Pale Blue Dress
Works and words by Brandon Tauszik
Interview via emails, February 2020
Tell us about your new project, Pale Blue Dress?
The project is comprised of photographs from my long term project documenting the world of Civil War Reenactments in California. The work gives an intimate look into these complex spaces, themselves emboldening participants to brandish the Southern cause while conveniently erasing slavery and emancipation from the war’s story.
I spent 2017, 2018 and 2019 visiting new reenactments and returning to others I’d been to in previous years. The ones I attended were in northern and central California, towns like Duncans Mills, Fresno, Marysville, Middletown, and Half Moon Bay.
The existing photography I’ve seen made in these spaces is largely condescending in tone and heavy on the irony. I wanted to make work free from that judgmental slant, presenting my subjects as they present themselves while upholding the theater of it all. I find something despondent in their recreating of America’s deadliest war during our current era of seemingly bottomless division.
Can you provide some background on these reenactments and how they came to be?
Americans love the Civil War. This enormous subculture was spawned primarily during celebrations of the war’s centennial in the 1960’s. The structure of reenactments tends to be a weekend long experience where people—primarily white men—attempt to “live history” by splitting up into Union and Confederate camps, fighting battles with replica guns, and sleeping in canvas tents beneath the stars.
It’s all very wholesome, with excruciating detail paid to every button and stitch. However this myopic view, often focused on the common soldier, excludes any attention to the social and political realities of the Civil War.
What was your expectation of these environments when you started the project?
Initially I was surprised to find out there are any Civil War reenactments in California at all. A continent removed from the main theaters of war, California is actually home to half a dozen Civil War reenactment organizations, which between them stage some twenty events per year.
I was attracted to that incongruence: geographically (this is not the South), culturally (this is a Blue state) and visually (these locations are full of redwoods and sequoias).
My initial expectation was basically that these events had to be—in some part—scapegoats by which racial prejudice is redirected as historical zealousness. It turns out that yes, that’s pretty much true. On the flip side, I encountered a large history buff contingent and countless homeschooled teens. Some people LARP and stay in-character of a particular soldier or famous general for days on end.
Who were some of the people you met along the way, what were their stories?
I met so many curious people while making this project and had a lot of earnest conversations with folks over the years.
Stephen and his friend (pictured left) reenact a pair of Zouaves, soldiers from France that fought in the Civil War. Like most others, they sleep outside during the reenactment with only one authentic wool blanket in the 36°F night.
Joel, a plumber from Selma, winked and smiled a wry grin when he told me how it was “a no brainer” as to why he decided to join the Confederacy over the Union. He said he doesn’t think the war was about slavery at all.
Danial, an avid collector of model trains in Salinas, has storage units full of nineteenth century ephemera and has been attending reenactments alongside his mother for decades. In a quintessentially American way, he’s become obsessed with collecting more and more “stuff”.
Richard, an aging veteren wearing a Come And Take It baseball cap, told me an N-word joke while drinking whiskey at the campfire in Fresno.
Being white myself, I was able to get a kind of emotional access to some folks and through the making of this work I witnessed first hand the socially conservative echo chamber that these spaces exist in.
Will you choose one image and tell us the story of how that image was made?
For obvious reasons, black reenactors form only a very small minority within the overall scene. At only one reenactment did I ever see a black historical character being reenacted.
This image is of Nancy, a social worker from Fresno who transforms herself into Harriet Tubman, leader of the Underground Railroad. Despite the all-white and socially conservitave slant of Civil War reenactments, she braves attending them to tell “her story”—the African American story. Here she can be seen looking up at a white attendee, debating that which should be of no debate.
My friend Pendarvis Harshaw is a writer that covers black arts & culture for KQED, and he was struck by this image when I showed him the project. “Who is she?”, he asked me. I was able to go back and photograph Nancy in her home for Pendarvis’ beautifully written profile on her. She really is incredibly heroic.
Why do you feel that these reenactments are important to document, and why now at this time in history?
The Civil War reenactor movement has been steadily dwindling over the past couple decades and is in a precarious position today. One one hand, this reinterpreting (or softening) of the war’s meaning is beginning to dissolve as our nation engages in a belated reckoning with slavery and its legacy. On the other hand, our current president openly condones racial discrimination and often alludes to America’s “great” past, emboldening those that embrace the iconography and ideology of the Confederacy.
Some theorists say that our founders’ intention was for this to be a deliberative democracy; that through actual debate and discussion citizens can come to an agreement about ideologies and policies. I don’t think we Americans can govern ourselves effectively unless we figure out how to work with people we disagree with. Maybe we should all visit a Civil War reenactment and chat with a fellow stranger.
Would were some of your considerations when translating this work for the exhibition you'll be opening at Book and Job?
For the exhibition, I wanted to pare it down and blow it up. There will be five large scale prints, one massive print, and 6 smaller ones. All unframed and nailed to the walls for a tactile feel. In tandem I’m also releasing a 32 page zine with similar sequencing that can be purchased here.
