BRATTLEBORO-Beauty in decay - discovering it and capturing it - has been Jim Westphalen's quest for more than a couple decades as a fine art photographer and through the making of his first film, Vanish: Disappearing Icons of a Rural America.
The 2023 documentary, which he calls a "self-funded labor of love," will be screened at the Latchis Theater on Saturday, Sept. 21.
Originally from Long Island, New York, Westphalen would often spend time with his grandmother in the Poconos as a boy: "I saw farms, barns, silos. I was fascinated by that as a kid and that just stayed with me," he told The Commons recently.
In 1996, Westphalen moved to Shelburne, Vermont, and was smitten.
"I'd be out on the landscape just photographing, and I was really drawn to the old barns and coal sheds, the old outbuildings and structures of the Vermont landscape," he said. "Soon I realized I was building this body of work."
And with each new ruin encountered, he'd register, This is compelling to me; I wonder if anyone else is going to get it.
"At that point I started doing it with more intention," he said.
In press communications, Westphalen writes that "over the past 20 years plus, I've traveled extensively throughout Vermont and various parts of the country photographing the rapidly disappearing rural structures (barns, coal sheds, grain elevators, one-room schoolhouses, prairie churches, etc.), that our country's rural heritage and economies were built upon.
"In a race against time and the elements, I endeavor to 'visually preserve' as many of these treasures as possible before they vanish completely from the American landscape."
As he would canvass the galleries where he shows, Westphalen - whose work is seen in Stowe's Front Four Gallery, Middlebury's Edgewater Gallery, and elsewhere in galleries and exhibits across the country - was assured that a collection of images of such rural ruins, and ultimately a documentary about them, would resonate with the public.
"Yes, there's an element of melancholy to it; there is certainly a nostalgic sort of element, but I think it goes deeper than that," he reflects.
Green Mountains and Big Sky
The focus of Vanish is on the crumbling rural architecture of Montana and of Vermont.
Regarding the geography of the film, he says, "I'd travel this area and through New England thinking about mission: I was wondering if what was happening here was happening all across the country."
He says he chose Montana "because it's aesthetically the antithesis of what we have here with its big sky […]. I wanted to pick an area that had structures we don't have, like grain elevators and prairie churches."
Westphalen juxtaposes a sequence of stills with recently shot footage of decaying rural sites and of folks who've known these old buildings intimately, folks who've studied them, and folks who simply care about and value them, creating a film intended to wake a viewer to a past worth preserving.
Evoking bygone days when a cow barn was hardly a romantic icon, a grain elevator hummed daily, and a church on a lonesome prairie would draw some 200 faithful who'd walk six or seven miles to congregate, it pays respect to bricks and mortar; to plaster, lathe, and clapboard; to ingenious, essential design. It also honors the people - and livestock - that gave these buildings a heartbeat.
"Equal parts history, anthropology, and art, the Vanish project is, at its core, about those who have lived on and worked the land that these structures were built upon," Westphalen's artist statement continues.
"And although my objective is to create 'art from decay,' it is of equal importance to unearth and celebrate the history of each of these fading treasures in order to honor those who built them," he writes.
Thus, Vanish was created "to share the rich stories firsthand, as told by those who have a history with these structures and struggle to maintain them, along with keen insights from preservation authorities."
"When I started this project 20 some odd years ago," Westphalen explains, "it was because I was very drawn to these old structures and just the beauty that exists in what they are in various states of disrepair: Whether it be the patina of rusted roofs or cracked paint on an old barn board and such, I was really drawn to that, and I started photographing it when I moved here."
Westphalen is first a fine artist whose stills, most shot old-style with a vintage 4 × 5 inch field camera, clearly reflect his inspiration: the paintings of Andrew Wyeth, Edward Hopper and, more recently, Hale Johnson, of Colrain, Massachusetts, who died in 2022.
"Originally the project was about the art and about the aesthetic" of each waning structure, Westphalen adds, but "I found myself really interested in the history behind each of them."
He would start "digging a little deeper with people who either own these structures or have some sort of association with them."
"Collecting these stories, I realized I wanted to tell [them] more in first person and in a deeper sense," Westphalen says. "The logical vehicle to do that would be some type of film."
He originally thought he would create a 20-minute short documentary, "but as I started working on the film it grew and grew."
Westphalen, who manages the business aspects of the project, also edited the film and wrote its narrative, consulting along the way with architectural historians and preservationists, some of whom appear in the film.
Kindred souls
The 77-minute Vanish has been screened throughout Vermont in Greensboro, Montpelier, Bennington, Middlebury, Burlington, and Woodstock.
One of the fans of the film is Charlie Sincerbeaux, a board member of Preservation Trust of Vermont (PTV), a statewide organization that, according to its website, has for 40 years "been working at saving buildings in each corner of Vermont and every town in between."
"We help communities keep gathering places alive and encourage the vitality of our downtowns and village centers while retaining the integrity of the surrounding rural landscape," the website continues.
Sincerbeaux saw the film and called PTV President Ben Doyle the next day.
Doyle recalls that his colleague told him, "If the PTV were going to hire a filmmaker to make a movie about why the work we do is important, they couldn't do better than what Jim's already made."
Thus, PTV has stepped in to assist Westphalen, who is pretty much a one-man show, with sponsoring and participating enthusiastically at screenings.
Westphalen isn't new to Brattleboro. "Years ago, when I was doing a lot of shootings for Vermont Life magazine, I did a story on Brattleboro and the Latchis and everything surrounding," he says.
Of Saturday's venue choice, he says that since PTV "had its organizational hand in some of the restoration work at the Latchis, organizers thought, 'Wouldn't it be great if we screened the film there?'"
"It's just an incredibly beautiful film," says Doyle. "Beautiful imagery. It's like an elegy for rural America and yet at the same time it's a call to action."
He laments the loss of "these places that really are the places where community happens or where it's defined and that hold the stories of the people who came before us."
The film, he says, "reminds people of how beautiful those spaces are and how important they are to preserve. It reminds us of the people behind them."
Westphalen echoes the call to action: As he raises awareness of the beauty of old rural buildings and the reality that they are disappearing, he hopes "for people who find this resonates with them and who have a passion for old buildings and resources, maybe those people could do some tangible things - fundraise to save grandpa's barn down the road or take to the state Legislature to get more funding for the Vermont Barn [Preservation] Grants project."
"We want as many people as possible to see it," Doyle says.
As far as distribution, Westphalen adds, "I've already garnered that in the educational/institutional space (GoodDocs) and am awaiting word from national PBS. If that doesn't pan out, Vermont PBS has already expressed interest and then it is shopping the film individually to all the regional affiliates around the country. A lot of work."
Vermonters may recognize several sites featured in Vanish: the old Bridport school, the Myrick family's farm in Bridport, Cornwall's Glen Dale Farm, and the New Haven train station that was moved in 2022 from busy Route 7 nearly two miles down Route 17 to a new location adjacent to the town library.
There, the 1868 brick structure awaits the grant money - $100,000 has already been granted by PTV - needed to insulate and to redo the roof, doors, and windows before its repurposing as a community resource comes to fruition, says New Haven's Town Clerk Pam Kingman.
As farms dwindle and fail, barns fall ignored, and the pace of rural life seems to quicken, the closing lines of Vanish might be well heeded:
"Let this be an encouragement to treasure these structures now, for sadly, most will eventually surrender and fold back into the ground that they were built upon taking their stories with them."
Vanish: Disappearing Icons of a Rural America can be seen Saturday, Sept. 21, at 7 p.m., at the Latchis Theatre, 50 Main St, Brattleboro. Tickets are $15, available in advance at app.arts-people.com/index.php?ticketing=larts or at the door. PTV president Ben Doyle, will give a brief talk introducing the film and laying out how PTV's mission and grants programs dovetail with that of Westphalen, who'll engage in a Q & A following the screening. For more info on Westphalen and Vanish, visit vanishfilm.com.
This Arts item by Annie Landenberger was written for The Commons.