the curtain of obscurity

A vast bitterness seemed to inspire these images, images I understood very well as referring to what had begun to play out before my eyes, the curtain of obscurity now lifted--the spectacle that for many nights now he could not observe without sorrow. The studio windows that opened onto the wall perpendicular to his and the rear windows of the building that faced onto the street all lit up almost simultaneously once the sun had passed, although the shred of sky visible from the well was still light. Many of the windows had no curtains, at least, no one bothered to close any. The astonishing variety of life was displayed there. 'An unacceptable waste of gestures, of words, an incoherent mix of differences and similarities, endless complication, a boiler bursting with screams . . .' I don't know which I found more painful: seeing these vague silhouettes behind windows, some furtive, others immobile for long stretches of time (the studios were so small that empty windows were rare), each making its own gestures, imperfect, fragmentary, discordant, mysterious; or hearing that voice, barely audible and once in a while suddenly hard and almost shrill, commenting on the spectacle which, in truth, was no spectacle since these shadows were in all likelihood alive.

Philippe Jaccottet, Obscurity, pg. 25
tr. Tess Lewis

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a figure and a window

Tadeusz Kantor, A Figure and a Window (People extended by objects. A Man and a Window), 1971

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self-portrait, madrid

Boris Savelev, 2007

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girl in harlem window

Harold Feinstein, 1948

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dame à la fenêtre

André Beaudin, 1948

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soprano

When you vanish up the staircase
Of the octaves

I know there is a window
Opening into
A garden
Where the tern, restless
On a plum branch

Prepares to migrate
Down the blue curve

Of that vein
Deep in your neck.

Thomas Johnson. 

Photo: Alfonso Almendros

(post via Paris Review)

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cornell

top: June 7, 1971  Joseph Cornell through garage window
bottom: Cornell in window, 1972
Harry Roseman

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red light (amsterdam)

James Zzz

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Greenwich Village, NYC

André Kertész, Greenwich Village, New York (woman reading in fire escape window), 1963

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man and woman

The solitary man by the window
At dusk looks out, stares
At the grey concrete wall that hides
His neighbour’s daily routine. Always,
The sound of someone sweeping
Dry leaves and later, smoke rising

Entering the room. Such a small world
That one’s rubbish can easily be another’s,
He thinks, then pauses as the first few
Notes rise from a stranger’s throat.
Behind the wall she stood, her secret pleasures,
Burning, singing, burning and singing.

Mayo Martin

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who are you, little i

who are you, little i

(five or six years old)
peering from some high

window; at the gold


of november sunset

(and feeling: that if day
has to become night

this is a beautiful way)



e.e. cummings

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a girl and her duenna (aka two women at a window)

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo

info

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the distant window witness

The gentlemen sat K. down on the ground, leant him against the stone and settled his head down on the top of it. Despite all the effort they went to, and despite all the co-operation shown by K., his demeanour seemed very forced and hard to believe. So one of the gentlemen asked the other to grant him a short time while he put K. in position by himself, but even that did nothing to make it better. In the end they left K. in a position that was far from the best of the ones they had tried so far. Then one of the gentlemen opened his frock coat and from a sheath hanging on a belt stretched across his waistcoat he withdrew a long, thin, double-edged butcher's knife which he held up in the light to test its sharpness. The repulsive courtesies began once again, one of them passed the knife over K. to the other, who then passed it back over K. to the first. K. now knew it would be his duty to take the knife as it passed from hand to hand above him and thrust it into himself. But he did not do it, instead he twisted his neck, which was still free, and looked around. He was not able to show his full worth, was not able to take all the work from the official bodies, he lacked the rest of the strength he needed and this final shortcoming was the fault of whoever had denied it to him. As he looked round, he saw the top floor of the building next to the quarry. He saw how a light flickered on and the two halves of a window opened out, somebody, made weak and thin by the height and the distance, leant suddenly far out from it and stretched his arms out even further. Who was that? A friend? A good person? Somebody who was taking part? Somebody who wanted to help? Was he alone? Was it everyone? Would anyone help? Were there objections that had been forgotten? There must have been some. The logic cannot be refuted, but someone who wants to live will not resist it. Where was the judge he'd never seen? Where was the high court he had never reached? He raised both hands and spread out all his fingers.

But the hands of one of the gentleman were laid on K.'s throat, while the other pushed the knife deep into his heart and twisted it there, twice. As his eyesight failed, K. saw the two gentlemen cheek by cheek, close in front of his face, watching the result. "Like a dog!" he said, it was as if the shame of it should outlive him.

Kafka, The Trial

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childhood window

Child with Basket, Walter Rosenblum, East Harlem 1952

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man in window, new york city, 1978

Lucinda Bunnen


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face behind a window

Odilon Redon
charcoal on paper

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Tenth Street at Night, 1960

John Cohen

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georgia at the window

Georgia O'Keeffe: a portrait, 1918
palladium print, Alfred Stieglitz

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the view inside

La fenêtre, Oil on canvas, 110 by 100 cm, 1936
Paul Delvaux

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two children looking out a window

Helen Levitt, 1940
silver gelatin print
info

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