Jason Thrasher in Conversation with Drew Lanham

Join us for an evening with Jason Thrasher and Drew Lanham, as they talk about Thrasher's book Mumur Trestle. Thrasher and Lanham will be at Hub City Bookshop on Thursday, December 12th at 6:00 PM. Come early at 5:45 PM and listen to an acoustic set played by Rishi before the event. This event is free and open to the public. 

We would love to know you are coming! Please RSVP on Eventbrite with the link below. Get a 10% discount on the book when you present your RSVP at the bookshop register. 

RSVP

About the Book: 

The back cover of R.E.M.'s influential 1983 album Murmur famously features an image of the wooden Trail Creek Trestle. Over time the aging nineteenth-century train trestle in Athens, Georgia, became known as, simply, the “Murmur Trestle,” a global pilgrimage site for fans of the band. Removed in 2021 to make way for a pedestrian bridge and bike path, the trestle has been captured for the ages in this new collection of photographs by Jason Thrasher.

Thrasher spent six years focusing his lens on an immersive exploration of the Murmur Trestle, photographing it within its changing natural environment. His contemplative images encourage readers to engage in a visual meditation, urging them to closely observe and appreciate the details of the decaying subject. Thrasher’s keen eye and patient observation reveal the wonders of details large and small and the harmonious interplay between wood, light, nature, and the seasons.

Together with a foreword by Patterson Hood of the Drive-By Truckers and “Reason by Rot,” an original poem by MacArthur Fellow J. Drew Lanham, these images speak to the trestle's significance in the community, the region, and the world. Murmur Trestle encourages wanderers to find solace in the gentle rhythm of nature through the passage of time and to embark on personal journeys of introspection and connection with the world around us.

About the Author:

Jason Thrasher is an artist and professional photographer, covering the Southeast's rich and varied music scene, including portraits of the Drive-By Truckers, Guided by Voices, R.E.M., OutKast, and Widespread Panic. His photographs have been published in Rolling Stone, Billboard, New York Magazine, and the New York Times. His work is in the permanent collections of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, the Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts, Music City San Francisco Museum, and the Georgia Museum of Art. He is also the author of Athens Potluck, a book of photography and personal essays about the Athens music scene that won the Georgia Author of the Year Award. He lives in Athens, Georgia, where he owns the Ace/Francisco Gallery with his wife and business partner, Beth Hall Thrasher.

Conversation Partner: 

J. Drew Lanham is the author of Sparrow Envy: Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts and The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man's Love Affair with Nature. He has received a MacArthur "Genius" Grant as well as the Dan W. Lufkin Conservation Award (National Audubon Society), the Rosa Parks and Grace Lee Boggs Outstanding Service Award (North American Association for Environmental Education), and the E. O. Wilson Award for Outstanding Science in Biodiversity Conservation (Center for Biological Diversity). He served as the Poet Laureate of Edgefield, South Carolina in 2022. He is a bird watcher, poet, and Distinguished Professor of Wildlife Ecology and Master Teacher at Clemson University. He lives in Seneca, South Carolina.