{"id":5592,"date":"2012-07-07T22:00:03","date_gmt":"2012-07-08T02:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=5592"},"modified":"2024-12-03T17:00:25","modified_gmt":"2024-12-03T22:00:25","slug":"windows-in-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=5592","title":{"rendered":"Windows in Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Linda Burton posting from Olympia, Washington <\/em>\u2013 \u201cYou should get together with that blond lady that\u2019s staying here,\u201d Mae told me as she took my ticket and greeted me in the breakfast room every morning. \u201cShe knows everything about the history of Olympia. You two should talk.\u201d But we kept missing each other, until finally the planets aligned and we wound up having breakfast at the same time. \u201cYou must be the person writing about capital cities,\u201d she said, standing beside my table with a cup of coffee in hand. \u201cAnd you must be the blond lady that knows everything about Olympia,\u201d I replied. \u201cPlease sit down.\u201d The \u201cblond lady\u201d I\u2019d finally met is Susan Parish, and the ensuing conversation led me to believe she not only knows the history of Olympia, \"\"<\/a>she has a photograph of most of it. She\u2019s staying at the Governor Hotel now because she\u2019s commissioned to \u201crecreate the history of the hotel\u201d through researching the art and times of the hotel\u2019s early days, now being remodeled to capture the look of its beginnings, the 1970\u2019s. As we walked through the newly renovated rooms on the upper floors, Susan showed me the photographs she is installing, and told me more of her work. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a photographer and a writer,\u201d Susan said, \u201cbut I\u2019m a collector too. I started collecting photos back in the 50\u2019s. So now I define myself as a photo historian.\u201d Her career is impressive \u2013 newspaper columnist, editor, Arts Program Designer and Director, Visitor Services Director, and, especially interesting to me, Exhibit Creator and Curator at the Washington State Capitol where her work in historical research and preservation helped create several historic preservation laws, and helped establish Washington State\u2019s Photo Archives.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>We stopped alongside a sepia-toned framed photograph of a man proudly holding up two fish. \u201cThat\u2019s former Governor Al Rossellini,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019re using photos of former Washington state governors in the hotel rooms. There is one of Governor Arthur Langlie strolling across the Capitol Campus and one of Governor Dan Evans sitting in a barber\u2019s chair reading a Playboy<\/em> magazine. We want the decor to be interesting and a little fun too. \u201c<\/p>\n

Susan specialized in black and white photography for most of her career, but has added digital color photographs now; those seem to be favorites of interior designers. Photographs she has made, or collected, are published in over 100 publications and installed in over 3,000 locations in public, commercial, and private collections internationally. \u201cI named my new business Shadow Catchers,\u201d Susan told me, as she jotted down the address of her website for me. http:\/\/shadowcatchers.net\/<\/a> \u201cShadow catchers is the name American Indians reportedly called photographers in the 1840’s. Because they believed their shadows, or spirit, would be captured within the large black camera boxes, many of them refused to be photographed. Actually, most people were afraid of cameras back then.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI think of photographic images as \u201ctime travel\u201d mechanisms, and that\u2019s one reason I am dedicated to preserving these visual remnants of time for this and future generations. Photographs cross all language, age, and political boundaries and barriers. They tell stories. If eyes are windows to the soul, then I say photographs are windows in time. I am thrilled with the technology available now. I am able to restore historic images that haven\u2019t been viewed since the photographer made them. That\u2019s exciting!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMae was right,\u201d I thought as I finally headed back to my room. \u201cThat was a good talk. Windows in Time<\/em>; I like that idea.\u201d<\/p>\n

About Shadow Catchers and The Susan Parish Collection of Photography. Susan Parish, Photo Historian, 360-349-9549, www.shadowcatchers.net<\/a><\/p>\n

About the Governor Hotel, 621 S Capitol Way, Olympia, WA, Sandra Miller, General Manager, http:\/\/www.olywagov.com\/hotel<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Linda Burton posting from Olympia, Washington \u2013 \u201cYou should get together with that blond lady that\u2019s staying here,\u201d Mae told me as she took my ticket and greeted me in the breakfast room every morning. \u201cShe knows everything about the history of Olympia. You two should talk.\u201d But we kept missing each other, until finally […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4586,728],"tags":[1520,1525,171,1526,1521,1345,3067,1524,1519,1522,1518,733,1523],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5592"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5592"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5592\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5597,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5592\/revisions\/5597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}