Shot in 1980, Garden & Alley shows JoAnn Elam’s vegetable garden in her backyard in Chicago. As in other elements of this collection, the camera here pans over the plants and flowers springing from the earth and over the houses around and garage doors at the end. In that sense, Garden & Alley further reveals
This footage by JoAnn Elam was probably shot in Michigan around 1976. It shows a man working on a farm and the nature, insects, and chickens around. Like many other titles in this collection, especially the ones from Elam’s trips to Monterey, MA, Michigan reveals Elam’s fascination for both natural beauty and farm labor.
This film from the JoAnn Elam collection was probably shot by JoAnn Elam’s second husband Joe Hendrix at their home in Chicago around 1985. But this does not diminish Elam’s authorial imprint. Almost certainly under Elam’s direction, Hendrix films her tending to her collards garden in a time-lapse fashion, from the moment she arranges the
In this footage, JoAnn Elam first films her surroundings from a fixed standpoint and out of focus. The cars, the house, the people, and the nature that one distinguishes look like the elements of an Impressionist painting seen from up close, where one is immersed in shapes and colors. Next, Elam becomes a voyeur inside
Shot around 1983, this footage first shows a man working on a farm and it exemplifies JoAnn Elam’s fascination for farm labor. The rest is rather dark, but it seems to be set inside Elam’s house, where the silhouette of a cat playing with a plant appears by the window. As many elements in this
Using stop motion, JoAnn Elam animates a series of pictures drawn by hand and depicting pink, purple, and blue flowers, trees, and suns. Although the landscapes resemble a child’s drawings and may be described as naive, they are also somewhat menacing, when the flowers and the suns grow bigger on the screen until they invade
This short footage by JoAnn Elam shows two women digging a hole in the woods. As many elements in this collection reveal, Elam was interested in farm labor, especially as she spent some time in Monterey, MA in the early 1980s. Throughout her life, Elam was also an advocate for gender equality and her work