I don't see this as much of an issue.

Nor I, but you did say:

SImply adding or removing photos to that photodir would add or remove them from the display.

which is not true as you specified it.

And it's pretty easy to make a blank cursor. Create a blank XBM:

#define blank_width 1

#define blank_height 1

#define blank_x_hot 0

#define blank_y_hot 0

static unsigned char blank_bits[] = {

   0x00};

save it as blank.xbm, and run "xsetroot -cursor blank.xbm blank.xbm".