Pilobolus, Punctum, Yellow Squash

Yellow Squash, yellow bowl

Pear as punctum*

As Ben used to say when he was little: "More too many!"

When I first posted the above series of yellow squash photos, my friend Eileen told me that she couldn't help thinking of her amazingly flexible flying friend

Adam Battelstein
and the

Pilobolus dancers
Even in black and white, you can see what she means, can't you? I was so intrigued that I had to learn more about the art of this talented touring non-profit modern dance troupe! Naturally, I was delighted to discover this next photograph . . . in the shape of a star, yes . . . but definitely the color of a yellow summer squash!

Pilobolus at the 2007 Academy Awards

Click here to see Pilobolus in Action
Learn More
*Punctum is French critic Roland Barthes' intriguing term for that touching or disconcerting detail which pierces through the still life, the object, or the studium. Rather than the usual sequence of subject first, object second, for Barthes, the "second element which will disturb the studium I shall therefore call punctum; for punctum is also: sting, speck, cut, little hole – and also a cast of the dice. A photograph’s punctum is that accident which pricks me (but also bruises me, is poignant to me)" (Barthes, Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography, 27).

As Eileen says, "great pear, just there."

P.S. Yes, we have no bananas -- kind of like squash!

P.P.S. See also:
"The Lughnasa Moon"
"The Handwriting on the Wall"
"This Little World, This England"
"Pear as Punctum"