ODD, EERILY ATMOSPHERIC VERNACULAR PHOTOS: COLLECTOR JOHN FOSTER PICKS A POTENT PORTFOLIO OF DYSTOPIAN IMAGES

STRANGE AND COMPELLING, THESE PICTURES CAPTURE THE SPIRIT OF A WORLD THAT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE

Published on May 19, 2025

by Edward M. Gómez

An image from John Foster’s collection of vernacular photographs whose date and creator are unknown; he has given it the working title “Airplane Nightmare.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

Over a period of several decades, John Foster, a graphic designer and collector of folk art and outsider art who is based in St. Louis, Missouri, has assembled a large and definitive collection of what is known as vernacular photography. In the world of photography collecting, this term refers to photographic images whose creators are unknown to us today. When, where, and why were such photos made? Often, those questions have no firm answers.

These photographs tend to be old but they could have been made just yesterday; in terms of their subject matter, they tend to fit relatively easily into several familiar categories, such as portraits, landscapes, travel-souvenir snapshots, or pictures of pets. Some have a stilted-sentimental character that is decidedly kitsch. Some were made for or in industrial, corporate, or governmental contexts, such as employee-ID badge headshots. Many of these photos possess and evoke a generic quality, even if, at the same time, the most compelling ones often seem inexplicable and odd.

Date and creator of this photo unknown; working title: “Tell Me Again About J.F.K.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

Foster owns thousands of such photographs, which, over the years, he has found in flea markets or stumbled upon in yard sales — forgotten family albums or batches of old photo prints or Polaroids stuffed into crumbling envelopes or tied up with string. Like other avid, active collectors in this specialized field, the more vernacular photographs Foster has acquired, the more he has been able to examine them all and sort them into thematic categories of his own, some of which boast some unlikely, distinctive subjects.

Date and creator of this photo unknown; working title: “Military Tank Men.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

How about hundreds of photos featuring what look like explosions or phantoms or mysterious flashes of light? Or countless others showing people of all ages dressed up as ghouls or monsters, wearing kooky costumes or masks? How about a collection within a collection of vehicles in the process of crashing or having just crashed?

In an essay for the catalogue of the traveling exhibition “Accidental Mysteries: Extraordinary Vernacular Photographs from the Collection of John and Teenuh Foster,” which opened in September 2005 at the Sheldon Art Galleries in St. Louis, I wrote, “When it comes to vernacular photography, the place in question is conceptual, not necessarily physical or geographic. Here, ‘vernacular’ refers to a locus of expression in the medium of photographic image-making that is, simultaneously, everywhere and nowhere; traditionally, that familiar ‘place’ has been and is anywhere where anyone who has ever handled a camera, shooting a conventional kind of photo […] has pointed his or her lens.”

Date and creator of this photo unknown; working title: “Baboon Invasion.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

Recently, as we began preparing a series of articles for brutjournal on the subject of “The New Dystopia,” responding to the many unsettling, dispiriting, and scary political, economic, technological, and other developments that are shaping the present moment around the world, we asked John Foster to dip into his vernacular-photography collection to see if he could find any images that might be relevant to and evoke our theme.

Date and creator of this photo unknown; working title: “Grim Task.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

Enthusiastically, he jumped on the assignment.

He said, “I have many photos that could help illustrate the spirit of this theme. Some are obvious, relating to soldiers, militarization, and war. Others are bizarre; they’re full of unusual atmosphere. They show people doing weird things or they show scenes whose meanings aren’t immediately clear. There’s something odd about them. They feel ominous and don’t make sense.”

Date and creator of this photo unknown; working title: “War Smoke.” Courtesy of the John and Teenuh Foster Collection of Vernacular Photography

Here, we present some of these rare and hard-to-classify images from Foster’s collection. In their accompanying captions, we note the working titles he has given them, reflecting the moods and subjects they depict. Still, what they might really represent and for exactly what purposes they were made — and when and where — are anybody’s guess.

This is part one of a dystopian-images portfolio culled from Foster’s vast collection of vernacular photographs. Stand by to see part two of this feature article, which will be coming very soon.

brutjournal is deeply grateful to John Foster for generously sharing these images from his collection with us.

[Scroll down to see more dystopia-related vernacular photos from John Foster’s collection.]