AA-2026-772DE6
On the image
Someone knelt on a curb with a camera to photograph two crocuses, which was, in the 1960s, considered a reasonable use of a household's limited color film budget. The flowers had pushed up through last year's dead leaves right at the seam where a concrete sidewalk meets a strip of scruffy lawn, which is the least romantic possible location and the one nature actually chose.
The gardener, if there was one, gets no credit here; crocuses do not require planning, only patience, and they come up in the same spot every March whether or not anyone deserves them. The photographer clearly understood this was the whole point of the picture, framing the blooms tight against gravel and old foliage rather than backing up for a wider, tidier garden shot.
What survives is not a garden but a proof of season: winter had ended on this particular strip of yard, and someone thought that fact was worth using a color exposure to record, back when that was not a trivial decision.
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Two Crocuses at the Curb, Suburban Spring, 1960s. 1960–1969. Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library, AA-2026-772DE6. https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-crocuses-at-the-curb-suburban-spring-1960s.
@misc{aaAA2026772DE6,
title = {Two Crocuses at the Curb, Suburban Spring, 1960s},
year = {1960–1969},
howpublished = {Archive \& Atlas, Historical Image Library},
note = {Accession AA-2026-772DE6},
url = {https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-crocuses-at-the-curb-suburban-spring-1960s}
}TY - ART TI - Two Crocuses at the Curb, Suburban Spring, 1960s PY - 1960–1969 PB - Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library AN - AA-2026-772DE6 UR - https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/two-crocuses-at-the-curb-suburban-spring-1960s ER -
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