This is my grandparents Charles and Rosa Crawford's kitchen. They had a smaller oven above the stove, in addition to the regular one under the stove. A tea kettle sits on the stovetop. My grandpa drank tea constantly, a habit that he introduced me to when I was a young boy. I still drink tea all the time!

This is a Polaroid SX-70 Manipulation. Polaroid SX-70 was the first "All in one" Polaroid film; unlike earlier Polaroid films, you did not have to peel apart the film to get the finished print. Unlike the later Polaroid 600 and Spectra films, the image of an SX-70 print remained soft for several minutes after the image had completely developed. This was discovered soon after the film was introduced back in the 1970s and artists began using blunt tools like wooden sticks and crochet needles to smear the image and push parts of it around under the clear plastic that covered the front surface.

I learned to do this in art school in the late 1990s. Unfortunately the Polaroid SX-70 film was discontinued only a couple years later, so I have only a handful of these images. The Polaroid SX-70 film sold today is a totally different material that was introduced a few years ago by the newly resurrected Polaroid company. Unfortunately, the new SX-70 film hardens before the image appears and cannot be manipulated like the old stuff. Images like this can never be made again.

1995

Update: Grandma died in 2002, and Grandpa died in 2008; their house was later demolished.