Charlee Brodsky In 1996, a steel mill smokestack stands on the site of the shopping complex that would become the Waterfront in Homestead. In an exhibit at the Westmoreland Museum of American Art, Charlee Brodsky's photo is accompanied by a poem by Jim Daniels called "Used-Ta-Be." Click photo for larger image.

Places change. Sometimes their stories are celebrated, sometimes they vanish, and sometimes they linger beneath the surface, awaiting rediscovery.

The images in "Charlee Brodsky: A Town Without Steel, Envisioning Homestead," a solo exhibition at the Westmoreland Museum of American Art, seem to allude to the latter option.

The artist and Carnegie Mellon University professor and chair of the communication design program documented the mill communities of Homestead, West Homestead and Munhall in the 1980s and early 1990s. Some of her photographs, along with commentary by anthropologist Judith Modell on the status of families who remained after the mill shut-downs, were published in their 1998 book, "A Town Without Steel -- Envisioning Homestead."

The 20 black-and-white images at the Westmoreland, which were taken during the past year, depict a worn neighborhood -- the remnant Homestead -- and the asphalt parking lots and condo poolsides, markers of the middle class, that were plopped atop the last gasps of the corpus of the once mighty steel plant that loomed along the river.

	Charlee Brodsky Brodsky's 2004 photo of Rainbow Kitchen, a boarded-up soup kitchen in Homestead, includes a poem by Jane McCafferty, "Rainbow Kitchen (Soup Kitchen)." Click photo for larger image.

For this project Brodsky, who frequently works collaboratively, invited writers and Carnegie Mellon English professors Jim Daniels and Jane McCafferty to respond to Homestead and her visual imagery.

The result is a trio of interpretations that expand the viewer's considerations, as opposed to a united choral voice.

Brodsky's images comprise a powerful narrative, a story without words that nonetheless speaks of what was -- for example, a modest, well-kept wooden home flying a flag from its front porch; of accommodations to changing conditions that themselves change -- a boarded-up soup kitchen; and of the future -- an oversized hamburger on a sign posted on the fence of a construction site.

The viewer draws conclusions. But he or she is guided. Objectivity and subjectivity are two sides of a mobius strip.

The poets bring their own experiences to the table.

To Brodsky's photograph "The Waterfront," a nearly empty parking lot with a scattering of trees that are in autumnal shed, Daniels responds with the poem:

"Find the Steel Mill in this Picture
or not. Which tree is the tree of knowledge? Which leaf is the leaf of forgiveness?
If a light post sprouted leaves, would it be
a mutation, or miracle? Would it be then
copyrighted, manufactured on an assembly line
constructed from steel produced
at a mill built on the site of this shopping center? ..."

	Charlee Brodsky Shopper at the Waterfront shopping complex Homestead, 2004 Click photo for larger image.

Brodsky's cropped movie theater inspires Daniels':

"The Palace of the Great Emperor Loew
resembles the uncombed hair of an adulterous lover/after a night of disgust and disappointment
in the back of an anonymous van ..."

McCafferty bristles at the sign posted in front of the neatly planted condos in one photograph with:

"Future Resident Parking Only
I can park here.
You can park here.
Anybody can park here.
Nobody, nobody, nobody knows
The future ..."

Of a composition featuring three slender wet teens in swim suits sprawled on parallel white-strapped lounge chairs, McCafferty opines:

"They want the sun to seal them in, tighten their skin, keep their limbs from turning into rivers.
They already suspect nobody will really love them ..."

		More photography Photography's in the spotlight locally this summer. Also at the Westmoreland is "Walker Evans and James Agee: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men." "Pittsburgh NOW" continues at Silver Eye Center for Photography through Aug. 20 (412-431-1810). And last week "Margaret Bourke-White: The Photography of Design, 1927-1936" opened at The Frick Art Museum (412-371-0600).

The viewer will, in turn, bring his or her own interpretive material. One may find a kind of desolation, physical or social, while another may see progressive change evidenced by material access and leisure.

Brodsky has made her peace. "I'm now comfortable with the Waterfront," she writes, "and I go there often."

"I'm teaching my daughter how to drive in their parking lots, I eat and shop there, too. I'm also photographing there. I'm still interested in this place -- in the mall and the towns that survive on the opposite side of the railroad tracks."

Under her persistent and perceptive lens the story of this place will both stand still and continue to reveal itself.

"Envisioning Homestead" continues through July 17 at 221 N. Main St., Greensburg. Hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays and until 9 p.m. Thursdays. Suggested donation is $3, children under 12 free. For information, call 724-837-1500 or visit www.wmuseumaa.org.