’s work was made on road trips that had the flavor of a Kerouac/Beat Generation type of journey that came to symbolize his own path and self-discovery. Fee’s last photographs were made on his final 2 road trips, to Monterey and Joshua Tree National Monument, accompanied by former students and friends who helped the ailing artist. He seemed to find solace in the natural. These images also portend imminent demise in images of barren trees, a solemn rock formation, a lone raven and the two studio pictures of skulls.”
Postscript
In the front row, I listened, open-mindedly, for an hour and a half to a cast of colorful but grandly eloquent friends and benefactors celebrate Mr. Fee’s daily journeys. Unfortunately, I remain unconverted, uncertain whether meeting Mr. Fee would have been nutritious. Happily, though, I am more sanguine about imbibing the art he left for us.
