AN ENIGMATIC PHOTO TAKEN 12 YEARS AGO IS BROUGHT BACK TO ATTENTION …

“Marilyn Through Glass” / Palm Desert, CA 2012

“What’s New” / Linda Rondsttadt

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The sun was good the afternoon I drove over to the old area of Palm Desert to take some photos. A haze from the streaks across the sky acting like a great umbrella and filtering the light. I looked at its positioning for a few seconds and began walking down the street taking photos. It was an interesting area of town full of consignment shops and antique stores. When the town first started back in the 40s, it was the main street in town until the fancy shopping street called El Paseo was built.

It was April and the sun had dropped far enough to put color into images and provide a good reflection to the items in the windows of the shops. The sky was light blue streaked the familiar white lines. Jet streams. Chemtrails.

That was when I saw the portrait of Marilyn through the window. Looking at me. I set up my tripod and took a photo using a technique called high dynamic range (HDR) photography. In effect, the camera was set to take three shots in quick order: one shot over-exposed, one shot under-exposed and one regularly exposed.

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That evening I processed the photos on my computer. I captured some good photos along the street but the one that stood out from the others was the photo of Marilyn I took through the window of the shop. It needed little editing in the Photomatix software I used to merge the photos. The afternoon light was just right on the window offering the right amount of reflection of the outside world in the bottom of the photo.

I looked at the photo. It was her expression that caught me immediately. I had not seen this portrait of her before. She looks defiant and self assured. Her dress looks stunning. Her arms in a somewhat challenging rather than relaxed pose. The portrait is against a dark background with a pale brown background above the dark background. It might be the ceiling with some sort of light on it. The brown might also be part of the wall. It is difficult to tell I never went into the shop to examine the photo.

The frame of the portrait is elaborate. Over the portrait hangs an orange curtain. One can envision it might be the curtain on a stage presenting this particular Marilyn to the world. There is the bluish overlay at the bottom part of the photo. Like a blue filter adding another element of interest to the enigmatic photo. At the right bottom were reflected red roses like flowers at the feet of the legendary icon. Underneath the portrait frame, there is a collection of objects almost like offerings to the famous sex goddess.

* * *

I stared at it for a few moments and an optical illusion appeared. The two large palm trees right under Marilyn might be envisioned as her legs. They are about the correct size in scale from the viewer’s perspective. The illusion here is that the legs of Marilyn are outside, alive in the real world, while her upper body is inside within a portrait. The sky reflected in the window has one long jet stream or chemtrail in it. Above this, more white streams like white chalk smeared into the pale blue sky.

I didn’t see any noticeable sign on the shop Marilyn’s portrait was in but I knew most of the shops in this area of town are consignment places. The window of the tailor shop next door looks dirty. Someone has attempted to scribble something on the dusty window. Inside, under the red neon “Tailor Shop” sign is what looks like the top of a mannequin used for fitting.

The photo “Marilyn Through Glass” went into the photo library on my MacBook Pro where it was stored with almost 3,000 other photos taken over the years. Many using the HDR photo techniques. I made a print of the photo and later had it printed on canvas. It hung in my office for awhile until it was relegated to a stack of my other prints on canvas in the basement.

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Now, it is a cold beginning of January 2025 back here in Columbus. Twelve years since the above photo was taken with the notes above I made at the time. A few days ago, a friend on social media posted a photo looking through a window at a dinner table with the street reflected against the dinner table inside so it looked like the table was on busy High Street in the Short North reflected in the photo. The photo reminded me of what I called my “Marilyn Through Glass” photo. I pulled out its file and sent it to my friend.

I think again about the enigmatic photo as I’ve done in the past. The images that come together in the photo. Signs in the photo telling me something but I can’t read them.

The photo is still one of my favorites. And one of my most mysterious.The photo speaks to me in a language I try to define. But it is no use. There is a message in the mixtures of the inside and outside world through the reflections of a window.

* * *

I look at the photo. I try to define the photo’s meaning for me. But definitions of meaning fade like dream fog dissolves when you wake up so you can’t take hold of it. Maybe this is why I pull it from my computer photo library and look at it every now and then.

It seems there is a special message in all of this just for me. Somewhere between reflection of an outside world mixed with an inside world. I did arrive in front of Marilyn’s portrait one day twelve years ago in Palm Desert. It didn’t seem like it was all my discovery but that Marilyn played some part in all of this. Perhaps she was simply waiting there, in that shop window, to be discovered, again. Rediscovered.

I wonder where the Marilyn portrait is today? I doubt the shop is still there. The town of Palm Desert was going through a growth spell when we lived out there from 2012 – 2015. If it was a consignment store, perhaps the owner of the portrait took it back. Maybe someone bought it. Most likely it is a copy and not an original. But it would be interesting to know more about it. At what age in her life this was done and a little context of the portrait. Good to know but might not ever get this.

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This image of Marilyn is good enough for me. The icon seems to speak just to me through the shop window. Examining the photo from a new perspective, I can say see that most of the bottom part of the photo has a blue tint to it. The upper part is caused by the shade of the store’s overhang. This blue tint stops right below Marilyn’s mouth. It can symbolically be seen as water which is almost drowning her. If the photo is interpreted this way, Marilyn’s position towards us is even bolder.

Her entire body is consumed by the blue water rising in the portrait. In fact, she might be trapped in the oblong prison of the portrait frame as the blue tinted water rises.

But then again, the portrait might also represent an entirely new period of her life. A time when she would be busting out of the prison of this gilded, ridiculous frame her portrait was put in. Breaking out of this little hawk shop on a nothing street in town. Starting a new period of her life. The pose of Marilyn suggests this anticipation but also assuredness of a new journey before her. Of course really meaning breaking out of the former type-casting and roles that had defined her. The type-casting of her had become its own type of prison for her. She was ready to move on to new roles. And this dumb place she was stuck in right now was not about to be her last gig.