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The Eyes Are Hardly Necessary
Continue ReadingA portrait requires a look into the eyes of the subject — or does it? Here I think we can tell a lot without the eyes. The lines and folds on the man’s face and neck reveal like tree rings a long life, a witness to an eventful stretch of history. There is an […]
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The Repetition of Like Forms
Continue ReadingElementary treatises on composition advise looking for and capturing photogenic repetitions of similar objects, a fundamental technique. These motifs can be overused, but have not become clichés in my estimation, because subjects can vary so widely. A better description might be stock-in-trade or standard equipment. The street vendor whose cart appears above has carefully arranged […]
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Emulating Cezanne
Continue ReadingPhotographs taken with normal lenses naturally diminish the size of distant objects. In this image that Renaissance perspective has been defeated. Using electronic means, I have elevated and enlarged the mountain range by a factor of three, and likewise stretched the foreground trees and slope. This has organized space more explicitly into overlapping planes: foreground […]
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Borrowing From Mrs. Cameron
Continue Reading“Mrs. Cameron exhibits her series of out-of-focus portraits of celebrities. We must give this lady credit for daring originality, but at the expense of all other photographic qualities. A true artist would employ all the resources at his disposal, in whatever branch of art he might practice. In these pictures all that is good in […]
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It Seems Too Simple
Continue ReadingI have heard it said: “Anything becomes interesting if you look at it long enough.” I have wondered if that is true, because it seems too simple. I looked at this tree outside my window through a 300mm lens for a long time before I took this frame. Has the hypothesis been proven? I […]
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Is This Photograph Readable?
Continue ReadingMost photographs have obvious meaning when considered as a flat surface, even if simply: “I was there, and this is what I saw.” If you have special knowledge of the subject you might go deeper, however the significance lies close to the picture plane. Other photos might signify something more. For instance: “I was there, […]
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Found Still Life, #2
Continue ReadingI found this collection of ancient cameras on a street in Cairo, Egypt. The vendor has made no effort to protect his merchandise from the soot and sand raining daily on the city. For me it is a still life with many resonances, evoking a city of great age known for its ruins, where […]
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A Found Still Life #1
Continue ReadingI cannot take credit for this still life. I did not create it, only found, framed and captured it. I do not know who arranged this work of imagination; it was probably the Russian curator of what has now become a state museum. This austere prison cell resembles the one where Feodor Dostoevsky was held […]
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What I Owe Mr. P.H. Emerson
Continue ReadingPeter Henry Emerson was a 19th Century British photographer intensely active beginning in the early 1880s, and ending about 1895, after which he photographed for his private consumption and did not publish. During his prime years he created a portfolio entitled “Life and Landscape on the Norfolk Broads,” a watery area near Yarmouth, north […]
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