I wrote a poem about it.*
Geoff Dyer (The Ongoing Moment) speaks of photographers returning and returning to certain subjects.
Here's one that will not leave me. Wants to cling on, even in language, even as a pun. Leaves. Well and I might as well say: sub-set 'leaves in gutters' (from where we can all choose to look at the stars, of course).
I love the pale colours here. This was another shot I almost didn't take. 'Oh, leaf-in-gutter again' said the voice in my head. But, obedient to my practice, I shot. What the eye fails to see and what the camera reveals. I am sure a thousand writers have said that. Repetition. Through repetition the variation. I saw the cigarette butt, but the building was invisible to me at time of 'pressing the shutter' or whatever the digital equivalent of that is. Opening a tiny door so that light can be recorded.
At a certain point I began taking multiple shots - so as not to be disappointed by an inconvenient blur. ANd lately I have been noticing how again and again it happens that the first shot is the one with the remarkable framing (not always - art and life are ever a dance between the accidental and the meant, the intuitive and the composed).
Although there is a spiritual principle from Indian schools of thought that nothing is deliberate (ie even the most considered composition). Our brains, to paraphrase the ancient vedas, love to think they have done something but they are always taking credit after the event. Lila is dancing. The all-being unity of the universe dresses itself into myriad guises for the pure joy of seeing itself reflected back, for the pure joy of movement and play, for the pure joy of 'dressing -up' and disguise. We are inside the dance of Lila. And - I know it doesn't feel like this - but Lila presses the button that opens the shutter (written while aware of the risk of sounding esoteric and grandiose).
* 'Repetition' from my recent performing show 'Imperfection' - which shares a title with the current collection of photographs for sale. 'Repetition', the poem, was written in response to the wonderful work of Japanese Outsider Artist Komei Bekki. You can see in the foreground here, his prolific series of small terracotta figures. The theme, the variation, the pure joy of creation and re-creation.
Geoff Dyer (The Ongoing Moment) speaks of photographers returning and returning to certain subjects.
Here's one that will not leave me. Wants to cling on, even in language, even as a pun. Leaves. Well and I might as well say: sub-set 'leaves in gutters' (from where we can all choose to look at the stars, of course).
I love the pale colours here. This was another shot I almost didn't take. 'Oh, leaf-in-gutter again' said the voice in my head. But, obedient to my practice, I shot. What the eye fails to see and what the camera reveals. I am sure a thousand writers have said that. Repetition. Through repetition the variation. I saw the cigarette butt, but the building was invisible to me at time of 'pressing the shutter' or whatever the digital equivalent of that is. Opening a tiny door so that light can be recorded.
At a certain point I began taking multiple shots - so as not to be disappointed by an inconvenient blur. ANd lately I have been noticing how again and again it happens that the first shot is the one with the remarkable framing (not always - art and life are ever a dance between the accidental and the meant, the intuitive and the composed).
Although there is a spiritual principle from Indian schools of thought that nothing is deliberate (ie even the most considered composition). Our brains, to paraphrase the ancient vedas, love to think they have done something but they are always taking credit after the event. Lila is dancing. The all-being unity of the universe dresses itself into myriad guises for the pure joy of seeing itself reflected back, for the pure joy of movement and play, for the pure joy of 'dressing -up' and disguise. We are inside the dance of Lila. And - I know it doesn't feel like this - but Lila presses the button that opens the shutter (written while aware of the risk of sounding esoteric and grandiose).
* 'Repetition' from my recent performing show 'Imperfection' - which shares a title with the current collection of photographs for sale. 'Repetition', the poem, was written in response to the wonderful work of Japanese Outsider Artist Komei Bekki. You can see in the foreground here, his prolific series of small terracotta figures. The theme, the variation, the pure joy of creation and re-creation.
waiting to be seen
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