“Sharpsville” — A person walks by the Sharpsville store in Dublin’s Temple Bar district.
On trips like our recent one to the British Isles, I operate in at least two distinctly different photographic modes: landscape photographer (s my recent Scotland work) and street photographer. During our visit to Dublin I was almost exclusively in the latter mode. Dublin is a rich location for street photography. There are crowds of people, and the city has a vibrant, alive feeling. There are also lots of fascinating old and sometimes nicely weathered building.
“Woman With Blue Bags, Alfama” — A woman carrying heavy blue bags walks along past weathered buildings along a curving Alfama street, Lisbon.
This photograph is a result of one of the quick, unexpected encounters that occur when doing street photography. Sometimes they happen so fast that there is hardly time to photograph. This one was brief, but not so quick that I couldn’t make a couple of photographs.
“Alfama Laundry” — Laundry hung by entry door and stairs, Alfama.
I know. Laundry hanging above urban homes in foreign cities is more than a bit of a cliche. I’ll try to minimize it, but sometimes I cannot resist. Here it is really more about the wild range of colors in the photograph, from that laundry to the colorful overhead streamers above the lane, and the contrast with the other less-colorful surroundings.
A figure in dark clothes waits behind baricades for the 2022 Manhattan “Columbus Day” parade to pass.
The light in urban areas is often special in different that what we find in the natural landscape. A feature in common among both types of landscape? The light matters. A feature that is different? The reflective surfaces in urban canyons reflect light in almost any direction to produce striking effects. Here we not only have some direct sunlight that backlights the main subject, but tons of reflected light creating fascinating patterns on the sidewalk and in the street.
A critique of this photograph could be, I suppose, that we cannot see the faces of the subjects. But in this case that is part of what makes it work. The central figure, dressed almost entirely in very dark colors, appears to be quite tall, an effect amplified by perspective and the smaller figures to the left. The person’s body language is fascinating, too, and I think I see a few parallels to that of the central figure in “The Scream” by Edvard Munch.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.