Jim Dow (American, b. 1942)

Baseball Stadiums, 1982

26 Ektacolor triptychs

Jim Dow's collection of 26 photographic panoramas of Major League baseball stadiums, circa 1982, explores the vernacular architecture of our erstwhile national pastime. Using an 8 x 10 camera and capturing multiple color images, Dow creates detailed vistas from the perspective of a solitary spectator. The absence of crowds, players, hot dog vendors, and activity on the ballfield strips away the elements that are typically associated with a baseball game, allowing viewers to reflect on the stadiums' past glory and the ghosts that haunt them. While the oldest of these American Colosseums, such as Fenway Park (1912) and Wrigley Field (1914), remain standing, nearly all the newer fields of dreams, in many cases poorly designed and cheaply (if not inexpensively) constructed, have been discarded and demolished in the four decades since Dow’s survey, continuing to exist now only in photographs and childhood memories.

Dow credits Walker Evans's book American Photographs (1938) as a significant early influence on his work. In 1972, Dow was commissioned to print Evans's photographs for a Museum of Modern Art retrospective. Under the tutelage of renowned photographers Harry Callahan and Minor White, Dow developed a formal approach to his work producing inventive images of commonplace architecture and cultural scenes. Dow has taught photography at Harvard University, Tufts University and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and his work has been widely exhibited.

More information on Jim Dow can be found here:

https://jimdowphotography.com/

https://www.robertkleingallery.com/artists/63-jim-dow/works/