Suzie's Thoughts on Whitworth's Photograph and Trash

One of the photographs in T. Coke Whitworth's Zionville, NC series is a digital print depicting a bare, wooded area interspersed with people's unwanted and used personal items. The used tires, couches, and bins look more like trash than used particles, though, primarily because these items are not in their correct environment. Instead, the photo immediately sends signals of disgust and disappointment to the viewer because of the man-made trash that is encompassing the natural habitat and wildlife, a scene that is becoming much too familiar in today's society.

Sunshine, lively deer and squirrels, green leaves, and newly budding flowers are non-existant in Whitworth's photo. The background is grey, the trees are bare, and no animals are in sight. Bright colors are completely absent, even the chairs and couches are dim and bland. The picture appears lifeless. Man's trash is overcoming nature, something we're all aware of by now, and this confiscatement of nature's habitats is blatantly obvious in Whitworth's snapshot. There is nothing abstract or mysterious about this piece of art. I immediately felt distress and anger when I saw the trashed woods. Man is taking over natural ecosystems, and in turn, animals all over the world, and especially in the US, are quickly losing their homes.

Too many people are wasteful in today's society, and this immense problem is honestly and readily depicted in the photograph. One of the objects in the foreground is a tasteless picture of a naked woman which is tacked to a tree. My eyes were initially drawn to this segment of the photo because it is one of the first objects in focus, and I automatically became disgusted. Because this feeling had already originated in my mind, it would be difficult to turn the mood in a different direction. I therefore think that Whitworth originally wanted pull his viewers' focuses in on this artificial and vulgar commodity in order to give them a taste of what the rest photograph was going to entail. Once my eyes wandered over the remaining pieces of the photo and I saw the lack of life, the trash, and the wastefullness, the feeling of repulsion and outrage continued to accumulate.

The few ragged couches and chairs that appear in Whitworth's photo represent abandonment and desertion. They are turned over and look to have simply been thrown into the woods as if it were a landfill. As I stated earlier, the image seems to be lifeless, and this desertion of wildlife is exemplified by the empty, turned over, worn out furniture.

The grey, bland colors, lack of life, and trash in the woods that appear in Whitworth's photograph all point towards the growing social dilemma that man is taking over Earth's natural ecosystems. We are taking too many things for granted, and instead of trying to fix the problem by using composts, recycling, etc., too many people continue to dump their used items in woods, fields, and other wildlife habitats. The photo is difficult to look at, because it reminds us that scenes like the one Whitworth captured exist in more places than they should. But hopefully, the more viewers that witness Whitworth's realistic photos, the more people will realize that it is imperative we change the way we are living our lives.