01 november 2020

Two halves of the same scene

William S. Burroughs versus Schultes' assistant, Mocoa
“It was an unlikely coincidence that in 1953 Burroughs and Schultes should have met in Columbia, a chance convergence of two Harvard men embarked on very different careers. Their encounter has been often noted but only observed in any detail by Wade Davis in his biography of Schultes, One River (1996), and his beautiful "photographic journey," The Lost Amazon (2004). One thing that got unnoticed is the material evidence that links the most famous picture of Burroughs — standing in the jungle outside Mocoa, holding his pith helmet in one hand, the other gripping an ayahuasca vine, gazing to his right — and a picture in Schultes' Vine of the Souls of one of his Indian assistants against the same backdrop, looking left; they're two halves of the same scene, confirming it was Schultes himself who took the picture with his twin-lens Rolleiflex.”
William S. Burroughs, Mocoa
Schultes' assistant, Mocoa
Tekst uit het voorwoord van:
William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg
The Yage Letters
Redux
Edited and with an Introduction by Oliver Harris
ISBN 978-0-141-18986-4


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